Last Day In Beijing (5MAY)

CCTV headquarters, said to have as much office space as the Pentagon. Notice the building next door which has noticeable fire damage... there's a funny story behind that...


Beijings World Trade Center Tower, China's tallest building. Just a few blocks from the CCTV Building


The Olympic Swim cube and a crazy Olympic torch inspired skyscraper, which has a huge TV/jumbotron screen on it.

More of the Olympic Park Grounds, grand walkway, lighting and the Control tower.

The birdsnest main Olympic stadium.

Our last day in Beijing was a bit of an architectural tour for me. I had read a national Geographic special on China and Beijing, which had highlighted a lot of the new construction that was rapidly dominating the skylines of Beijing with greater western influence than some locals, and worldwide culture conservationists, care to see. I would agree that a lot of historical structures and even neighborhoods are being lost, but I am not going to pretend I have a pulpit to preach from on this front.

I can say I was amazed as I traveled across the country and saw the expansive the constructions efforts in almost every city and village. At times, it even seemed like entire cities and suburbs were being built from the ground up and were only populated by the constructions workers raising the skyline from the earth. A horizon dotted with cranes, the skeletons of buildings slowly being filled in with the circulations systems of plumbing, and electrical circuitry, meat of insulation still flapping in the wind before the skin of siding could be applied to conceal it all. In some areas, even the new construction was already in decay, leaning and crumbling victims of recent earthquakes, in a sad state of ruin before even the first tenant had moved in.

Back in Beijing, we stopped in the Chaoyang district in the eastern section of the city for our last few hours before catching the train to Xian. Most of the new buildings I saw there was complete and quickly being filled by the consumers of the new capitalist state. However, there were also a few new construction sites were still springing up in the spaces between. Some of the buildings I had read about in National Geographic were in this district, like the China World Trade Center, which is the tallest building in China. I had also read about the new CCTV tower, which was under construction when the article was published but had recently been completed. I was struggling to find it, which was surprising since it is such a large building, I expected to see it on the horizon, but could not see beyond the canopy of the urban jungle on any street I wondering along.

While searching for the CCTV building, I ran into ‘Ricky,’ a local ‘artist’ that chatted with me for a few minutes, before inviting me up to see his art exhibition. This is a common scam on the streets of Beijing where ‘local artists’ will invite you to their exhibition and charge exorbitant amounts for the artwork, which is often not really even their work. I knew this going in and did not have any intention to buy anything, but the kid seemed friendly enough, so I took him up on the offer to look. He showed me a few of the works he claimed as his own as well as many of the nicer pieces that were said to be done by his instructor. He did a good job explaining the meaning behind the various pieces. He had painted a collection of paintings representing the four seasons. He explained that the seasons also represent a persons life (Spring: Birth, Summer: Youth, Autumn: Adulthood/Productive Years and Winter: Retirement/Old Age). He nearly insulted me by saying I was in the autumn of my life, but quickly recovered by explaining that those are often your best years.

I enjoyed chatting with him and as expected, we ended up getting down to the business of discussing a purchase. To sweeten the deal he also introduced me to his instructor who painted my name in Chinese characters as a thank you for visiting. Of course, we had to wait for it to dry and what better way to wait, than looking for a piece to buy. I entertained him and we discussed his artwork on the seasons, and in the end I walked away with Spring and Autumn for 30 dollars, which was a little high for China but not bad. I would like to hope Ricky was really the artist, and I wish him a rich harvest in the autumn of his career.

On my way out, they gave me direction to the CCTV building and also informed me that the locals affectionately refer to the building as men’s underwear because of it’s unique design of two towers joined by a bridge along the upper floors. I also later learned that the building next to it was damaged by fire when the workers set off fireworks to celebrate the completion of the CCTV tower. The ensuing damage is reportedly valued at 13 billion Yuan (approx. six billion US Dollars), and the construction workers are still at large.

Another common scam in Beijing is cute ‘college girls’ who approach western men and ask them if they would come with them to a tea house, so the ‘students’ can practice their English. The westerner then gets stuck with the bill for tea that costs about six dollars for each thimble sized glass. I also met a few attractive young students and, though the never said they wanted to practice their English, they did ask if I would like to join them for tea. We chatted for a bit, and they were fun to talk with, but I excused myself to buy sunglasses at the flea market across the street. I do not know if they were legitimate students or not, but they did help me by telling me not to pay more than 30 Yuan for sunglasses. Armed with this advice, I entered and found a sunglass shop, the girl working at the shop helped me pick out a pair and then we began to barter a price on a hand held calculator.
She began with, “I like you. Normally I sell these glasses for 500 but for you…” she typed 300.
I laughed and said, “I like your enthusiasm, but I’m thinking…” I typed 30.
“No, you need to type serious price so we can barter. Here…” Again she typed 300.
“This is a serious offer…” again I type 30.
“No, you must go higher before I go lower. These are high quality sunglasses…” so this time I type 20.
Now, I was breaking all the rules and she did not like it at all. I think she then typed 320 and I told her to have a good day, and I would shop elsewhere, since this was a five story mall of street side style stalls selling tons of the same fake copies of brand name merchandise. As I tried to walk away she grabbed at my arm and tried to reinvigorate the bartering banter but, realizing it was going nowhere, finally surrendered to the 30 Yuan price with a huff. Whether or not the girls on the street were trying to con me with tea, I do thank them for the advice on the glasses.

In addition to the Chaoyang district, we also made a quick stop at the Olympic complex, which was still busy with a few tourists but felt very empty compared to the crowds in the rest of the city. I had seen the buildings highlighted on the news coverage of the games, but I was surprised at how large the entire Olympic complex area was. In such a crowded and tightly packed city, it seemed like the grand walk/parade areas, that were at least 100 yards wide and several blocks long, were out of place and a waste of space. The area also had a similar feeling as some of the other areas of rapid expansion construction across the country. Though the games had just passed, the area felt like it was both just being completed and simultaneously beginning to decay. The grounds seemed like they had just been planted, but in need of grooming and the buildings had temporary barriers erected to direct the crowds to operating entrances and the swimming cube already had sections of its bubbled exterior deflated and torn.