WANT to peer into Beijing’s past without having to walk through the perfect arches of the Summer Palace? Then wander through the streets of the Shichahai area near Houhai, through old hutongs or alleys that haven’t been ripped apart to make way for the mother of all makeovers that is about to be unleashed upon Beijing.
After China won its bid for the 2008 Olympics, locals say developers have been moving at a dizzying pace, creating massive, soulless boulevards. The Chinese are intent on replacing quaint courtyard houses with towering hulks of glass and concrete. They call it progress. The romantic in most people will call it a travesty. The Shichahai area has escaped the construction workers and cranes looming over the not so distant horizon and you can take a pedi-cab or rickshaw through the narrow streets bubbling with life. Government numbers indicate that about half the city’s population still lives in Siheyuan houses, while conservationists say the houses are disappearing and that now the courtyard dwellings are lived in by less than a third of the population. If you have some understanding of feng shui, you will understand why, as you step into courtyards, there is a free-standing wall, like a concrete screen, called a spirit wall and its sole purpose is to stop evil spirits from entering the house. And when you consider the superstition that evil spirits can’t turn corners, the winding corridors all start to make charming sense. Despite the frenzied pace at which Beijing is modernizing, feng shui considerations aiming at placating demons and spirits show up in even the most glamorous projects: watch out for the massive building shaped like a square ring; the gaping hole in the middle is for the dragon to pass through.
Communism has been overshadowed by the cult of consumerism. And one of its most startling manifestations is a little Starbucks in the heart of the Forbidden City. The city was built for royalty and has ramparts to keep commoners out. There are different areas in which dignitaries of varying levels were entertained. It is thus offensive to find a Starbucks sitting smugly in the center of all this intricately carved, palatial piece of ancient China. There are no signs — that was part of the deal, only the faint smell of coffee, to direct the tourists to the café in the southeastern corner of the Hall of Preserving Harmony. If, on the other hand, watching mogra flowers unfurl in a glass teapot as the near-boiling water is infused with the taste and fragrance of jasmine tea sounds good, go to a teahouse such as Cha Jia Fu Teahouse (inside Houhai Park, Deshengmen Nei Dajie, Xicheng District) or try the teahouse in Prince Gong’s Residence (17 Qianhai Xijie, Shichahai area, Xicheng District), where a tea ceremony in English is a fabulous introduction to local teas.
Although locals often take their tea in what looks like a washed out jam jar with a two-inch deep layer of grass-like (jasmine tea) floating in yellow water, tea is still a ritual that is religiously observed in the city. Teahouses have been the social centers of urban life for centuries, and today the only difference is that patrons often come in with laptops that pick up wireless internet.
If you are interested, make your way to Sanlitun where many of the city’s expatriates have set up shop, serving confused but mostly tasty concoctions they call fusion food. Here too, you will be confronted by what one local resident called the relentless “wind of change sweeping, and destroying the streets of Beijing.” The area is strewn with the skeletal remains of residential buildings painted with a massive single Chinese character ringed in white. The character is a target and shows the bulldozers what needs to be knocked down. Once the sign shows up on your building, locals say you have two weeks to vacate before the bulldozers show up. So many of the cafes and boutiques and clubs responsible for Sanlitun’s slightly quirky atmosphere with slick rooftop clubs standing alongside make-it-yourself pearl and bead emporiums may soon be gone. All of Beijing’s neighbourhoods are in a state of flux, but there is still one place where you can stop time: a 12-kilometer stretch of the Great Wall going from Jinshanling to Simatai. This section has escaped the government’s enthusiasm for preserving monuments by reconstructing them. Some parts of the wall are crumbling and make for a slightly treacherous hike. The easiest way to get to those places, unless you feel confident about haggling with cab drivers over the fare, is to hop onto a bus taking back-packers to Jinshanling. There will be about 20 at the outset but very soon, everyone will be walking at their own pace, which means you can marvel at endless mountains that fade from green to blue as they touch the thin veil of clouds against a brilliant blue sky. At first the Chinese vendors walking along with you, insisting you buy water seem irritating. But it’s hot on the Great Wall, and despite the watchtowers that provide welcome respite from the scorching heat, you will soon be grateful for the water-sellers you meet every few kilometers. The further you go, the more you sweat, and the higher the price of water climbs.
In some places the flat wall turns into steep, virtually vertical inclines, and you find yourself clinging to the crevices between ancient stones, hauling yourself up to watch towers only to find you have to jump down to the other side or be lowered by a friend, because where there were once stairs, there is now debris. Inside the watch towers, located at regular intervals you can relax for a few minutes and enjoy the views. The Great Wall unfurls before you like an endless ribbon, straddling the mountain ridge. The watch towers manage to catch the wind as it passes through the stony, shaded interior of the structures. The rush of wind is a welcome relief from the heat on the wall. A hike on this 12-15 km stretch of the wall is rewarding for many reasons. For one, it is about 130 km northeast of Beijing, far enough to dissuade all but the most dedicated hikers. Also, guide books frighten most travelers away with talk of 70-degree inclines and a wall in a state of ruin, almost untouched for 500 years, which means only a handful of nomadic souls will venture that far out to experience what was once the China’s first line of defense against enemy incursions.
