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Published: February 12th 2010
During weekends and free time I have been out and about to explore more of Beijing; though the bitter winter has provided little incentive to leave the warmth of inside!
While Alice was over, we visited (and in my case revisited) some of 'the sights' in Beijing, including the Temple of Heaven, Forbidden City, 798 art district, the Great Wall and the Summer Palace. We also managed to see some acrobatics, 'Beijing opera' & Kong fu shows. The Summer Palace made a real impression on me, possibly partly because of the fantastic weather that day... but it's definitely a fascinating and beautiful place. The lake was frozen over by that time and we were able to walk right across it; others chose to skate or cycle, and we even saw people swimming in one part that had not yet frozen: brrrr! The building itself and surrounding views combined with the vast park make this quite a sublime place to wander for a day... and in the summer it will look completely different.
The 798 art district is located in an old factory complex, which evidently gives the place an industrial feel. There are a few new buildings but most
of the galleries are hosted in renovated warehouses. There's a lot of interesting graffiti and such, but mostly the place consists of contemporary galleries selling expensive art and the occasional souvenir shop. According to my sources, there was a time when artists would take up residence here, and you could walk into buildings and watch the art-making process... but it seems that 798's growing reputation as a tourist attraction has lead to it's commercialisation pushing the working artists to move to less expensive and well-know areas of town. We didn't see any artists at work... but it's an interesting place to look around nevertheless.
Christmas-eve was spent on the Great Wall. We headed to 'Simatai' for a less-touristic experience (though you still have to buy a ticket to get in). Much off the wall here has not been renovated so you can see it more-or-less in the 'historical ruins'/untouched condition. We were lucky with the weather again though it was bitterly cold!
We spent some time exploring other parts of Beijing with my language-partner 'Seven'. One evening were invited to have a hot-pot diner prepared by Seven's mother in their home. Hot pot is a very popular food
option in China (and throughout other parts of Asia). It's especially good for warming the insides during the cold winters which grip northern China.
A word on accents and dialects... Most people on the mainland speak Mandarin ('putonghua'), though there are many dialects such as Shanghainese which sound completely different and will not be understood by people outside of the Shanghai area. The Beijing dialect is pretty much the same as Mandarin but spoken with a rather UK west-country-sounding accent! The letter 'r' is often very exaggerated, especially at the end of a word; and often words that normally end in other letters in Mandarin will end with a rolling R, if spoken by a Beijinger. Some examples include 'cha guarrr'- normally 'cha guan' (tea house); 'fuwuyuarrr'- normally' fuwuyuan' (waiter/waitress) and 'tang yuarrr' - usually pronounced 'tang yuan' (a kind of sweet rice-dumpling soup). So, as I understand so far, to sound 'proper Beijing' you just need to speak Mandarin with your thickest Devonshire accent.
As I write we are fast approaching the advent of the Chinese year of the Tiger, and 'chun jie' the Chinese spring festival season. Beijing is comparatively empty now as many people have
already returned home to spend the festival holiday with their families, as per tradition. Many buildings are decked out in red-lanterns and decorations, the occasional premature fire-cracker can be heard at points throughout the day and night, and cake-shops are full of people buying gift-boxes for their friends and family.
Chun Jie kuai le!
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Doreen
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Wanderings
What a lovely name for a spot to visit ! Fragrant I would really like to follow in your footsteps Tom. You make it sound so very interesting .Hope you have a happy new year of the Tiger with many new vistas to tempt us to want to join you in visiting. Much love Grannie xxxx