Classic touch

Customers holding bird cages, smoking pipes, enjoying tea and gossip, acrobats tumbling, waiters bustling about with white towels on their shoulders, busy filling teacups with boiling water from long-spouted teapots.

These scenes from Beijing's old teahouses should not be missed. To bring back the unique flavor of traditional Beijing culture, the first Beijing traditional culture festival, with more than 60 traditional shows in venues like tea houses and crosstalk theaters, will run from Nov 6 to 20.

The festival will kick off this Saturday with a grand Chinese folk music concert, "Nu Er Feng Liu", at Tianqiao Theater. It will include Chinese classic music and complicated ancient dances. At the Lao She Tea House (No.3 Qianmen West Street), audiences can enjoy the show "Four Seasons, Beijing Tea" to explore the essence of China's tea culture.