Hi Foring,
My wife and I used Sophia as a guide for two days (June 8-9) and she was terrific. She is a university graduate, registered guide with the government, thoroughly pleasant, and speaks excellent English. Once we had settled on hiring her, she was in communication with us with advice, etc.

She met us on both days at our hotel lobby promptly at the prearranged time. We toured the usual (fascinating) sites and she was a wealth of information. She arranged a car to take us to the Wall. Instead of our suggested Peking duck restaurant, we went to one in her neighborhood and it was excellent and of course we were the only non-Chinese in the whole area.

We saw how many urban Chinese live, away from the fancy hotels/apartments. She had worked as a tour guide for an agency and explained how the guides get a hefty percentage of sales in "factories", so she did not take us there. When my wife insisted on visiting a pearl factory, Sophia gave us strict bargaining instructions and they worked well!

One of the best parts of using a guide like her was the flexibility: We moved at our own pace. One day, in the Temple of Heaven park, we came upon some senior citizens playing and singing Chinese opera just for the joy of it. We stopped and listened to them for a while in the cool shade of summer. It is a vivid memory that stays with us even now.

The tour package we took
Beijing Highlights Tour