Welcome to Three Shots with Beijing Cream, where local personalities may or may not get drunk on camera, depending on their alcohol tolerance. Produced and directed by Gabriel Clermont and Anthony Tao.

Vicky Mohieddeen arrived in China halfway by accident with no long-term plans, but in an opportunity-rich place like Beijing, it didn’t take long for her to find a calling. Or several, as it were. She’s currently the artistic director of Electric Shadows, video producer for Koryo Tours, and co-organizer of Cinequeer. Watch her talk about North Korean engagement, Vice’s Dennis Rodman-in-DPRK tour, the website China Dirt, and her “chipster.”

Three Shots With Vicky Mohieddeen was filmed at Revolution (west side of Yashow, off Gongti Beilu), owned by the distinguished Lu (Xiao) Ming.

Edited by Gabriel Clermont (@gabrieltrane).

Previously: Three Shots With… Mitch Moxley

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I spent my last 30 minutes at the 2nd annual Beijing Craft Beer Festival sitting behind a desk under the LGBT Resource Center tent handing out fliers and chatting with curious Chinese onlookers and expats happy to see the table. (How drunk was I? You decide.) Ni hao, women shi Beijing TongZhi ZhongXin, we announced to a curious child and his semi-interested mother. Her eyes snapped to a rainbow-patterned poster, then to the two smiling foreigners sitting in front of her. With the speed and grace of a defensive tackle scooping up a fumble, lady disappeared with child.

Not a minute later, a separate young mother had her two daughters each put 10 kuai into the donations box. Scurrying and donating — it was like that all evening, and the organizers were just fine with that.

I’m guessing that the majority of readers, especially those outside of Beijing, mostly know about the beer festival because of the dust-up between the LGBT Center and Soho management, in which a mid-level manager — since reprimanded — wrote that LGBT members might “not fit with the site’s architecture.” Well, the Center was there. No protest. No glitterbombing. The architecture seemed fine.

Earlier that evening, when I approached the tent and said I wanted to get some quotes for an article, I was cheerfully yet firmly directed to turn off my recorder and wait for Stepehen Leonelli, the development and operations director of the Beijing LGBT Center. Arriving with a beer in hand, he made it clear that his organization never intended to have a public spat with Soho. I noticed a pile of That’s Beijing magazines — the guys who broke the original story – and was made to understand that their story wasn’t necessarily welcome.

“I understand there’s a tension within these journalists because they want to write about a subject that’s very sensational,” Leonelli said. But when the story broke, he added, LGBT had already been in talks with the people at Great Leap Brewing — the primary organizers of the beer festival — and Soho management to ensure that the LGBTQ community would be there.

The LGBT Center eventually got a formal apology from Soho, which said they have an anti-discrimination policy. The Center pushed for Soho’s policy to include a specific clause stating that the company doesn’t discriminate against sexual orientation or gender identity, but as Leonelli put it, “in China, generally speaking, we’re not there yet.” They had, however, been getting a positive response at the festival, and received lots of donations.

Galaxy Soho comprises the three bleached-white honeycombs designed by Zaha Hadid, known for being empty and holding events. The space felt large and cozy, with sterile office complexes surrounding beer and food tents (Taco Bar came back!). “Embrace Zaha. We are in her womb. You are Zaha,” is how one expat described the experience. My bad for not thinking to check if she was on anything at the moment.

She was certainly drunk though, as were most of the 4,500 people who made their way through the festival despite the early rain and ominous skies. “It’s great to get all the best brews in one place in a very convenient way,” another friend said. “It is a very convenient way to get drunk.”

Organized by Great Leap Brewing and SeeDiceGo (the recently publicized name for Candice Lee’s event-throwing crew, which, according to Lee, is probably throwing its last party), the festival crowd appeared pretty split in their allegiances between GLB and SDG. The tight-pantsed and Ai Weiwei-barbered opinion leaders and social media gurus from C-Dice’s chili cook-off and bowling league formed one group, while the cargo-shorted, non-flat-brimmed hat-wearing older crowd with wife and children in tow (“Goddamnit Starry, I didn’t buy a motherflippin’ 4,000 kuai double-stroller so you and your girlfriends could just shuttle the kids from pilates to The Orchard… YOU call the damn driver, you know he has no idea what I’m saying… Oh can it, if we don’t hit traffic we should make it down from Shunui in an hour and a half!”) formed the other.

