The 2004
Vol 21 – The Rogue
Beijing Bar Guide
Date:
Bored with the ads (masqueraded as
reviews) of bars and restaurants listed in the entertainment directory of
Wudaokou Pubs – Wudaokou,
an urban area about 12ks NW of the Beijing CBD where I live and study, is
essentially a student town hosting at least a dozen universities in the area
(including the famed Beida & Tsinghua, China’s
Oxford & Cambridge). Teeming with
local kids and seemingly an endless stream spoilt foreign brats who are more
interested in downing beers than examining the finer points of the Chinese
grammar, pubs in this area do a brisk trade during the week when most couldn’t
be arsed trekking all the way down to Saluntun on the
other side of the city where the bulk of city’s watering holes are.
Lush – café/bistro by day and lounge/bar
by night, this cosy wood panelled joint run by a couple of New Zealanders, is
the expat free for all student hub of Wudaokou. Go there
and you actually feel strange sporting black hair and dark eyes. Start speaking in Mandarin and you’ll get
stared at. Rock up in a suit and the
crowd would think you’re from another galaxy.
That said, it is famous for Thursday night
cocktails and legendary madness that is open mike on Sunday nights. A form of glorified communal karaoke event
with acoustic guitars thrown in, this is where wannabe invincible guitar
masters (for we all know there’s only one, at most two invincible guitar
masters on this side of the universe) take turns to strut their stuff in front
of a crowd, ostensibly to score a free beer from the bar, but really just to
impress the ladies/wannabe groupies in the audience. It’s the absolute oldest trick in the book,
but judging from the audience’s reaction, still a foolproof one, especially if
you’re one of the more creative types who write and sing their own ditties –
like my fellow jailbird’s rousing rendition of the ‘Wudaokou
Blues’ with another ‘Apotment’
occupant.
Propaganda – first mentioned in Vol 2 of
the rants and a stone’s throw away from Lush, this risquély
named establishment is a fixture in the Wudaokou pub
scene synonymous with lots of R&B booty shakin
and gratuitous boozing. So popular is
the place on Thursday nights (ladies night, go figure) it is positively
claustrophobic, and some paranoid part of me always fears being crushed in the
crowd on the downstairs dance floor as soon as someone yells ‘fire’. A huge favourite of BJ’s
Afro community, this is the place to go if you want to see lots of black guys
dressed up as homeboys and gals in tight spray on pants shaking their (shapely,
and gravity defying) bootylicious ass. And lots of
people do. As the popular cliché goes –
once you go….nevermind. Personally, I stopped going
there since they raised the price of screwdrivers from 10 to 15 kuai.
Bla Bla – an
absolute skank of a watering hole tucked inside the
school campus, it was a personal favourite for no other reason than for the
fact that I loved its Location, Location, Location – right next to dorm 7 where
I happened to reside (hey, it’s not often where your room is 50m of the bar),
which made it super convenient spot to while away some time whenever I didn’t
feel like doing any work (which was often).
At least the stagger home was short trip if things ever got messy after
one of those ‘quiet drinks’ that eventually degenerate into alcohol fuelled,
navel gazing, self absorbed ‘aunt abby’
sessions. Another thing I’ve got to be
grateful to Bla Bla for is
that this is where plans for Cams & Fortuna’s excellent adventures started
after a couple of beers.
Taku – Newcomer to the scene trying to steal
business away from Lush and Propaganda, my recollections of Taku
were vague thanks to the bottles of spirits a friend’s boyfriend managed to
score for the night. Needless to say it
was a messy night for all participants and a few skeletons came out of the
closet that night….from what I remember it was like an early 90s Melbourne
night club – lots of black marble, flash lighting, booths……and very bad
music. Which was all
fine after we’d all downed about 10 shots of vodka in the space of half an
hour… Recently it seems to be consolidating its reputation by hosting a
series of frat boy events such as Traffic Light Parties…and there you are
thinking that (dis)Orientation week was something
that took place sometime back in the last century…..nuff
said.
Say Yes Bar – one of those unremarkable
bars tucked inside a hotel near school, it seems to be a perpetual (and
exclusive, seeing as I never seem to notice anyone around) C8 class hangout
during those final weeks of last semester.
Perhaps its merit lies in the fact that it seems to be always willing to
put up with a pack of rowdy kids at any given hour. Still, this always seems to be the place
where I always end up having heated arguments with my Jap classmates over the
fact that ‘Great Wall Wines’ do not qualify to be called ‘Wine’. So nasty is that stuff (vinegar anyone???)
you need to put ice cubes in your glass to water it down. But even that isn’t enough to convince them….
Hey, who thought I was even remotely capable of being a wine snob????
