Living in Beijing: useful stuff

As I start to see the end of my time in Beijing approaching (still a fair way away yet!), I'm thinking of what things I would have liked to have known at the start, and also of how I can make all this knowledge about the city I've accumulated somehow useful to other people. 

So this is a list of stuff that is useful.

Touristing stuff:

• It's easy to see all the main touristy things like the Forbidden City, Summer Palace and the temples by bus or subway. I'd suggest either get yourself a good guidebook (not lonely planet, which is only useful for practical information) or look out through your connections for some kind of local (e.g. a language partner) who will take you there.
• Getting the Great Wall is a bit of a challenge by yourself, because it's a fair way out of Beijing. You could hire a driver or there's a bus-taxi method (in lonely planet) but I'd strongly recommend going with a tour group. If you like walking/hiking, I strongly recommend Beijing Hikers. Alternatively, I've heard the China Culture Centre does good tours. I would be wary of the random internet tour companies you might come across, especially if their English is not good. One other thing: avoid the Badaling area at all costs! You can hardly move for the tourists, and there are so many other amazing places to go. 
• Good places to go for weekend trips are (in order of preference): Shanghai, Qingdao, Chengde, Datong, Pingyao, and Tianjin, among many others (keep an eye on the expat mags for suggestions). You can also get to a huge number of places in China within a short flight, but it's probably going to be expensive.

Stuff to do around town that's not (too) touristy:

• I love cooking, and I knew almost nothing about cooking Chinese food when I came here. It's also a very practical skill for living in Beijing, as it can be quite difficult to cook food you normally eat at home for a variety of reasons (see below). So I've been to about a dozen classes at The Hutong. I thoroughly recommend any of their classes (make sure you get the membership on your first visit!)—check out this post for a taster. Black Sesame also does cooking classes, but I have never been to any of them.
• Check out all the green spaces in Beijing, especially during summer. There are loads of cool parks around the place where you'll laugh at the old people doing Tai Chi or Qi Gong in the morning, smile at the kiddies playing in the daytime or enjoy the music and dancing in the evening. The more time I spend here, the more I find myself wondering why we don't get together to dance or sing in public spaces at home, although it seemed so ridiculous to me when I arrived. I recommend Ritan Park or Temple of the Earth Park, but seriously any of them will do.
• Check out Houhai lake. It's a full of people most of the time (doing Tai Chi or just walking), but is definitely worth the visit. You can also grab a drink at one of the bazillion cafe/bars.
• If you like hiking, go with Beijing Hikers on any of their trips. They're all pretty great. There's also a local hiking group called Beijing Walkers (or Wallkers, depending on who you listen to), which goes for hikes every Sunday, but you have to know someone to get on the email list. If you do, jump on it, because the hikes are great and a lot cheaper than paying a tour company. Make sure you sign up as soon as the email comes out and be prepared for a hike that's on the difficult side.
• Go to any of the cool new hip and trendy restaurants that are opening all the time. To find out what's cool and hip, check out the expat mags (see below).
• Try out dragon boating. There's an expat-friendly club that trains on Houhai on Sunday afternoons at about 4.30pm—they're very chilled and you definitely don't need to be fit or have any skills in dragon boating to participate. It's a good way to meet people and get some exercise, but be prepared to be very sore the next day!
• Check out the streets of Nanluoguxiang, Guloudong dajie and Wudaoying Hutong for boutique clothes shopping, funky gifts, cool bars and cafes. I spent a large part of my life walking around these streets.
• Cycle through the hutongs south of Yonghegong, Andingmen and Gulou stations. It's one of the most fun, relaxing and cultural things you can do in Beijing.

