Hutong life, courtyard homes and Beijing breakfasts
Local tour guide in Beijing, China.
I grew up in a courtyard house in a Dongcheng hutong, sharing a yard with three families, two jujube trees, and one opinionated cat. Much of that world is vanishing, so I guide to keep it alive: breakfast stalls that open at dawn, grandmothers playing cards under the trees, craftsmen repairing bicycles the old way. My walks are slow and full of small kindnesses. This is Beijing at courtyard height.
Spend a morning inside Beijing's old alleyway world before it changes forever. We eat a proper hutong breakfast of jianbing and soy milk, visit a courtyard home where my neighbours still live, watch the Bell and Drum Tower square wake up, and learn to read the carved gate piers that reveal each family's old status.