2nd Last Week in Beijing

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Usually I wait until the end of the week to write up a post, but the accumulation of events spanning across this colourful Tuesday are meaty enough to serve a post I'm excited to write about.

So it's my last Tuesday in the office, and was a pretty routine morning. I was in a good mood though, as I just got back my reference letter my supervisor had done, and in the midst of this good moodiness boldness on my behalf was fed.

The first occurrence of this was during the time of my mid-morning cup of tea... I'm not a big tea drinker but it was free so obviously I had to score some. It was your standard office tea set; paper cup, Lipton tea bag, lukewarm water, however an essential element was missing and yes, it was the milk. But milk was on BYO terms. And so in a moment of madness I scanned the premises, and then executed to the opening of the fridge and then a milk carton respectively in proper Oceans 11 smoothness. I need not say the rest.

As exciting as the above story may seem, that wasn't the only daring deed that day...

For lunch, I was meeting a good friend of mine (Paul), an aspiring film director (who not surprisingly happens to also be French) had been filming about in Beijing for the past week about Beijing.... how creative.

I met him as he was taking shots of the CCTV tower that was across the road. I thought it was a bit of a boring attempt to capture the essence of Beijing, as there was like a billion pictures from that angle, or in fact any angle of that CCTV tower already taken. And then a brilliant idea hit me, as they are not shy of doing so: We were going to go into the tower .

The first task was getting past security as obviously this site being the equivalent of the BBC headquarters for the “most important” country in the world would have pretty tight security. Apparently not... I'm guessing it's due to the fact that I was in a suit so I looked important, and Paul with all this equipment looked like some French architect that was going to measure something important. And so like a stroll in the park, we progressed through the first line of security.

This lead us to our next security stop where beyond this was the entrance of the uninhabited tower. I lie, there were inhabitants and these were the migrant workers that worked on site. I really wanted to talk to them and see what they thought of the building, but felt we should keep our profile low. Asserting control as we approached the security check point I decided to ask the guard questions before he did to me. So following my 2 minute interrogation, politely I requested hard hats to fulfill the look. I do have to give it to them, I mean what foreigners dressed for the part would walk into a construction site of a symbolic monument of modern China and have absolutely no idea what they were doing. Alternative we were!

The gates opened and we were free to roam. Note to self: 1.) Always look like you know where you're going. 2.) When in need of speaking Chinese, sound as American as possible. 3.) Every now and again tap one of the concrete pillars and nod, as to say “I know what I'm doing and this looks stable”. And so with all this, the façade was complete and we made our way up to the top of the tower, via stairs, cool construction site elevators, and more stairs.

The view was pretty decent as we peered out the new glass windows of future offices, as well as the internal architectural impressiveness of the building. But, I was more interested in the mini civilization of the migrant workers in this concrete jungle. All scruffy, and evident of denied showers, they had big smiles and glowing personalities (the toxic fumes could potentially be responsible for that). And so after 40 minute of lording about and checking stuff out, we headed back down. Paul did mention that he wanted to work here when he was older, so I guess I might pay this place another visit some day.

Following this, we decided to be local and so had lunch at this restaurant which was someone's house and kitchen in one room and another with low chairs and tables that had a cool pond with a turtle. We struck up a conversation with the people sitting next to us after I had pointed to the food on their table, as I didn't know what or how else to order. They were impressed that we were so independent and responsible... I felt pretty independent and responsible for a minute, but came back to earth after I remembered I've never done laundry in my life, and what had been executed 5 minutes ago at the tower. As well as showering us with praise, they asked our advice about where their children should study abroad along with what the best foreign country and language was. We tried our best to answer.

And on request of the bill, we found out that they had paid for our lunch, which later I found out was donkey (after realizing all the donkey pictures on the wall), and a strange concoction of soup that I tried my best to finish as not to upset the waitress who most probably was the cook. At this moment I was loving China and especially Beijing. How many places could I have pulled off the construction site stint, and get a free lunch of donkey meat in the same 1 and a half hour lunch break. I was really enjoying the idea that rules and set norms of western societies don't necessarily apply here... and rightly so, as this adolescent Chinese society rapidly changes shape everyday to form its own identity.

I must retreat to my bed now as a major head ache has birthed most probably due to the fumes or the foreign donkey meat.

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Photos

Migrant Workers
Having a nap, on the 60 something floor with beautifully smoggy beijing in the background. I personally like the rigid sleeping style of the guy on the left