If you’re like me, you’d rather count smog particles with a magnifying glass than try to merge onto the Third Ring Road. Driving in a foreign country can be daunting at the best of times, and then add to the mix the insurance, number plate rental, license conversion, etc., and most of us just prefer staying far away from it.

We decided on a spur-of-the-moment little beach breakaway and wanted something not too far away, since we are traveling with two under 2. We hoped to try out the first-class train seats for the first time, as they are not exorbitant for short trips. Alas, they were all sold out, and we were left pondering whether to brave it in commuter class with a family of five or find alternative means of travel.

Upon checking whether one could do long trips on DiDi, I found the trip from Beijing to Beidaihe (our chosen beach break destination) was RMB 2,000 with a six-seater vehicle. Now, before you do a spit-take, consider that first-class train tickets would have cost us just over RMB 1,700, plus the DiDi rides to and from the station and all the hassle of clearing security, going through the gate with the swarm of people (with two babies), and boarding and disembarking the train.

Once I saw the DiDi price, I decided to contact a few car services to see what they could offer, because I wanted to be able to book and confirm details in advance and have the flexibility of stopping along the way if needed.

While most of the car services quoted me prices higher than DiDi, May from Show Beijing was willing to organize a car for us that matched Didi’s rate. We decided to book the car for the trip there and economy-class tickets on the high-speed train for the trip back.

Pro Tip: May does more than just help you book show tickets and cars. She also has access to great masseuses and can help you plan amazing boat rides on the Liangma River.

What we loved about the car:

Convenience – With two little ones (one eager to run everywhere), it was so much easier to be picked up right outside our building and dropped off right in front of the hotel check-in. Especially since May and the driver took the time in advance to confirm the correct address with the hotel.
Comfort – The driver brought both ice-cold and room-temperature water bottles for the ride. The car was air-conditioned, and the six-seater gave us plenty of space for all our luggage and for us to sit comfortably.
Speed – Though the train is much faster, when you factor in the trips to and from the stations, along with all the checks, boarding, and queuing at the station, the car service ended up saving us time. With a total ride of about 3.5 hours, the train ride of 1.5 hours turned out to be a five-hour endeavor in total.
Care – May took extra care to check whether we needed car seats for the babies and to ensure that the car was clean and odor-free.Things to consider:

Checkpoints – There are often police checkpoints when crossing provincial borders, so keep everyone’s passports handy for a quick grab if needed. Be prepared to sit tight for a bit as they ask the driver a few standard questions and give the car a quick scan while looking over your passports.
Munchies – We packed a few sandwiches, berries, grapes and dried fruit snacks (and coffee for the adults) as they were great, bite-sized, and mess-free treats that occupied our toddler and served as breakfast, allowing us an even earlier getaway.
Busy bees – We got one of those magnetic drawing boards and downloaded the Finger Sparkles and Fluid apps on our tablet, which kept our daughter wonderfully busy until she passed out cold.

After this experience, we will definitely be booking car services more often going forward. It is hassle-free and convenient, and when travelling with many passengers, it can end up saving money. With so many destinations within driving distance, it cuts out a lot of the 麻烦 máfan of traveling with toddlers. With everything running around in a parent’s mind (“Did I pack the swimming diapers?”, “Did I remember to turn off the AC?”) it is incredibly comforting having an entire aspect of the trip that you don’t need to spend any brain power on.

Images: Janita Shahsavari

When it comes to waimai, my platform of choice is always Meituan. It’s not that they’ve got more options than eleme or anything like that. It’s simply a matter of habit. Nevertheless, what began as a humble food delivery app has since grown to include shared bikes, grocery delivery, hotel booking, attraction ticket sales, medicine delivery, and my latest favorite feature – ride hailing. It seems like they’re trying to gain market share from Didi by offering cheaper rates for riders and not taking commission from drivers, an obvious incentive for any potential recruit.

Here’s how to use it

Go to the car icon at the top of your Meituan homepage.

Once it’s open, you should get a pretty accurate pin for your current location. If you need to change it, simply click on the blue location pin and manually input your address.

