Friday, February 11, 2005

Sanlitun South Street R.I.P. One of my favourite parts of Beijing has always been Sanlitun South Street. This is the small bar street opposite QiLin Dasha, with bars such as Minders, Hidden Tree and Durty Nellies. The best nights of partying I had in Beijing were probably in this street. When I just came to Beijing five years ago I loved to go to Minder[base ']s with my friends. Not too bad food, live music until 12, and after that a disco mix of 70[base ']s and 80[base ']s music. When the street started to develop more, we often had 5 kuai Tsingtao[base ']s standing on the street outside Durty Nellie[base ']s. You always met everyone else there, and there was always something to do. But all that is over now: Sanlitun South Street has been destroyed... Where Minder[base ']s used to be is now a large pile of stones. Durty Nellies has disappeared and is now in the middle of an open field full of rubble. I drove by last night, and it was a very sad sight. I love Beijing, but I hate the way it changes continuoulsy because of [OE]City Planning[base ']. Hutongs disappear overnight to make space for new apartments, outside shopping markets get destroyed for similar reasons (Sanlitun market in 2001, the Silk Market a few weeks ago). And now my favourite bar street has gone. The bars will probably re-appear somewhere else, but the atmosphere won[base ']t be the same. 8:48:02 PM    comment []