Yandai Xijie

The afternoon was nice and not too warm after another thundery night, so we went on a short tandem ride to Yandai Xijie in the Houhai district to restock our fresh coffee supply. It's only about three miles away, and a relatively nice bike ride past lakes Xihai and Houhai. Only the very busy junction of Xinjiekouwai Street and the Third Ring Road presents the problems of cycling on Beijing's busy streets.

The Lotus in Lake Xihai are beginning to bloom and look pretty


Lake Xihai


Lotus Blossom
Yandai Xijie is a little passageway of tourist shops and restaurants. A pair of young artists were painting the street.


Artists


The Real Thing
Unfortunately, there was nobody to sell us the coffee beans at the shop - a trio was playing cards on the balcony, and told us there was no-one from the shop there, although the door was open. So we rode around the back streets a little, and eventually refound the Passerby Bar and had some cold coffee.

Rainy Days

Rainy Morning on BNU Campus

Umbrellas

Umbrella Seller
What a change from when we first arrived at the beginning of March! The weather is now a mixture of sunny hot and rather humid days, getting up to 97F today for example, and heavy rain and thunder storms. This umbrella sales lady was opposite the kindergarten on campus, taking advantage of the market for protection against both rain and sun. Umbrellas are used a great deal for both purposes here, as you can see from the picture of the crowds waiting in the sun to enter the mausoleum of Mao Zedong from two weekends ago. And in both sun and rain you can see many people cycling along holding an umbrella in one hand. Another common sight is a man on the saddle, and a woman on the luggage rack behind, holding an umbrella over both of them.

The rain is certainly a nice change from the bone-dry weather of winter. Unfortunately one thing that is the same is that the air is almost never clear. Back then it was the dust from the winds. Now a combination of the humidity and presumably city smog means that, again, we don't see blue sky for days on end. Even looking across campus the haze is evident.

More Pictures from Cuandixia

Door Screen


Dried Corn


Doorway


Stone Walls


Construction Worker


Stove


Wall Construction


Well


Child Playing

Cuandixia

Chinese Character from Cuandixia
Cuandixia is a small village of old stone cottages about 60 miles from Beijing. It has been turned into a tourist attraction - you pay (20 yuan) to enter the village, and almost every house either is a little shop selling souvenirs, or will put visitors up overnight or serve meals. This sounds dreadful, but the village is actually very pleasant to visit - it does not have the Disneyland feel of artificial reconstruction that characterizes many of the historic attractions in China.

We spent several hours wandering around the narrow passageways and looking at the cottages, and ended up having lunch by ourselves in one of the homes. Many of the homes (including the one where we had lunch) are constructed as four tiny buildings around a central courtyard - I couldn't tell if this was for a single family or more.


Aerial View


Fields and Village


Rooftops


Courtyard Home


Precarious


Cute Dog


Colorful Screens


Doorway and Cottages

Fishing Lake Xihai

Fishing is a popular pastime in China - maybe partly because fresh fish is an essential part of meals. Xihai lake in Beijing near the BNU campus seems to be a favorite place for this. The fish being caught were quite large - some enough to feed four I would guess. I don't know if the lake is stocked, or if the fish are natural.

At one end of the lake there is a small pool dammed off from the main lake. There were several people fishing there. The man in the black tee shirt caught about 10 fish for every one caught by all the others put together. He would through the hook in, and after a wait of typically 30 seconds would suddenly yank the rod and have a large fish attached. He must have had some secret!


Fishing


Got One!


Hauling in the Catch


Meet the Fish

This man had caught four, and was cleaning them in the lake.



Cleaning the Fish
All around the lake the bank was lined with fishermen...


Xihai Fishermen
....some with quite fancy equipment including very long poles (but they weren't catching nearly as many as the man in the black tee shirt!)



This spot looked very peaceful:

Winding Down

Term is coming to an end here at BNU. Here are some pictures of end-of-term activities;


Lining Up for the Paperwork


Music School Students' Graduation Concert


Chinese Dulcimer (Yangqin)


Physics Masters Students Preparing for their Photo


Shipping Home


Dorm Sidewalk Sale

Picture Puzzle

Here's a puzzle: What is this a picture of?

Another hint:



The answer....



.... a lacebark pine, in a grove on the BNU campus. The trunks are very pretty, even more so when they are wet from rain or sprinklers. Here's another example we saw in the Imperial Garden on our recent visit to the Forbidden City:

Laoshe Teahouse

I finally got to the Laoshe Teahouse last week, after our earlier aborted attempt. Our 5 year old guide book says they have folk music performances and other shows in the afternoons, but this seems to have been cut back to "Shadow Puppet" performances. There were very few customers in the middle of the afternoon. In the evening there are still music and opera performances, so maybe it is more popular then.


Shadow Puppet Show

So I sipped my expensive tea (I think $5 was the cheapest), which was indeed very nice, and watched the show for about half an hour, glad to get out of the hot sun. The shadow puppets are flat articulated dolls that are manipulated by the puppeteers behind a white, strongly illuminated screen. When they touch the screen, the elaborate clothing and decorations can be seen. Some simple story is acted out, with Punch-and-Judy level of violence, to the accompaniment of drums and other percussion.

This is "back stage" after the show:



Puppets, Screen, and Script


Array of Puppets

Beijing Panoramas

Saturday was an unusually clear day, so the views from the White Dagoba at the top of the hill in Behai Park were spectacular.

This is the view south towards the Forbidden City. (You can find a panning version here.)


South from the White Dagoba


North from the White Dagoba
I don't think Beijing is ever this clear!