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Friday, December 12, 2008
Place of interest 3 Hutongs are one of the places that we must visit when we are touring in Beijing. It contains the essence of china's culture and history. While visiting the hutong which is formed by siheyuans, we saw the hierarchy system that was present during China's dynastic period. Every detail of the siheyuan, from the size of the building, the door to the material of the lion in front of the door shows the difference in status of the siheyuan's owner. In addition, the difference between a high-end siheyuan which for instance, the Forbidden city and a commoner's siheyuan in the hutongs is very great. One is a grand, magnificent place while the other may look like a run-down building.
Furthermore, the hutongs shows us one of Asia's traditional values - communal living. In a siheyuan, a few generations live together and people like to have gatherings in the hutongs. This is something very different from Singapore's HDB and can nowhere be seen now. Thus, i think hutong is a place that is preserved to show and remind us of the diminishing Chinese culture.