Then in the second line, input your desired destination. For most popular places such as Solana Mall, both Chinese and English are acceptable. However, if you know the Chinese name, I would highly recommend using it to avoid any mistakes.

Once you’ve put in your destination you can now select drivers from multiple ride-hailing apps, with estimated costs listed on the right.

Then click the black button at the bottom to call your car.

Some have said that the quality of drivers is not as great as those who work for Didi, but honestly, after using Meituan for a week, I haven’t seen any difference between their drivers and a Didi Express.

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Images: Mina Yan, Pexels

Last June, China Daily reported that the country has once again announced an impending car seat law, and despite multiple attempts at similar legislation in the past, this time they seem to mean it as General Motors, in partnership with Safe Kids Worldwide, recently started training sessions in cities across China.

There’s no mention of when cities will start cracking down on the new law, but ride-hailing services have been incrementally stepping up their game over the years. ShouYue Chauffeur Service, a car service app that’s got specific types of cars for various needs, introduced their fleet of Mommy Cars (宝马 bǎomǎ) back in October 2020. And in May of 2017 China Daily reported that Didi Chuxing announced it would start equipping Premier vehicles with child car seats, becoming one of the first on-demand transport platforms in China to offer customized services for children’s safety. Likewise, in November 2019 our editor Wendy Xu discovered a Didi hack that makes life easier for parents. By switching Didi from English to Chinese, you’re given more car options, one of them being 宝贝专车 (Children’s Car) which is a car seat service Didi created for children between the ages of 9 months and 12 years.

Nevertheless, the latest car seat law isn’t new. It was first introduced back in 2013 as part of a larger set of laws aimed at protecting minors. However, that car seat regulation was vaguely worded and forgoes any mentions of age, height, or weight specifications for a child.

To date, car seats and seatbelts have largely been a matter of personal preference in China. During my third trimester of pregnancy, I bought a Doona stroller. It’s the only one I found that could collapse into a car seat since I don’t drive in Beijing. Admittedly, it wasn’t the lightest or cheapest, but it was something I felt was necessary to keep my baby safe while tooling around town.

Now that my daughter is 9-months-old, just about every time I take a Didi, I have to confront drivers who tell me to put the stroller in the trunk and hold my baby, lest I soil their precious interior. Needless to say, explaining the mechanics of how a Doona stroller collapses into a car seat has become second nature, as has spewing facts about infant mortality rates in car accidents.

The Doona stroller

When I asked a few local parents how they managed to get around the city with their babies, much to my surprise, more than a handful said they simply carry their babies in the backseat.

One of the arguments that I hear most often is that cars can’t go very fast in the city anyway and that when there’s a baby on board, parents will drive extra carefully. Well, no offense, but they’re called traffic “accidents” for a reason. No one wakes up in the morning and plans to crash into another car/bike/scooter/tuk tuk/pedestrian/whatever else is on the road.

Let’s look at some numbers. According to Xinhua News Agency, about 18,500 children under the age of 14 die in traffic accidents in China every year. Moreover, a child who weighs 10kg and is traveling at 50km per hour in a car has a force impact of 300kg in a crash, according to the China Automotive Technology and Research Center. So you don’t need to be going at F1 speeds to get into a damaging crash. In some tragedies, children have been thrown through the windshield driving at that speed. Armed with that knowledge, I could not condone driving while holding your child in the backseat.

Got any useful tips or stories about traveling around Beijing with a baby? Let us know in the comments!

KEEP READING: The New Mommy Car Service and Pregnancy Travel Tips

Images: Doona, Maxi Cosi

It’s no secret: Beijing is massive and getting from point A to point B as a functioning adult is tough some days. Doing it with kids…on the best of days…nightmare! For most of us, getting around requires my least favorite form of travel – Didi. It’s expensive, it’s slow, it pollutes the air and in my case, induces motion sickness. So here are a few alternatives. None of them are particularly creative but all of them will save you money, time, and could even reduce the amount of vomit you need to scrape off some stranger’s back seat.

