Qianmen Street, Beijing
Another new project that caught my attention in Beijing was the redevelopment and refurbishment of the ancient Qianmen street. Located at the southern end of Tiananmen Square the street even boasts a tram car which occasionally whizzes past.
Now this refurbishment actually caused me to sit back and ponder a question which disturbs me a little – have my tastes become Chinafied?
As I wandered along Qianmen I found myself thinking “gee this is really nice, they have done a great job”. Realistically, there has been a lot of effort and planning go into the refurbishment which I believe is evident through the buildings being rebuilt in varying styles in what I hope actually resembles the original structures. In an attempt to take on different aspects of Chinese culture, the street lights feature as gilded bird cages, which are a popular sight in parks throughout the nation. The seats are stone replicas of the large Chinese drums and the rubbish bins are some of the most stylish I have seen in China. So, all looks great but if I look a bit closer I then realize that all the buildings are in fact all the same shade of gray. The flowers are plastic, some with edges even coated in glitter to give that extra bit of sparkle. I didn’t visit at night but I am pretty certain there will be a lot of fairy lights!
I am not sure if my tastes are in fact changing but another friend who has been here for many years also seemed to agree it was an attractive area. And my liking of thousands of fairy lights all over the place, I am pretty sure, is something that I didn’t have 5 years ago.
Perhaps the greatest thing to see in Qianmen Street which I am sure is not going to last forever is the contrast of wandering down this splendid newly constructed old street and turning off down one of the side streets to find that after just 25 metres you are truly back in the real old Beijing.
