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| Shanhaiguan 200 Kms East of Beijing |
Shanhaiguan, a sea resort roughly 200 kilometers east of Beijing, is the well-known starting point of the Great Wall.
Upon the arrival at the train station, the tourist is welcomed by a particularly desolate landscape. A broad, empty parking lot, a long aveue ending with a Great-ish Wall, a long row of contryside shops. The ones with green wedding dresses on orange-haired mannequins.
As soon as we set foot on the parking lot, a taxi driver started walking with us, offering a ride. Another one came straight towards us, crossing the parking lot and making us fear for our lives (never trust a Chinese taxi).
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| This is the 'vintage' model; the '2001: Space Odissy' and the "ratwagon", for large families, are also available |
As Rule Number One is NEVER to hire a taxi outside the station, we started walking through the avenue, asking directions.
Of course, nobody had ever heard about our hotel or about its street.
At the end of the avenue, we took left, ending on the cycle track, temporarily converted into a ratmobile parking lot.
Running away from ratmobile and taxi asking 30RMB for a 9km ride (in Beijing with 30RMB you get a 15km drive), we ended up at the front gate of the old city.
The main street had been demolished and completely rebuilt. One of the saddest place on Earth, it looked like Disneyland in a gray December day. All houses looked fake and, most important of all, were all empty. Not a shop; not a Chinese around, with the exception of tourists and those trying to rope in tourists.
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| A spasso per gli hutong .. Walking through hutongs |
Luckily, just behind the new old city, layed the real old city. As we were getting really depressed, we decided to explore one of the many hutongs, and ending up in another dimension.
At first, we thought ourselves to be right in the middle of a street market, with stalls on both sides selling everything from buttons to books, to military clothes.
Eventually, we realised that that was just the local mall: the stalls were right outside the respective shops.
The funny thing about the market was that we were the main attraction, everybody was staring at us, speculating about our nationality. Russian, according to the majority.
We were buying some red bean-filled pastries at a stall (really good, by the way), when a man approached us. He looked at the waitress and asked her: "Do they speak Chinese?" "Yes..." "Where are they from?".
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| Spezie e prodotti essicati. Spices and dried food |
We pointed out to him that, being there at his disposal, he could ask all his questions directly to us. After being informed of our Italian origin, he jumped back on his mighty electric motorbike and rode through the whole market to spread the intelligence.
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| Shanhaiguan Hutong |
Once out of the market, we headed towards the hotel. Or, at least, towards where we thought the hotel was. We walked through the main street up to the rear gate, a majestic stone construction opening onto fields. Is there any chance we took the wrong street? Two ratmobiles were parked near the gate and, after a brief bargaining, we hopped in. If you are ever going to Shanhaiguan, make sure the ratmobile becomes your mean of transport. When we got off at the hotel, we had stomach cramps from too much laughter.
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| The "Journey of Hope". For the convenient price of 30RMB, local fishermen hand a life vest to tourists and take them offshore. The one who makes it back, wins. In Italian we call "viaggio della speranza" (journey of hope) the trip African immigrants undergo to enter Italy illegally. They travel on dangerous, small, bad-kept ships, which usually sink not far from the shore. I don't think the English literal translation has the same connotation. |
I have seen a lot of depressing places in my life but the Shanhaiguan beach, just 5 minutes walk from the hotel, has good chances to beat them all. First of all, the mist. On the left, far away, some cranes that looked like mirages. On the right, deep in the fog, the Great Wall, a long snake, impersonal and completely out of place. Even before reaching the shore, our nostrils were attacked by the smell of the sea. This, at least, smelled right.
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| Interesting Notice Board - un interessante cartello in inglese |
Behind a really interesting Notice Board, we saw a stall with some shell necklaces and bracelets. We stopped to have a look, ready to bargain on the price. When the "shop keeper" told us that the necklaces were 3RMB and the bracelets 1RMB, we decided not to bargain. Even though, looking at the small crowd that had gathered around us, we should have been the ones to be paid!
Now, a brief description of the Chinese beach attire is appropriate. The wind blows and the sun tans. Which is bad. Really bad.
This is why, the Chinese woman, in her spring-summer collection, must have: sport cap, sunglasses (even if there is no sun), foulard on the cap, long sleeve T-shirt, jeans and sneakers. Not a hint of skin exposed. And we were wearing thin tops.
Depressing or not, the sea is still the sea; we watered our feet and collected shells, doing our best to avoid the huge quantity of seaweed. The beach was rather crowded, young couples, happy families.
During our walk, we were approached by a native, of the orangutan species. Leaving his two companions behind, he followed us for a while, shouting "Ou! Ou! Ou!" towards us. Luckily enough, he soon realised we cannot speak his language and left us alone.
