Bob’s Museum

My first trip to Beijing was during a snowy winter in the early 1990’s. I always carried my rollerblades during my frequent business trips as I’ve found they offer the best speed and means of seeing a new city.

Rollerblader’s were less prevalent in those days and people would often stop me to ask questions or to talk. That particular winter day, I had a couple hours before my flight to explore a new city. It was cold and there was ice on the streets and snow in the open areas. I was in the center of Beijing, near Tianamen Square, and in this area there are four lanes of car traffic and very wide areas for the bicycle and pedestrian traffic on each side of the car lanes.

I started out and skated over to the Forbidden City where I had a local snap the picture above. And then I began my intended short skate.

After about five minutes of skating, and I was the only skater in the crowd of thousands, a bicyclist came up beside me. A local, he said “hi, my name is Bob”. We stopped along side of the multi-lane bicycle track as at the very least I was intrigued by a Chinese person named “Bob”. And then he completed the deal when he said “Do you want to see my museum?”

Given the situation, how could I possibly say no?

And so I went with Bob to his museum. As I remember, we took three lefts and a right. I guess I didn’t remember correctly as it went horribly wrong later. But I followed Bob to his museum. We ended up on a tree-lined street at a “pre-revolutionary” building. We passed through the façade and ended up in a beautiful courtyard. When we arrived, I took off my blades and a woman brought us tea as we entered a gorgeous building filled with modern art. Bob actually did have a museum.

I drank my tea and marveled at the beautiful art as Bob and I wandered around the three story structure. As the unexpectedly enthralling time came to an end, I strapped on my blades and began to search my memory for my path of return.

But this is where my plans when awry. I was carrying local currency and my passport but I had no clue as to the name of my hotel. And so I skated.

The skate was wonderful; I saw aspects of Beijing that I would never have normally seen, even with the omnipresent guide I normally possessed. But soon I ended up in places a rollerblader in the dead of winter should never end up.

I ended up on a very long dirt road packed with stopped traffic. The road ran along the old city wall. All along the side of the road and the old walled city, there were scads of people moving bricks. Moving bricks from one pile to another pile. And it was very cold. And snowy. And I was on a dirt road in stopped traffic. Adventure at its best, although I definitely didn’t feel as much.

As I was trying to skate along my cold, snowy, dirt road, all I could think about was why these poor people were moving these bricks from one pile to another. This was while there were all looking at me with an incredulous look in their eyes. I’m certain they were all thinking “what in the hell is that stupid Waiguoren doing skating out in the snow on a dirt road?”

Eventually I found a taxi rank and skated up. After I had waved my arms sufficiently enough for one of them to feel sorry for me, one of them came over and offered to take my money.

As I had no idea of the name of my hotel and as we couldn’t speak nor write any common languages, we rode around for quite awhile. After he had rung up a year’s salary in fare, we began to approach the center of Beijing. I got out of the taxi and skated around until I found a famous landmark. Specifically, the McDonald’s near Tianamen Square.

When I finally found my hotel I skated in looking disheveled, cold and scared. I got to my room and opened the door and I found all my clothes on the bed. Talk about disheveled.

Apparently whilst I was out on my adventure and missing my flight out of town, “they” decided that they should search my room, apparently to see if foul play had taken place. A nice touch and a fine ending to my first adventure in China.

I’ve been back to China and Beijing many times since but I have never brought my blades…