Qianmen Dajie

Qianmen Dajie, the quarter’s biggest street, runs immediately south from the gate, off to either side are trading streets and hutongs, with intriguing traditional pharmacies and herbalist shops, dozens of clothes shops, silk traders and an impressive array of side-stalls and cake shops selling fresh food and cooked snacks.

Once the district was noisy with opera singers. Today the theatres have been converted to cinemas and the area resounds instead with film soundtracks,piped into the street, and with the bips and beeps of the computer games sold at street stalls. For a rather sanitized taste of the district’s old delights, visit the Lao She Tea House which puts on daily shows of acrobatics and opera.

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