Ich Bin Ein Beijinger: Seen and B-Scenes

“Ich Bin Ein Beijinger” was a magazine column written by Kaiser Kuo that ran in every issue from October 2001 to October 2011. Kaiser offered one self-proclaimed Beijinger's take on the city that he's come to call home.

April 2005 - To be a cool foreigner in The Jing, you need to get with one of the cool local scenes! Follow this simple guide to learn how to insinuate yourself into any of the four truly important scenes in Beijing – what we call the “B-scenes” – and why it’s so incredibly cool to be a part of each. But watch out – they each have their pitfalls!

The Rock Scene

Your entry:
Girls: “I’m a graduate student on a generous research grant writing my dissertation on themes of alienation and Otherness in the alternative Chinese rock scene.”
Guys: “I come bearing sticks, strings, Steve Vai instructional videos and a quarter pound of kind sinsemilla!”

Why it’s awesome:
Girls: You get backstage passes, the privilege of saying, “I’m with the band,” and the chance to canoodle with the hottie bassist with the huge hands. Meanwhile, you gain first-hand insight into themes of alienation and Otherness in the alternative Chinese rock scene.
Guys: You get free admission to shows, free band beer, and ample groupie spillover. You gain intimate knowledge of all the hippest rocker slang. You get to impose your idiosyncratic musical tastes on poor Chinese rockers who don’t know better.

Why you need to get out:
Girls: Your research subjects rarely change underwear. You’re on your fifth long-haired, baijiu-soaked guitarist boyfriend and you’ve earned the unpleasant moniker “rock n’ roll comfort woman.”
Guys: You tear the filters off Zhongnanhai cigarettes before lighting up. You’ve received not so much as a thank-you for installing Kazaa on the PC you donated to the drummer of your pet band. You’ve contracted several hitherto unknown STDs. You rarely change your underwear.

The Film Scene

Your entry:
“I’m consulting for (Cannes/Rotterdam/Sundance/Berlin/San Sebastian), and Giselle at the Festival thinks you might just be the next Jia Zhangke.”

Why it’s awesome:
You get subtitling credits, you get to attend premieres at the Great Hall of the People, and you can proudly boast, “Foreigner Drinking Baijiu #2 – that was me!” You also get “I knew him when” bragging rights for your friends back in LA. Plus, no one seems to know – or care – that after toiling in the industry for five years, you have basically nothing to show for it.

Why you need to get out:
After translating screenplays of five underground masterpieces, no one’s paid you a kuai. You’ve also developed a paranoid belief that every Chinese film out there has borrowed liberally from your own brilliant screenplay – in development now for four years. The film in which you played Foreigner Drinking Baijiu #2 was viewed by exactly 17 androgynous Berliners in black turtlenecks.

The Art Scene
Your entry:
“I’m a buyer for a major New York gallery and we’re very, very hot on contemporary Chinese art right now.”

Why it’s awesome:
You can buy original art without the 9 million-percent markup. You dine with the hipoisie at any number of Yunnan-themed restaurants owned by Beijing artists. You get “I knew him when” bragging rights for your friends back in Manhattan. You get to secretly snicker at the gauche, passè McStruggle paintings your expat friends collect.

Why you need to get out:
You realize, too late, that the emperor is as naked as the pretentious performance artist you’ve been duped into promoting. With all the xingwei yishu you’ve seen, you’ve been splattered with more animal blood than a veteran Ozzy Osbourne roadie. You’ve started to understand the appeal of McStruggle paintings, and have collected a few yourself. You own a disturbing number of contemporary Chinese paintings all of which feature large, grinning heads rendered in bright colors in a cartoonish style.

The Rave Scene

Your entry:
“I ran a vinyl-only shop in Brixton where Paul used to come in, yeah? Oakenfold, mate, who’d you think I meant? Yeah, I shipped all me records out. Doin’ a drum-and-bass set at Twister on Saturday. Brilliant shite, mate. Hardcore.”

Why it’s awesome:
With that “DJ” before your oh-so-cool nom de guerre, you’re getting paid and getting laid for doing nothing more than twiddling knobs and bobbing your head with one ear of an outsize headphone clapped to it.

Why you need to get out:
You find the scene filled with “too many tossers callin’ theyselves DJ this and DJ that, doing shite that ain’t nothing more than twiddling knobs and bobbing their ‘eads with one ear of an ‘eadphone clapped to it.” You can’t remember the last time you saw the sun. E has drained the last bit of fluid from your spine and you can no longer bob your head.