If you look, you’re practically going to buy. At least that seems to be the merchant’s mantra in Beijing for everyone from the sidewalk army of salesmen dispatched to peddle premature Olympics merchandise to Silk Street’s multilingual (in sales phrases, at least) vendors hawking everything from knockoff Air Force Ones to Mao Zedong wristwatches with the late chairman’s hand ticking away the hours.
Some customers/survivors have labeled one’s interaction with China’s salespeople a form of psychological warfare; what I choose to avoid as I try to shimmy my way through Silk Street’s stall-decked aisles, making full use of my peripheral vision in case my eye catches something worth unleashing the haggle-hungry Sun Tzu within. So far, averting my gaze has worked to shake off all the hey yous! and I give you good prices! And at least they haven’t hijacked my arms or assumed body barricade formation yet (it happens), some savage peddlers accosting browsers with hostile faux-friendliness (yes, there’s such a thing here) and shoving a Hollister t-shirt; or bogus iPhone; or a calculator with a supposedly good price on it, in your face.
Taking its Olympics as seriously as it did its Opium
With the Summer Olympics dropping in Beijing on August 8 and China’s nonpareil efforts in molding its capital into a tourist-friendly haven where its citizens no longer spit wherever they can, yap as loudly as they can, or not give a flying **** as much as they can, the government could still probably chuck some Quaaludes its salespeople’s way just to mellow them out a bit. But then Beijing certainly isn’t what it used to be if you, say, wind the clock back a few years — an immediate observation when you enter the spanking new Terminal 3 and dash through the checks, where you can rate your security check point satisfaction via a four-button electronic panel. (Wait, did the official just beam me a smile? “Greatly satisfied” it is, then.)
A domino effect appears to have been set off from Beijing’s transformation for the Olympics. Like its government realized that, hey, we’re formidable contenders, anyway, so why don’t we just bid for and host the damn thing — and then throw in scads of new roads and subway extensions, erect some awesome buildings, cut a huge chunk of air and water pollution out, and get our citizens to cultivate a bit of universal decorum while we’re at it. Leave it to the Chinese to go big-time with an event that’ll firmly instate that it can get the party started like the rest of the Olympic host nations — both its endeavors to make Beijing clean (we’re talking more hygienic food prep and a hell of a lot more trash collectors) and green (why the cab drivers have shut their ACs off and rolled their windows down), and the heavy-duty Olympic facilities it’s jonesing to unveil as well.
There’s the Beijing National Stadium or Bird’s Nest, which may or may not have something to do with the soup, but is an astounding architectural feat that’ll nestle the festival’s terra events — discus throwing, hurdles, marathon beer-guzzling for the sideline spectators — and the wandering souls of the 10 workers who died during its construction. And then there’s the 177-meter-long National Aquatics Center that London’s The Guardian lauded as “a masterpiece in theoretical physics” considering its exterior is constructed from blue ETFE cushions (inflated with low-pressure air to provide insulation and resist wind loads) restrained by 20,000 aluminum rods to form what looks like a ginormous “Water Cube,” which is what the arena is more widely known.
Like the hordes of Chinese mugging outside the Water Cube and Bird’s Nest, Nanxing, our film-finicky (“Luc Besson is too commercial”), French-fluent (cuss words included) tour guide, is gushingly proud of the Olympic structures. Having recently returned after three years of university in France, there were a lot of things that caught him off-guard about the new Beijing. Like how the taxi cabs, all uniformly white a couple of years ago, were now painted in a variety of colors and how a lot of Chinese are on the splurge due to the economic boom, big pimpin’ their Bimers and Benzes down the streets. He can also see the sky now — the sheath of smog cloaking the tips of skyscrapers having significantly thinned — and that the hutongs (narrow, old-world alleys) are being sledgehammered into commerce-hardy streets rife with cafes and their share of hipper-than-thou Euro clientele sipping cappuccinos and smoking Panda cigarettes. Our tour guide himself is an exemplar of this change; Nanxing being one of the many Chinese apart from the stall attendants who can actually speak more words than “you buy now!” and who isn’t afraid to spend more and live a little as well.
