Dashilan Deadline

By Lin Shujuan(China Daily)
Updated: 2006-03-24 08:28

If the Forbidden City has been a capsule of China's royal culture since the Ming Dynasty (1368 - 1644), then the Dashilan area in Qianmen is that of grassroots culture over the same period.

Dashilan Street, the oldest commercial street in Beijing, is now more packed than ever. Besides the usual hordes of tourists, more locals are also thronging to the area for a farewell visit and a last taste of old Beijing.

Starting from May, the city will begin to convert the Dashilan area, one of the last remnants of bustling old Beijing, into a modern commercial zone selling Chinese style garments, jewellery and cuisine, as well as courtyard-style hostels, by 2008.

A prosperous business area since the Ming and Qing dynasties (1368-1911), Dashilan is as unique to Beijing as the way the name sounds. Dashilan is how the locals say "Dazhalan" in standard Mandarin, and means big fences.

Its history can be traced back around 600 years ago when the Emperor ordered fences to be built to prevent thieves getting in the area. The fences remained for a long time, and thus came the name of the area.

It has been the centre of old Beijing's leading retail market for centuries, with the streets and hutongs around the area bustling with people and atmosphere.

In the past, this district was cluttered with teahouses, theatres, acrobatic shows, brothels, opium dens, stalls and crowds from all walks of life.

Today it has been cleaned up and is now a major shopping street. A new look replaces some of the chaos but the atmosphere of the district remains. Cinemas, video halls, karaoke bars and clubs vie with long-established traditional Chinese stores for space and attention in this intriguing little area of the capital.

Yet, this soon will become history as the area is to be levelled and residents relocated, during the two-year-long restoration.

Being the host of the 2008 Olympic Games, the Beijing Municipality decided to transform and reorganize some 300 "villages-amid-the-city" and urban "corners" in Beijing which are considered dirty, chaotic and poor and the Dashilan area was one of the first on the list.

Despite its historical prosperity, Dashilan has deteriorated into "a typical slum" in recent decades, according to the "Investigation of Urban Corners in Beijing," a report published by the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences in July 2005.

Population density in the area was 45,000 persons per square kilometre, and the housing was over-crowded, with many dangerous and old buildings posing a serious fire hazard. Other problems cited in the report included a shortage of water and electricity, poor hygiene, worsening public security, the rampant sale of counterfeit goods, plus a huge number of migrant workers living on less than 8 yuan (US96 cents) a day.

Over the past few years, the city government has discussed details of the renovation with cultural heritage experts, in an attempt to preserve some of the well-known courtyards, lanes and the ancient retail centre of Dashilan.

"The Dashilan area will maintain its overall pattern, cultural relics and valuable compounds despite the renovations," said Wu Bihu, director of Tourism Research and Development Centre associated with Peking University and one of the consultants for the project.

According to the professor, heritage-themed tourism will become the major industry for the area after the renovation, integrated with attractions and activities including hutong sightseeing, a traditional Chinese commercial shopping pedestrian street, courtyard family hostels, making it an urban holiday destination.

Hard to say goodbye

Though the decision doesn't come without rational reasons, many are reluctant to say goodbye.

Xie Wenhua, a man in his mid-60s, came all the way from the eastern suburb of Tongzhou District to Dashilan last Sunday, with his digital camera.

Though a Beijing native, Xie admits that this was his first visit to the street in about 20 years.

Through his lens, he hoped to capture some precious moments in the life of old Beijing.

Of particular interest to him were the skylines defined by chaotic electrical wiring, time-worn eaves, colourful shop posters, and the long-established stores.

There are quite a number of these stores left, such as Qianxiangyi, the century-old silk store, the Zhang Yiyuan Teahouse, and the snack shop Baodu Feng (boiled stomachs of cattle or lambs, or baodu, made by the Feng family), to name but a few.

Though the government has reiterated that they will try to maintain the area's original style as much as possible, many, including Xie, still take it with a pinch of salt.

"I don't want to regret in later life having missed this last chance (of visiting the area)," Xie said.

He isn't alone. The streets and lanes are so packed with other similar visitors that Xie had to fight his way through the human traffic.

Nostalgia is in the air as many stop to have a casual chat with local residents, and sentences like "soon these will all be gone" can be heard from time to time. Xie had hoped to eat at Baodu Feng on Langfang Ertiao hutong, only to find that he had to wait in a long queue.

A waiter tried to persuade him from queuing, saying he should come and visit their new shop later, but failed. Xie waited along with dozens of others for around an hour to finally have his helping of baodu.

"I am sure the food will remain quite the same, but it will taste rather different, I mean not with the atmosphere here," Xie said.

While for people like Xie having a taste at the long established snack shop is a souvenir memory, for local residents it's part of their daily routine.

Next to the restaurant is a small parlour selling paintings and calligraphy scrolls run by Yang Haibin, 43, who has been living in the area since birth, who orders a bowl of baodu for an afternoon snack every day.

"There aren't too many days left (for a life like this)," said Yang morosely.

However, these are only minor concerns. Like most of his neighbours, Yang's main concerns are: What compensation can he get for having his building demolished? How will he make a living in the future?

Yang is currently living with his wife and two children in a nearby rented house . They use their own house, about 40 square metres, to run the business.

If relocated, Yang's family can expect compensation of around 9,000 yuan (US$1,080) per square metre.

That's barely enough for him to buy a two-bedroom apartment within the Fifth Ring Road.

Yang's story can be regarded as typical of the situation faced by most residents in the area awaiting relocation, who make a living out of their property.

"Gone along with their home is also their way of living," said Ou Ning, a sociologist who is among the senior members of the Dashilan Project, a investigative programme on urban transformation of traditional sectors in Beijing run by a group of sociologists, architects and artists, about a year ago.

According to Ou, over recent years, there has been a big demand for the preservation of historical relics during the process of urbanization and transformation of old cities. "However, people hardly pay attention to the rights of citizens," Ou said in a report.

He and his fellow team members have urged the government to do its best to be as fair and just as possible in the demolition and relocation process, and to guarantee the relocated residents the possibility of freely expressing their opinions, making it easier for them to say goodbye.

But for Yang, saying goodbye will be hard to do, as he grows increasingly insecure about the future.

"With the compensation we can get better accommodation in the suburbs, but what is the point of us living in a big house if we are worrying about our next meal?"

(China Daily 03/23/2006 page3)

From: http://www.chinadaily.cn/bjweekend/2006-03/24/content_551047.htm