Cloudy in Beijing Blogging about my time in China

Clubs, bars and coffee

"Do you guys go out to drink coffee?"

"Noooo!"

"Do you guys go to bars?"

"Noooo!"

Sometimes I'll ask my students what their plans are for the weekend. "Sleep" is often times the unanimous answer. But never do I hear my Chinese students say they plan on going to a bar, club, or coffee shop. So lately, I've been asking them why is this?

"It's too expensive," a class of students told me today when asked about going to Starbucks.

True. Paying $3.50 for a coffee drink even in the U.S. is kind of a lot. But in China, that same amount of money could buy you several meals. When I asked students today about what annoyed them, one student said: "I'm annoyed that I have no money."

As for bars, one student told me weeks earlier that, "all the people there look shady and like they do drugs."

"The people there are terrible," another student told me today.

Why bars and clubs here are associated with such a negative image, I wasn't entirely sure at the time. But one local Chinese teacher told me, "Going to bars and clubs is still a very modern thing to do... When we were younger, we didn't have bars."

Xi'an does have its own bar district here. But every time I walk through it, most of the shops seem largely vacant, even on a Friday and Saturday night.

That's not to say my students don't drink. They certainly do, but not at bars. Instead, it's more of a tradition to go to restaurants to eat and drink beer. Already I've had a few times where I've had dinner with my students, only to end up close to being drunk. (It's difficult to refuse a drink when you've basically been designated a "guest of honor".)

Recently I've been asking a student here her take on the issue, and she put things in an interesting perspective:

"Going to a coffee place just isn't suitable," she said to me today. "If you wanted to drink coffee you would just go to supermarket and get the drink there. You wouldn't go all the way to the coffee shop just to drink coffee... It's the same with going to a bar and having a beer."

That kind of makes sense. But what about just going to a bar or a coffee place to relax?

According to her, many of the people who got coffee places are white-collar workers, who need to do business or sign contracts. She added that there is also a certain kind of person who goes to a coffee place; a person who likes to "receive enjoyment" or "appreciate things".

"But don't you like to enjoy things?" I asked.

"It's just not suitable," she replied. "But we do go to McDonalds or KFC."

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My students may not go to get coffee, but plenty of other young people here do. The Starbucks in Xi'an, which are almost the same as they are in America, are often packed with seemingly college-aged people.

Last Saturday I also went to a night club, and the place filled with the same young demographic graphic. Maybe somewhat ironically, clubs in Xi'an are way better than they are in my home state of Oregon.

For one, this club was free. Also, it was a bit more high-class than what I was used. As we entered it, me and another fellow foreign teacher crossed through a metal detector. Every now and then we saw helmeted guards posted here and there. The club itself was ultra-modern and sleek and it was easy to marvel at its architecture. While walking through the place, part of me felt that we had left Xi'an, and entered some place entirely new. Later, the club featured a group of professional dancers, the women dressed scantily-clad.

The crowd at the club was made up of almost all young people. But I didn't expect to see any of my students here. The dorms at the college have a curfew at around 11 or midnight. Plus, its expensive.

Today I asked my Chinese tutor about why my students don't go to clubs, and yet so many other young people do.

"A lot of these young people (at the clubs) don't have jobs, but they rely on their parents for money." she said. "Or they do have jobs, which they got through their parents. The girls there may also be trying to find a guy, who is rich."

Other interesting folk can also be present at such clubs. My foreign friend told me that sometimes he'll see a beautiful Chinese woman eyeing him, who will then be followed by a man. These women, he was told, are usually prosititutes, the man being the bodyguard.

What young people do with their spare time is still a bit of a mystery to me, but I'm starting to understand why my students look down on clubs. My Chinese tutor added: "If you want to be a good girl, it's best not to go to these clubs."