Snapshots of Beijing: These are the weeks that were

Along the waterfront between the SOLANA shopping center and Chaoyang Park

After 640 days of online and in-class instruction (yes, I Googled it), I am no longer a language student. The real world awaits with the end of classes, though I've managed to put back my reentry into the work sphere until late July (more on that in a moment). I'm now proficient in Mandarin in the eyes of the State Department. Although I beg to differ with that overly optimistic assessment, as stated in the previous post I will gladly accept the score without argument or question. It's my reward for spending nearly two years of my life studying 普通话 the FSI way. I've bitched way too often (though justifiably so) in the past regarding my feelings on how languages are taught in the State Department, so at this point I'll receive my score, then sit back down and shut up. The immediate goal now regarding Mandarin is to undue the 大陆-inspired damage accrued over the course of these past 21 months, and both relearn the Taiwanese way of speaking 國語 (for example, saying 腳踏車 instead of 自行车), and reacquaint myself with the traditional characters (as opposed to the simplified ones that dominate life both in and outside of the classroom). One of these days I'd like up to pick up a certain level of proficiency as well in the wife's native tongue, Taiwanese 台語 (and not have to refer to it in class as Mǐnnánhuà 闽南话), but Shu-E has always oddly been reluctant to reveal the secrets of her native tongue to both her child and her spouse. Yours truly in the top row below can barely contain his unbridled joy at the successful completion of his Mandarin studies:

After suffering through Chinese (twice!), Russian and Amharic, and with only one more tour remaining after this one before feeling the welcoming embrace of retirement, I'd like to say I'm finished with language acquisition. But if I've learned nothing else after more than a decade in this line of work, it's that nothing is ever certain when it comes to assignments and postings. All I can state with any certainty is that the chances of landing that currently non-existent dream assignment in Pyongyang (and therefore learning Korean) is extremely remote. 

While I was taking Mandarin classes every 星期一 to 星期五 the real world went about its business. I suppose the other "highlight" of these past thirty-three days since I last reported here was my coming down with the coronavirus...again. Most likely I caught COVID-19 at an event at my daughter's school, one that hadn't been held during the past several years because of the pandemic. A sore throat the evening after returning home from the event led to an in-home test the following day that returned a positive result. I would remain in that state until the following Sunday morning (including another positive test on Friday evening), when I finally came up negative. Needless to say I didn't go to Mandarin class that week, though my wife and daughter both felt fine (Shu-E tested negative twice during that time). As for me, I didn't have a fever, and at worse felt like I just had a case of the flu - sore throat, runny nose, achy muscles. And in a case of serendipity, the master bedroom needed extensive repair work to fix a water leak during the week I was down with the virus. Because of the work, management had arranged for my wife and I to stay in an apartment next door to our residence - instead, I had my very own quarantine space, returning home for meals. Serendipitous indeed.

The following are snapshots of some of the things I've (we've) been doing between now and the last time I posted. Such as the ongoing quest to sample local craft beer, like this 双合盛 Sonhoshin Beer (est. 1915), a German-style wheat beer 德式小麦啤酒 and a pleasantly-tasting experience:

Timi's dermatology issues continued for a short while, necessitating the ongoing wearing of an Elizabethan collar. Shu-E replaced his dull transparent neckwear with this more colorful collar. Amber said Timi looked like a sunflower, but my wife thought he resembled a donut:

I took Shu-E's side on this. ミスドポンデライオン:

In any event, his dignity has since been handed back to him.

Before coming down with COVID (and after recovering from it) we would sometimes venture out after dinner. SOLANA has recently set up a Taiwanese-style night market (albeit a small one) in front of the mall. My daughter wanted some "rock delicious" Egg waffles 鸡蛋仔 Jīdànzǐ:

We've been trying to get the indoor cat accustomed to the outside world. He's still terrified of what lies beyond the front door, but is become more accustomed to the back yard:

Eyeing the neighbor's cat:

Amber manning a booth at her aforementioned school festival. Was it one of these little twerps students that passed along the coronavirus?:

What I assumed was a statue of Michelangelo's God turned out to be Archimedes: 

Sunday in the park, I think it was the 21st of May...

