Beijing's 20 Most Interesting People: Jim Boyce

We have a saying here at the Beijinger that even if nothing interesting could be written about 99 percent of Beijing's approximately 20 million people, there would still be 200,000 great stories remaining. To us, what makes a person interesting was not only their long-term presence in Beijing, but that they had done something of note within the last 12 months. Here is one of our picks, and you can always find more in our October issue, now out on the stands.

Jim Boyce
Webmaster for Beijing Boyce and Grape Wall of China wine blogs

Years in Beijing: 8

Why he’s interesting: Known to many as Beijing Boyce, Jim evolved a newsletter about Beijing’s nightlife into an expanded blog that has become one of the city’s top sources of dining and drinking information, all presented with humor and flair for language rarely matched in our fair city. For a nightcap, he expanded to writing about wine via his Grape Wall of China blog, and in the process established himself as one of the leading voices on Chinese wine in English.

What he says: “Life in Beijing can be frustrating at times but it happens at a breakneck – and addictive – speed. And to live in the capital of the world’s most populous nation as it establishes itself as a world power, and to see the change unfold, both for better and worse, within the city itself – I feel lucky to be witness to all this.”

Photo: Lova