hookin' up around the world

it seems that where ever i go around the world, i usually meet up with leann there. leann is one of the polish posse and she was staying for three days in beijing before hopping on the trans-mongolian express and spending a month making her way to moscow with her parents.

pretty damn cool in my book. she was in beijing for three days and we finally managed to meet up for dinner. we, once again, went to sichahai/houhai to one of my favorite restaurants for dinner with ronda and leann's parents.
the great part is that while traveling i've met up with leann in more random locations than any other friend. looking back we've hung out in poland, rome, paris, and now beijing. (ok, the list isn't that long, but she's definitely in the lead compared to all my other friends.)
after dinner we went to a rooftop bar where we sat outside in the heat and humidity and drank beers for a while. around midnight her parents went back to their hotel and me, ronda, and leann went to a different bar to sit around for a couple more hours talking about all sort of odds and ends.
her trip sounded absolutely great. she had planned the entire thing (which came together really at the last minute, with tickets arriving the day they were leaving) and included many stops on the way. a week in mongolia, time in russia, etc. i was quite jealous.
when ronda was talking about coming over here we discussed ideas about going to inner mongolia or xingjiang, none of which i was sufficiently motivated to really plan out and make work. (ok, xingjiang would have been impossible given time constraints, but inner mongolia was a possibility that never panned out.)
it was also really good seeing her here and hanging out with her and ronda. i hadn't seen her the last time she visited san francisco, so i had a lot of catching up to do on the state of her life and what she was doing.
also finding out about friends, family, and posse members back home from a familiar face (and not over the phone or email) was really great.
we only hung out for one night, but it was a really good time and i'm glad that we managed to meet up.