Officially Leaving Beijing

I finally see the panda in real life, but in Tokyo.
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I packed up my two suitcases. In one, I have my favorite duvet, pure cottern pillow and summer blanket. I shipped it to Canton province where Uncle Thomas' factory is (to avoid the tedious custom clearance, after all, GuangChou is only one hour train ride away from Hong Kong). The other has the clothes, shoes and all my kitchenware from my collage years, which I gave to the girl from the dry cleaner downstair. After getting the deposit back, I carried one roller with my summer clothes and everyday-must-have items to the airport. I left Beijing for good.

My feelings toward Beijing is complicated. I have read so much about the city, about the foods, about the culture and the people. The language to me is not foreign, only sounds different. I have met many modest, polite, hardworking people. However, I feel tensed and uneasy constantly.

I get very paranoid about washing my hands, even when I am in my own apartment. Of course, people on the street spit around makes me nervous. I am very weary about any physical contact with my fellow passengers in the train, taxi drivers or waitrons. The dirt-filled air quality certainly doesn't help. No matter how often I clean, I still feel the stench and dirt all over my living space. I don't have the obssessive compulsary disorder, but I am developing it.

I dislike the newspaper although I am OK with simplified Chinese (still eyesore to me, seeing them like seeing a person without an arm or leg, sympahty and sadness follows). The news only reports great stories, what annoys me the most is that people read them. The ambience is suffocating, I think the only open air space is how to get rich soon. The only good thing is it is so cheap to buy books. However, the Chinese comtemporary writers don't have much interesting things to write about. They seem unable to get out of great culture revolution. Novels that set in the modern China are not entertaining. Perhaps I just cannot fit myself into the stories (the characters seem unrealistic), just like how I cannot fit into the modern Beijing life.

Strolling down the pub streets, pubs are filled with low quality alcohol (beer rarely chilled enough) and mediocre singers. The music are so loud that my ear drums hurt. Where is the innovative thinking? Pubs should cater different stages of life, we only see the simple version of it. Of course, pubs are not the originated from Beijing. This is just one of Beijing's attempts to be cool. However, this attempt has no root in Beijing culture. Defintiely lost.

I believe Beijing can do better given some time, it is not yet finding the right balance between old Beijing and modern Beijing, between old residents and immigrants, between communism and capitalism, between Chinese and Western. My general feeling is that Beijing at this stage is lacking the cultural confidence. Beijing is ashame of the old flat housing (hu-tong), in fact, I think Beijing's charm lies in them. But without the confidence, they are destroyed, flattened, in the name of modernisation... It will really take time before Beijing is inhabitable.