Wang Fu Jing (王府井)

While I was in Beijing, I visited Wang Fu Jing, which is a very famous area in Beijing for shopping. It's basically a "walking street" so no cars are allowed to drive in that area (except for tourist shuttles). When I arrived there, I couldn't believe the amount of people there. I guess if you are from an Asian country, you may be used to seeing this type of population density. Coming from Toronto, however, I usually only see crowds like that during rush hour, concerts, or sporting events. I wish I was here for the May 1st Chinese holiday...I can't imagine what it would have been like then! Wang Fu Jing has many shopping malls there. All the younger teens/students seemed to be in fashion. In one of the pictures I posted, you can see a picture of a girl in some kind of "frilly" dress (I think there's a real name for this type of fashion). I've heard that this fashion is popular in Asian countries but don't quote me on that. It reminded me of the Japanese movie "Kamikaze Girls" where the lead character really liked wearing these old style dresses. I thought it was quite interesting to see someone actually wearing one out in public. Anyways, if you love shopping, this is the place to be...clothes are not cheap here but that's because all the brand name clothing are found here - no fakes. Tourists think that Chinese people go to fake clothing markets to get cheap clothes all the time but it is sooo not true. I talked to a few locals and they all say they usually don't buy clothes at those markets because they are not high quality. Sometimes it feels like those fake markets are filled with only tourists. Wang Fu Jing is also famous for the wondeful food stalls there. They have the regular snacks/dumpling stands but as you can see in some of the pictures, they also have a few exotic ones for the brave souls. I couldn't believe the size of the grasshoppers on the sticks!! It was pretty gross in my eyes since some of the insects were still moving. Once you decide you really want to try one, the vendor would cook those babies right there so it's nice and fresh in your mouth. The shocker for me was seeing the live sea horse and starfish on sticks! I mean, do people really eat those things?? I guess they must sell well or else all these vendors would go out of business. While I was there, I didn't see many people buying them though. I did catch one girl eating a starfish. I guess the truth is that you can pretty much eat anything...our minds are just trained to say what we think is ok to eat...I mean is eating shrimps, octopus, seaweed any better? I think we are all just used to it. Hmm? Maybe grasshoppers are very tasty! I will be back to Beijing in a few weeks...maybe I'll give those babies a try...or maybe not....I'll stick with duck....mmmm...duck...