My favorite Beijing streets
By Daniel Garst (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-03-29 09:52
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While great cities are often defined by their buildings and landmarks, streets play an equal, if not more important, role in the identity of a metropolise.
If one thinks of Los Angeles, Hollywood and Sunset Boulevards immediately come to mind, while the same goes for Broadway, Park Avenue and Wall Street in New York. Tokyo is famous for Ginza, Berlin boasts the Kurfuerstendamm, and Shanghai has the Bund and Nanjing Road.
As Beijing's old hutong disappear, the capital is increasingly defined by its wide boulevards and new shopping streets, particularly Chang'an Avenue and the Wangfujng and Qianmen pedestrian malls. This trend is in line with the modern and affluent image China wants to project to the rest of the world. However, neither Chang'an Avenue nor the Wangfujing and Qianmen pedestrian malls rank among the best streets in the capital.
While Chang'an Avenue is lined with impressive buildings and landmarks, it exists mainly for motor vehicles and has long sections that are devoid of foot traffic. And now that Wangfujing's night market has become a small remnant of its former self, the mall is just a collection of very nice but uninteresting mega-complexes and stores. And despite all the effort put into restoring the Qianmen mall strip, it has a very artificial feel.
A great street is not just a place where people can go to nice stores and then dine, drink and relax in good restaurants, cafs and bars. Beijing has many streets like that, including the Sanlitun Area where I now live. Great streets have a character all their own.
Three streets in Beijing, the Guozijian, Nanluoguxiang and Gulou Dajie between Andingmennei Dajie and the Drum and Bell Towers, have character in abundance, and all three are closely linked to Beijing's unique cultural and architectural heritage.
The Guozijian, Gulou Dajie and Nanluoguxiang nestle amid the Eastern Dongcheng district's remaining dense network of hutong neighborhoods. The low-slung buildings give these streets a human feel that is lacking in the Wangfujing Mall, where pedestrians are dwarfed by massive high-rise mega-shopping complexes. And while both Wangfujing and Qianmen are largely bricks and concrete, the Guozijian, Gulou Dajie and Nanluoguxiang all have lots of old trees.
Not to beat about the bush, these streets are funky. The Gulou Dajie is home to numerous guitar shops where musicians can often be heard jamming, and Guozijian boasts the quirky "Lost and Found", a treasure trove of odd merchandise, including an old-fashioned Chinese typewriter.
And besides its numerous small and interesting clothing shops, pottery outlets, and photo gallery, Nanluoguxiang has one of Beijing's best DVD stores, a small hole in the wall establishment whose bins are crammed with obscure Chinese and non-Chinese films (the friendly boss does a good job helping customers sort through these riches).
Of course, all three streets are filled with, or are very near, good restaurants and cafs, many of which have pleasant outdoor rooftop dining terraces.
But what sets Guozijian, Gulou Dajie and Nanluoguxiang apart from Beijing's other hot dining areas is that one can find plenty of good neighborhood Chinese restaurants, and their clientele consists of local people.
Indeed, one doesn't have go far off the Guozijian, Gulou Dajie or Nanluoguxiang to get away from the affluent foreigners and Chinese yuppies.
Unlike Houhai's hutong, the neighborhoods around these streets have not been completely taken over by wealthy expats and rich Chinese, and the adjacent hutong are filled with residents relaxing or doing everyday chores.
By contrast, most of the old hutong that once existed around Wangfujing are long gone.
Unfortunately, this kind of urban renewal, or should we say urban removal, is rapidly overtaking the historic Dashila area south of Qianmen.
The vibrant hutong neighborhoods surrounding the Guozijian, Gulou Dajie and Nanluoguxiang are one link between these streets and Beijing's history and cultural heritage.
Another is the ancient Drum and Bell Towers anchoring the Gulou Dajie and Nanluoguxiang and the Guozijian's Confucian Temple.
The latter is one of the capital's underappreciated gems: I love walking among the steles devoted to candidates who endured the "examination hell" and visiting the stunning hall from which the emperor addressed scholars every year.
Although China should be proud of its rapid modernization and is certainly justified to showcase that in the streets of its capital, it also ought to celebrate the historic Guozijian, Gulou Dajie and Nanluoguxiang.
In any case, as this year's long winter finally ends, I'll be making a beeline to all three.