Panjiayuan - The Flea Market

Above: Old Movie Star posters at Panjiayuan

On the southeast side of the city, diagonally opposite to the northwest quadrant where we live, is the famous Panjiayuan Market. It's held only on Saturdays and Sundays, and people who are organized get there early. It's a slice of Chinese life, filled with Beijingers as well as tourists. The locals outnumber the tourists (at least the western tourists), which always makes for an experience that feels more authentic (Fussell writes a lot about what is touristy and what is not: I'm not sure what he'd make of this market.) It is laid out not unlike a flea market in the U.S., in squares and rectangles, and easy to find your way around. Some of the shops are handsome and permanent, selling fine jewelry and expensive antiques. Some of the goods are on tables, and others laid out on the ground. I wanted to see a Chinese person bargain, so tried to be unobtrusive as I watched a woman comparing a new jade bracelet to the one she already owned, The vendor used a glass bar the size of a piece of chalk and tapped on the jade so that it made a satisfying ring, but still no sale. My companions for the day were looking for small porcelain dishes, a scroll, an abacus, and a rolling pin made out of fine wood, and of course they found everything. The professor who wanted the rolling pin is Italian and was going to use it for pizza dough although the Chinese ones are for dumplings. But what I was looking for was historical ephemera - posters or other documents from the Cultural Revolution, something that has become very marketable. I was not disappointed. I'm having some trouble uploading photos, but I'm going to try again to get more on the next post. Any hints about uploading photos? For some reason I can do them from my camera directly from the memory card, but not from my saved files.