Whenever you travel to a new destination—especially, it seems, major cities—you need to be aware of the tricks that local scammers pull on unsuspecting first-time visitors. New York has its Three-Card Monte and shell games; Bangkok’s tuk tuk drivers might ignore your wishes, taking you instead to their preferred hotels or jewelry and silk shops where the owners pay them for each tourist they bring in; Beijing has its art students.

Con Artists

If you are an obvious tourist in Beijing, it is nearly inevitable you will be approached by someone who claims to be an art student. They will tell you about a special one-day only exhibit of their work, or will offer to take you to their studio where they can be had for a special price—just for you. In reality, instead of discovering the next Chinese Picasso, you will be subjected to mediocre to downright awful paintings and sketches, then pressured to make a purchase at exorbitant prices. Tiananmen Square is a popular place for these scams.

I knew about this con heading to Beijing, and on my first day out and about on my own, I asked someone for directions at a busy business intersection nowhere near Tiananmen, and after pointing me down the right path, he proceeded to tell me he taught calligraphy on the side and would I care to see his and his students works that he keeps in his nearby office.

I’ve learned during my travels that not all scams need turn out negatively—if you’re careful. Having spent the past 25 years living in major metropolitan areas, I have a pretty well developed sense of con (though that doesn’t mean I’ve never been taken, cause I have). However, if you’re aware of the deal, it isn’t obviously dangerous and you can stay firm regarding not purchasing too much, it can be an adventure.

So I agreed to go to this dude’s office. His name was Victor. We went up to what looked like an insurance company office where in the conference room he had a box filled with silk sketches, pastels, paintings, etc. Pretty scenes of rural China, rivers and mountains, cats. You get the picture.



Victor’s spiel went from no cost to “I’ll make a special deal for you. Cheaper than in the stores.” Well, yes, that would be true, I realized, after hitting a couple of the markets where tourist souvenirs are so grossly overpriced that you need to have bargaining skills of steel to get the cost down to anything remotely close to fair.

So after starting out at his initial offer of 250 RMB for one piece, he dropped it to 150, then 100, and I eventually got two landscape panels (by one of his students) and one of his humorous sketches for 100 RMB total, about $15. It was of a man with a large belly who stood with his mouth open to the sky. Victor told me that it represented a government official, good only for eating and getting fat. That story alone sold me.

I’m sure I still overpaid, but the experience was worth it.

Hutong Abduction

My last night in Beijing, I was approached by a young woman (named Hope) who wanted to give me a tour of one of the city’s old hutong neighborhood, including a visit to a traditional home, for free. Nothing is free, I said. What was the catch? No catch, I was assured by her manager at the tour office. It was the end of the day and they just wanted to share Beijing culture. Hmmm…

Again, curiosity got the better of me, so I climbed into the rickshaw. (I also desperately needed to give my sore feet a rest.) We drove around the alleyways while Hope gave me cultural insights: the number of beams above a doorway corresponded to a family’s prestige, doorways have raised bottoms so it’s harder for husbands to sneak out and so on. We turned down narrower and narrower alleyways, no one was out on the street, it was getting to be dusk, and I was beginning to smell danger.

I had been making a mental note of our path into the hutong so I could get out of the alleyway maze, and was preparing to run if need be. To my surprise, about a minute later we made a turn and were in front of a busy home where people were running around, some with large blocks of ice.

I was told to wait a few minutes while Hope made sure it was okay for me to come in. The driver tried to insist I leave my backpack on his seat since it was so heavy, but I kept it firmly secured on my shoulders. The “home” turned out to be a restaurant where SAS, the Scandinavian airline, was hosting a private dinner. The company’s chairman hoped to secure more routes to China, at least that’s what the Swedish chef told me, whom I ended up talking to for about 10 minutes while waiting for my “tour.”

Suddenly I’m pulled to the side of the courtyard—hutong homes are four buildings that form a square and face a shared courtyard: parents stay in the north home, daughters in the west, sons in the east, servants in the south—and the next thing I know a reporter for CCTV, China’s official television station, puts a microphone in front of me and a cameraman positions me for an interview.

What?!

Turns out CCTV was covering the dinner, but for whatever reason wanted or needed a token Westerner perspective on the city. Hope’s job had been to find someone appropriate. They didn’t want to know my name, where I was from or what I did for a living. Only what I liked about Beijing. Ah, the catch.



On the way out, the large ice chunks had been turned into a sculpture of an SAS jet. Hope was fascinated by the piece and wanted a picture of her touching the cold mass.

In the end, she asked just that I give a donation to the driver, which I gladly handed over, and that I e-mail the picture of the ice sculpture. I agreed, and walked away smiling and shaking my head.

This—the unexpected— is why I travel.