It’s almost exactly a decade since I’ve been to China. Perhaps not a significant hiatus for most but for me given that it’s a country I lived in for 6 years, where I got married and where my eldest son was born, it’s probably been too long a gap between visits.
The pandemic certainly didn’t help and even for the Mrs it’s therefore been 7 years since she returned, while my youngest boy is visiting his Chinese family for the very first time.
Actually, the visiting family part will have to wait a while longer because for the first couple of weeks of the holiday, we’ll be travelling around several parts of China starting with Beijing.
If you’ve never visited China then Beijing is a great place to start. In many ways it encapsulates the country as a whole and its opposing, often contradictory feel.
Beijing is both steeped in tradition while at the same time ultra modern. One moment you can be surrounded by high rise buildings, bright lights and all the hubbub of one of the world’s largest cities and the next, you find yourself in a hutong 胡同, a traditional Beijing neighbourhood of largely single story buildings, where life takes on a less frenetic pace.
Sky Scrapers in central Beijing
True, many of the traditional hutongs are disappearing either to be replaced by skyscrapers or modernised into tourist traps where residential properties are replaced by businesses selling the idea of old Beijing but if you’re willing to break away from crowds and walk down some less well signposted streets you can still find it.
In fact, one of the things I’ve always liked about travelling in China is how safe I feel. Yes, I’m a white 6ft tall male so I’m probably better off than some and it helps that I speak passable Mandarin making trips ‘off the beaten track’ much easier to navigate.
a 胡同 Hutong in central Beijing
Still anti-social behaviour here is more of a general annoyance than a physical threat which is not the case everywhere, even when walking in parts of the UK. The constant staring, the surprised calls of 老外 laowai（foreigner) when you’re seen and a lack of personal space I’m sure will start to grate (as they did 10 years ago) but for now I’m happy to chalk these up to curiosity mixed in with a bit of ignorance on behalf of some of the locals. I also know it’ll be a lot worse once we reach my wife’s home town which is nowhere as cosmopolitan as Beijing!
We landed in Beijing at about 2pm local time and made it to our hotel by 4pm. It’s a simple, bog standard Chinese chain hotel, nothing special but the beds are comfy enough, it’s relatively quiet and it’s right around the corner from a metro station which is good news because it’s damn hot! By the time I’ve dragged the suitcase the 300m from the metro to the reception I’m caked in sweat.
After showering and chilling out in the air con for a short while we headed out for dinner. No great surprise, there’s a really good Beijing duck restaurant a couple of mins walk away. I say it’s really good but that’s based on the kids’ feedback as between them they scoffed almost the entire half duck! Obviously they get a good deal of Chinese cuisine at home but I think
they’ll enjoy eating out here even more.
the boys are ready to add Beijing duck to the endangered species list
Our first full day we’ve organised a car to drive us the 2 hours out to part of the Great Wall. We want to avoid the worst of the rush hour and the afternoon heat so we ask the driver to pick us up at 7am.
I set the alarm for 6 but when it goes off I make the cardinal sin of closing it and thinking I’ll just lie quietly for a few minutes before getting going. Of course, I fall back to sleep and 45mins later sit bolt upright and raise the alarm. We jump to it, bundle some clothes on (no point showering now) and tumble down into the car, even finding time to grab some 笼子包 shao long Bao (steamed dumplings) for breakfast on the way.
I’ve forgotten how bad Chinese driving is! As we head down massive highways it seems that every driver is compelled to change lane every 500m without reason or warning. There were at least 4 occasions on the trip there and back that almost resulted in us being involved in an unnecessary collision. However, we survived and it was worth it!
We arrived at a part of the Great Wall called 慕田峪 (Mutianyu). You can get a cable car up from the bottom of the valley to the wall itself but the queue was long and we thought we’d brave the climb on foot. It’s a little cooler out here and a nice breeze was blowing but it was still hard work! We took a couple of water breaks but credit to the boys they touched it out to the top.
Once there you can see the wall stretching off into the distance, winding up and down the ridges as it goes. It does of course mean lots more steps both up and down and the Mrs and boys eventually gave up and left me to climb the last few watchtowers to the top of this part of the reclaimed wall. The wall does continue onwards but it’s not safe for thousands of tourists to walk along some of the parts which have begun to crumble over the years.
Despite the crazy driving, I’m glad we have a driver waiting for us when we get back to the bottom rather than trying to fight it out on public transport. We’re all beat and in need of a relaxing drive back to Beijing and a meal.
The next day we head out into Beijing. Our initial plan had been to go to the Forbidden City but it’s school holidays and we weren’t able to get the tickets. No great loss for me because I’ve been before but would have been nice for the kids.
The Imperial Vault of Heaven
Instead, we head for another of Beijing’s main attractions, the Temple of Heaven, a massive complex of religious buildings constructed over 600 years ago during the Ming Dynasty. The Temple was the place that the Emperor and his court would visit to perform a variety of rituals and sacrifices in order to maintain their ‘mandate from heaven’. The rituals lasted days and it was widely believed that even the smallest deviation from the script could have disastrous consequences for the Emperor’s rule and the kingdom more generally.
The Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests
After a hot day of walking through Beijing we head for a dinner at a popular Chinese fast food restaurant chain called 沙县 Sha Xian. You can find multiple Sha Xians in every town and city in China and they’re good for getting basic, rice, noodle and dumpling
I went for my usual portion of 煎饺 jian jiao (steamed dumplings) and was happy to find that they still serve the exact same spicy sauce from 10 years ago. I used to stop at my local Sha Xian on the way home from work and order the exact same thing washed down with a nice cold bottle of beer. That’s the taste of China I remember.