Wangfujing Commercial Street stands at the center of Beijing city beside Tiananmen Square. It is the first modern commercial street built in Beijing, about 800 meters long and with many stores and malls standing on two sides of the street.
The Wangfujing shopping district aims to achieve equal ranking with New York's Fifth Avenue, the Champs-Elysees of Paris and the Ginza in Tokyo. The packed stores in the street selling clothes, tea, shoes, souvenirs, books, hats, etc. - you name it, Wangfujing has got it.
The most famous eating place is the Snack Street. The Wangfujing Night Market has a selection of exotic Street food on the Snack Street. Deep fried insects, scorpions, and sea creatures can be found, along with other animals and animal parts not ordinarily consumed as food in the west. But while these exotic snacks can be found, other more common foods, such as Chuanr (meat kebabs, commonly made of lamb) and desserts, such as Tanghulu, or candied fruits making up the majority of the food sold on the street.
At night the stores of Wangfujing Street close at 9PM, but a small night market stays open after that which caters to tourists. The night market consists of vendor stalls that stretch along a few blocks of side streets and alleys that branch off from Wangfujing Street near the southern end of its pedestrian mall section.
Most of the stalls sell either souvenirs or food. The souvenirs are the same things that you see in shops all over the city, and you will have to bargain to get down to the right price. For souvenirs, try to buy them for about 1/3 of the asking price. You will have to bargain for a few rounds and walk away once or twice to get to the right price.
The Wngfujing Book Store has a history of nearly 50 years, and it is the preference of many foreigners in Beijing. The bookstore has a great number of books written in English covering literature, history, politics, travel, art and even cooking. Most of them are published by Chinese publishing houses, while there are also some original imported books from foreign countries.
During your visit to Beijing, you will enjoy a lot when you come to Wangfujing to stay for a while.