Monday outside the same park, I think it was the 22nd of May. Still down with the virus, but in need of Vitamin D (according to the neurologist), I went out for a long walk in and around Chaoyang Park 朝阳公园, making sure to wear a mask and to keep my distance from those around me (and being a Monday there weren't many taking leisurely strolls in the morning sunshine). The final numbers were 99 minutes /9639 steps:

Walking along the Liangma River 亮马河, something you will quickly notice I've been quite a lot of as you scroll through this post:

Excursion boats have resumed their leisure cruises along the river:

A post-recovery lunch with the missus one afternoon along the Liangma River, at a Japanese eatery called "No. 29 Butcher Shop" 贰拾玖号肉铺:

I had their "Volcanic Beef Rice Bowl Set Meal" 火山牛肉盖饭定食:

After much thought I realized the answer was "42":

Gazania flowers  天人菊 along the riverfront:

One evening Amber and I went out for dinner at Blue Frog in SOLANA (Shu-E was dining with some Taiwanese friends and acquaintances, at a Taiwanese restaurant at the opposite end of the same shopping mall). A strong stench aroma of durian permeated the air throughout SOLANA. We soon discovered the source:

Here we go round the mulberry tree:

3-D light displays at SOLANA featuring phoenixes and astronauts, among other things (such as a few broken panels):

Having discovered that some of my work shirts no longer fit (and yet my pants all do, with some of them even verging on being too big - have I lost weight around my waist only to gain some around my neck?), Shu-E drove me to a tailor's shop in Beijing's 北京 Wangjing District 望京 to have a couple of 衬衫 made to order. I'm tall but not big, which means I've always had issues buying clothes in my size even in the U.S. In Asia the struggle is real: 

The view from the tailor's shop:

Shuizhui Lake 水碓胡, the above-mentioned body of water sitting between the mall and the park (going back to the start of this post), looking striking under the evening full moon:

It's pleasurable on occasions to take a break from having meals delivered to one's home, and instead to head out for a fine dining experience. Which the three of us did on a recent Sunday, having lunch at the Sanyuanqiao 三元桥 branch of Taste of Dadong 小大董 (located on the third floor of the Galleria Shopping Mall). It's a concept eatery, as described in the exhaustive place mat:

The most famous dish at Taste of Dadong is the duck, to which my iPhone camera doesn't do justice. The hook here is to sprinkle sugar on the duck skin:

Among the other dishes between the three of us was this bowl of Zhájiàng mián 炸酱面, Beijing's signature noodle dish. In retrospect, I probably should've snapped a photo of the noodles before mixing in the sauce as it would've looked more photogenic (not to mention more appetizing):

Keeping Timi entertained with videos targeting the feline market. He shows the rare flash of intelligence by looking behind the laptop to see where the birds went:

Evening along the Liangma. While on one of our ever more frequent after-dinner walks, Amber and I noticed a small crowd standing on the Shengmeijianbu Bridge 盛梅健步桥, phones pointed west. This is the scene with which they were enamored:

Taking a break on a hot weekday morning in Tuanjiehu Park 团结湖公园:

The Liangma after dark:

The sole time in these recent weeks we have ventured out to explore the capital was during Father's Day weekend. Only we (I) didn't uncover much of anything that was new to me. I took Amber to Dongjiaomin Xiang 东交民巷, a neighborhood near Tiananmen Square 天安门广场. Shu-E and I had walked through the same area on a weekday afternoon last September, so some of the following photographs are very similar to ones I posted on this blog just nine months ago. One photo that hasn't been duplicated, though, is this one of my daughter standing in front of the old French Hospital, as the red-brick building was hidden beneath scaffolding:

Some history: one of the demands made on the Chinese by the British following the Second Opium War in 1860 was the establishment of a diplomatic quarter in Beijing. Dongjiaomin Xiang was the neighborhood chosen for this "honor", and was home to the foreign legations (embassies) until the Second World War. A number of Western-style structures survive to this day - behind this archway stands the former American Legation, though it was clear that visitors were not allowed inside to have a look:

This green-roofed building was the former Dutch Legation:

The First National City Bank of New York is now the Beijing Police Museum 北京警察博物馆. I wanted to take Amber inside to see the exhibits, but in this post-coronavirus age many sightseeing spots in China's capital now require visitors to make online reservations in advance. Which I'd neglected to do. D'oh...:

On the corner of Zhengyi Lu 正义路 and Dongjiaomin Xiang stands the current China Court Museum 中国法院博物馆, housed in the former Yokohama Specie Bank (1910):

