A friend in the United States asked me, "are there any suburbs in Beijing?"
The short answer is, of course, yes. Anywhere there are cities, there are suburbs, even in China. But they are not the kind of surburban living spaces we are familiar with in the USA. There are no Schaumburgs, West Nyacks, or Farmington Hills in China. Remember that in most countries outside the USA, the "suburbs" are places choked with overcrowding, poverty and joblessness. And near the big cities that anchor third world countries, the "suburbs" look like American inner cities, not Levittown. There's no sense talking about a "car in every garage" unless you are considering blowing up the car -- and the garage -- to make a political statement.
Hence, I chose to search for a well-known Beijing surburb one recent evening, a mystical place called Shunyi. I had heard that this was not just where the well-off Beijingers and foreign expats live, but it was where you can find imported foods and other goods in abundance. In fact, I was outraged to read some articles in the free English-language magazines, which noted that people in Shunyi were living the same kind of lifestyle -- cars, homes, gardens, modern toilets, etc. -- that I used to take for granted in the USA.
According to the latest city maps, I expected to find Shangri-La, er, Shunyi, at the end of one of Beijing's newest subway routes. Predictably, it was the one which ran closest to Beijing International Airport. Shunyi was sounding better all the time. I boarded a train that was refreshingly free of the serial spitters and snot-slingers of urban Beijing, and sat among the nouveau riche of New China for the journey to the Promised Land.
I took the train to the end of the line, disembarked at the park-and-ride, and found that the area looked about the same as the station where I'd gotten on. Old high-rise apartments, trash-strewn countryside, abandoned factories, and the occasional import car dealership; plus taxi drivers and bicyclists for whom traffic laws were just a joke.
The line had ended several kilometers short of the surburb itself. I was so disappointed. Like the author James Hilton wrote in "Lost Horizon", everyone hopes they'll find their Shangri-La. I don't think I ever found Shunyi.
