Central Perk the place for friends
By Liu Yi-Wei (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-07-17 09:37
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Six years after its last episode was released, Friends, a TV sitcom following the lives of a tightly knit group of six friends, remains one of the most popular American TV shows among young people in China.
Some Chinese universities even use episodes of Friends to help students understand American culture and speech and the show is almost universally known among English-speakers.
And nowhere else is the popularity of Friends in China more evident than in the new Friends Cafe in Beijing, where the owner of the cafe, Du Xin, has set up a startling imitation of the Central Perk cafe from the show.
On the sixth floor of Building A in Chaowai Soho, the cafe models the famous Central Perk in New York from the set of Friends down to the sofas, the oversized cups, the writing on the walls, and even the bicycle outside the shop.
Du, after studying thousands of photos of the show's Central Perk, took months designing the cafe, finally opening it a month ago.
"I wanted to create a place where we can learn to treat our friends like they do on the show, to cherish our friendships and wife like Chandler," Du says. "I saw the show, fell in love, and just wanted to do something for the show by sharing this love with other fans."
Indeed, customers are usually huge fans of the show themselves. Some customers volunteer to be "Rachel", a character on the show known to help her friends serve coffee. There is sometimes even the occasional "Pheobe", famous for her guitar-strumming and humorous songs.
"They did a really good job making this cafe like the one in Friends. The atmosphere is so relaxed and is a testament to the success of Friends in China," says Walter McKenzie, a foreign tourist and a fan of the show, who visited the cafe after seeing Internet buzz about it during his stay in Beijing.
The reruns of episodes of Friends that play continuously on the TVs and pictures of memorable moments from the show on a wall, undoubtedly add to the atmosphere.
"I love Friends and I was so happy to be able to come to this cafe. I could stay here for hours, watching these reruns," says a local customer.
Du gives his explanation why he thought so many Chinese young people love watching Friends: "The humor is easy to understand and, compared to other soap operas, it's all very realistic."
"I have watched this TV show about 20 times, and a lot of my customers have done the same thing," Du adds. "The first time you think the show is just funny, but watching it again and again makes you see the love and relationships between the characters; it's like a perfect fairy tale."
He hopes that more fans, either local or foreign, either those who have watched all episodes countless times or those who are still in the middle of it all, can make a trip to Beijing's very own Central Perk cafe. It certainly is a unique experience to enjoy.