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Beijing is now an international city. Wudaokou is a small United Nation in this big city. When you walk on the street, you can meet different people, yellow, white and black. Korean is the largest foreign population here. Wudaokou is one of the two major Korean residential places in Beijing. Americans are here too of course. Americans who come to China are known as the elite Americans. They want to do something real instead of being a media fooled enjoy-my-life American. Some Europeans just spend their lazy life in a different cultured country. They talk about culture and are interested in a mysterious Far East country. Some other Europeans come here because they were told you can pick up money everywhere here in China. Foreigners from third world come here to study and look for opportunities to get their life better just like people rush to the States. For them, here is much better than their own country.

When Sinclair came to Wudaokou in 1996, it was a only suburb of Beijing. No high buildings, no streets, no foreigners. Tsinghua University was all it has. Tsinghua has a large campus with everything you need for a life. If ever he went out of the campus, he would say, oh I’m going to downtown!

Sinclair was born in late 1970s. He experienced planned economy period in his childhood. He can still remember when he was a little boy, almost every consumer goods require coupons. Food coupons, meat coupons, cloth coupons and etc. Even matches require coupons. Every month, every person has limited amount of rice, meat and other consumer goods.

Coupons are not enough. Because the amount of things you want to buy is always less than the amount of coupons. And the buyable has different quality. One time, when the department store would provide fresh pork, he and his mother joined the long queue waiting for the department store opened its door for business the night before. Everyone wanted to get a good piece of meat. During the waiting, when someone in the queue had to answer the nature’s call, he had to place a blank basket at where he stood and then release himself.

But, if you know a salesperson in a department store, you will benefit a lot. Not only you won’t suffer from the waiting, but also he will get you something really limited. So at that time, salespersons in a department store were well respected.

When the forth ring was completed, the prosperity was also transferred to the gate of the campus. Wudaokou gradually became a gathering place for foreign students. And as the city train extended its trail to Wudaokou, the small UN was born.

Sculpturing Time opened its second chain café store near the Wudaokou city train station. The wood floor, wood furniture and the crowded but cozy surroundings suddenly became foreigners’ favorite. Everyday, language exchangers, friends makers, startup teams and girl hookers gather there for different purposes. Some students even come here to do homework. You can find different skin colors, different hairstyles, different laptops, different languages, different cigarette, and different everything here.

SIT was Sinclair’s favorite place. Several years ago, when SIT café (Sculpturing Time) was hiding in a narrow lane, Sinclair enjoyed the staying in this small but cozy place. After all these years, SIT has 6 chain café now. His favorite one is the one at the foot of the Fragrant Mountain at the west suburb of Beijing. Fragrant Mountain is a famous scenery spot. Outside of SIT, it is crowded tourists and all kinds of noises. But when you step in, you will find a totally different world: quiet and lazy and comfortable. The most notable is the small yard behind the café room. It is really a Xanadu everyone is searching in our whipped-forward life. At a time, Sinclair would go climbing the Fragrant Mountain every weekend and when he came down from the mountain, he would be the first guest in SIT café and spent a whole day in the yard reading and writing. And that was when he began chatting with his sweet heart online through SIT’s wireless access point. It was the beginning of their great love.