Houhai 18 – Houhai,
meaning ‘back seas’, it’s actually a lake area near the centre of the city
surrounded by pubs and restaurants on its shores. More an upscale precinct consisting of classy
(read: expensive) bars and lounges than messy rowdy nightclubs, we stumbled
across Houhai 18, this cute hole in the wall bar
facing the lake one night while searching for some live music. Baulking at paying for Long island iced tea
by the glass at western prices, my friend Jess and I managed to sweet talk the
barman (oh, the poor helpless confused boy who turned into putty in the face of
Jess’ s batting eyelashes and charms) into giving us
lethal jugs of the potions at the bulk price deal $100kuai ($16AUD) a pop. Needless to say, we become VIP customers soon
after that, and even convinced the (live) singers to take requests. With that sorted it was inevitable that I would
take my 25th Birthday Celebrations there……resulting in many participants
walking away from the night with some very, very sore heads. Much to my devastation, that was my last time
there. After a summer away, I recently
returned to find they’d renovated and spiffed up the place which completely
destroyed everything that I’d loved about my old haunt.
Saluntun – ahhh…..located
at the eastern of the city, this is basically
Vics – Conjure thoughts of noisy mid
nineties clubs like
Deep – another one of those bars where
I’m sure I’ve been to but can’t remember too much of. From my vague recollections, it had something
to do with a lot of free tequila….nonetheless, certain
persons on this mailing list would find Deep a very memorable place in more
ways than one…
MIX – what the hell is the deal with
these monosyllabic names for flashy overrated bars anyway? (Vics, Mix, Deep,
Heat….) Across the road from Vics, the newly opened
MIX is supposedly designed to usurp Vic’s place as
Cloud Nine – finally, one bar that lives
up to its name, reputation, and steep pricetag. A decadent, opulent, post modern Opium den
Shanghai styled lounge/bar on the lower floor for those who want to mellow
about and down a few cocktails, and dead beat techo
scene for those more inclined to substance abuse on the upper floor. This place is truly something, and while the
price list for drinks may raise a few eyebrows, you never forget the fact that
you’re in Cloud Nine, even though 90% of the credits go to the interior
designer.
Pure Girl – Ah, the original hole in the
wall $5 kuai shot place first mentioned in the ‘Tight
Ass Diaries’ rant has done so well it’s expanded…..without lifting the ambience
up a notch. You really can’t stoop much
lower than this cheap, cheerful, and positively nasty place, though my mate
‘Marco’ is such good mates with the bartender he actually steps behind the bar
to pour himself drinks, picking up two for one deals along the way. One night, we got so ‘inspired’ we literally plastered
our names and profound personal quotes on the wall (with the owner’s
permission)….very, very classy indeed.
Poachers – if there is anything worse
than a meat market (namely, Vics, MIX and every other
establishment in BJ), then it’s a meat market absolutely crawling with expat men (of all ages, but usually sporting
US/UK/Canadian/Australia passports)on
fat packages looking to (sic) ‘make someone’s day’…..resulting in the
occasional urge for one to unleash caustic comments like ‘I’m afraid you’ll
need to find someone else in order to make somebody’s day – I already have my
OWN degree, source of income, AND passport’.
Ouch. Fortunately for them,
that’s not a hard feat to achieve (let’s just say that drinks are not the only
thing cheap there) though the consolation for the likes of me is that at least
people watching here’s more interesting….or horrifyingly fascinating at the
very least. Which is good for the owners
as this place does an absolutely roaring trade on any given night.
Happy House –cheesy 80’s disco and
Britney Spears tunes, big student crowd, matched by student priced drinks makes
this a very happy house indeed. If any
‘O-week type’ rumours start circulating about what happened between certain
people on the weekend, this is the place where it most probably started.
Chaoyang – Upmarket expat
precinct on the far east side of the city – worth mentioning as it is host to
one of BJ’s most (in)famous establishments, the World
of Suzie Wong (aka Suzie Wong’s).
Modelled to re-create the ambience of a
decadent 30’s Shanghai Opium Den (before Cloud Nine came in and did an even
better job of it), it is another venue for entertaining people watching, with a
sizeable percentage of Poachers crowd/demographic often spilling onto here on
Friday and Saturday nights. The reasonably
priced drinks here are actually quite good, but only if you can actually get
past the door and find some room to breathe.
Another notable feature here is a
disproportionate amount of females there that seem a tad….underdressed (and by
that I’m not meaning that they’re wearing torn jeans and a stained t-shirt).
Accompanying some sunglass clad Armani suit wearing dude who looks like he’s
got at least $30,000kuai stashed in that man bag/pouch of his as often as they
are found chatting amongst themselves in small groups while obviously eyeing
the crowd (and every male that steps through the door), you can’t help but come
to the conclusion that the distinct difference between Poachers and Suzie Wongs is that you are more likely to have to pay for the
women here….though sometimes it’s an incredibly fine line that’s hard to
draw…As one visiting (male) friend from the Netherlands once remarked, ‘it’s
like Russia, you never know if the women there are (for) real or not’…. The other thing I’m curious about is what cut
does the place get for hosting such large numbers of
pros….
Still, it’s a chilled place to hang out
on Sunday night, when everyone seems to have gone home, or made enough for the
week.
And having offended enough people with my none too professional assessments of their favourite
watering holes, I think it’s time to sign off before I get sued for
defamation.
Cheers indeed,
Cams