Hebei Day 1!

Today, my dad and I traveled to China’s Hebei province. Our first destination was Shijiazhuang-the capital of the province- which was about a 3 hour plane ride from Hong Kong. We stopped by the Kaiyuan temple and the Zhengding city wall. Our next stop was Baoding—just a 30 minute high speed railway ride (it’s fascinating how you can get almost anywhere in China by railway!)

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For lunch before catching the highspeed railway, we enjoyed some of the famous siumai, right next to our hotel. Our meal—twelve large siumais and a big bowl of soup—cost only 35 rmb (less than $4!)

After a short stop at Baoding, we will be heading to Pingxiang county, Julu county and Guangzong county in the span of the coming week. All three counties have a population of around 300,000 with an approximate area of 500km squared. I was particularly shocked after learning about the gdp per capita for each county. For Pingxiang, it is 33900 rmb, while for Julu it is 36200 rmb, but for Guangzong it’s only 28100 rmb. Guangzong’s GDP per capita is only 3% that of where I go to school in Boston, and 7% of that of Hong Kong!

Upon arriving at Baoding, we went to the 直隶总督 (Museum of Zhili Govern-general’s Office). Towards the end of the visit, we walked into the gifts shop hoping to buy some magnets. I picked up a design that caught my eye. “That’s 35 rmb,” the cashier said. I immediately put it down-considering how you could get boba for 7 rmb and ice cream for 2 rmb at the famous Mixue shop, this price was absurd. 

“10 rmb for one magnet would sound a lot more sense. I would buy it for that price,” my dad said.

To our surprise, we saw a stall selling the exact same magnets the moment we walked out of the site-for 9.8 rmb. We got so excited and bought one that we didn’t even notice another stall just a few meters away-selling them at just 7.8 rmb!

I later asked my dad why it was this case. Did you see how the sellers at the gift shop inside the site weren’t even trying to persuade us to buy their products? That’s because they are government owned, so they don’t really care about how much they actually have to sell. To them, it doesn’t make a difference.

After our visit, we decided to take a walk along the bustling streets of Baoding. 

A stall selling labubu caught my attention. These dolls have been a great hit recently and are pretty much all sold out in Hong Kong- I couldn’t find them in the popmart stores. From the sight of the labubus with odd-looking eyes and a slightly distorted body, I knew they were fabricated. 

Even the seller admitted it himself when he told us the price-25 rmb each, whereas the real one of the same style costs up to 300 rmb on Taobao. Though I’m not a huge fan of labubus (and definitely not fake labubus), I wanted to support the small business. At the end, I chose a black labubu with rainbow teeth at a discount price of 20 rmb. 

We walked some more along the street, exploring the shops. We even found a Photo Booth that captures a photo of you and the streets behind as the news headline. It was my first time seeing something like this.

For dinner, we decided to try a famous local dish-beef zhaobing. It was surprisingly delicious. 

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We had an amazing day today and will be traveling down to the Pingxiang county tomorrow!