re were shops peeking out from doors and holes. I had never grasped the meaning of the term “a hole in the wall” until this day. Shops and eateries were operated often not from large spaces, and not even from rooms but rather, from simple holes carved in the cement covered walls……All of these shops were quite dark. Either they had no electricity, or the few fixtures they had were not turned on. Some f these tiny places consisted of no more than a person seated inside of a door way, hovering over a single bowl of vegetables offered for sale.
In the shop pictured below, we see some loose noodles lying in an open plastic bag on the lower left corner, next to a box of what might be radishes......On the right we see large bottles of something which could possibly be juice, or which might be some kind of oil. These appear next to milk crates full of bottled beer and in front of other milk crates holding I am not sure what kind of fruit. What I did not catch at the time is the large bags of open pet food standing on the step. We see a pink bag of Whiskas and an orange bag of Pedigree dog food. I get the impression that customers would not buy the entire bag, but might just purchase a scoop or two, to get through a short period of time. Behind these bags we see two bowls full of what may be eggs, but it is very hard to tell. Behind the two ladies standing in the doorway, sacks are piled high inside the storage area of the shop. These app
ear to be rice. And two buckets appear behind the jars, one bright orange and one in hot pink. These also say Whiskas on the side, so this is perhaps more cat food.Another shop featured a plank set outside, a top a couple of crates. Plum, radishes, cucumbers and a bag of green beans were for sale. A window above held bok choy, some spring onions and a scale. Two stacks of plastic bags were nailed to the wall and a white sign in red characters was displayed above.The neighborhood was very a very large, of narrow alleyways. In some places there was room only for our line of pedicabs, and one very precariously passing bicycle, teetering between us and the wall. I know this quite well because as we traveled, several peddling peddlars came right along side of us and tried to sell us postcards, jewelry and all manner of trinkets. Buyao, sie sie, we would say over and over again. Our guides had taught us as the polite way to say something like, I don't want any, thank you... and we had so very many chances to practice this phrase in China.
In some places we saw new doors being hung, and the ubiquitous piles of bricks standing and waiting for you-are-never-quite-sure-what . Piles of bricks lie everywhere in China...in this community, evidence of the gentrification well under way for this Beijing community which truly is one of the most expensive places to live in the city. Having seen a few new and well manicured highrises, this was difficult for us to believe, but the appeal of the historical district and the comparatively less crowded living conditions is quite strong, I suppose.The homes were large and rambling, and laid around courtyards. You could not tell where one ended and another began, because they were all connected together . At one time these courtyard homes would house one family, an extended family perhaps, but just one. Now they are each multifamily housing, with at least four families or so, sharing a courtyard. We listened to very elaborate explanations of who stayed in which part of the house, all determined by Feng Shui.
Spirits can come into a house, but not if there is a threshold because spirits cannot bend at the knee. Hence, each house in the hutong, had quite a nice high threshold. Further, if spirits were to get in, they would be foiled by walls in front of them, as spirits are not able to turn corners.
Something enters a house from the northwest and goes out through the southeast opening, but I cannot recall what…….good luck? Not sure. But each house is constructed so as to have openings at these directions. Everyone in the family had a specific room to sleep in, and again, I believe this was determined by feng shui, such that the parents would sleep in a certain room of the home, with the eldest son in another certain room. Other sons would share a room of lesser benefit. Daughters got no room at all, but slept outside in the courtyard.
Ah, but at least these were very NICE courtyards. The one which we visited was a magical place , quite large and dominated by nice big trees. The edges were formed of a platform all along the edge of the four connecting sides of the home, all under cover of an overhang. Beautiful tile adorned the gutterless roofs. The edge of the roof was slightly upturned, as you would expect the roof of a pagoda to be...this I suppose, helps to slow down the rainwater as it falls off the roof. The walls were of a grey brick and the woodwork adorning the windows and the doors was ornate, in emerald green and in red. We also had quite a lesson in the meaning of color in China .......red is the color of happiness in China, which is why brides wear bright red silk dresses, and green is the color of the people.
From the raised platform, you could walk down two or three steps into the courtyard garden, where you could walk along brick-paved paths, each surrounding little plots were vegetables and herbs were growing. Bird cages hung in one section, as did gourds attached to a wooden drying structure you could walk into. Flower pots stood about i n groups. Red paper lanterns and banners displaying characters hung in from the overhang
As the group stood and watched a kite making demonstration, I had the most amazing thought. For a moment I must have forgotten just where I was. I thought to myself, “I bet this is the exactly the kind of thing I would see were I ever to visit the REAL China. I had to pinch myself back to my senses to remember, that yes, I was IN the REAL China, the China which I had read so much about in the storybooks of my youth, and which I had come to believe was a closed country……a country which I would never have the opportunity to visit.
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