The last time I was here with my wife, the former French post office was serving as a backdrop for wedding photos. Nothing has changed:

A few steps away stands the old French Legation, now the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which explains the presence of a guard from the People's Armed Police 中国人民武装警察部队, the same friendly bunch of fellas who stand watch in front of today's embassies (including mine), welcoming all comers with a warm greeting and a pleasant smile:

Shu-E had elected to stay home and work in her garden on this particular Sunday afternoon, which turned out to be her loss. Back in September she had wanted to stop for lunch at a Chinese restaurant called Aohua 澳华餐厅, with a history going back to 1904. Unfortunately, the line to get in was a long one, so we ended up having lunch in the food court of a nearby shopping mall. This time, however, the girl and I were able to be seated immediately:

Amber: Does the State Department ever check what you post on social media?

Me: I don't know. Why do you ask?

The fried mutton was surprisingly good, even if it did chop a few weeks off of my overall life expectancy:

The twin spires of the Gothic St. Michael's Church (1904) loom up behind the restaurant. Naturally, you can't enter the grounds:

We could've gone in to see the old Belgian Legation, across the road from the church, but only if we'd bought tickets to see a blues and jazz festival being held there:

Heading north along Taijichang Dajie 台基厂大街:

On the northern wall of Taijichang Toutiao 台基厂头条 is this old brick street sign carved with the  previous (i.e. Western) name of the road, Rue Hart:

Located on Rue Hart is the Austro-Hungarian Legation:

Our afternoon ended at the former Grand Hotel de Pékin (1917), but not before one of those roadblocks authoritarian regimes are so adept at throwing up. In the area around Tiananmen Square are a number of security checkpoints. Chinese residents can get through these quickly by scanning their national ID cards, but things are more problematic for foreigners. As diplomats we should have been waved through ourselves, but the one police officer "in charge" insisted we wait behind a group of six Russian tourists. He then began painstakingly checking the documents of these visitors one by one, asking them questions in Mandarin about where they were going (despite the fact none of them could really understand what he was saying), looking over their passports and manually entering their bio and visa information into his cell phone. Roughly halfway through this ordeal, one of his colleagues showed up on a motorcycle. Officer Number Two glanced at both of our diplomatic passports and my diplomatic ID card, and then waved us through the checkpoint in a process than took less than a minute. I'm going to give Officer Number One the benefit of the doubt and assume he was annoyed with the USA national soccer team jersey I was wearing. It isn't my fault the Chinese men's national team hasn't qualified for a World Cup since 2002.

Oh, yes, the hotel. It's now called the Beijing Hotel NUO 北京饭店诺金. We stuck our heads in to have a peek at the more atmospheric older wing:

More scenes along the Liangma River:

On the most recent Tuesday afternoon after work I decided to walk to the Liangma River by way of a short street that separates the Four Seasons and Kempinksi Hotels. I was surprised to see a police presence and a large throng of people on both sides of the usually quiet street, many of whom were wearing Argentina national soccer jerseys. I should've stopped and waited to see what was going on, perhaps snapping a few pics with my phone, but instead I blithely carried on toward the river, and eventually arrived home. It wasn't until after I had settled in that I checked online and found the reason why. I'll be the first to admit I'm not always the most observant or clued in. 

The next day I made up for the oblivious oversight, and did my due diligence by returning to the street in the morning to see some vendors setting up to take advantage of the opportunity...:

…and then again in the afternoon to witness a small but growing crowd that had gathered to catch a glimpse of their presumed athletic idol. As it was 37°C/99°F in the shade, and lacking their devotion, I quickly retreated home and into air-conditioned comfort:

According to traditional Chinese culture, as of this past Wednesday I have completed (not always successfully) one life cycle. My celebratory lunch that afternoon was a bentō  弁当 from the Japanese tonkatsu 豚カツ restaurant chain Saboten さぼてん, and a milk tea 奶茶 from the CoCo都可 Taiwanese bubble tea franchise:

And in the evening my celebratory dinner was at a restaurant in the Chaoyang area called Serendipity (the Chinese name 寻宝人 means "treasure hunter"), chosen and reserved by Shu-E without telling me where we would be eating that evening. Located in an upscale complex that appears to have been converted from a factory, you ring a doorbell that then allows you entry into a loosely-themed British restaurant. Among the various delicacies we savored that evening were a Scotch egg salad...:

