Fresh territory, again? No, I’m still in China and plan to be here for another couple of years. But yes, another move happened in the meantime. In May I said goodbye to my Shanghai lane house and off I went to the capital of the Middle Kingdom. I’m following a trajectory contrary to many expats. It’s much more common to start in Beijing or Shanghai and finally move to Yunnan to enjoy a quieter life with less pressure.
Hutong life
I found a home for Yun 云 and myself in a traditional Beijing hutong 胡同 house in another beautifully named street. Longtoujingjie 龙头井街 means ‘the street with the dragon head well’. My apartment – now equiped with all mod-cons such as an indoor toilet – was probably built around the tumultuous start of the 20th century. It is shaded by a gigantic tree from around the same time. Apart from the tree, I fell in love with the many original details of the house, my sweet neighbours and the slow and quiet way of life in these narrow streets. It looks and feels like village life in Dali. I’ve installed a hammock on the rooftop terrace under my tree. I look at the moon on hot and humid evenings filled with the white noise of whirring crickets. At night it’s oh-so-quiet.
There are gecko’s, birds, stray cats and I’ve caught a scorpion (my neighbours suggested I fry and eat it). My favourite creature native to the hutongs is the hutong weasel. A few weeks ago I spotted one for the first time. I took as an auspicious omen, to be graced with a glimpse of one of the city’s many ancient spirits.
From the rooftop of my modest one-bedroom house I can glimpse more of Beijing’s magic. Prince Gong’s Palace is a mere 100m away. A little further away is the best thing about my neighbourhood. Hou Hai (‘Back Sea’) 后海 and Qian Hai (‘Opposite Sea’) 前海 are artificial lakes dug some 1000 years ago by the Mongol Yuan dynasty to provide relief from the summer heat.
Pretty summer residences were built here where the upper echelons could retreat to on sweltering days. I follow their lead and also use the lakes to cool down. I love swimming with the old guys from the neighbourhood, who have accepted me as one of their own despite my still crappy Chinese and lazy swimming. Beijingers are very unpretentious and straightforward so they have actually told me I’m a lazy swimmer and not very good at Chinese. It’s funny and refreshing and it makes me feel at home.
Most of all, the area is a place of sprawling low-rise hutong courtyards and trees. So here I am, happily ensconced in the peacock’s tail of alleyways that fans out from the heart of the Middle Kingdom—the Forbidden City. Here once lived and worked the artisans, traders, administrators and all the other minor cogs that kept the wheels of the intricate imperial machinery slowly but surely turning. The current great helmsman is not far away either. His power and control are seen and felt. But my street, the Street of the Dragonhead Well, is surprisingly free of any kind of interference. Even the tourists rarely wander through.
It’s hard to believe I live in another Chinese megapolis of 22 million inhabitants.
The summer heat is slowly waning into a pleasant autumn. I’m apprehensive about the extremely cold Beijing winter, but excited about the prospect of skating on Hou Hai and Qian Hai. The old dudes, of course, will continue to swim. In holes they hack into the ice. They are brimming with vitality, but I don’t think I’m brave enough to swim year-round.
A country I don’t like to visit
Speaking of vitality. Apart from the move to Beijing, I recently ventured into another unfamiliar territory. The world of poor health is another country, says Susan Sontag in Illness as Metaphor. I started re-reading her essay after a routine cervical cancer check with my GP in the Netherlands came back with the advice to do more tests and quickly escalated to have something removed in a minor operation. I was in expert hands with a top-notch specialist and good insurance, but was still shaken. Results recently came back – all clear!
As I have done with all my travels to unknown places, reading with genuine curiosity is the best preparation and it made me feel somewhat less powerless. The whole experience of operation and anaesthesia was novel and threw up lots of additional questions about bodily autonomy, spirituality, independence, holistic care etc etc. It’s weird to lay down on a gurney, get wrapped into a sheet, have your phone and glasses taken away and effectively turn from a person into a thing with a hardware problem. The nurses tried to take away my jade bracelet, too, but I clung to it, suddenly superstitious, believing it would protect me. Maybe I clung to a last chance at control – this bracelet is mine, it is me, you cannot take it if I say so. I felt a need for ritual, soothing and protecting the spirit during this sudden and shocking invasion of the body.
When I come to from the sedation I wake up from a beautiful dream – drinking tea with a friend by Lake Erhai, not far from Dali Old Town. I’m proud to say I started speaking Chinese as soon as I came to and got laughs and compliments on my Chinese from the anaesthesiologist. For a few days I feel tired and tender but bounced back quickly. The many tests told me that overall I’m in extraordinary good health – results indicating I’m ten years younger than what my passport says.
But until I got my all-clear I was stuck in this new territory, the no-man’s land of not knowing, and I didn’t like it very much. I thought China was the country that had over the years worn me down with it’s arcane and unknowable visa processes, but this kind of waiting was even worse. Huge relief and gratitude when it was over.
I have left this dreary country behind but learned I can find great solace and guidance with Sontag and other thinkers should I ever have to travel that way again. One more good thing to come out of this experience – I know I really like my rich and varied life. No regrets. More variety coming up very soon: another cycling jaunt around Yunnan!