Internet stuff:

• Before I launch into what's available on the web, I'll say this: Get a VPN before you come here if you can. You'll be amazed at how many websites you use regularly are not available at all (e.g. facebook/twitter, news sites), or at least not available consistently (google products). I suggest Strong VPN, which is reliable and trustworthy, with great tech support. Make sure you get one that is compatible with your phone, as well!
• 
  By far the best source for information about what's going on around town is the expat magazines. Timeout and The Beijinger are the best. Pick one up at any of the expat type cafes around town or check out their websites, which have loads and loads of information.
• For blogs, I like to follow The China Story, Danwei, and Lost Laowai when I have the time. There are plenty of others, plus all the major international news services generally have good China blogs.
• As I've mentioned in earlier posts, I like to listen to the China History Podcast and Sinica for China-related stuff.

Living stuff:

• Language training is a must in Beijing. Of course, there are millions of people who tour through the city without Chinese, but it's actually quite difficult to get around without at least a few words. Far fewer people speak English than you might assume. Plus, Chinese is fun to study after the first uphill battle with sounds and characters. If you ask me, you need to study both characters and pinyin, but that's just my preference because I'm a visual learner and I like to be able to read signs. Most people do one-on-one classes or intensive group classes. I can recommend Rose Finch (although it's quite expensive), or my friends have also recommended The Hutong School.
• Groceries. I've mentioned this in earlier posts, but it can be quite difficult and expensive to get ingredients for foreign foods. It's not just that you can't get your favourite brand of crackers or some vegemite, it's that you can't buy breakfast cereal, or bread that's not sweetened, or cheese. Chinese supermarkets (Merry Mart, Dia, Wumart, etc) can be very confronting and uncomfortable, or loads of fun, depending on your outlook. If you can't cope, which has been me for a large portion of my time here, there are western or semi-western supermarkets around. Look for BHG, Jenny Lou's or April Gourmet in the expat districts (largely in Chaoyang). Expect to pay the same price at home for anything that's imported.
• How do you know which bus or subway to catch? Plug it into google maps on your phone. Seriously, I couldn't live without google maps. Just tell google maps where you want to go, select public transport, and you're away. It has all the bus and train routes already plugged in.
• Public transport doesn't run after 10.30-11pm ish. Catch a taxi, if you can get one. I could go on a rant about cabs, but I won't. Suffice to say the cabs are hard to pull over (particularly at night) and the drivers are mean, and they definitely don't speak English. Remind yourself they treat everyone the same way, including Chinese locals.
• Electricity and gas super cheap and is usually paid with a card that you take to the bank. Now, the only way of doing this is with a Chinese bank account card, but if you smile sweetly enough, the staff will do it for you.
• Re. finding a place to live, this is mostly done through agents (you generally pay them a fee of one month's rent, up front, for this privilege). Check out the classifieds on The Beijinger for recommendations and for rooms available.
• Clothes shopping is not as cheap as you might think. Anything you could get at home is the same price as at home, unless you're at a market. I suggest visiting Yaxiu (Yashow) Markets or the Beijing Zoo Market. Be prepared to bargain hard (starting at 1/10th their asking price is a good idea) and to have to push through swathes of people.
• Buy a bike! Seriously, it's so much fun cycling in Beijing. I wouldn't pay more than about RMB 300 for a reasonable, if clunky, second-hand bike. If it breaks down, there are plenty of shops in the hutongs that fix them quickly and cheaply. Buy a helmet from one of the expat areas (or, even better, bring it from home) because, even if nobody else wears them, you're an idiot if you think your brain is safe in Beijing traffic.

Wow that was a huge brain dump! I'm sure there's more useful stuff I could provide, but that's the bones of it. Hope it's useful to someone, and if you need more info, feel free to comment!

Camping at the Great Wall

(Continued from Great Wall part 1)

Then we decided to get a bit adventurous. My friends had a festival of birthdays (since when are there so many birthdays in June? ... that makes then September conceptions in case you couldn't work it out) so they decided to go away for a weekend to celebrate. What better thing to do to celebrate your birthday than go out to the hills, haul a 10kg pack up a mountain, get covered in sweat and dirt, sleep on a rock, wake up at 5am and repeat the whole thing again backwards? Yes! I say best birthday idea ever. So that's what we did.

