At the end of Langfang Second Lane, I saw a small road with a few souvenir shops and booths. A woman who was at the souvenir booth told me that it was the Zhubaoshi Street (珠宝市街). I was surprised. I thought that it should be a busy street with many jewelery shops. But I was not disappointed because my purpose of the trip was to look for Qianshi Hutong, the narrowest alleyway in Beijing. There were a few lanes along Zhubaoshi Street and I was not sure which the Qianshi Hutong was. If you read Chinese, this is the website on 钱市胡同. I asked a few locals, they just pointed and said, 'there'. I was really not sure which was the 'there'! I then saw a small shop selling some printings on the Cultural Revolution. I approached the seller. She was a young lady who did not know anything on the Cultural Revolution. I selected ten pieces of the printings and bought them. When I picked up a printing on 'Zhou Enlai', I smiled. The young lady wondered why I was so happy with 'Uncle Zhou was with Us'. I then walked slowly and observed every lane I passed by. I could not find any name plate of the lane. I saw a narrow lane. There were a few families. I thought that should be the Qianshi Hutong. I took a few pictures. I did not go in to find out more. It was narrow. I wondered if a fat person walked into it, how I was going to come out. After that, I walked to Da Zha Lan (大栅栏). I met a man at Da Zha Lan. He showed me a new shopping mall which almost already for operation. I took a few pictures at Qianmen (前门) and then took a subway train to Jianguomen (建国门) Station.

Ancient Observatory (古观象台) Getting out to the South-west exit of Jianguomen Station, the subway worker at the exit showed me the direction to the Ancient Observatory. I could not get any book or pamphlet on Ancient Observatory. Climbing up the steps, I finally saw the Observatory. It was near the hotel I stayed. When I visited Beijing with lvkissinger in 2005, we were stayed at the same hotel. But we did not visit the Observatory as we were short of free time. After getting down of the castle, I went to the courtyard. There were more exhibitions. The memory card of my camera was full and I could not take any more pictures in the courtyard and the exhibition rooms. I bought a box of poker cards with pictures of the planetarium and a planetarium observatory instruction card.

Going Home We checked out of the hotel at noon and headed for the Beijing International Airport. No more free plastic bag for customer since 1 June in China. During the last few days, I made used of the bag given by the church in Zhoukou as my shopping bag. At the airport, I bought a few copies of books. There was one book on the Beijing alleyways (北京胡同), two books on the Sichuan Quake (中国汶川抗震救灾纪实) and (殇恸). A few shopkeepers were very keen in working in Singapore. I told them that I love to stay in Singapore because it is peaceful. But working life for a China nationalist in Singapore is not that easy as they imagined. I bought some Beijing products. The sale girl recognised me as I bought the products when going to Zhoukou last few days. She was a little hesitant before handing the products to me. It was because she could not give me any plastic bag free. I told her that I had my hand-carried luggage and I reserved some space for shopping. I called Jin Yu to say goodbye to her. I told her that I would write down notes I wrote during the last few days in Beijing. I would send her those ideas I had that might help the relevant organisations to provide better service to the tourists at the Olympics Games season.