Living in Haidian

[ford2014]

Hello,

I'm a Junior at the University of Georgia in the U.S. and will be spending the next two semesters learning Chinese at Tsinghua University. Anyway, I wanted to hear some advice for activities near Tsinghua and Haidian in general. Some major interests that I have and would be especially interested in hearing about include the following:

1. Movie theaters

2.Mexican/southwest food (does it exist in Beijing?)

3.Basketball courts

4.Places for a bookworm (book stores, coffee shops, etc.)

All suggestions welcome, even stuff not mentioned earlier.

[dizhitian]

There is a movie theatre right behind 五道口subway station by 王庄路. At the moment it only has Chinese movies playing. It is really easy to join a pickup basketball game on the Tsinghua campus. I try to do that once or twice a week but be warned that the style of play might be a little different (smoke breaks between games). There is also a great bookstore about a five minute walk from the south gate called 万圣书园 that also has a coffee shop. I am not sure about Mexican food but hopefully someone else has more details on that.

Hope this helps

[calif90071]

I studied Chinese at Tsinghua University last year. There is a place in Wudaokou called "La Bamba" (it's across from the subway station, next to the 7-11). It has Mexican food, and considering it's in Beijing I thought it was quite good. They also have free beer from 11-1 on the weekend (at least that's how it was when I was there). If you show them your Tsinghua student ID you also get a discount on most things. Hope this helps.

[ford2014]

Thank you so much, both posts are great.

Dizhitian: As far as the style of play I'm not too particular. Just getting out and hitting some jumpshots is more than enough for me and smoke breaks will just give me more water breaks Thanks for the tip on the bookstore, it's much appreciated.

calif90071: I will definitely have to check out La Bamba, I was worried I'd have to forego Mexican food for an entire year!