Day 8- Strolling the Streets
After a morning of lectures, I again was able to delve deeper into understanding China’s history and culture. I’m surprised by how useful I am finding these lessons. They really enable me to ‘get’ China; when I am exploring the city, I understand what people have been through and how their country has changed so much over recent times. Most of this is completely new to me even though my professor said some of things we are learning are taught in elementary school here! It shows how our own education system is relatively ethnocentric so I am enjoying getting a glimpse of how this non-western society actually lives.
After class, I grabbed some lunch in the cafeteria (shrimp, rice and veg) and explored campus a little more. Then a few of us decided to go out for dinner to Ghost Street. Contrary to its name; it is extremely busy! The street is lined with brightly lit restaurants with waiters standing in the street ready to entice you in to get your dinner; of course all claiming theirs is the ‘best’. We also noticed lots of lobsters outside; presumably you pick the one you want to eat first...the picture I took above is an example; it made me laugh as the tub was in the middle of the street! After deciding on somewhere to eat, we ordered a mix of dishes and a jug of watermelon juice to share. It was delicious.
We then wandered the streets. We first came across a park that had loud music being played. Intrigued, we walked over to find the place full of people working out; following an instructor in the middle. It was a bit like Zumba, but calmer. Of course we couldn’t help but join in and it was quite a work out! We wandered down a bit further only to come across some elderly ladies ‘flag waving’ in the street. More accurately; they had silk cloth attached to the end of their fans that they were waving. We watched for a while, clapped then kept walking down. We weren’t disappointed! Another park we came across was also full of people with music playing. Here they were ballroom dancing. Again, we joined in although we had no idea how to dance so not only did we get stares because of our skin colour but also our terrible moves! We weren’t taking it very seriously and an elderly lady came up to us (the one in the picture above) telling us how to do it. Of course we had no idea what she was saying and she couldn’t understand us, so it was quite comical! Seeing this really gave us an insight into the community here; everyone came together to have fun and get fit- it was such a good atmosphere.
We kept walking and fortunately stumbled across a busy market street. There were shops and food stalls lining a narrow cobblestone street packed with locals and tourists. It also had a lively atmosphere and it was fun to wander through.
Overall, it was a great evening. The night does have a different feeling than the day. Both day and night are busy here in Beijing but in very different ways. The evening felt a lot more relaxed; people came out to socialise, shop and eat and it was good to join in with this.