Xingqing Park

Perhaps the most interesting facet of my routine is the daily feast of eye candy I consume during jogs and walks in Xingqing park. Every morning this park, located just around the corner from our apartment on the site of a former royal palace, is packed with thousands of Chinese, coming primarily from the 50 - 80 year old set, exercising.



As you pass through the gate you enter the park's largest plaza and find it overflowing with couples and individuals engaged in dance classes drawing from an array of traditions. These are mass, public classes that seem to follow some sort of routine, but hard for me to discern. The different styles integrate and blur with competing sound systems cranking out various fast paced dance tunes that merge into a rhythmic, moving mass of humanity.




As you dive further in the dance music fades and is replaced by the swish of ad hoc badminton courts which are squeezed into any available open space or path. This is probably China’s main outdoor sport and you see couples engaged in what look like long standing court dates all over the park.



Tai chi and kung fu classes are another regular, with tai chi sometimes in smaller groupings in rather serene, woody settings; while at other times featuring their own traditional sound accompaniment piped in and featuring larger clusters of practitioners in similar, traditional dress. Spread out rather evenly throughout the park, these more mass tai chi groups battle with the dance classes for the title of Xingqing’s most popular exercise form.



There is also the occasion 50+ person singing group working on a piece, random collections of flute players, kite fliers, paddle exercisers, sword enthusiasts, and even a jazz corner on a dirt path going up to the park's central temple. One of my favorite activities takes place on the trail surrounding the pool on the park's northwest corner where people come alone, face the lake and yell out single syllable words at the top of their lungs.




There is also the spinning top area, where people manipulate low-toned, humming tops on strings around their bodies or the huge floor top that the master keeps spinning with a perfectly positioned lash from his bull whip. Then there are the random artists working water brushes on beautiful lines of calligraphy that fade before they are completed, bird enthusiasts that descend on a woody area to tease songs out of their caged pets with the false hope of a return to nature, and the clusters of what appear to be religious practitioners of some sort, reading lines from delicately drawn text around the park’s central fountain.



All these activities intersect along the Xingqing’s meandering trails which are highlighted by beautiful stone benches, ornate light features, and a few carefully placed temple buildings / cafes. The winter has taken the edge off the foliage, but given their attention to detail in the other features of the park, I'm sure spring in Xingqing will be spectacular.