BEIJING: the hutongs

 

 Surrounding the Forbidden City were these old neighborhoods now called hutongs because they are made up of alleyways. No sky rises here. The hutongs were full of siheyuan courtyard houses. Now some of the areas have been turned into restuarants, tourist areas, shops, but some are still homes. Our tour guide said they were very "desireable" and expensive. Hard for me to believe since they still don't have indoor plumbing. You gotta go down to the neighborhood restrooms on the corner. But they were so fun to explore. 

 

 

 

 

 

One day we had lunch at a place down this alley. The pizza was so good. Gage made some friends out front.

 

 

 

 

  

Another day I took a bicylce tour of the hutongs by the drum tower in Hou Hai by myself. 

 

As part of the tour we stopped at an occupied courtyard house. This nice man gave me a tour of his courtyard pointing out the 300 year old trees and the spirit wall (it was all in mandarin so I didn't understand very much, plus I was distracted because all I could think about was Jackie Chan in the Karate Kid with a car in his living room and "pick up your jacket." Seriously, it looked exactly the same). 

We even went inside and he showed me family portraits of his wife's family and talked about how long they had lived in this quaint place. He said he was sad because now his wife, himself, and his son are the only ones living here. The One Child Policy has changed the way Chinese families function.

Our driver for the week told us he just had a new baby boy. He showed us pictures on his phone even. He said that since he and his wife were both only children and since she was from the countryside they were allowed to apply to have a second child. He said they really really wanted a baby girl and were waiting to hear back about their application.

 

Here's a shot of a more touristy hutong on a busy Saturday. But Dave found a corner selling churros with ice cream which we gobbled up while people stopped to take pictures of our kids.