Traditional splendour meets relentless progress in Beijing

Spending a few days in China's booming capital Beijing gives you box seats to the amazing transition taking place in the world's mst populous nation, as millions of people each year move from impoverished rural provinces for a taste of modern capitalism. Many of the physical changes to the cityscape occurred in the lead up to the 2008 Olympic Games, but on a human level the metamorphosis continues.

Amazingly, this sprawling metropolis of 19 million people is only China’s third largest city, behind Chongqing and Shanghai. Like most Chinese urban jungles, it is immaculately well planned, arranged around a set of concentric ring roads spiralling out from the centre.

Beijing is spread out, even at its bustling epicentre. The roads, arranged in a neat grid pattern, are very wide and the blocks are enormous. Looking at a map gives you the impression that the city is quite compact, until you realise it can be up to a kilometre between major thoroughfares! There is also a slick modern and efficient subway, although this hasn’t done much to curb the city’s alarmingly choked arteries. It is possible to get stuck in appalling traffic jams at any hour of the day.

Lantern-lined Ghost Street (Guijie)

Most of the city’s tourist attractions are handily clustered in the centre of town around Beijing’s historical heart, the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square. Nestled among the traffic-choked boulevards of the Dongcheng district is a maze of alleyways known as hutongs, which provide a fascinating glimpse into traditional Chinese life. Hutongs are jammed with hole in the wall restaurants, where workers slurp up steaming bowls of noodle soup, small grocery stores stacked with cigarettes, rice wine and vegetables and traditional Chinese courtyard houses hiding behind high brick walls.

Courtyard houses are shared by several families who are often part of the same work unit, which, after the immediate family, is the building block of Chinese social life. Members of work units not only live together, they also holiday together, visiting other parts of China on guided tours, wearing identically coloured hats and following a flag-toting guide.

Many run-down Hutongs are being cleared for developments

Hanging in a hutong and peeking into bicycle-crowded entranceways is the best way to observe ordinary Chinese people go about their business. There is always something happening in the alleys – I walked past three ladies lounging around on a couch outside a house, gossiping away, and several groups of men arguing heatedly over games of Chinese chess.

Houses in many of the city’s hutongs are pretty run-down, and since the construction boom leading up to the Olympics many have been cleared to make way for shiny new developments. Sadly one of Beijing’s last remaining cultural institutions is gradually disappearing.

There is an impossible number of attractions and entertainment options in Beiiing, and like most things in China, everything is done on a grand scale. The Forbidden City, once the heart of imperial China, is no exception. Passing under the Meridian Gate opposite Tiananmen Square, the stately main entrance bearing an enormous portrait of Mao Tse Tung, you are instantly aware of the enormity of the place.

Entrance to Forbidden City

There are another five identical gates to pass through before you reach a dizzying labyrinth clustered with 20 or so palaces, plus other interesting sites housing ancient calligraphy and ceramics collections and other royal treasures. The palaces were predominantly built during the Ming dynasty in the 1600s. Many were destroyed (often repeatedly) by fire and later rebuilt and updated during the later Qing dynasty which ruled until the fuedal system was brought down in 1911. Many buildings had amusingly grandiose names. My favourites were the Hall of Mental Cultivation, The Palace of Gathered Elegance and the Hall of Martial Valor. I also loitered around the Hall of Literary Glory, hoping some to absorb some good vibes.

It seemed the emperors had palaces for all occasions. There was the resting palace, where the emperor would have some downtime before important state visits or war meetings, palaces for the various armies of concubines, and palaces occupied by different emperors at various times throughout history. At the top of the site sits the imperial garden, a tranquil area dotted with dome-shaped pavilions surrounded by cypress trees and rock gardens.

All buildings are of a similar design, with identical roof tiles, colourfully painted beams and upward-sloping eaves adorned with tiny dragon figurines. The network of walls in the city, both inside and out, are all painted red. Aside from the enormity of it all, the most amazing thing about the Forbidden City is how incredibly well-preserved the buildings are, both inside and out. Many of the palaces are still decorated with their original objects – elegant wood-carved furniture, ornaments and beds still made up with mattresses and bolsters.

Beijing’s parks are built on a similarly grand scale, and are another great way to gain an insight into daily life. We visited the Tian Tan, built 600 years ago during the Ming dynasty. The centrepiece is the Temple of Heavenly Peace where people went to pray for bumper harvests. The park, set over more than 100 acres, also contains a tomb and other imperial buildings including a fasting palace, where the emperor would avoid meat, alcohol, women and other vices before a big event.

Smoking men

Curiously, there is an entry fee for the park, and it costs extra to visit the palaces, but we didn’t bother because there was quite enough to entertain us just strolling along the cypress-lined avenues and exploring the various gardens. One area was packed with groups of exuberant cards and chess players, while on benches under the cypress trees people sat, smoked and chatted in groups of twos and threes. There were even small choral groups practicing under the trees surrounding the rose garden. A conductor faced the group, who followed a book of song verses attached to a music stand.

The Chinese seem to make the most of their playtime. Despite the early winter chill, they turn out in droves every morning to practice tai-chi in the park. Others group together for ping-pong tournaments in neighbourhood parks, or play hacky sack with curious bouncing objects shaped like badminton shuttlecocks.

Despite increasing levels of car ownership – which often cost Chinese families more than the value of their homes – bicycles and scooters are the preferred means of getting about. Beijing is an amazingly bike-friendly city. Besides being pancake flat, there are dedicated bicycle lanes on every road. Still, cycling around the city is not without its perils, mainly because bigger vehicles automatically assume right of way, and at every intersection cars turn across bicycle lanes whenever they feel like it.

Cars are allowed to turn right on red lights, and scooters share the bicycle lanes. If that wasn’t enough, cars often sneak in there too, and park right across the lane. There is also the danger of pedestrians stepping out on the street without looking. I saw three traffic accidents – all involving pedestrians – during my time in Beijing.

Sculpture at 798 Art Zone

Being a pedestrian automatically puts you at the bottom of the pile. Even though all of the intersections are marked with green men, they do not make a scrap of difference, as every time you cross a road you are stalked by turning cars, scooters and bicycles, many of which are electric so you can’t hear them coming. Some of the streets are over 10 lanes wide, so crossing them can be quite an experience!

Riding around the city was an exhilarating, if not slightly perilous experience. We rode out to the edgy 798 contemporary art zone, a precinct of galleries, cafes and restaurants in a disused East German factory. The trip took us right out near Beijing airport, somewhere between the fourth and fifth ring roads. There was an amazing variety on exhibition there in the muddle of independent galleries - from Chinese contemporary paintings to kooky sculptures to a Tibetan photo collection to North Korean propaganda art - where we got in trouble with the thought police for taking photos.