Old-School Walking: Like I said, not creative but it has worked for thousands of years. If it’s not a yucky AQI day or pouring rain, it will help your family get their steps in and provide some much-needed fresh air. Pro tip: To pass the time, play a focused game of I-Spy. Decide what your family will look for before you leave the house. Younger kids can see how many red items they pass for instance, while older ones can try to spot as many different flags as possible. Enjoy getting around outdoors while you can. In the winter, when temperatures dip below zero, it’s simply not an option. So take advantage of the capital’s beautiful spring and fall weather. Heck, even balmy summer afternoons or evenings are an excuse to get outside and move, albeit in shorter spurts. Just make sure you put on your SPF!

Scooters and Bikes: They’ve been an iconic part of Chinese life for more than a century and by far the fastest way to navigate the city! I found foldable scooters for kids on Taobao for as little as RMB 45. There are also tons of baby bike/scooter seats a mere click away. Just please make sure they have a helmet and I’m begging you: Don’t put them in the basket of a rented bike while weaving in and out of traffic. Check out this article on cycling with kids for some great safety tips.

The Subway: Okay, not my favorite – especially in the middle of the sweaty summer heat. But, if given the choice between sitting in rush hour traffic with a potty training child for an hour or doing a 20-minute subway ride, I know what I would pick. The subway is also fun for kids. They love the trains and lights and maps so take advantage of the inexpensive adventure.

Public Bus: Did you know that Apple Maps has integrated public buses into its navigational system? A colleague of mine followed instructions on the user-friendly app and seamlessly boarded, alighted, and transferred buses from downtown CBD all the way to her home in east Beijing. She prefers buses to the subway because she loves the passing scenery and fresh air (the windows are usually open on the bus unless it’s raining). Also, you can pay your bus fare with a simple tap using Alipay!

Final Thoughts: The number one reason I hear parents say they take a taxi is not because of the kids, it’s because of kid stuff. We live in the middle of a major city, not the desert! So ask yourself, do we really need three water bottles, four snack options, half a dozen toys, a full liter of hand sanitizer, and the Nintendo Switch for a one-hour trip to the park? A friend of mine used to have a house rule that if the 3-year-old couldn’t fit it in her mini-backpack it couldn’t come. Occasionally they would need to buy a bottle of water or some extra SPF, but I never knew her to be woefully unprepared. 

No matter how you get where you’re going remember we’re expats, travel is kind of our thing, so make it fun! Explore some new options of getting around the city; it’s really is as easy as riding a bike. *wink 

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Photos: Unsplash

Getting to work on a Monday morning during rush hour is a nightmare! There have been more than a handful of mornings where I’ve stared at my Didi in disbelief at my place 58^th in line for the next available car.

Beijing’s a busy city and it seems like we’re all in a rush to get somewhere. And while Didi is the most convenient ride-hailing app for non-Chinese speakers to use, it’s not the only one.

Recently I’ve discovered that Amaps (the standard navigation app that comes with android phones) has a ride-hailing service that’ll call cars through every app all at once, giving you better chances of getting a car much quicker especially during rush hours.

Check out the video below for a step-by-step guide on using the Amaps ride-hailing service.

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Images: Mina Yan, Pexels

With Didi and express courier (aka kuaidi) services to Shunyi suspended for several weeks due to an outbreak of COVID-19 cases in the district, residents are getting used to life without them – and in many cases realizing how dependent they have become on them.

PR representatives from Didi and several courier companies contacted by beijingkids on Monday afternoon stated that they are following the orders of city government officials in charge of epidemic prevention and control and, as yet, have been given no timeline for the restoration of normal services. Asked to speculate, one courier company said that they don’t expect full service to resume until after the Chinese New Year holiday in mid-February. Residents in the district have said that while Didi is an absolute no-go, some packages have managed to get through despite the restrictions.

The Shunyi cluster sprang up in late December, and at its peak resulted in seven neighborhoods – all north and northeast of Beijing Capital International Airport – being declared “medium risk” areas. Since that time, the risk level of all but two of those areas has been returned to the baseline low-risk level.

