The Guardian

Beijing, February 12:

They can hardly be mourned on aesthetic, historical or ethical grounds, but the demise of Beijing’s two most notorious tourist traps is likely to induce at least a twinge of nostalgia in any foreigner who has visited the city in the past 10 years.

In less than two months the Silk Market, one of the world’s hotbeds of brand piracy, has been shut down and South Bar Street in Sanlitun, the city’s most popular collection of watering holes, has been demolished.

Until the last stallholders were evicted last month, the Silk Market was a vibrant, cramped and gloriously messy reminder of China’s conversion to capitalism. Its traders were among the first to exploit the economic revolution launched in 1979.

Setting up in a narrow brick-walled alley next to the US embassy in the Jianguomen district — then one of the only places where foreigners were allowed to live — the stallholders were well placed to milk the huge influx of overseas capital that had begun to drive China’s growth.

Far more than the state-run Friendship Store, which will also soon close, they knew what their customers wanted. At first they sold mainly fabrics and clothes. But the business rapidly expanded to mock-communist trinkets such as Mao Zedong alarm clocks and to fake brandname goods. With a little haggling, pirated Nike trainers and Rolex watches could be had for a fraction of the priceof the genuine article.

Some were real - the unauthorised produce of Chinese factories seeking to make a little money on the side from foreign contractors. But none of the 400 sellers or millions of buyers seemed to care. As one trader used to joke, “Do you want a good fake or a really good fake?” Western companies have never seen the funny side, and many welcomed the decision to close the market on the grounds of ‘fire hazards’. Their relief may be shortlived: a giant indoor market with 1,600 stalls will open nearby next month.

South Bar Street’s demolition is also likely to be a change of scale rather than philosophy. Sanlitun’s first bar opened here in 1995. Hundreds have followed.

At first, most were shacks serving Yanjing beer on plastic tables lit by fairy lights; but the nearby alleys have filled with pubs, restaurants, jazz clubs, hip-hop venues and neon-lit ‘lady bars’ for foreign customers.

They are living on borrowed time. With the Olympics three years away, the image- and profit-conscious authorities want to replace the buildings with modern entertainment centres. And rather than reminding the world of the period when China was dependent on foreign money, they hope to attract more wealthy local customers.

South Bar Street is the first to go. The area is now a wasteland, with only one pub, the Hidden Tree, left standing. Even this will not last long.

Mutability has become such a feature of Beijing life that it is milked by sharp entrepreneurs. The staff of the Hidden Tree wear and sell sweatshirts emblazoned with the character chai, which means demolish, and the profile of a local artist, Zhang Dali, who uses condemned buildings as the canvas for his graffiti. One story doing the rounds is of a bar that called ‘last orders’ for the first time in its history, an hour before the walls came down.

The hoardings around a nearby development site are daubed with giant pictures of old Beijing and a half-mocking, half-mournful slogan, “Our old town: Gone with the wind.” That may be no bad thing. The city is now less dependent on foreign cash, living standards have improved and the restrictions on movement and residency have eased.

Expats may lament or rejoice, but the Beijing refrain is the same. It is the end of an era. Again.