If the cocooning comfort of the room embraced me more completely, I would be loathe to leave. I would conspire to remain in Beijing as long as my yuan would allow. How many writers and travelers had passed through these tall French doors in to the Peace Hotel back in the early 20th century? Now the Raffles calls this historic building its home.
A mooncake waited for me in the room, with a pink daisy floating in a glass cube vase, but I needed more. Something savoury. So I said hello to the butler, whom I had perplexed earlier that day by asking for a document notarized. (“You mean…a chop?” He knit his brow into a firm ledge, frowning. “Madam, I don’t think that’s possible in such a short time.”) And I found a quiet table amongst the dark woods of the Writer’s Bar.
My dirty martini with three olives topped a coaster with a famous writerly quote in Gothic script for me to contemplate, while I waited for my pork buns to arrive. Ah, that my heart will be so inspired within these walls! Far from the ever-vigilant eyes of the Party outside…
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- Perched on its coaster waiting for me to sip it slowly taking in the quiet comfort around me
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- A single gerbera daisy to greet me in my room
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- Oh these lovely pork buns to fill me up before bedtime