"Lazy" Sunday

So Ted and I finally decided to take the subway for the first time yesterday. We had to get to a market all the way across town, and to be honest, my feet have been killing me. I can count three band-aids on them as of right now, and that is even after the restful day we had today. After our plans to see the national museum earlier this week were thwarted when we found out it was closed for repairs, we saw yesterday numerous posters throughout the subway for the capital museum. They were hosting a Greek exhibit on loan from the Louvre, which perked Ted and I's interest immediately.

So when we had no other plans for our lazy Sunday, we decided to go check out this brand spankin' new museum, which was just completed last year. While the in-house collection was not that extensive, we really enjoyed the few pieces that were on display in the special Greek exhibit in the main hall.

The collection was comprised of stone statuary and red and black Attic vases, but was hard to see because of the hordes of people pushing to get a look at the art, all snapping photographs. One man Ted and I saw took at least three pictures of every piece, and at least one of all of the information cards. Sheesh. But instead of me tiredly mumbling on about the exhibit, I thought I would share the few pictures I took:

After a while of pushing through people to get a glimpse at some art, Ted and I had worked up a big appetite and found a little but boisterous place to grab some lunch close to the museum. Everything on the menu was either seafood or spicy food, so we decided to go for the latter. To our table came buckwheat noodles which were smothered in chili oil, and ground chicken floating in a sea of red peppers, ginger, and green onions. Needless to say, the Tsingtao was chugged to extinguish the fires in our mouths, and we left with noses running but pocketbooks barely dented. It makes my nose hurt just thinking about it!

So we rolled ourselves down to the subway for the ride home, where we got to share some intimate moments with our fellow riders... all 100 thousand of them. At one point, I thought Ted and I were going to get separated, as I got pushed onto the 1 line by a sea of Beijingers, while Ted almost got left behind. Luckily he made it in the car with the last desperate push of riders to make the train, and we managed to get home intact.

It was still fairly early in the afternoon, so I decided to let Ted live out his Beijing dream: take a paddle boat out onto Houhai lake. Note to potential paddlers: avoid the damn thing when the wind has been gusting all day. The boats are not necessarily what you would call "aerodynamic" so expect to paddle hard against the wind to get to your destination. Also, if you are above "typical Asian stature", this may not be the ride for you. About 5 minutes in, Ted had to ghetto rig a front seat so that he could paddle from the front, where there was enough leg room to prevent, and I quote, "my ass from cramping up something fierce". But again, I'll let the pictures speak for themselves:
Before I forget, I also have to mention the band that we listened to for quite some time before hopping onto the paddle boat. The great thing about Beijing is that there are people doing great things in public all the time. If you visit a park, there is usually something going on, and today at Houhai there was a classical Chinese band there that blew Ted and I away. The violin player (Chinese two string violin: I don't know the technical term) was amazing, and you could tell these old guys knew how to wail. They had drawn a huge crowd, and still had one hours later when Ted and I walked by the same pavilion after the boat ride.

We ended the day with an indulgence that Ted and I have been craving: pizza. Since we were down on Houhai we decided to stop into one of the trendy bars (which was empty being Sunday night and all) to have a beer and some 'za (thanks Lee). The pizza was very mediocre, but it was the first melted cheese we had had in over a week. Yum. And you know, the place was pretty cute. We decided to sit at the big booth with high benches and a low table, where we had to take off our shoes and sit cross-legged on big over-stuffed cushions. This is a far cry from some of the places we have been frequenting since our arrival in Beijing, which usually feature chairs with removable seat covers and chopsticks which come in the same packet as a moist towelette. It almost made the overpriced pizza seem worth it.

Since we only have a couple of days left in Beijing before we head to Qingdao and Shanghai, I thought I would leave you with a shot of the Drum Tower across Houhai at night:

lolbeijing

Count da craens!
Dis Partee propagandeh brot to u by Nintendo Wii!
Um, which wey did the Revolushun go?
U takes us home naow? Pleez?
U doen yet? Iz embarassing.
Huuuugs!
Im in ur marckets maeking a mockery of UO outreech programz
Sad hutong kitteh... iz sad.
O knee how! Pinyin Kitteh halps dumm laowai!

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 ...

Qianmen and the quest for Peking duck

After our depressing day at the zoo yesterday, Ted an I decided that we needed the ultimate pick-me-up: a traditional Peking duck meal. Ted, being the ultimate foodie, had already researched where to get the best duck in town, and declared we would head down to the Qianmen neighborhood in search of this culinary delight.

