Nanluoguxiang

Had a great session last night with Daniel Bell, Chris Panza and Randy Perenboom, among others.  They all had detailed comments on a couple of chapters of my book.  Some of Daniel's graduate students were there as well and they, too, gave me a lot to think about.  We sat and talked and drank and ate for several hours, a regular salon!  The book should be better for all of this help.

I'm a bit too distracted, however, to delve into the substance of their suggestions here.  Rather, I am just going to put up some more photos of the neighborhood where I am staying: Nanluoguxiang.

The main hutong here has been taken over by lots of trendy boutiques and bars, as I mention below.  But those businesses have preserved the basic architecture of the area.  And, overall, I think the adaptation works.  It seems preferable to me to work with and through existing buildings, to save at least some of the old physical surroundings, as opposed to wholesale demolition that happens in so many other sections of the city.  If the cost is a bit of kitsch,  so be it.  As you can see below, there is a very pleasant and uniquely  Beijing quality to the streets:

More photos below the jump:

Many of the businesses do not  unduly disrupt the feel of the street:

And the intrusion of the modern allows for the persistence of tradition.  In the mornings peddlars move through the hutongs, singing out what wares they are selling, a practice that goes back a long, long time.  Here is a woman on her trycycle selling flour for noodles (that's what I think it was, at least.  The combination of the local dialect and the special sing-song call makes it hard to translate):

The cars don't quite fit, but they're everywhere (it's very much a car city now):

The front of my hotel, said to date back to the 19th century:

And, finally, the inner court yard of my hotel:

Comments

[Peony]

I've really been enjoying looking at the pictures and dreaming of walking down the street above. When do you head back into the sunset?

[Meg]

Where is that hotel? The other pictures look like the brick factory hutong, off Dianmenwai dajie, but I didn't know there was a hotel there. Or do I have my twisty hutong streets confused?