The cab pulls away from the protective cocoon of the Peninsula Hotel. Another dash across this great big city. I think we are headed north, or is it south? I give up trying to figure that out as images catch my eye. When we pass Wangfujing, the main shopping street, a crowd gathers for a small ceremony. A phalanx of military guards in their crisp green uniforms with red-trimmed caps set the stage for the dignitary who will preside at this little event. The formality of the guards is contrasted with the tacky stage with its bright red balloon arch and the paper towers with levitating lanterns. The Chinese love ceremonies with dignitaries. We certainly learned that last year at the Olympics.
We go a little farther and across the street; the staff is lined up outside a restaurant, dark-suited waiters on the left, white-coated kitchen staff on the right. Their leader barks commands like a marine corps drill sergeant and they respond in unison like a bunch of new cadets during training. Will they be cooking meals in there or planning an assault on the senses? This being Beijing, clearly both will be happening.
There's a shop called Sweet Potato Workplace. Hmm, who's doing the working, the people or the potatoes? I wish I could do the eating. Farther on we head into an older neighborhood. The street is lined with lovely arching trees and hutongs, the traditional house-lined alleys of Beijing, small shops along the bigger streets, courtyard houses in the back. The austere gray-roofed homes provide a beautiful setting for the deep red, green, and yellow temples which punctuate this older urban landscape every so often. It makes a for a beautiful ensemble.
Elsewhere, massive gray stone square towers mark the portals of the old Ming city. These are the only remains of the city walls torn down in the 1960s by the Communist government in an effort to open up and modernize the city.
Soon the old city gives way to broad avenues lined with apartment blocks of gated communities, one with an Egyptian temple entry. At the driveway to another, a dwarf in a red silk jacket and black top hat directs traffic into the complex—quite surreal. Huge restaurants sit on many of the streets. They are all adorned with large gaudy signs, bands of neon, letters on top which punch the skyline. I imagine what delicacies the troops inside are preparing—Beijing Duck no doubt. Is there anything better? Bright contemporary restaurants like Do Dong with their eager young staff prepare the duck so that it is light and crispy and absolutely delectable.
As we head farther out, the buildings are taller and newer, huge blocks of them along the busy boulevards. Many are international-style buildings, business centers for the exploding capitalist enterprises here. But this is Beijing, so some of the buildings have decorative tops, temple roofs 30 or 40 stories up in the sky. In this dense urban skyline it is amusing to see these buildings with their "hats," a curious juxtaposition of the modern and the traditional city. Corporate logos and hotel names also dot the skyline; apparently there's no zoning to limit the proliferation of urban signage.
As we pass through the Central Business District, the blackened hulk of Rem Koolhaas' Mandarin Oriental Hotel building sits angrily, a ruined but shapely block next to the dramatic sculptural China Central Television tower which stands like a giant Lego construction in the sky. The hotel and cultural center burned on the last night of the Lunar New Year in February. The hotel was set ablaze by an illegal fireworks display held too close to the unfinished building. Fire equipment couldn't reach high enough to douse the flames. The massive ruin is a cautionary note on the pitfalls of instant overdevelopment. For this New Yorker it provides haunting memories of 9/11 and the ruins of my old office building at 90 West Street.
We're arrived at the conference center...well, not quite. My cab driver wants to dump me out across a busy highway across from the hotel with no apparent route to the front door. I flap my hands and point, she responds in Chinese, somehow we communicate. She understands what I want and makes the elaborate loop needed to get me across the road. It's the Beijing version of the Jersey left turn.
This is my second visit to the Chinese capital and on second glance Beijing has more appeal. Then it was bitterly cold, now I'm enjoying lovely fall days. While before it was a complete mystery, now it begins to make sense. I understand more of the geography and the urban structure, where to find things, and where to look for them. I'm not afraid of it, I can connect with it. A sweet eager smile from a handsome driver in a passing truck helps to bridge the gaps of time and space and brings me right here and now.