Between the beach and the street there is a green area with a lot of small cute bushes... Of marijuana. Or at least of something that looks terribly like it. After the walk at the beach, we headed towards the entrance of the Great Wall, reaching what looked like a working site. On the right, the entrance to a temple.
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| Tempio sull'Oceano. Temple on the Ocean Shanhaiguan China - (Truncated photo) |
We approached the ticket office and the keeper told us that this was not the place we wanted to go to, and that to go to the place we wanted to go to, we had to go straight on and then turn left.
He had already decided our intentions and all we could do was to go straight on and turn left.
We passed some sad restaurants and reached another ticket office. We entered and were on the verge of entering a building, when another two keepers told us that we could not get in. Excuse me?
You have to go there and then turn right. We went there, turned right and ended up exactly on the other side of the entrance through which the first keeper would not let us in!
From the outside, the temple was quite nice and not too fake-looking. As soon as we got in, we radically downsized our first impression. In front of us, a Great Wall large-scale model, with trees and small rivers. It was missing the triumphant march on the background to look perfect! The visit continued through other Great Wall theme rooms.
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| Tempio sull'Oceano. Temple on the Ocean |
The second building was the actual (Buddhist) temple. A long and winding tour among small rooms, each and every one containing plenty of colorful frescoes, some containing simple altars, some containing reclined Buddhas. Some frescoes were pretty modern, some abstracts. And no mannequins.
Once we checked the temple off the "must see list", we headed towards what looked like the entrace to the Great Wall, presumably, "the place where we wanted to go". It looked like closing time was approaching and there were not many people around. As we were approaching the ticket office, a man approached us. We callously ignored him but he did not desist and followed us up to the ticket office, were he asked for a receipt. The man collected a commission for taking three tourists to the attraction!
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| Le attrattive principali della spiaggia sono il giro a cavallo, la foto sul cammello .. The main attractions were the horse ride, the picture on the camel and .. |
The Great Wall in three adjectives: dreary, sad and fake. Quick tower tour, quick promenade on the bastion, quick tour of the temple on the sea tour (the only worthwhile building, unfortunately already half closed).
As with many Chinese restaurants, our hotel restaurant had fish tanks at the entrance, with the live fishes that are listed on the menu. Usually, however, the fishes are alive. The ones in these particular tanks were clearly stone cold dead. Unless they were practicing some kind of meditation exercise involving sprawled out legs and absolute immobility. As we could still clearly see in our mind the beheaded animals we saw at the market, we decided to have a vegan dinner.
The following morning we reached by ratmobile the temple dedicated to Jiang Mengnu (a rather popular figure in Shanhaiguan), a quiet complex amongst nature, with a small pond, a few pavillions and a Buddhist temple manned by a kind monk. In the park, all around the pond, the story of Jiang Mengnu and her lover had been mounted with the usual stuffed characters. To provide ourselves with an original if not unique perspective, we decided to approach it from the other end (ok, we went the wrong way!).
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| Laghetto all'interno del tempio dedicato a Jiang Mengnu. Jiang Mengnu temple's small pond |
All along the path, boards with pearls of Chinese wisdom: "Beautify the place and civilize the hearth", "Public places are a test to your virtue without supervisors. May you pass it." An interesting element inside the complex were the target shooting stall, were we won three peluches more because of our sense of humour than because of our skills. Once out of the temple, we took the ratmobile back downtown, towards another section of the Great Wall open to the public.
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| Avvertenze: da assumersi a stomaco vuoto. Warning: take it on an empty stomach |
By then, we had a rough idea of the city road network. So, when our driver went straight on when he was supposed to turn, we asked him where he was going. He answered that we could go that way too and took us exactly were the day before we turned and founded the market. He parked the ratmobile and walked with us to get the commission. The more we walked the more perplexed we got. The street was busy but rather narrow. The Great Wall is a rather imposing structure, we could not possibly be at the right place. As it turned out, he stopped ouside a museum of folk traditions, even though he perfectly understood what was our intended destination. Here he could get a commission, though. After a brief discussion, we left him there and walked to the Great Wall, not too far away.
As far as the Great Wall is concerned, I will just say it was a complete disappointment, a gigantic crap. Completely fake and converted into a junk market. Well! That is it for Shanhaiguan. Once we left the Great Wall, we stocked pastries at the market and then went back to the station, with a prospective six hour trip back to Beijing.
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| China is a Strange Place after all! |
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Chiara Braccagni
In 2007 Chiara Braccagni spent 4 months in Suzhou as an Italian teacher at the SuZhou Polytechnic Institute of Agriculture before returning to Italy to Graduate from college.
After graduating from Interpreter School (Trieste) she returned to China (Beijing) where she did further Chinese studies to gain Oral Proficiency. She is currently and temporarily working in the Italian Embassy in Beijing. She likes to travel, explore and look for good excuses not to go back home.
Her articles appear in both Italian and English with larger Photos at KingsCalendar Stories from China