I'm going to give some detail for those who are wishing to do a similar trip. We hired a driver with a small truck, only just big enough to accommodate all of us and our bags. We left Beijing in the middle of the day, stopping at Sanfo to hire some gear. Both the driver and the equipment hire were quite cheap—a few hundred kuai per person all up—and you can basically hire everything except boots. Unfortunately the gear is not particularly well designed for hiking (it's heavy and not weather-proof) but it's fine for a night.

Back to the exciting stuff. We went to 箭扣 (Jiankou, near the town of 西栅子村—Xizhazi), which is one of the most rugged sections of the Great Wall near Beijing. It took us two hours in our tiny van to get there—by which time all of our extremities had gone to sleep, which is really lucky because it was incredibly hot. That is, it was hot until it started raining. Pouring, actually. It was like we arrived in the mountains, and the sky broke in half. Thunder and lightning and huge gusts of wind. When we arrived at the little guesthouse (info here) at the bottom of the mountain the locals were actually laughing at us. Great Wall fail.

We ate. We waited. We lamented our forgotten raincoats safely in our dry wardrobes at home. We considered the likelihood of being struck by lightning on a tower. We drank beer to calm the sense of frustration.

Somebody must have prayed as well, because as suddenly as it had started, the inclement weather miraculously dissipated. What the? As it turns out, the rain was a godsend because it cooled the air to a bearable hiking temperature and, the best part, it cleared the smog completely! So my adventures at the Great Wall had now come full circle. And it was glorious:

And the best thing is ... I got a room with a view:

It's at this point, you inch yourself to make sure you're not dreaming and think: what an amazing adventure I'm on!

My first go at ... the Great Wall!

There's really only one thing to say about the Great Wall. It's spectacular! It's everything you expect it to be when you look at those pictures that fancy photographers post on their websites to make themselves seem well-travelled.

I've been now twice since I've been living in Beijing, and both have been very worthwhile. The first time I went with a tour group—Beijing Hikers—to 龙泉峪 (Longquanyu), which is an unrestored part of the wall (=crumbling rocks, overgrown shrubs and a whole lot of natural beauty). It was an incredibly smoggy day; in fact, according to the US Embassy live twitter feed on air quality, the air was 'hazardous'—i.e. the worst possible rating. If you're wondering how normal that is, I've seen 'hazardous' 2-3 times in the seven weeks I've been here. When it gets to that point, you can hardly see 500m in front of you and your nasal passages start to fill with gunk, so that you have to blow your nose once an hour just to breathe. That's the kind of pollution that gives you asthma even when you've never had it at home.

Anyway, back to the Great Wall. So when I first went there I couldn't see much for the haze. What I could see was pretty much like everything you see in pictures - long sweeping curves of wall that look like they've been painted by a Chinese water painter's brush tip, against a landscape that's dense with bright green forestation ... and tourists everywhere! The one thing that was actually surprising (that I hadn't noticed just from seeing pics) was the steepness of the mountains. The wall goes straight along the ridge line, which is incredibly jagged. It's like the teeth of a coarse saw if you look at it from the side. To give you an idea, the Chinese character for mountain is based on a pictograph and it looks like this: 山.

So walking along the Great Wall essentially involves going straight up a hill to the top, and then straight back down again. None of this faffing about zigzagging from left to right to make it easier on the old hammies. Nope, let's just go straight up the thing. It looks lovely from photographs but, to be honest, is not a particularly practical way to take on a mountain. What's even more amazing is ... they built a wall on it! Who's idea was that? Really, these mountains are virtually impassable anyway, it seems a little ridiculous when you get to the top to see they've built a wall that essentially goes vertically up the side of the mountain to keep out the 'invaders'.

But the climb is totally worth it. Check it out:

By the way, a small piece of trivia: the Great Wall is not visible from space. Google it.


(stay tuned for part two of the Great Wall series)