Best Apartment in Beijing

Best Apartment in Beijing

BEIJING - Down a dusty road just off Tiananmen Square, not far from the mausoleum that holds Chairman Mao in his crystal crypt, you will find - if you don't wait too long - one of China's last hutongs. <Apartment Beijing>

It's spared - for now - from the bulldozers that have put Beijing under a shroud of dust created by the wreckers balls that are modernizing China's capital for the Olympics. <Apartment Beijing>

And being left in the past is fine with the men sitting around a rickety table sharing lunch, just as they have done most summer days for decades in this warren of alleyways and traditional Chinese courtyard houses in the heart of Beijing.

"This is how the ordinary people once lived in Beijing,'' says Cai De, taking shade from the day's 40 C heat wave under a poplar tree. "We don't know how long our hutong will stay like this. There is a lot of destruction and building because of the Olympics. The wreckers are certainly getting close to us." <Apartment Beijing>

In the run-up to the 2008 Summer Games, Beijing seems to have been transformed into the world's biggest construction site. While no final number is available, it's estimated Olympic-related projects - everything from a new airport terminal, hundreds of kilometres of new roads, a train to the airport and a massive new subway - has created $40 billion US in construction.<Apartment Beijing>

Around every Beijing street corner you can hear the hiss of the arc welding as girders are added to new skyscrapers rising on the skyline. There is the constant explosion of falling concrete, as old buildings from the time of Mao come crashing down. The city's air is filled with a fine powder, a mix of cement and the yellow dust of the Gobi desert, that covers everything in a gritty film. <Apartment Beijing>

"Yes, there's a lot of chaos,'' agreed Cai, 62. "It's a lot of inconvenience for the ordinary people. Lots of trouble for us."

So is he unhappy about what this Olympic building boom has wrought and with the very real possibility he may soon be bulldozed out of his home?<Apartment in Beijing>

"Of course not," he says, taking a sip of Yanjing, the official beer of the 2008 Games. "It's a difficult time now, but the Olympics will be great for Beijing's economy and it's important for China's development."

That seems to encapsulate the mood of many Beijingers. Most people in this metropolis of 15 million will tell you they are mightily inconvenienced by the rapid modernization of the city and the unprecedented construction boom. But there is also a fierce pride, mixed with Chinese nationalism, that China is having its first Olympics.

There is, however, also an undeniable degree of social dislocation taking place.

As vast areas of the city are transformed in the march to hold the Olympics, China's planners are often condemning entire city blocks and neighbourhoods, forcing people to move.<Apartment in Beijing>

The Geneva-based Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions estimates "by April 2007, at least 1.25 million people have already been displaced as a result of urban development linked to the Olympic Games, and unknown numbers of these people have been evicted forcibly.<Apartment in Beijing>

"At least a further 250,000 people are expected to be displaced in the final year before the Olympic Games, resulting in a total of 1.5 million people being displaced in Beijing due to Olympics-related development. While many of these displacements resulted from large-scale urban redevelopment that would have occurred without the Olympic Games, the scale of displacements has more than doubled since Beijing was elected as an Olympic host city."

The scale of the change, in fact, is like nothing seen in Beijing's modern history.

"This is changing the face of Beijing," says Paul Evans, a frequent visitor to Beijing who heads the Vancouver-based Asia-Pacific Foundation. "This is the biggest makeover in Beijing's history."

In most cases, people moved out of hutongs are being given financial compensation and a chance at a new, modern apartment further on Beijing's outskirts. That is pleasing to many, who are happy to leave the communal washrooms and dilapidated houses - most lacking air conditioning - that go with life in the Chinese hutong.

"Most people are happy to get a new home when the time comes," said Hezu Bing, a Beijing taxi driver. "The Olympics have helped improve the lives of people."<Apartment in Beijing>

But as is often the case with China's major real estate developments, there has also been graft along with the boom.

In March, after looking into forced evictions of Beijingers, Human Rights Watch reported: "Chinese citizens lack any real property rights. When people present their cases to courts, judges are usually corrupted by party officials and developers. Sometimes homes will have already been destroyed by the time a judge makes a decision to even hear the case. There have been complaints of violent evictions by thugs or construction crews injuring or even killing occupants during a demolition."<Apartment in Beijing>

A high-level Beijing Olympic organizer was also been implicated in shady deals in 2006. Liu Zhihua, who supervised Olympic construction projects, is under investigation for allegedly taking more than $1 million from developers. Xinhua, the regime's official news agency, reported Beijing's vice-mayor was ousted after "corruption and dissoluteness."<Apartment in Beijing>

That embarrassment, the constant construction and destruction does not seem to have diminished the general support for the Olympics. If there is one major concern it's whether poorer Beijingers will be able to attend the event.

"There are lots of Chinese people with money now," said Wei Guo, a 42-year-old taxi driver who said he works 12-hour days, seven days a week to help put his 17-year-old daughter through school. "But I don't make that much money. I don't think I'll be able to see the Games myself."<Apartment in Beijing>

Added Hezu Bing, a construction worker: "The tickets are surely going to be expensive, I think. The good seats will be at least 500 rmb (about $70) and I can't afford so much. The cheap tickets will be too far away from the action. So I will watch the Olympics on my TV, here in my house."<Apartment in Beijing>

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