…truffle and mushroom soup...:

…and this very succulent black pepper steak:

Fortunately there was no singing. TGI Fridays this wasn't!:

Amber enjoying a mocktail:

For me the only downside to Serendipity was its paltry beer selection, which came down to Corona or....I heard the server mention 比利时 and got excited, thinking she was referring to a Trappist brew. It turned out to be Hoegaarden, the trailer park choice of Belgian beer drinkers*. At least it wasn't Stella Artois:

A unique selling point at Serendipity, no doubt aimed at Chinese diners not accustomed to such Western-style dishes, was the opportunity to don some period dress during the meal. I'm not sure which era exactly our daughter was evoking, but she looked quite fetching in the outfit she chose:

As usual, the wife preferred to take photographs rather than be photographed:

It turned out be a fine evening that Shu-E had arranged, and a nice way to kick of the sixties:

Back home, the girl and I went for an evening stroll to work off some of those calories, especially from the desserts (the photo above is just on of three that came with our set). The crowds were thick outside the Four Seasons, a growing throng of those waiting to see Lionel Messi. Amber wasn't at all comfortable with hordes:

Things got Messier the following day. At SOLANA I came across this temporary pavilion set up by the Yili Group 伊利团, an Inner Mongolia-based dairy products manufacturer. The Chinese expresses the company's love for the blue-and-white (meaning Argentina, duh). It wasn't until I uploaded the photo at home that I noticed the panda in the background:

My sympathies to the person who had to don a milk carton outfit in the 38°C/100°F heat:

Despite the friendly with Australia not taking place until 2000 hours Thursday evening, crowds continued to gather several hours earlier on the street alongside the hotel, waiting for...Godot?:

If anyone is actually interested in the match itself and the final outcome, you can read about it here and here. Or better yet, watch the highlights below:

There's also this story on a young Chinese fan who couldn't control himself and rushed the pitch to hug the Argentine superstar. In the video below on the incident, you can also get a glimpse of what the crowds lining the road beside the Four Seasons were hoping to see. I feel sorry for those fans who stood for hours in the heat only to discover they were on the wrong side of the street:

After a three-year delay brought on by everyone's least favorite viral contagion, I am more than pleased to announce that starting Monday my daughter and I will fly to Tōkyō 東京 to embark on a 27-day trip through Japan's Kantō 関東, Chūbu 中部, Kinki 近畿 and Chūgoku 中国 regions. Originally I was going to take Amber on a two-week trek through central Honshū 本州 during the summer of 2020, but we all know what happened that summer to scuttle our plans. So now I'm making up for lost time (and using as many of the annual leave hours that have accrued due to the inability to go anywhere during the pandemic) by giving my offspring a crash course in Japan (part of it, anyway). The girl has been to Kyūshū 九州 and the western parts of Chūgoku on previous visits (as well as a night ten years ago laying over in Narita 成田 while en route to Shanghai 上海), but this will be her first opportunity to experience both Japan's new and old capitals (the latter being Kyōto 京都, of course). For myself, this trip will open up some areas I haven't yet visited. It will also mean getting to meet again some people that I haven't seen in quite literally ages. 

But wait, that's not all. From our final stop in Ōsaka 大阪 the two of us will fly onward to Taiwan, where we will reunite with Shu-E (you may remember her from earlier paragraphs). I'll only be in Formosa for around six days, long enough to see some friends and family, before returning to Beijing in late July (and finally starting doing some real work after almost two years), but the girls will remain in Taiwan until the middle of August. It should be quite a summer!

This will be my last blog post until sometime towards the end of next month. Or it may only be a few days before I'm posting again. I'm hoping to bring my (not very light) laptop with me on the trip, and maintain an ongoing journal of our experiences while we're out of China. To do so, I'll have to dispense with my usual insightful, in-depth analytical reporting, and be content with providing some (hopefully) interesting photos. If you'd like to know more about the sights we'll be visiting, Google is your friend. 

So here's hoping the trip will be a smooth one. It may be wet at times (we'll be arriving at the onset of Japan's rainy season 梅雨), but three years between visits is too long, and much time needs to be made up. Stay tuned...

As for Timi, I doubt he'll care much about who is or isn't around, as long as those food and water bowls get filled at their regular times:

*At my now advanced age I'm allowed to be a little snobbish