Beijing's building boom is sweeping away history -- and memories -- in the blink of an eye

It's the time of year when we reflect on what the previous year brought us.

Here in China, one year goes so quickly that it seems like four.

In fact, that was the finding of an economist with Standard Chartered in Shanghai. China is developing so fast, he reported, that one year's worth of development in a Chinese city is equal to four years of development in a European or North American one.

This year, that finding couldn't have been more true in Beijing.

The new China Central Television tower, a state-of-the-art facility that resembles a twisted, square doughnut, went from being a hole in the ground to towering above the central business district.

American bawdy chain-restaurant Hooters opened in the city's entertainment area, another million or two migrants waded into the city core and the Olympic buzz reached deafening proportions.

But with the new going up, the old must come down.

Many of the top restaurants and bars from a few years ago no longer even exist. When I first arrived in Beijing in 2004, a bar called Cloud 9 was rated as the city's best, and the entertainment district was called Sanlitun South.

A few months later, the bar and the entire entertainment area were bulldozed.

When a friend from Canada visited in the summer of 2005, we walked around the historic hutongs, or traditional Chinese courtyard homes, south of Tiananmen Square.

A few months later, the entire area was rubble. These areas are being rebuilt with gleaming new malls, department stores, office towers and luxury apartments.

On one hand, the improvements are turning Beijing into a much cleaner, more livable city. On the other, much of the charm and history of the city's past are being bulldozed along with the buildings.

It can be difficult -- and at times, frustrating -- living here. One comes to feel comfortable going to certain places, only to find they no longer exist a short time later. Keeping track of changing neighbourhoods, malls, bars and restaurants requires a profound dedication to the city's many free-listings magazines.

One of the places we used to visit for an after-work drink was called the Goose and Duck. The Beijing sports bar institution was named because of its connection to Canada -- the Canada goose, the Beijing duck.

Owner John Harkness would walk around the tables, his ponytail poking through the back of his ball cap and with an ice cold bottle of Tsingdao in hand. Each night, the band (which had been at the establishment as long as I could remember) would play nearly the same tired set list -- a mix of ballads from the 1970s and 1980s. We expats would chat about life in China over a few games of darts.

We haven't made it to the Goose much recently. Everyone I know who moved to China has either returned home or settled into a rather normal existence of getting up, going to work, coming home, making dinner and heading to bed.

Which is why it was special when some longtime high school friends and my family visited China a few months ago.

On a lark for old times' sake, a group of us piled into taxis and headed for the Goose. We ordered a round of beers and divided everyone up into dart teams.

The crowd was a mix of several of us who had lived in China for a few years, my dad and some friends visiting from Kelowna, Vancouver and Victoria. We chatted, laughed, played darts, took some photos and then everyone headed home.

As it turns out, that was our last visit. When some colleagues tried to visit a few weeks ago, the Goose was closed. It has moved further out of town into a sterile strip mall.

The old one was in the way of Beijing's rapid development.

The story of the Goose is just a microcosm of the changes occurring across this sprawling metropolis.

Simply put, Beijing is unrecognizable from the city I first visited in 1999 and completely different from the city I moved to in 2004. Sometimes one wonders whether the changes haven't only begun.

American and European chain stores, restaurants and cafés will continue opening here to cash in on China's growing wealthy class.

More students, small-business owners, managers, travellers and journalists will come to these shores seeking their piece of the "Chinese dream."

Nobody can stop the march of time, just as the old Goose and Duck couldn't stand in the way of Beijing's breakneck development. I'm thankful for the memories of old Beijing, even if that city no longer exists.

It's a good reminder, as we reflect back on 2007: Be thankful for what you have because you never know when it will be gone.

This article was published in the Victoria Times Colonist on Sunday December 30, 2007. The original article can be found here.