Top 5 Beijing Favorites

I’ve reached the halfway mark of my time in Beijing, so I thought a little reflection might be appropriate. Top 5 Beijing Favorites:

5)THE DOGS - apparently there are restrictions here for owning dogs (kind of like for owning kids). Each family can only have one and there’s a height limit, so there are a ton of little chihuahuas and poodles and other adorable little guys running around the streets. I think my very favorite might be the one who lives around our Hutong in whose hair are shaved and dyed the Olympic rings. (There’s also a little one who lives on the second floor of our hotel (with the prostitutes?) who will occasionally wander up the stairs to our floor. We’ve learned not to leave anything in the hall, because he will reliably proceed to mark it as his territory).

4) THE OLYMPICS - As demonstrated by the fur of the dog mentioned above, Olympic fever is EVERYWHERE. You can hardly wipe yourself with a piece of toilet paper (when, in the rare case that toilet paper is actually available, that is) without seeing the Olympic emblem on a sponsor’s label or the little Fuwa mascots (funny story here: apparently, the Fuwa were orginially called “The Friendlies,” but Chinese people with poor English pronunciation kept pronouncing them, “The FriendLESS,” so they changed it…).

It’s been really cool watching the city transform to get ready, and everyday there are more and more signs up, English recordings in places, etc… My favorite are the commercials they’re playing on TV. In one, they teach the Chinese people the official national cheer (two claps and then extending the arms while yelling Zhongguo Jia Yo! (Literally, “Add gas, China!” but basically, our “Go!”). This is an attempt to get the culturally reserved Chinese people to actually get excited and express emotion during the games, since they will be the primary spectators. They also have “public manners education” commercials in an attempt to get the public to be more “civilized.” In this commercial they discourage people from spitting on the streets, and demonstrate how to give up your seat for an old person and talk quietly on your cell phone in public areas. It’s hilarious.

They’re also having things like “National No-Spitting Day” and “National Queue Up Day,” to help with the efforts. I’d say the results are mixed. They do have people lining up in the subways (in actually probably the most single-file lines I’ve ever seen, as enforced by “line monitors” who also help push people in when the subways get too crowded for people to force themselves in on their own). But as soon as the train pulls up, those lines dissolve completely and everyone crashes to the doors like it’s the fourth quarter of the super bowl and a fumbled ball lay just on the other side of the doors, (or starved ducks on a piece of bread…I entertain myself on the subways on the way to work by thinking up similes to describe the phenomenon).

3) THE T-SHIRTS AND SIGNS with poorly translated/ seemingly randomly chosen English words. So many excellent ones. I keep meaning to start a list of the best ones I see, but this is definitely one of them:

Elmo. Cookied. Is On. Sesame Street. (with the enhancement of a masquerade mask in sequins)

2) THE PARKS - “Park” is definitely an understatement, as many of these are old imperial gardens of the dynastic emperors. My favorite is Jing Shan, where you can climb up a hill onto a pagoda which overlooks the Forbidden City. The best part though is the people watching there. Older people flock to the park on nice days with their portable speakers and sing (in seemingly competing – they’re all right next to one another) choirs. There are also random flute players nestled along the path of stairs leading up to the top, and of course people playing cards and hackie-sack, and women sitting around gossiping with their fans. The afternoon I spent there was definitely one of my favorites thus far.

Relatedly, the PUBLIC GYMS, which are scattered throughout the city. They look a lot like playgrounds, but if you look closely, they’re filled with exercise equipment. It’s all mechanical though- here’s the Chinese public gym version of a treadmill:

1) PEOPLE WATCHING - Not too much specific to say here, but it’s just fascinating and quickly becoming one of my favorite pastimes. I’m trying to figure out the best way to bring an old Chinese man home with me, so I can just look at him all day and think about how cute he is. And apparently it’s mutual, because we get asked to be taken a photograph of all the time).

To stay realistic, I could easily make a parallel Top 5 Least Favorite things which would include things like the fact that the concept of personal space is non-existent and there is a pervading stench of caused by lack of adequate plumbing which is fairly inescapable, but all in all, this is a pretty sweet place to spend the summer.