The Great Leap Forward

This morning seemed positively leisurely after the past few days of 7 AM starts. We didn’t have to meet in the lobby until 8 AM!

Our group made our way from the hotel to the Beijing subway; although the entrance was only a few hundred feet from the hotel, getting there required walking in the street, zigzagging across berms and tall curbs, and dodging traffic in a freeway cloverleaf (with crosswalks). It was rush hour and the subways were packed, but we only had to go a few stops.

We emerged from the subway in Tienammen Square. Dragon gave us an hour to do a self-guided tour, with an agreed upon meeting place at the entrance to the Forbidden City. The Square itself is pretty inhospitable—no trees or amenities, really—just a vast expanse of pavement ringed by very large, non-descript buildings. The ubiquitous poster of Chairman Mao hangs at the north end. The immediate comparison one makes is to the National Mall, which is much more beautiful, green, and gracious by comparison.

There were scads of tourists everywhere, most traveling in groups and following leaders with megaphones and “follow me” flags. The hawkers were relentless, chasing us with kites, t-shirts, hats, post-cards, and other assorted junk.

Once inside the Forbidden City (around 9:45 AM), we had a two-hour guided tour led by one of the “official” tour guides. Frankly, she seemed more interested in text messaging on her cell phone than telling us anything insightful. Like many of the other guides, her English was a little hard to follow and she spoke in a soft voice. The crowds were getting bigger, too, and it was starting to get warm. The sky was a yellowish brown color, which we were told was due to construction dust and sand blowing in from Mongolia (they like to blame bad things on Mongolia here!).

The Forbidden City was very imposing, but was not exactly what I was expecting. The architecture and detail is amazing, the scale is gigantic, and it is awe-inspiring to stand in the place where entry was limited to royalty, eunuchs, and concubines for 600 years. But the interior environment is pretty harsh, with one enormous paved plaza after another and no greenery (except in a small garden at the north end). We passed through ornate gate after ornate gate for almost a mile, finally emerging at the north end around Noon.

From there, we took taxis to a location a few miles north. A woman greeted us and we were paired off and put in pedicabs (they called them rickshaws). A driver pedaled through the narrow alleys (called “hutongs”) while we sat in the back seats like privileged imperialists. I didn’t really care for this experience, as this seemed like yet another packaged “tourist experience” designed to appeal to westerners, fulfill a cultural stereotype, and ultimately, to sell stuff. In this case, the pedicab ride ended in a cheesy tourist street, which the guide told us was the “best street in China” for bars and bargains. She looked out over this very polluted green lake and said “as you can see, people come here because it very beautiful.” Sad.

At around 2, the group dispersed. Bob and Charlotte and I took a taxi to the Beijing offices of the Dahlin Group, for a meeting that I had arranged before leaving the US. Dahlin is a large land planning and design firm in the Bay Area that established a Beijing office a few years ago. They now have 40 employees here. Getting to the office was an adventure, as all we had was a slip of paper with the address written in Chinese characters. When we got out of the cab, we had to ask about 5 different people before we found our way into the building.

We were warmly greeted and spent about 90 minutes meeting with the General Manager of the office and her assistant. The visit was a nice way to close our meeting with Chinese planning professionals, because it provided another perspective on how the growing wealth in China is changing development and consumer patterns. Dahlin is building a lot of very high end housing to meet the demand created by new money; homes that would fit in well in the Bay Area’s most exclusive neighborhoods. They are also starting to do new towns with a broader mix of housing types and land uses. It was fascinating to talk about the changes in consumer preferences and the Chinese land development system.

We were driven back to the hotel by a Dahlin staff person at around 4:30. At 5:30, our entire group met with the company that organized our trip to provide them with feedback on our experience. We went day by day, pointing out our highlights and lowlights and ways to improve the trip experience for the next group of planners (they arrive in Hong Kong tomorrow!). After about an hour, our entire group headed for the subway, going to a neighborhood a few stops away for our farewell dinner.

The celebratory dinner was a really nice occasion. We had peking duck and a million other dishes. Everything was delicious, but mostly we remarked how much we’d enjoyed getting to know each other and what a great experience this has been.

This will be my last entry before returning to the US tomorrow. My flight is at noon, but we’ve been advised to head to the airport at 8 AM. I will post some more post-trip reflections tomorrow.