Over the past month or so, Shunyi residents have gone through multiple rounds of mass testing to weed out any cases that were flying under the radar, with some compounds being put under closed management for short periods of time before test results were returned. Residents have also been advised to curtail unnecessary trips outside the district.

While local deliveries from supermarkets and restaurants within the district are still available, most items from outside the district are not. In addition, many housing estates have requested that all packages be left at the main gate, which has produced grumbles from some living in the often massive complexes, especially since it is winter to boot.

Some have questioned why such drastic measures remain in place in the district overall, especially compared to Daxing district, where a new outbreak has caused a cessation of services only to the affected neighborhoods and not to the district overall.

Nevertheless, residents of Shunyi are adjusting to life in the district, finding themselves getting more familiar with bus and subway transport (which remains unaffected), and walking and biking more than usual. Others have formed carpools with private drivers and had their courier packages delivered to their office downtown to take back home.

Tracy Blacklock, a teacher who lives and works in Shunyi, has gotten accustomed to biking 6km each way to work in the winter, grappling with sub-zero temperatures. “Once it was -13℃ and not very fun … but it means I get fit,” she said.

Biking at night has also been nerve-wracking for Blacklock, but tough times call for innovative solutions: “My [bike]  lights broke, so at one point I wrapped Christmas tree lights around me to stay safe.”

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Photos: Pexels

It happened to me just last Friday. We were all excited to go to a tree lighting, I dragged the kids downstairs, and…….we waited. We waited for 45 minutes while I tried to call a DiDi. At every ten minute interval, I made that most difficult of decisions: do I stick it out with the taxi or try a van or maybe Express? Do I (gasp) cancel my trip and call a new one or hope beyond hope that we’ll get a car before the event is over or my kids get bored of waiting?

It would be so great if I could call a few different cars and just get whichever one comes first rather than roll the dice!

Enter DiDi’s new update: simultaneous ride calling.

I’m not exaggerating when I say this is my dream. No more waiting in the rain to get to work, helplessly checking my app until I decide to brave a crowded subway during rush hour or throw in the towel and work from home. No more wondering what would have been, if I had just stuck with that first 20-minute wait instead of switching between different price points?

Like most updates, this feature is ready for iPhones but is not in all Android updates yet.

And now, even if for some reason the simultaneous ride calling doesn’t work, we can always try the new DiDi Bike. This feature isn’t as simple as a button push though, so take some time to register now if you think you’ll need it.

Step 1: Scroll down, click “Scan to Ride” – “Notification”

Step 2: Input your information. If you have a Chinese ID, enter your full name and ID information. If you don’t have a Chinese ID, choose “Verification for Non-Mainland Riders” and type in your info.

Step 3: Identify yourself, twice. Take a photo of your identity document (likely your passport name page) and a photo of you holding your ID in front of you. But don’t hide your face!

Step 3: Click confirm. Wait up to three hours.

Step 4: Get a text. Relaunch the app. Accept the “User Service Agreement” and scan your bike!

The DiDi Bike function takes some forward planning but will be a great help once it’s set up.

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Photos: DiDi app

In another life, I’m a notorious over tipper. Even — or especially — when I had little money of my own to spare, I always added whatever I could to the tip jar, automatically calculating 25% for restaurant or delivery service, minimum. It likely comes from all my years of working for tips myself and knowing how hard a customer-facing position can be, especially in a world where “the customer is always right.”

Moving to a country where you don’t tip out of respect was a hard transition, so I channeled my energies towards the reviews or ratings at the end of a DiDi ride. It seemed like a no brainer way to show my appreciation and took just a few seconds.

I never think of rating my package delivery services, however. I certainly never dug back into an order once I had received it just to praise a delivery person for a job done well. I also rarely complained unless I didn’t get a package at all. After reading this article on npr about how overburdened and harshly punished delivery workers are in China, however, that will change.