On the way we couldn't help but stop by Tienanmen Square again, as there were only thousands of people there today in contrast with the millions on national day. But to tell you the truth, we were drawn to the area by catching a glimpse of this sight through a hutong:












It was the new national theater which was just completed this year, and Ted and I couldn't help but be drawn to it like a fat kid to a twinkie. I have to say, it looked beautiful in the pollution filtered morning light, as Chinese tourists walked around its moat taking in the sight before moving on to the Great Hall of the People. Complete with Egyptian-inspired papyrus bundle capitals and red flags waving for national week, the building was quite impressive, and made a powerful impact upon the square.

The square itself is also quite impressive, as it is surrounded by massive government buildings that were built to inspire. There are also monuments to laborers on the square which flank Chairman Mao's mausoleum, which was closed for the day. Too bad, considering I got all worked up to see the man after being offered the coolest item I've spotted in Beijing thus far: the Chairman Mao watch, complete with "solute to the people" action, as demonstrated on Ted's blog.

After completing the tourist's loop of the monuments, we shuffled through the crowds to get to the Beijing Planning Exhibition Hall. A magnet for laowai like ourselves, we joined other white tourists to see all of the wonderful plans that Beijing has for the future. Or we all just came to see the huge model of the city of Beijing. Whatever.

Covering a whole floor, the model shows every little detail of metropolitan Beijing. But being the history nerd I am, I was immediately drawn to the preservation section of the planning hall, which went into detail about the evolution of preservation agendas implemented by the municipal government. It was very informative, so I took a picture of every single display they had, models of siheyuan and all (siheyuan are the traditional courtyard houses of the hutong).

Being that I was inspired by the planning hall, Ted and I decided to swing through the Qianmen hutongs to get a glimpse of the neighborhoods that inspired my thesis topic, which was an eye opening experience. As you can see, it looked as if a bomb went off in these areas, as walls were missing, bricks were wearing away, and the streets hadn't even been paved, which is a luxury that most hutongs have been afforded over the years in Beijing. What was even more interesting is that we had entered from a back area that was not blocked off, but it was obviously a construction zone. It was hard to tell what kind of work they were doing, but by comparing it to work that had already been done on the main street to the west, they were preparing to build a wall in front of the homes to block them from view.

Seeing this, and then immediately walking onto the main street where they had constructed new walls in attempt to hide the homes from view was a huge wake-up call. Ted and I had seen many new walls around the city and got small glimpses here and there of the crumbling buildings behind them, but we had not yet actually walked behind any of these walls to see the utter destruction that lay behind them. In our little hutong the homes are fairly run down, and also stand behind new walls that hide the true state of the structures, but it comes nothing close to this. We found out today that our hutong is actually one of the protected areas under a new conservation plan in Beijing, which means that new buildings going up here are in the old style, and the ones that remain are kept in at least standing condition. Here, who knows what will happen to these structures, how long they have been ignored, and if people will continue to live here in the future. I do have to admit though that I laughed most of the way through the hutong, as the construction workers got a kick out of the laowai walking through that part of town, laughing at us and saying hello. Those Beijingers and their sense of humor ...

After trekking down to Tienanmen and Qianmen, Ted and I had worked up an appetite, and decided upon a place in a still-standing and decent hutong a little west of the bomb site seen above to dine on duck. While we really got the laowai price (240 yuan! What?), we also got one superb meal that we will still be drooling about when we get home. I took a picture so we could share it all with you:

The one and only Peking duck, sliced table side, with plum sauce, pancakes, what we identified as slivered daikon radish, cucumber bites doused in vinegar dressing, duck soup made from the leftovers after slicing, and no meal would be complete without a glass (or six) of Tsingtao. Enjoy!

I know people use the phrase "concrete jungle", but come on ...

You want to know what the saddest thing in Beijing is? Let me show you:
That's right, folks. Right in the midst of boundless pride associated with national week, Ted and I witnessed one sad excuse of a zoo today at the Beijing Zoo. While we had heard that the place was ghetto fabulous and the admission was only 20 yuan (compared to the 100 yuan for the new aquarium), we still thought it would be worth the walk to see the pandas and such at the largest zoo in China.

Well, I guess you get what you pay for. Not only did we get to see exotic animal species such as nutria and skunks, but we also got to see animals in exquisite cages which included such luxury items as fake plants and painted backgrounds. As Ted put it, you could just see the designer saying, "They're just stupid animals; they can't tell the difference if it is real or painted on!" But the worst was probably a tie between the big cat house and the nocturnal animals. As you can see, the big cats all looked like they wanted to die: they were either curled up in a corner or pacing furiously, looking as if they wanted to tear the head off of every last one of the gawking zoo goers. The nocturnal animal house featured cracked windows which looked like they had been patched with spackle and animals that were traumatized by endless flash photography and screaming children. Don't worry though, there was a sign saying there was no smoking allowed.

Other wonderful interactions witnessed at the zoo were children throwing trash and food into the open enclosures, a man throwing rocks at a sick wolf that was missing one ear, and a man tapping on the glass of the outer cage for polecats, which were all housed in cages ... inside the glass enclosure.

