Old town in Shenzhen?

In the heart of Shenzhen, or maybe one of the kidneys, there is an old village that is the closest thing to a hutong in this city of high rise buildings.  The place is so easy to miss and ignored, that it took me three years to even hear about it.  Last week, Jesse Warren invited me to visit Hubei Old Village with him and one of his Chinese friends, Ross, so we could shoot some photos.  Though the owners are Hakka people, most of the tenants are from Chaozhou, in eastern Guangdong.  We wandered around the alleys trying to find out some background on the village and how it has avoided the wrecking ball seeing as it is built on such prime real estate.  Jesse wrote a piece on the village for the Shenzhen Daily.  If you are interested you can find it here. 

If you know Shenzhen, the city is only 30 years old and, with the exception this village, everything in Lohuo District was built in the last 10 years or so.  That makes Hubei Old Village the only bit of architectural history around.

One thing Jesse and Ross did was stop and talk with people and ask store owners about the history of the village.  They actually got quite a few different versions of the story, which made it difficult to find out what the truth was about its origin.

While wandering around, Jesse found the home of a family that had invited him in for tea once before.  They even let him check out the loft above where the kids sleep.  We asked around about renting a place like this, but generally were told it is very difficult to get one.

Back on the street, we found our way to the village market and a dinner ofChaozhou street food .

In this shop, Jesse almost lost his head.  Well, his hair anyway.  Those are metal fan blades.

Keep your eye on the, well, I'm not sure.  We watched this dice game for a bit, but I never did try to really figure it out.  The guy placing the bet was obviously doing so for our benefit.  Clearly, he and the guy on the left were working with the man sitting at the table.  We decided not to play.  I love the expression on the kid's face because he's probably the ringleader.  Each time the man placed a bet, he would pull same look of surprise.  I don't think Macao has much to worry about.

It was the first time I have poked around a place in Shenzhen and forgot I was in the middle of an urban jungle .  The place reminded me of many such villages elsewhere in China and I look forward to revisiting it again, even if it does take me a whole 15 minutes to walk over there.