I live in what the Beijing government calls an administrative district of Beijing outside of the city, what the laowai calls the suburbs and what a local refers to as the villa area. This is all thanks to my employer who is located in the same district - Shunyi. By that I really do mean thanks - no sacarsm intended - for living in the area means quality housing, green and spacious compounds, relatively car-free roads and neighbors who know how to smile, say hello and stand in line to pay at the local grocer.
My First Housing Compound in Shunyi - Chateau Regalia
Speaking of grocer, I have to begin my long whiny discourse on the good/bad (I couldn't decide) life here in Shunyi, starting from grocery shopping. If you don't live in Shunyi, you will never understand how different life is out here compared to the rest of Beijing. It is like living in Chinatown in LA, only the reverse.
My housing compound is one of the many so-called villa compounds in this area, with most of their residents being foreigners living in bungalows, semi-detached houses, terraced townhouses or apartments with English-speaking domestic helpers. They all feature grandiose clubhouses with multiple sports and recreational facilities, an army of security guards and manicured lawns with European fountains. On a not-so-clear-headed day, one might think he is back in America or Australia. Quite charming but not the Beijing I thought I'd live in.
A skate board park in my second housing compound - Capital Paradise
Granted, there is a local village near my housing compound with regular Chinese-speaking folks - old grandmas sitting outside their courtyard houses chatting and fanning themselves fervently while looking on their grandchildren running around in open-crotch diaper pants, elderly men practicing modified qigong that includes strange outbursts of laughter, migrant workers squatting around talking to their hometown sweethearts over the cellphone, those kind of things. However, the village consisted of single-story brick houses and dingy shacks hidden well out of sight, away from the main street and hardly intruded by outsiders. A laowai could live in Shunyi for a decade and not realize the existance of the village. All in all, Shunyi can jolly well be a neighborhood in the U.S. Midwest.
When I first settled in the neighborhood, I thought I was blessed with a good combination of both local old-school grocer stores that sells basic Chinese condiments and fancy supermarkets that offer imported fruit, cheese and wine sampling and same-day home delivery. Afterall, I look Chinese, speak the language and know enough about the Chinese way of life to "inflitrate" into the village stores. I am also paid a decent wage to be able to enjoy some luxuries of life that other foreigners do. The best of both worlds!
My bike parked outside a village hairdresser.
Husband insisted on cheap haircut for himself, and thankfully, not me.
Well, I was right but as life goes, there is no free lunch. I've come to learn that wadding through half-melted snow to the local village shack stores in the winter or putting up with the stench of its decomposing roadside trash in the summer for a bottle of soy sauce ain't no fun. Moreover, the village grocers can smell a laowai from a hundred li away and an overseas-Chinese compatriot perhaps twice that distance away. More often than not, I end up paying fancy supermarket prices at those pathetic shack stores and worse, enjoy no heating/air-con, pretty shopping bags nor VIP points. The only marginally nice part of being an overseas-Chinese compatriot customer instead of a laowai one is that I could understand the Chinese characters on those dusty labels, saving me from the heartbreak of returning home with dubious black liquid that is not soy sauce. Really, I feel for my laowai friends.
Well, I was right but as life goes, there is no free lunch. I've come to learn that wadding through half-melted snow to the local village shack stores in the winter or putting up with the stench of its decomposing roadside trash in the summer for a bottle of soy sauce ain't no fun. Moreover, the village grocers can smell a laowai from a hundred li away and an overseas-Chinese compatriot perhaps twice that distance away. More often than not, I end up paying fancy supermarket prices at those pathetic shack stores and worse, enjoy no heating/air-con, pretty shopping bags nor VIP points. The only marginally nice part of being an overseas-Chinese compatriot customer instead of a laowai one is that I could understand the Chinese characters on those dusty labels, saving me from the heartbreak of returning home with dubious black liquid that is not soy sauce. Really, I feel for my laowai friends.
Village trash left out daily for the garbage truck.
OK in winter but smells real bad in summer.
On the other hand, if I decide to go upmarket and shop at pricier Jenny Lou's or BHG, which I do most of the time simply because it makes me feel better, I have to put up with watermelon prices being at least 200% more expensive, and they are not even of the organic kind. Vegetables are worse, with a measly bunch commanding RMB15 just because they are labeled organic when I could buy a heftier bundle for just RMB1 in the village. And who can be so sure they didn't come from the same patch of farm? I am not going to talk about the imported mangosteens and Alaskan King Crabs, you get the idea.
I think I should start exploring a third grocery shopping option - cycle 5 kilometers to a less snobbish local supermarket that looks like the Beijing version of SHOP N' SAVE. I've only got to endure shoving shoppers and impatient cashiers in return for reasonable prices and a roof over my head when I am grocery shopping. I really shouldn't complain. All I need is a bigger bike basket to fit my shopping bags, and a stronger set of legs!
On the other hand, if I decide to go upmarket and shop at pricier Jenny Lou's or BHG, which I do most of the time simply because it makes me feel better, I have to put up with watermelon prices being at least 200% more expensive, and they are not even of the organic kind. Vegetables are worse, with a measly bunch commanding RMB15 just because they are labeled organic when I could buy a heftier bundle for just RMB1 in the village. And who can be so sure they didn't come from the same patch of farm? I am not going to talk about the imported mangosteens and Alaskan King Crabs, you get the idea.
I think I should start exploring a third grocery shopping option - cycle 5 kilometers to a less snobbish local supermarket that looks like the Beijing version of SHOP N' SAVE. I've only got to endure shoving shoppers and impatient cashiers in return for reasonable prices and a roof over my head when I am grocery shopping. I really shouldn't complain. All I need is a bigger bike basket to fit my shopping bags, and a stronger set of legs!
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