Chinese development and the craze to raze
Hong Kong to UK by train: Day 2
Down with the old, up with the new. Such is the way in contemporary China. In every major town and city the past is being replaced or sanitized in the name of tourism and commercialism, these two myopic siblings stomping hand in hand over much of the uniqueness rapidly disappearing.
And so it is here in Beijing. My first salutation from the city being a walk down Qianmen Dajie on the hunt for my hostel – an avenue pimped with a cherry-picked selection of stores seen on pedestrianized shopping streets the developed world over. There was a Pizza Hut, camera shops, clothes and sportswear outlets, all well-known major brands. The tourists were posing in front of the faux-ancient façades, greedily lapping at this font of homogeneity, and I was left with an initial smack of sadness at the way the world is going.
But China is a country intent on development, and no amount of western sentimentality for what-once-was will stand in the way of this most intriguing of growth spurts. In a land with one of the world’s oldest civilisations, the drive to reinvent itself from insular under-achiever to 21st century global leader has left little that is sacred.
But not all is as gaudily soulless as it may on first appearance seem. With only a few moments’ detour from the sound and the lights of Qianmen Dajie, one can easily get lost amongst history in the hutong that in certain parts criss-cross the city. These narrow, one-storey alleyways have become havens for a non-gentrified, local way of life fast being replaced. It is true, that where in the 1950s the Beijing hutong numbered around 6000 they have now been razed or redeveloped to only 2000, and it is said that 10,000 homes are being lost from the hutong each year, but many still do exist. Some may have been refurbished or appendaged with some breezeblock outhouse or other (Bejing’s hutong are in no way untouched by modernity) but life still goes on governed by the day-to-day practicalities of families living together as a neighbourhood rather than by turnover and the luring of tourists.
Within their warren, even with a map it is easy to lose your way. The alleys are often too small to be labeled or else nameless altogether, and with a rucksack and backpack weighing you down, losing your way can soon turn into a déjà vu-inducing, disoriented torment. I saw the same streets and same people variously cooking, eating, playing cards or getting on with whatever trade happened to make their living whilst on my own accommodation hunt. Even when I asked for directions I would soon be lost again and going round in circles. But without shoulders full of luggage, getting willfully lost in the hutongs is one of the delights of a Beijing stay. How long they will remain, however, is a question only the whim of the developers can answer.