According to the article, “Good customer reviews earn delivery workers virtual points in the app, which serve as a buffer against deductions. In the case of a late package or a three-out-of-five-star review, the app will knock off points. Too few points, and a worker gets fined….If Wang fails to garner at least one five-star review a month, he gets slapped with an $8 pay deduction. If someone complains by email, Wang is fined about $300, nearly a week’s wages. Lesser offenses can carry fines of about $30 to $80.”

Now I feel bad about a time last year when I ordered two small coatracks and neither one arrived. The delivery person said he only had one, and he offered to pay for the one he delivered to the wrong address, almost RMB 250. After reading that article, now I understand that it is possible only one was in his care, where it sounded like a weird trick at the time. Although I didn’t allow him to pay for the mistake, as it seemed like too much for one person to fix out of their own wages, I hope my messages to customer service didn’t cause him more trouble.

I usually don’t like to patronize companies who use such punitive measures, and that sentiment was echoed in one or two WeChat groups where I shared this article. It’s not always that simple, however, since ceasing to use delivery services ultimately only harms the very delivery people we want to help. Without more orders to deliver, they’ll likely lose their jobs, or get wages cut even more.

There’s no way to know what happens on the other side of a delivery, and I’ve never actively tried to get someone in trouble. But I’ve never gone out of my way to write a nice review either. I tend towards Baopals and PandaBoo, but friends use Taobao and showed me where to leave a rating:

I even returned to a recent order and reviewed it, for good measure.

This wasn’t just to make myself feel better, or so I could tout my virtue in this article. I know how difficult it is for me to get everything together, get the kids to school and myself to work, and that’s with a very family-flexible office a mere ten minutes away. I could walk there if necessary. The holidays are coming…who am I kidding? They’re here! And that means more deliveries, more traffic, more people upset, and probably more chances for screw-ups than normal. If there’s one thing I can do on a micro level that might mean a lot more to my receiver, it’s to take 30 seconds to rate and write a review for a job well done.

We have been talking a lot about gratitude and kindness around the beijngkids office lately, as it’s the theme of our next magazine. Let’s just remember that in this case, a job well done is merely a package delivered; where we might normally tip the minimum, we must type the minimum. Be thankful, be kind, and for goodness sake, leave a five-star review!

KEEP READING: How to Use WeChat Subscriptions For All Your Beijing Family News

Photos: Cindy Marie Jenkins, Public Domain Pictures

As we read up on daily COVID-19 news and updates, we’re rapidly becoming experts in virus prevention ourselves. Families have their own disinfecting routine when coming home and hospitals have recommended avoiding public transportation, especially for those who are expecting a baby.

While we’re already accustomed to using Didi, recently I’ve discovered another car service that’s putting in extra precautions which make germaphobes like myself a tad more comfortable when riding around the city.

My recent experiences with Shouqi Limousines and Chauffeurs（首汽约车）has been nothing but spectacular. Their drivers make the extra effort to find your exact location and so far, I’ve only ever encountered polite drivers sharply dressed in their black and white suits.

With the current COVID-19 outbreak, Shouqi has installed thick plastic partitions in all their cars as well as require all their drivers to wear face masks. Their driver tells me that according to company policy, they’re required to disinfect their cars at least once per day and drivers are encouraged to disinfect their cars throughout the day when they have free time. Every three days, they bring their cars in for a deep clean, which means that you’ll never be picked up by a dusty or smelly Shouqi car.

Signing up for Shouqi literally takes seconds.

After you’ve downloaded the app, accept their terms and conditions and enter your phone number. You’ll receive a four digit verification code.

Once you’ve entered the code, you’re done.

Shouqi will start you off with a pack of discount vouchers that you can use immediately. The interface is setup the same as Didi and is completely in English.

Extra perks:

They offer the option to request half-day or 8-hour rentals of sedans, or business vans for private charter services. This comes in handy when you’re looking to go on a day trip somewhere that’s not abundant in taxis.

On average, for a half-day sedan, Shouqi charges a prepaid RMB 477.

Photos: Mina Yan, icauto.com.cn, zhimg.com, weiyanzixun.com, m.cyzone.cn, rollnews.tuxi.com.cn