China Travel, News and Lifestyle
Nightlife
Night food of Zhuhai
Apr 10th
Usually when you go out to the club after several hours of partying you become hungry. In most countries in the world you are doomed to go with an empty belly, or visit McDonald’s at best. Not in China.
Usually when the clock strikes 10 PM tents are being raised at various streets and tables being prepared with different snack foods. These foods include calamari on stick (Squid), Pork/lamb meat on stick, Fishballs, cabbage in soy sauce, fried dumpling on stick and much more. These nightly food stands are usually open between 10 PM and 2 AM.
Each foodstuff comes with a price of either 1 or 2 kuai so its inexpensive. Beer to that (usually a local brand or Tsingtao) comes at a price of 4-5 kuai.
The places where the food is served are very simple with plastic chairs and plastic tables in the open air. Still, it has a nice atmosphere due to the fact that Chinese people hang around there, not only “tourists”.
You can also eat snack foods at the bars but its usually a lot more expensive. For example a portion of French Fries in MTC club would go for 20 kuai which is the equivalent of Ten lambsticks at a nightmarket stand.
McDonald’s in China is open 24/7 and offer food for the hungry after a bar night. The price is usually 20 kuai for a Big Mac set.
Personally I prefer the Nightmarket food.
Night Life in China part 2
Apr 4th
Most cities in China have a so called Bar Street or Jiu Ba Jie. Its where all the clubs are placed and the center of the nightlife. In Zhuhai you can choose between many bars along the street which is 1 kilometer or so. More >
Night life in China
Feb 3rd
When I arrived in Zhuhai I wanted to check out how the night life is. Well in Zhuhai there is one bar street which only contains clubs and bars. Outside the clubs there were some guards standing but no one checked my ID if I was over eighteen (which they do in Sweden). There was no problem getting in the Red bar which was the name of the first club.
The strange thing was that even though the club had music and a DJ mixing songs there was no dance floor to dance on. And if there were any dance floor it would probably be very small.
Overall the clubs have very nice interior and good atmosphere. But what amazed me was that people just sat there smoking cigarettes and just listening to the music. Almost no one dances here in China it seems. Very different from my home country Sweden where the dancefloor is packed with people…..
And ordering a drink without knowing Chinese is a cliffhanger.
If you do go to a club in China make sure to bring a card which says your address in chinese characters because otherwise you would probably spend the night at the police station trying to explain where you live.
Club Tango Beijing
Aug 5th
By a rare stroke of luck, I’ve managed to gain a great contact. She works in the Beijing nightlife scene and can get free tables and drinks for friends at clubs around town. Without going into more details, we hit to Club Tango one night.
Club Tango is a nice, newly renovated place located near the south gate of Ditan park. Inside, there are many rooms for karaoke, but also a regular club with DJs, bartenders and tables. Tango is more known for their karaoke than their club.
We got a three-sofa table group and were 7 people. We had sweet strawberry cocktail shots, fruit plates, 3 bottles of Johnny Walker Black Label and lots of soft drinks. The Black Label was mixed either with ginger ale or grape juice. Both were good, but I preferred the ginger ale version.
Between the Black Label drinks, I had some pure Black Label. On one shot a bartender and also part-owner of the club set the 43% JW shot on fire with his lighter. It was pretty hot, so I dropped it and set the tissue on the table on fire – a small embarrassment. That night I also learned a drinking game played with dices. It’s pretty fun and I’ll probably cover it some time.
Drinking Beijing Style
Aug 4th
When you’re tired of all the Western-style bars and clubs over at Sanlitun, Houhai and Workers Stadium – you should definitely try this out. This is what many Beijingers do and is a cool experience for the casual traveler.
- Make sure you’re with good company.
- Scourge the streets until you find the closest Muslim (Xinjiang) joint, and get a table outdoors.
- Start ordering Yanjing (Beijing) brand beers and some shish kebab (yang rou chuan / lamb on a stick), some pickled peanuts and green beans to go along with it.
- If you don’t know how to order, point at the plate of your neighbors and order what they’ve ordered.
- Let the games begin. Usually 6 bottles is enough for a person.
- Be merry.
The beers go for around 4 CNY ($0.6 USD) per 600 ml bottle and the kebabs 0.5 CNY ($0.1 USD) each. All together it shouldn’t cost more than 35 CNY ($5 USD) per person. Not only is this a very good deal, but also something unique to remember. I liked the food and the beers, and would do this again anytime.
These guys know how to earn money and close when all their customers leave, so don’t worry about the time.
