Beihai Lake, Meeting the Parents, Taxi Lessons
Trip Start
Apr 26, 2006
1
7
13
Trip End
May 10, 2006
Beijing,
China
Monday, May 1, 2006
I was supposed to meet up with a friend of mine at today. She had suggested that we meet at Beihai lake at the Starbucks. I had thought that it would be easy to find because starbucks are generally pretty distinct and you can spot them from far away. HOWEVER things didn't play out this way. Beihai Lake is a huge lake that is a few kilometers in circumference. Siyi had suggested that I tell the cab driver to drop me off at the bar district of Beihai Lake. Just say that and they will know where to drop you off. Apparently it's not as simple as I had originally thought.
The cab driver had no idea where the bar district of Beihai like was so he just dropped me off at the entrance. When got out of the entrance, I realized that I would never find Siyi. The lake was huge and there were literally thousands of people walking around. What was especially confusing because Beihai lake itself is a national monument and you have to pay money to walk into the lake park. I wouldn't not find out until later on that what Siyi had meant was the bar district in the Beihai region and not the monument itself. I ended up paying the 10 yuan entry fee and proceeded to wander around aimlessly at Beihai park. I kept walking around the circumference of the lake asking random people where Starbucks could be. What made things more difficult was the fact that I had no idea how to say "Starbucks" in Chinese. I basically followed the edge of the lake and walked around the entire circumference. That took me over 2 hours and at that point I just decided to give up.
AtBeihai1
I had absolutely no idea where anything was and at that point, I just as well assumed she went home. Oh well, at least I took some good picture of the Beihai region.Picking up the Parents
From Beihai, I went for lunch at the Passby Bar in one of the Hutongs. I went there in January and had a good time there so I decided to go back again. Went straight to go pick up the parents afterwards at the airport. The trip to the airport was uneventful until I got to the airport.
When I got out of the cab, I got grabbed by a older taxi driver. He asked me, " Do you speak Engligh?" I'm like,"uh, yeah why?" He's like, I got this crazy middle eastern guy whom I'm arguing with over cab fair but he has no idea what I'm saying and I have no idea what he is saying either. I could tell that both of them had been arguing and both were frustrated frustrated.
I asked the Middle Eastern guy what was the story. He basically said that he's trying to tell the cab driver that he needs to go back into the airport to exchange some RMBs. He said that he wanted to pay the cab driver but its just that he didn't have any money.
I went back to the cab driver to explain what the Middle Eastern guy was saying and that he just need to go inside to get some money. The cab driver said," yes I figured that part out, I just wanted to tell him to come with me to the parking lot because I can't park at the departure gate.
I went to the Middle Eastern guy and explained the cab driver's story and the Middle Eastern guy suddenly smiles and says, "We've been arguing for the past 10 minutes for nothing! We've been saying the same thing".
AtBeihai2
They both then embrace each other with huge warm hugs and all of a sudden treat each other like long lost friends. It was pretty hilarious but I was just happy that I was help them out.The parents and my sister arrived shortly after that odd event and we went back to the hotel. I played tour guide for awhile and called it a night.
Lessons in Real Estate
I have to say that the best source of information about what's really going on in Beijing is to talk to the local taxi drivers. Beijing's drivers are the best. They care about their country and their city. They seem to have a good grasp on what's going on politically and economically. I always engaged in interesting conversations with them and gleam enormous amounts of insight on many things in China. Tonight was no different.
My family and I decided to look at alternate properties late Monday night as to get an idea on what else is out there before deciding on buying the reserved property at Silo City. We were fortunate to get a taxi driver who had lived in Beijing for many, many years. He gave us an in depth tour of the city and the major living areas along with his outlook on real estate in Beijing. Basically he summed things up as such:
"Beijing has been going through major upgrades over the past 10 years. Each time what has happened is that when land is needed, the government moves people from their homes to the outer rings of Beijing. At this rate the city center is becoming a prime shopping, high-end place for the elite whereas the external areas are becoming where the average Joe lives. Therefore when picking a place, the more to the central Beijing the better. The other thing to note is that all investments now are the result of planning from a few years ago after it was known that Beijing would get the Olympics. As a result, most of the buildings are scheduled to be finished by the Olympics. Therefore there will be a glut of housing and not enough people to buy stuff."
In my opinion, the taxi driver was usually insightful. More importantly because he doesn't care if we bought or not, he gave probably the most honest expert opinion on the whole matter. Given what he said, I decided not to buy Silo City. Hell if I was going to get anything, I'm going to get in the center of the city.
