Hutong is the name of part of the city with narrow alleys (translated from the mongolian waterwell). Here lives a close community. Today are the hutongs threatened by demolition. You find them all over the town, but lesser and lesser.
Many of the hutongs don't have water and people share the public toilets. 2002, 6 hutongs were demolished and many followed especially now before the Olimpic Games. It's hard to get into the hutongs nowadays. People doesn't want to have tourist there and I do respects that. It's like coming into your house / home showing how people live. But you can stroll around in this labirints, meet people outside talking, see how some of the have been repaired and rented out or sold to people with money, while some of them are still very poor.
Here some shots that I made from the Drum Tower.
The last 4 nights we lived in a old hutong part of Beijing that has been restored and is today one of the touristic places but it's also very lovely.
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