From comments I’ve heard at various travel gatherings, a great many Americans are planning to visit Beijing at the time of the Summer Olympics in 2008. That would be most unwise.
To begin with, you won’t get a room. The Chinese government has already blocked off more than 70 percent of the city’s hotel space for people with better connections than yours.
But more distressingly, the same government is quite openly using the Games as a reason to accelerate the reinvention of Beijing into something it feels will be a testament to modern China. Vast areas of historic Beijing are vanishing without fanfare beneath bulldozers. Though the cash cows of Chinese tourism will remain untouched – the Forbidden City, the Temple of Heaven, the Summer Palace and the like – it’s becoming increasingly evident that the historic residential neighborhoods of Beijing are fast disappearing. Lost forever will soon be the famous hutongs – the twisting alleyways of old neighborhoods that made Beijing street life world famous.
Ever since the city was known as Peking, it has been defined by its maze-like, low-slung compounds of Chinese-style wood-and-brick houses and tight alleys. Some date back 800 years and are oriented around ancient wells. For centuries, one of the great pleasures of visiting Beijing was being able to wander these cozy neighborhoods, sampling street food, dodging bicycles and socializing with the locals.
An estimated 300,000 hutong residents have already been moved to clear the way for the massive Olympic project. With the exception of a handful of government-approved areas, which will be kept squeaky-clean for tourists, it’s plain that a great majority of inner-city hutongs will be eliminated to make way for gleaming glass towers or empty parks.
The change will be as drastic to the fabric of Beijing as if Old Jerusalem were bulldozed for a Wal-Mart, or if Santa Fe eliminated its pueblos to make way for a giant Hilton.
So if you were thinking of visiting Beijing, go soon, before the hutongs are a memory. The travel packages for doing so are many, inexpensive and easy to book (as is the task of obtaining a visa for China, handled by most tour operators).
Friendly Planet’s Beijing & Shanghai Express (five nights in Beijing, three in Shanghai, with a flight between them thrown in) is $994 per person based on two traveling together, including tax. There are monthly departures at that price between November and April 1, 2006, and all include round-trip airfare on Air China from San Francisco. (Contact 800-555-5765, friendlyplanet.com.)
If you’ve already got airfare covered via frequent-flier miles, Octopus Travel sells four-night hotel-only packages for $141 per person, double occupancy, including taxes and a city tour. (Contact 1-866-462-8678, octopustravel.com.)
And for a more elaborate tour of the country, China Focus Travel charges a very reasonable (it includes all international and domestic taxes) $1,311 per person, double occupancy, for its 12-day “Historic China” trips, which include round-trip airfare from San Francisco, all transportation within China, three nights in Beijing and the balance of the time in Shanghai, Tai’an, Qufu and Ji’nan. It also includes most meals, daily sightseeing and much besides. For departures from Los Angeles add on $100; from Phoenix, Portland, Ore., or Seattle add $120; and from nearly any other major U.S. city, including New York, add $280. The prices I’ve cited are for October, November and December of 2005, with 2006 rates undetermined as of the time I write this. (Contact 800-868-7244, chinafocustravel.com.)
Arthur Frommer, who first published “Europe on $5 A Day” in 1956, is a recognized authority on budget travel.
