Beijing - the first few days (and Observations #3)

My desert

I’ll start out by saying first up, that after spending a whole two days here, Beijing is both an awesome and at the same time difficult city.  Awesome as the city has so much to offer – history, culture, size and scale, markets, bars, clubs, shops and a lifestyle to match London.  Difficult as you are generally the only westerner around, sometimes Beijingers can be a little like Londoners – brusque, sometimes verging on rude.

However, two days in, and I love the city.

I arrived on the sleeper train from Chengdu (here’s comes the transport geek bit) which is perhaps the most impressive bit of train service I have ever been on – certainly beats British transport – comfortable, clean and fast. 

After waiting an hour for a taxi at the train station I got chatting to 5 Ugandan girls who were teaching in China and visiting Beijing.  To be honest it was nice to speak English to someone after negotiating a 15 hour train ride with my broken Mandarin.  8:30am check in.  10am Tiananmen Square – which is where I was staying.

That day I went to the Square after first trying to visit Mao’s Mausoleum (which is closed in the afternoon).  It’s bloody huge.  Like probably half a mile wide and long (being a square, of course).  In the centre are two massively long TV screens which play out calming music and pictures of the picturesque Chinese countryside.  Being impressed with their size, I took a photo.  A few moments after, two Chinese women dressed in pink dresses who spoke suspiciously good English came over and engaged in friendly conversation.  They were very charming.  What I realised whilst walking away from the conversation was that they had, through the course of our chat, managed to find out every detail about me, my trip, where I was staying, what I was doing in China, where I came from in England, whether I intended to drink a lot (!), unwittingly to me.  When I asked for one of their e-mail addresses, they said they didn’t have an e-mail address.  Hmmm.  Interesting.  I feel like I was being a paranoid Westerner, and I hope they were speaking to me to practice their English!

The giant TV screen that got me into trouble

I also went to the National Museum of China – which houses a lot of ancient artefacts and art – it was cool and a huge building – although most of it was empty.

That night I met an old university friend – Matt – in Hulou area for a meal down a really cool Hutong.  Matt has been living in Beijing for a couple of years and speaks perfect Mandarin – which was pretty impressive.  Hutongs are like side streets, and Beijing is full of them.  A part of Beijing (and indeed China’s history) which has been kept perfectly alive.  Most hutongs have great restaurants, street food and shops, and much of what is cool and great to see in Beijing is down the Hutongs. 

Here I discovered a new, and palatable side to Beijing cuisine – the dumpling.  All varieties of dumpling.  And a great thing which was essentially a stuffed tofu pancake – it was so delicious I want to remember the name of it so I can order it again.

I would highly recommend a bar called Mao Mao Zhong (think I’ve spelled it right) for good cocktails and a friendly crowd.  It was here that me, Matt and an American friend discussed the merits of methods in Neil Strauss’s “The Game” for pulling (a book I had read only a few weeks before).  A very bizarre and strangely cerebral conversation.  (Sufficed to say the consensus was that the methods worked.)

p.s. I have discovered a new medical condition.  I have named it “China cough syndrome”.  It is basically this – a very dry cough that aggravates the throat due to the dry heat, pollution and lack of moisture in the air in China – largely in summer.  I have it, it has lasted for a week, and it is a bugger to get rid of as your lungs basically have to become used to the dry conditions.  (Note to self - Ju Hua Cha (a type of flower tea) is very useful for alleviating the aggravated throat.) 

The next day I went to lunch with an old client’s daughter who he had put me in touch with before I left the UK (Madeleine, and her partner Martin) around San Li Tun area.  San Li Tun is easily one of Beijing’s cool quarters.  A very modern and very international upmarket area of Beijing with lots of amazing restaurants, bars, clubs and shops.  Think New Bond Street meets Shoreditch.  Kind of. 

We ate at an upmarket dumpling restaurant, (who’s sister restaurant was apparently rated as one of the best in the world for dumplings) which had, probably, some of the best food I had ever tasted.  A word on dumplings.  Dumplings, like Chinese people, come in all different shapes and sizes.  Usually a wet, kind of pasta like coating, filled with different sort of meats and fillings.  We had crab and pork, one with beef and soup at the bottom, and an amazing array of dips.  (see pic of my desert above) I was very pleased. 

I was also introduced to “Bookworm” which is a great book shop and café (complete with free Wi-Fi: yay!) selling English speaking books and magazines.  If you stay in Beijing for longer than 3 days, I also have to recommend “An insider’s guide to Beijing” which is written by the same people who produce “The Beijinger” an expats magazine which has come in invaluable.

Later that day we went to Chaoyang Park.  I didn’t realise Beijing had parks.  And this one was so big and well kept it easily bettered some of London’s green spaces.  It’s a pretty upmarket area, near to San Li Tun.  What I did find a little curious was the amusement park, by the lake (one of four which are interconnected in the park) and the space centre (which looked more like a space shed) smacked right at the south gate of the park. 

That night I decided to head out to a few bars around San Li Tun (on my own) to meet some new people.  Alas, t’interweb failed me and the night that I wanted to go to was not on at the bar it said, so I was left roaming the streets until I bumped into a group of guys whom I asked for directions, and who invited me to join their group for a drink.  Bonza.  Plan executed successfully.  A few drinks and a club later (Beijing clubs are mad) I headed home.

First impressions of China – Observations volume 3.

1. Public toilets – are everywhere.  Some Beijingers (and indeed other Chinese) who live in Houtongs don’t have a toilet – so they use public toilets. The thing is, some of the public toilets just have rows of holes in the ground (“Chinese style toilets”) with no cubicles and no dividers.  Makes for an awkward experience.
2. There are no black people in China - apart from Nigerians.  They usually greet me in the street with (Hey dude) and try to offer me various substances.  Not cool.
3. Car registration lottery – you can only have one car in China.  And get this; the number at the end of your licence plate denotes which day (usually 2 days of the week) you can drive in Beijing.  Kind of like a weird congestion charge. 
4. One property rule – like the one child policy, you can only own one property.  This, apparently, is to stop property prices in cities like Beijing from rocketing
5. 24 hour food – you can buy cooked food anywhere and anytime in most places in Beijing.  From street stalls to restaurants on “ghost street” near where I live in Yong He Gong.
6. Vegetarianism – is tolerated.  Which is weird as the Chinese put meat (“rou”) into everything.  Strange thing is – there was a huge veggie section on the menu of the local French restaurant (Café de la Post).  And here I was thinking the French saw it as an immoral life choice. 
7. No traffic etiquette – I bought a bike.  And I can do whatever I want on the roads.  I don’t, because I want to live, but there is no traffic etiquette in this city.






8. Hot cola with ginger for throat – here I was thinking traditional Chinese medicine was all about rare flowers from mountains in Mongolia.  Apparently one of the best offerings to cure a cough is heated Coca Cola with ginger.  I had it.  It tasted so nice.  And it kinda worked.
9. Scrap waste guys who pay for waste - kinda like a gypsy with a horse and cart, except they come round to your apartment to collect empty plastic and glass bottles, and any other manner of waste you have.  And they pay you for it.
10. Beijingers are generally polite on the subway - everyone gives up seats for oldies and youngies.  I won’t be giving up my seat for a child, they can learn to stand. 

(Some pictures of touristy Beijing below)

space shed