Last week our oral teacher kindly invited our class around to her house for tea and some snacks. She lives in one of the oldest Hutongs in Beijing and her house is a real mix of old and new. Whilst the building itself is untouched, a few commodities don’t quite fit in (wireless internet, brand new laptop etc!) We sat around and chatted whilst eating cakes, fruit, peanuts, seeds, steamed buns and some other things that were more unusual. Afterwards our teacher took us to visit the oldest shopping street in Beijing (currently having some refurbishing done for the olympics). Later, a few classmates went on to see an acrobatics performance at TianQiao - I instead went to meet up with Joe and Charles.
Here are some photos from the evening:
I managed to get in touch with Jo and Charles (some relatives) who were up in Beijing for four days and we arranged to go out for a meal together last night. They are staying in the Peninsular hotel in the centre of Beijing - next to Beijing’s biggest and busiest shopping street. The hotel is quite simply unmissable and is so grand that I was initially concerned that they might just turn me away at the door (in my hoody and shorts)! Jo and Charles were waiting in the lounge/lobby so we had a drink and some nibbles together before heading out to find somewhere to eat. We found a lovely restaurant where we ate sweet and sour pork (糖醋里脊), crispy peppered lamb (黑椒铁板羊肉），griddled aubergine with beef and bak choi (油菜）along with a couple of cold 青岛 (Tsing Tao) beers. I think we can definitely say that we ate well! On the way back to the hotel we passed by the Wangfujing night market to see some of the weird and wonderful edible-things-on-sticks that they had for sale.
All in all it was a lovely meal and nice to see some familiar faces so far away from home. Here are a few photos.
A couple of weeks ago, me and Siqi decided to take a break from the bustling Beijing life and head ‘down to the countryside’ to stay at a traditional chinese homestay. We filled our backpacks full of yummy food and caught the oldest and most rickety train I have ever been on to Hebei province, about a 3 or 4 hour train ride. Onboard were mainly migrant workers who live out in the countryside but head in to Beijing for work. It wouldn’t surprise me if I was the first westerner ever to have made the journey!
The village we were staying in was in a valley surrounded by mountains. All the way around on the horizon you could make out the sillouette of the great wall snaking around. The homestay was very primitive but I loved it. Only a few hours out of Beijing and yet in this village the only electrical appliances to be found are lightbulbs and (if you are lucky) a telephone. Furthermore, there was no hot shower water and all cooking was done over gas flames or compressed coal blocks! The family were very welcoming and made us some of the most delicous food I have had in China. It was a big change from Beijing’s restaurants - a lot less meat and oil goes into the dishes and the flavours are not so strong. Much healthier - although most westerners (excluding myself and a few other odd ones) would not agree to the breakfast of rice porridge, spicy pickled potato shreds, steamed bread buns and a cabbage soup of some sorts! Another thing to note in the countryside was the cold! In Beijing it was still 20 degrees on sunny days and yet out here at night it was getting below freezing point - lucky I had some warm clothes packed.
On Saturday we got up at 5：00 and got a minibus to 金山岭 (jinshanling), one of the sections of the great wall. It was only a 20 minute ride away and when we got there, there was not a single tourist in sight… thats right… not one! This must be one of the best sections of the great wall to walk if you have the time to head that far out of Beijing. We walked all the way from 金山岭 (jinshanling) to 司马台 (Simatai), about 6 hours of walking in total. The scenery is amazing and the wall is pretty wild in places - some of it could be considered as mortally dangerous in wet conditions - many parts of the wall are starting to crumble here and some bits are ridiculously steep! Again, we didn’t come across anybody apart from the ticketman all along that vast stretch of wall. It rained quite heavily for about an hour in the afternoon but we took shelter in one of the many beacon posts along the way and munched on some rather odd chinese snacks. Got the minibus back to the homestay for lunch - again delicious - then had a rather sleepy afternoon!
We were up early on Sunday morning and got the 9:00 train back to Beijing. All in all a great weekend; it was lovely to get out of the city to some nice clean air and beautiful surroundings. It was also a great opportunity to speak some chinese - with Siqi, with the people who ran the homestay and with the other Beijing students (all Chinese) who were staying for the weekend. Finally, it was a good reminder that in fact the vast majority of Chinese people (80%) are still peasants and that the majority of what you see in Beijing, in films and on the news does not reflect in the slightest the harsh realities of everyday life for a normal Chinese citizen.
Jono