Even as sad as those images are, the worst thing witnessed on the day was at the bear enclosure. Looking depressed and hungry, one bear began to paw at a cracker that a kid threw down into the mud and concrete enclosure. I kid you not, there was a construction zone directly behind the bears, concrete was everywhere, the only "natural" thing there was dirty looking water in the corner, the trees were even surrounded by concrete, and the bear sat there, trying to paw a cracker out of the mud.

As sad as it was, Ted and I decided to go check out the main attraction before heading home, the giant panda house. While these enclosures had obviously had more time and effort put into their construction, the pandas were so put off my the chaos and flashbulbs surrounding them that they sat facing the back wall of their enclosures as to avoid the herd of pushing gawkers and small children, all being yelled at by some dude with a megaphone who was probably there to control the crowd.

So what we thought was going to be a nice half day at the zoo turned out to be the downer of the week. After seeing such horrible enclosures and depressed animals, we couldn't help but take it home with us, as we haven't stopped a second to catch our breath from the time our plane landed this weekend. Needless to say, we spent the second half of the afternoon relaxing on the roof of the hostel, reading, emailing, and soaking in the sun of what was the most beautiful day so far of our stay in Beijing. Yes, we could even see the moon and some clouds, which was a first, as we usually can't even see the sun on an average day because the pollution is so bad.

After some much needed relaxation and some store-bought soup with steamed buns from the hutong, I think we will be ready to hit the streets again tomorrow.

Update: we can finally see our blogs!

... but who knows how long it will last. Ted and I have had a lot of fun navigating the blogger interface with everything in Chinese characters and all, and have finally figured out how to access our pages, and therefore comments, at the moment. But we have also noticed that we have not been able to access, up to this point, other .blogspot pages linked from google searches, so who knows how this development happened, or how long it will last.

But we do love to read your comments, either in China or when we get home, so please drop us a line!

It's National Day!

What a day! Let's just set the mood with this picture:

But before we got all flag-waving and patriotic in Tienanmen Square, we started our day early at the Xi Dan shopping district, just west of the Forbidden City.

Shopping in Beijing is a little tricky, because it is hard to know when you should haggle. While one mall in the district will have much more chic items that seem to be set in their price, other malls next door will sell lower quality goods to younger shoppers, and are much more flexible with their pricing policy. Even with this hurdle, Ted still managed to buy me a compact mirror with an elephant on it using his limited Mandarin. I would be lost and starving at this point without his knowledge of some key phrases, although I can count to ten now, ask how much something costs, and most importantly, know that I am a "laowai".

"Laowai" means foreigner in Mandarin, and no, it's not of the "Head Games" and "Cold as Ice" variety. It is the "Oh my God, what planet do blonde people come from?" type of foreigner. With National Week beginning today, Chinese tourists from around the country have poured into the city to see the ancient monuments, but seem much more taken aback by my blonde hair and blue eyes. One family in Tienanmen Square insisted that I pose for a photo with their young, adorable daughter, both of us waving small Chinese flags. Even earlier in the Forbidden City, I thought I was in the way of a photo being taken by an elderly woman, when in fact she was taking a photo of me. Once I realized what she was after, Ted and I posed for a nice picture for her to show her family. I also saw her snap a more candid shot as Ted and I were walking away ... she just couldn't get herself enough "laowai" for one day.

But as Ted pointed out to me, it is a point of pride to many people that young foreigners come all the way across the world to see their great culture. Walking around the Forbidden City and Tienanmen Square with literally millions of Chinese people from around the country, we felt like we were sharing in their national pride and their celebration, rather than imposing on their special day. Many people, seeing that we were Americans, would tell us "Hello", to which we would answer "Nihao," drawing huge smiles. My favorite thing to do was say "Nihao" to some of the cute kids on the street, who would be waving their flags, reveling in the celebration. While many were stunned by the big blonde walking by, their parents would smile and laugh, and tell them to say "Hello" back, clearly enjoying the exchange.

Today really made me re-think some common perceptions that people back home have of China and the Chinese people in general. What has surprised me throughout our short time in Beijing thus far has been how warmly people have received us throughout the city. While we stick out like a sore thumb without trying, even the smallest efforts on our part to use Mandarin words and phrases here and there does wonders for eliminating the "laowai" stigma. Often Ted and I see other tourists from Germany, France, Australia, and the US, and even we try to avoid them as much as possible. They seem very set in their comfort zone, demanding that their Chinese hosts accomodate them as much as possible so that their vacation is as sanitized as possible. But one will find that when you are willing to meet Beijingers half way, it not only makes the interaction easier for everyone, but also seems to lighten the mood and make everyone involved smile and laugh. What's better than that?