guomao

After living and working around the Shuangjing area for three years, I'm finally starting to feel like our 'hood is shaping up into a fantastic area for family life.

Mind you, I use the geographic term loosely - "Shuangjing" is technically a bridge south of Guomao on the east Third Ring Road - but most expats seem to use it as a blanket term for the entire area running south of the Tonghui River/Jianwai Soho complex and east to Dawang Qiao/Dawang Lu. The southern border is essentially the south side of Guangqumennei and Guangqumenwai Dajie, which intersects Shuangjing Qiao itself.

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If you've exhausted all choices at the discount book carts around Beijing, then you'll be happy to hear about the grand opening of Page One in Guomao are, as reported by the Beijinger.

It looks like the bookstore competition in Beijing is heating up: Page One, a shiny (and rather sexy, to be honest) new bookstore just opened in Guomao today, at the Summit Wing section of the China World Mall. About 65% of their over 150,000 titles will be in English, covering art/design, food and wine, children's books, etc.

Actually, the shop features an excellent selection of children's books! A cursory glance revealed popular imported titles that aren't found in other bookstores around town. The staff seemed tolerant of browsing and reading aloud to children. However, expect to pay premium prices for the imported books.

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