Today we went to the cultural street Qian Men (前门). Here, we wandered through local cafés, went on a Beijing Postcards tour, and ate at a nearby food street.
The hutongs surrounding Qian Men were in the same area as Liu Li Chang, meaning the streets were busy and full of people. Everywhere you looked there were tuk-tuks, bikes, and scooters beeping around on the streets, pushing people to the sides of the streets. The café I went to was called “Comedy Shop” and was filled with neon art and pillows, as well as cacti and an open roof. The lemonade was BOMB and the café’s aesthetic was incredible (plus it was air-conditioned!).
During the Beijing Postcards tour, I learnt a brief history of Qian Men including hutong facts about the pillars on the top of courtyard gates and history about inner and outer Beijing. Whilst the tour was interesting, I will say it was a lot of walking and quite tiresome. It did, however, allow us to see a good portion of the beautiful hutong and scenery, which was quite lovely. We got to see a man that had a pigeon whistle from the 1600s and a BUNCH of domesticated pigeons, which was probably the most interesting thing on the tour.
This is the selfie that won the best selfie of the day award (three for three!!), and it was taken whilst we were absolutely chowing down on 北京烤鸭 (we ate half a duck in 10 minutes).
