the Beijinger

I am a photographer so all of the books I really love the most are my photographers’ monographs that are personally signed to me. (Those are all back home in New York, though.) And of course my dog-eared copy of Slightly Out of Focus, the biography of war photographer Robert Capa.

Rule number one: Don’t queue.

Your best chance of getting a seat is being the first person to charge through that train door, and being at the back of a line won’t help. If you see people lining up, simply ask them what scissors do – and then do it.

If the line has already collapsed into a mass of bodies, then push, jostle, climb or crawl your way to the front. If you’re not getting dirty looks from people around you, you’re doing it wrong.

Come February 14, will you be giving someone chocolates? If you’ve come to us looking for recommendations, think again. Unless you’re trying to end the affair, these affordable crunch-themed bars of milk chocolate are unlikely to do you many favors.

What do you get when Simon Cowell combines the sound of the Three Tenors with the look of Armani models? Luckily for us Beijingers, it’s Il Divo.

Hello, readers. You're well aware that we're a blog – you're reading it right now – but some of you apparently are not aware that the Beijinger is also a print magazine. (Not a joke. More than a few people have expressed great surprise when they first see a copy of our publication.)

While we strive to distribute our magazine to the venues that we think our readers like to hang out, there is always room for improvement. With that in mind, we'd like to hear from you so that we can figure out how to reach more of you. We've got a few questions for you. Step into our office, please ....

Perhaps you’ve already checked out some of our brick-and-mortar options recommended in our earlier post and are still not satisfied. (Either that or you have yet to leave your house. We don’t blame you. It sure is cold out there.) In any case, here is a way to shop for naughty lingerie from the comfort of your own home. But hurry – you’re running out of time! Some of these places do offer overnight shipping; otherwise, consider this a belated Valentine’s Day gift.

When I first came to Beijing four years ago, I thought I had stepped into an alternate universe. At the end of my first interview, when my supervisor was going over the contract, I could only focus on one thing: “You’re going to pay me this much to speak English?”

No one in their right mind would have offered me this starting salary in the States, and certainly not for such little work. I was fresh from film school with no marketable skills. I had come to Beijing on a lark and the plan was to find a short-term job so no one could say I was afraid of the real world when I eventually retreated to graduate school. That’s how I found myself being offered an American salary in a land of Chinese prices.

It takes a special personality to be a wedding emcee – to say those sweet words over and over again with the greatest sincerity. Fortunately for Li Yao, he really does seem to be in love with love.

Whether you’re shopping for yourself or your sweetheart, when it comes to lingerie, everybody wins. Here, we’ve rounded up a list of Beijing’s best brick-and-mortar stores to buy sexy bras, panties and teddies, with helpful photos to boot.