Beijing Street Life

A little girl looks warily at the large stranger with a camera...

When I visit a new city, especially one as different to me as Beijing, one of my favorite things to do is just wander the streets and watch people. If someone is interesting to me and I want to photograph them, I either ask their permission or try to do so unobtrusively. The following photographs are from a few walks I took around Beijing in early June. As is common in Beijing it was overcast and smoggy that day, so no clear blue skies, but the people were all out and about...

A bus driver - I liked his serious look:

I tried to get the owner to pose with his dogs, but he insisted that they were more photogenic than he was...

This photo was taken inside the Temple of Heaven - these women appeared to be tourists just like me, but Chinese

This guy could be a migrant worker from the countryside or just a local man of little means.

China's economic boom has not reached all quarters. A statistic that I heard more than once from different sources is that 900 million rural Chinese live on about $1 a day...

A couple kanoodling on a bench next to the Forbidden City:

Same couple in 40 years? More likely the two above will be driving a Lexus...

A girl working on her calligraphy using a brush dipped in water - a common sight in public parks in the city.

I think I saw this car in Oxford didn't I? This one is parked next to the Forbidden City wall

Hard to see, but this guy is wearing a Yankee cap - you just cannot escape members of the Evil Empire...

An elderly man taking a load off next to the Forbidden City

The public park at the Temple of Heaven was crowded with groups of people playing music, dancing, singing, playing dominoes, etc.

The man below is playing an Er-hu, or two stringed Chinese violin.

Another guy who seemed to be down on his luck. He seemed very interested in the trash barrel in front of him. There were very few homeless people in the center areas of Beijing. I suspect the government keeps things "tidy" for foreign visitors

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A pedi-cab ride for the whole family!

Either she is tiny or that lantern is VERY large...

Nice ass, great mellons... (sorry, I couldn't resist...)

Fishing in the moat around the Forbidden City

Proud little guy in his coolest outfit posing for mom & dad at the Temple of Heaven

Still the most popular form of transportation in China

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On my walk I came across a street lined with food vendors. They were just setting up for the evening and didn't have their grills fired up yet, but most of their "raw" material was presented for inspection

Start with veggies...

Move on to cray-fish or shrimp...

Maybe some squid or octopus?

Some cicada pupae or heart?

And finish with starfish and sea urchin...

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Finally, I liked how intently this man was filling the cracks between the bricks in the Temple of Heaven. I watched him for a few minutes and his focus never wavered...