Qianmen, day two

It seemed this morning that Ted and I had began to face the dreaded traveler's burn out. You know, that feeling that you've already seen a lot of things in a city, and its gotten to the point where you no longer wake up instantly with a destination in mind for the day. This morning we had that feeling, as we were clueless about what to do today as we shopped at our local corner store for some essentials and picked up some more delicious tamarind bread (which Ted described on his blog) for breakfast from the hutong.

But while we sat and drank our morning cha (jasmine tea), we both agreed that we should head down to the Qianmen area again. No, we didn't want to go back for the expensive duck, but instead were intrigued by something we had seen the day before.

It was this: a billboard for a new shopping mall, which is to be completed in a hutong style. While it was hard to tell through the gates what exactly had been there before as it had been entirely cleared out for construction, I had heard about sections of Qianmen (historic sections none the less) being torn down to make way for a pedestrian mall as part of an overall city improvement plan to ready Beijing for the Olympics, so we thought we would go down and take a look for ourselves what was happening at the site.

What we saw was quite astounding. While this shopping mall was in no way a sporting venue for the games, it had Olympic logos, complete with Olympic mascots and the Paralympics logo pasted all over the walls which hide the construction site from view. They also showed a computer generated image of what the mall would look like, complete with a trolley system and a multi-cultural shoppers. A similar wall around the corner states "All brands coexist harmoniously: Ideal ancient streetscape for tourists".

Uh-oh. I could see the biggest no-no known to preservations in the making. To a preservationist, tearing down a historic building is bad enough, but building fake disney-fied ones to replace them? Even worse. It is widely accepted internationally that preservation, no matter what the intention, should make it clear which buildings and building sections are originals, and which are new additions or structures. This way, no one is fooled into believing that something is a historic form when it is clearly a reproduction.

But what is happening in Beijing is that the hutong, which was once a non-deserving form that was thrown to the wayside of economic growth, has now been targeted as a huge moneymaker for the city of Beijing. As more and more international-looking, forgettable skyscrapers fill the landscape of Beijing, any and all historic structures, including the hutong, are now bringing in loads of money acting as tourist destinations. International tourists, who can see big buildings anywhere (and whom I know didn't come for the pollution), come to Beijing for the historic value of this place. There is history everywhere, and as the government has recently realized, there is also valuable history in the vernacular form of the siheyuan and the winding hutongs that give a glimpse into imperial life hundreds of years ago.

Now that this realization has occurred, it has almost been to the detriment of these areas, especially those in close proximity to larger cultural sites, as seen at Qianmen. And who knows what is in store for the bombed-out areas I showed you yesterday: they could be luxury apartments, luxury siheyuan (which, by the way, sell for over $1.3 million US), or could be a part of this retail development down the street. With all of these walls up blocking what is really going on at these sites, hidden by phrases such as "600 years of commerce" and Beijing 2008 logos, it is hard to tell at this time what the future holds for Qianmen.

But on a more pleasant note, Ted and I did get to see the Temple of Heaven, which was beautiful in the morning light. There were roses everywhere of all different varieties, and the park was full of beautiful green grass and perfectly planted trees. We followed this up with a nice, cheap lunch in the alley (eating like the locals do, and at the local price - 71 yuan), and made the long trip home, stumbling north through the Xidan shopping district and financial street. Tomorrow we rest in the park, if the weather permits - it started raining just now ...