One of many...

... piles of sand.

Some people didn't believe me, thought I might have been exaggerating a bit yesterday about the ubiquity of sand, dust, and building works around Beijing. Not a bit of it. Here is a picture of the nearest pile of sand to my apartment. There are a couple more between here and the end of the street 300 yards away. And the sidewalk re-laying operation is about 80% finished here (actually, I suspect it is 100% finished and they're just never going to get around to tidying up the remaining loose or unlaid bricks), whereas along the whole of the rest of the mile-and-a-bit long street, on both sides of the road, the sidewalk is still completely ripped up; and there are piles of sand like this one every 100 or 200 yards.

And at the moment, you see sights like this just about everywhere you go in Beijing. Hence the rattle in my bronchi, I think we can safely conclude.

PS A few days later I wrote a related post over on my Barstool Blues blog - go check it out.