Covering the last two days, 3-4 and 3-5: Qinghua and Peking University, more food, crazy coincidences, and trying to see what Beijing bars have to offer.

Monday 3-4

First, I woke up at 7:30 and got out the door around 8:30 to walk to the bus which would take me to the subway station. When I tried to board the subway car, there was too many people so I had to wait for the next train! I tried pushing in, but no luck.

Upon arriving at the Qinghua University southern gate I met my friend, who had her dad’s friend who was an ex-professor drive us into campus. Getting into the university requires you to be a student or employee of the university (or family of one) so it’s a great place for the family members of professors to dance in the squares, take walks, and enjoy the scenery away from the busy city.

Besides the gardens and American-Chinese architectural style, it was a pretty unremarkable campus. There’s a lot of business buildings and a tech park nearby the campus, so I imagine there’s a lot more to it than a couple hours walking around with a non-Qinghua friend.

Peking University on the other hand is a very beautiful campus with a more condensed teaching area. We happened to walk through this section of the campus when classes let out, and it was more crowded than most subway stations during peak times! The lake in the middle of campus was tasteful, and there were some people that were walking around in subtly fashionable clothes – the kind of clothes you know cost more than the plane ticket back home.

This university is extremely famous for its prestige and alumni, including many people I’ve run upon during my studies – figures like Mao Zedong, Li Keqiang, Bo Xilai, Lu Xun, Hu Shi, and Fei Xiaotong all had some relationship to the university. It’s the center for intellectual movements like the Tiananmen protests and the more recent (2018) “Orthodox Marxism Societies” related to Yue Xin and the Jasic Workers Solidarity Group I did some research on for classes.

While we were on campus, we saw other foreigners walking around trying to interview students. At some point we saw them in a confrontation with the campus security, who used force to confiscate their camera and delete video from it. My friend and I happened to meet them at a crosswalk and I asked them about what happened. Turns out they were part of some English program and one of them was a Peking University alumni. They were doing some interviews to “show how good Beida student’s English is” but I surmised it was more entertainment content for social media. The speculation among us as to why the security wouldn’t let them film was that if Beida students had poor English and this ended up on the internet, it could cause them to lose face and get heckled. Naturally my friend and I were interviewed, and I got to show off my Nanjing dialect Chinese and banter a bit.

Overall, my impression of the two universities is that Qinghua is more geared towards business, sciences, technology, and engineering while Peking University is about liberal arts. As visitors it’s hard to get a good impression of the community and culture, but it was a great experience.

After all this plus some coffee, it was time for dinner and this Chinese friend and I joined the German guy I’m staying with for some Beijing food in the Wudaokou area. We had our rounds of Er Guo Tou and talked for two hours about Chinese culture and our time in China. Before we ran into this German friend’s girlfriend on the street. What a coincidence! And then after eating we ran upon her again, just after finishing up dinner with her friend. It’s fate! Of all the times we could have left the restaurant, of all the streets we walked down, we happened upon her twice.

After this it was just the trip home.

Tuesday 3-5

The day before yesterday, I went to a hutong district near the drum tower (Gulou) and bought some souvenirs for gifts. This went well, and afterwards I checked out Houhai which was apparently an “art bar” district according to a friend who’s spent some time in Beijing. It must have been because it was a Tuesday night, but there wasn’t much besides employees trying to get you in with calls of “Beer?”

After this I tried going to some bars in Sanlitun. I heard it was a fun place a decade ago but recently reformed. Sure enough, it was the usual Chinese bar scene where hawkers try to lure you into their bars. I went home after a quick walk around and a single beer at what looked like a popular expat bar. Later, I learned that Wudaoku has more interesting spots due to its proximity to colleges, but that’s a trip for next time.

In Nanjing I had a decent idea of where some interesting places to hang out were that offered some good conversation, but it’s been a lot harder to find that in Beijing. Especially on a Tuesday.

Wednesday 3-6

Since I haven’t had “特辣” (“exceptionally spicy”) food in China so I went to a 重庆小面 shop and had some. It was so hot I started sweating, tearing up, and coughing. The women working there originally said it was so cool a foreigner was having such spicy food, but it turned into being roasted by a ton of old women for not being able to handle it. I could only finish about half and ran outside to a nearby shop to grab some milk.

After this I headed over to the 798 art district. It wasn’t too interesting and was no different than Shanghai’s version of a “warehouse art district.” I assume it was much more influential in the past, like Sanlitun. Or maybe I wasn’t looking hard enough.

But what was a fun time was going to Caochangdi which was northeast of 798. One thing I’ve missed most about Nanjing was the kind of street I lived on, with fruit vendors and all sorts of food stalls offering cheap and tasty eats. Caochangdi scratched that itch, and is packed full of food choices and shops. The alleyways and narrow busy streets surrounded by tall buildings reminded me of my old street in Nanjing. According to online sources it is supposed to have hosted a lot of art spaces and even Ai Weiwei’s studio, but I had trouble finding artistic influence besides the odd studio. Still absolutely worth the trip though.