Bangin’ Beijing!
Indeed, this year’s Olympic emblem depicting a “Dancing Beijing” says a lot about how, even before that torch burns up the cauldron, we’re already witnessing China shake its rump on the global dance floor. In Beijing, history and hedonism have found a way to commingle, given that while you’ve got your Great Wall entry points, Forbidden City (modest nomenclature was obviously forbidden during the Ming and Qing dynasties: enter the “Tower of Enhanced Righteousness” or the “Palace of Accumulated Purity”), and Tiananmen Square (what would make an expansive parking lot), all massive and sobering relics, you’ve also got countless ways to get hammered and have a rip-rollicking great time after museum closing hours.
While a trickle of Beijing’s hotspots are spread out around areas like the Worker’s Stadium (Vics for that compulsory hip-hop bump n’ grind) or in hotel lobbies (Centro at Shangri-la’s Kerry Center for a jazz enclave of martini-swilling Armani adherents), you can swing by any of Beijing’s three main “bar streets” to behold its live-and-let-loose night scene. Of course, there’s Houhai, the rickshaw-ridden, original bar street bordering its namesake’s lake, where at 4 p.m., hooky-playing students, tourists, and young expats are already filing into its winding stretch of bars — pick your sound: Neyo, Cat Power, Chinese reggae; it gets pretty diverse — and kicking back on couches by the street, sipping on their Yanjing beers and sucking on Sheesha pipes. And then there’s Xingba Lu, the third and newest bar street, across the grunge wear boutiques and Szechuan eateries of Silk, where you and your caballeros can hit-up a dive like Mexican Wave for a strummed-out night of nodding to Bob (Dylan and Marley) tunes while downing kiwi margaritas. Both Xingba Lu and Sanlitun (the embassy-proximal 2nd bar street) have their diverse share of Irish pubs, posh clubs, wine bars, and seedy lounges, but the lactic acid buildup in my legs from walking the Great Wall and Summer Palace (no wonder Empress Dowager Xixi was carried around) makes me want to just lean against the bar counter at Nashville, a dimly-lit, saloon-like joint along Sanlitun where a Pinoy guy named Chris plays amazing renditions of everything from Kiss from a rose to Solsbury Hill in between sips of his Heineken.
Millions — and the world — Served
The Great Leap Forward that Mao emphasized for China is realized today, albeit in the sense that there’s a lot more to scale in Beijing than a lengthy stack of stones and a lot more to look forward to than fake Paul Smith dress shirts and Peking duck. What’s more, China isn’t just banging its gong to gain the attention it seeks from the world but to signal its masses’ stepping out of the stringent commie mindset and living it up in other countries; the 4th China Outbound Travel and Tourism Market Show (COTTM) held from April 14-16 at Beijing’s China World Trade Center an indication of China’s newfound propensity to travel. With about 37.5 million Chinese now getting their passport pages stamped, over 130 countries at the COTTM — every spa resort, tourist board, and airline — were looking to cater to even the regular dim sum chef looking to munch on ‘Kuyrdak’ in Kazakhstan; or sand-ski in Dubai; or knock back a few shells of coconut juice while getting a VCO rubdown on any one of our 7,107 islands.
If there’s anything China’s ants are all marching towards, it’s newfound liberation. You can see it in every overhauled street in Beijing, where in the same area, you’ll probably find a Pizza Hut right beside a cigar club and a traditional courtyard residence — oriental eaves and all — on the other side of the road. Even when the Olympic flags come down and the Water Cube is dismantled to become a huge swim training arena/water park/lifestyle complex, China will be asserting its change, hollering at the world and telling it, ‘Hey you! We give you good price! We give you good time over here!’ And damned if we don’t buy into it.
