destination reports: china: Meet the giant
Meet the giant
Napolean once referred to China as the ‘sleeping giant’ and commented that if it awakes it will shake the world. The country has been roused from its slumber for some time and gave a good morning wake-up call that echoed around the world in 2008 with the most impressive Olympic Games opening ceremony in history.
In 2011, the world is now hanging on to the country’s coattails, struggling to keep up and hoping that China’s might will be its saviour. With such a backdrop, it is impossible not to arrive in Beijing with eyes, ears and mind wide-open, leaving any notion of western superiority behind at immigration. We are now entering a new world and China is at its core.
I arrived in Beijing two days ahead of CIBTM’s opening and approached the trip differently to other familiarisation trips or international shows that I have attended. I went with no expectation and simply wanted to take it all in.
Beijing International Airport is both huge and heaving. Here, the world is literally queuing up to get into China and it takes time to make it through passport control. Past immigration and then you need to take a train to reach the baggage claim. The scale is amazing.
I looked around and saw a family clad in designer wear. Two sisters in matching Burberry skirts and Armani knee-high boots. Their green T-shirts with cartoon prints were at odds with the rest of their outfits. This being China, I asked myself the question, ‘Are they real?’.
Airports are always fascinating places to people watch. Westerners in baggy leggings, men in suits, and lots of Chinese vacationers returning home laden with Duty Free bags and more hand luggage than my collection from the carousel. The result of shopping sprees in far flung places, no doubt.
I stayed at The Pangu 7-Star Hotel and was confused as ratings only go up to five stars everywhere else in the world. After arriving at the hotel, I realised that this was the actual name, ‘The Pangu 7-Star Hotel’. Like everything else in China, you can’t take a label at face value, but it certainly built an expectation and was a constant talking point for visitors to CIBTM.
The room at The Pangu Hotel was both unique and state-of-the-art, making a change from the more non-descript badged hotels where rooms are often more uniform to comply with brand standards and the consistent expectations of loyalty card holders.
There was a Bose system linked to a TV, a fireplace with a plasma centre-piece made to look like a real log fire, a business desk with IP phone and a king-sized bed with an ‘underduvet’ that made me feel like I was sleeping on a cloud. There was also an impressive Chinese artwork above the bed and a mosaic on the ceiling, carved into a recess that made it look like an atrium.
Breakfast at The Pangu was a king-size buffet, with the only frustration being the tiny side plates that I found to be a consistent feature in all restaurants of the capital. It did however make for some enjoyable morning exercise walking to and from the buffet.
Food does seem to be a bit of an obsession in China. The front page of the Sunday China Daily that I picked up had as its cover story: “Ambassador in chef”, which was about the Spanish emissary for tourism. Page three continued the story at the bottom, with the remaining two thirds titled, “What Biden really ate in Beijing”. The whole paper extended to eight pages.
As I had a day to spare before attending the show, I decided to take in some of the local culture. At one place of interest a street vendor set me in her sights. Just an old lady selling socks, but she provided me with a great lesson on the power of China.
It was a fantastic deal straight away and there was no need for bargaining – seven pairs of socks for less than a dollar. If I was in the market for some socks, I’d have snapped them up. But I didn’t want them. I didn’t need them. And I was on the way to meet a friend.
The old lady kept up with my fast walk. She already had seven pairs in a bag and was holding them out to me. I made the mistake of asking to see a pair. I couldn’t believe the price and assumed they were poor quality. She took them out and stretched them, shouting “Big! Big!”.
Tiring of my refusals, she offered me the seven pairs for fifty cents. An absolutely crazy price that I couldn’t imagine would yield her any return whatsoever.
I kept walking. “Eight! Okay, eight!” I couldn’t help but laugh and still said no. She sensed the kill though and kept walking. When she threw 10 pairs in the bag I didn’t have the heart to refuse. I paid 50 cents for 10 pairs of cotton socks.
For days after I wondered at this transaction and how China has made manufacturing anywhere else uncompetitive with the cost of production here being so low. It was a simple purchase on a Beijing street that spoke volumes for the global economy.
When it was time to return to the hotel, taxis proved elusive. The Chinese don’t like to queue and simply made their way further up the road to jump ahead of us. The hotel provides a card with the details of where you are going written in Chinese as none of the drivers speak English. It is an exercise in good faith that some attendees at CIBTM fell foul of, as the occasional driver runs the meter by taking the ‘scenic route’.
I took in a tour of some temples and heritage sites with the hosted buyers. Now I like history as much as the next man, but I struggled to digest the barrage of significant facts and events, from Peking man through to Ming, Qing and Mao. One fact that did stick in my mind though was that our guide’s name was Frank Wong – one of 64 million Wongs in China. I have just checked and the population of the UK in 2009 was less than 62 million.
At the Laoshe Tea House we were treated to lunch, tea, stage performances and then a puppet show behind a screen. Entertainment in China before DVDs, PlayStation and Nintendo.
The stage show was a hoot. It started off with ‘Four men, play five instruments’ and we witnessed a line-up of a quartet of men sitting close together playing a mix of string instruments. With crossed arms, one strummed while the next man selected the notes. Incredible dexterity and it was very amusing. Except all of this is taken very seriously – the concentration and the pride they take in their task is something to see.
The tour provided a glimpse of old and new culminating in stops at the ‘Bird’s Nest’ Athletics Stadium and ‘The Cube’ Aquatic Centre. Three thousand acres of residences were cleared in a space of two years to make way for the Olympic facilities, involving the relocation of 40,000 people. Development and building of The Cube alone for the Olympic Games cost US$125 million. The bulk – US$100 million – came from Chinese overseas worker contributions.
We took a tour of The Cube, which is still a major attraction owing to its waterpark. Unlike other waterparks there were no snaking queues for the slides, but the wave pool was a sea of people in rubber rings and arm bands enjoying the waves and a stage show of young female Chinese dancers – a few overzealous boys splashed them as they danced in precarious platform heels.
All of the stops we made on the pre-CIBTM tour can be used for various scale events, including The Cube. The Bird’s Nest is also available for commercial hire, but with a capacity of 80,000 spectators, it would have to be large-scale to justify the space, and no doubt, the cost.