They were able to put their differences aside for one thing: the beers, which did not disappoint. While there was some grousing that no one made any special beers for the festival, the range of options, from Beijing stalwarts Great Leap and Slow Boat, to Boxing Cat from Shanghai, as well as beers from two Taiwanese dudes dressed as Germans, provided enough variety to appease even the most capable of drinkers. I showed up having not eaten, quickly put down a Taiwanese beer (bomb), one of the Jing A Strawberry Stouts (…an acquired taste) and two (or three?) Boxing Cats, then all the home-brew beers. I expressed my surprise to one of the home-brewers that without the fancy vats and expensive gear of the bigger breweries, the beer was equally as delicious. He gave me the same look I gave a college friend when she expressed disbelief that they could have yogurt in Africa considering they didn’t have “microscopes and stuff there.” Needless to say, despite the lack of production sophistication and the fact that they often resort to smuggling hops into the country in briefcases, the home-brews delivered.

After jamming along to Tavey Lean and the Solid Gold Dream Machine and the Hutong Yellow Weasels/Beijing Pickers, being interviewed for TV, and getting into a highbrow discussion on dating amongst foreigners (“see, all you young dudes are doing it wrong with these Chinese girls. Out here man, I’ve banged my way through the Pac-12, I’ve banged my way through the Ivy League…”), I decided to head out.

There’s something to be said for local expat bars being able to put on events of this magnitude in spaces as prominent as the Galaxy, and hopefully the trend continues. Despite some rough edges with a few beers running out early, and the issue of, well, you know, the event was well received and well organized. Hopefully, even with SeeDiceGo leaving town, we’ll still be able, here in Beijing, to have nice things.

Gabe Clermont edits videos for us, including the Three Shots series. He has his own BJC business card (yes, they exist. Collect them all!). Follow him at @gabrieltrane.

Welcome to Three Shots with Beijing Cream, where local personalities show off their drinking prowess at bars you should patronize. Produced and directed by Gabriel Clermont and Anthony Tao.

You’ve likely bumped into him at one of the city’s bars, if you’re the bar-going kind. Otherwise, you might know his work from The Atlantic, the New York Times, TIME, CNN, Huffington Post, and a variety of other publications. Our guest this week is Mitch Moxley, former China Daily copy editor, author of the forthcoming Apologies to My Censor about being a white man in China. UPDATE, 6/10: Mitch addresses some of the comments that appear below. 

Three Shots With Mitch Moxley was filmed at Mao Mao Chong (12 Banchang Hutong), which was featured in the New York Times as a “pioneer of creative cocktails.” Try the mala (hot-and-spicy) Moscow Mule.

Edited by Gabriel Clermont (@gabrieltrane), with additional filming by The Good Doctor. Special thanks to Stephen of Mao Mao Chong

Previously: Three Shots With… Nestor Santana

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Welcome to Three Shots with Beijing Cream, where local personalities get drunk with us for some reason. Produced and directed by Gabriel Clermont and Anthony Tao.

Our guest this week is the loquacious and smoky-eyed Nestor Santana, a longtime expat with the expat’s trove of stories — many of them we can’t tell here. It doesn’t mean we can’t ask about them though.

Nestor is the Asia manager for an ad and marketing company and has lived in Beijing for eight years. You’ll have to catch him at one of the city’s bars, of which he is a habitué, for fuller scoops.

Three Shots With Nestor Santana was filmed at Cu Ju (28 Xiguan Hutong), run by another longtime expat, the estimable Badr of Beijing Daze. Go for the rums. Seriously, do it. The collection is to be marveled.

Edited by Gabriel Clermont (@gabrieltrane), with additional filming by Stone Yu. Special thanks to Badr of Cu Ju.

Previously: Three Shots With… Sophie Cooke

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Last week I got an invite to roll with some musician buddies up at Midi Festival and decided it’d be a great opportunity to grab a camera and capture the people and fashions that only “the biggest rock festival” in China can provide.

Undeterred by the lack of a fucking functional website, the promise of awe-inspiring traffic, and the threat of hours of shitty metal, I took a whiskey-soaked ride up to the Beijing Yuyang International Ski Resort and brought back photos from the Pulp Fiction/Sid and Nancy/The Last Waltz/skate video some kids from Ohio would make/Betty Boop/Hot Topic Lookbook fever dream that was Midi Festival 2013.

First up, just a great mix of people tenting it up…

…love that both dudes on the left got the “cowboy attire” memo and brought very different interpretations to the table.

It was only after I’d been working on this — …photo-essay? vertical slideshow? whatever, anyway, looking at the above picture — for a while did I realize that her shirt also said “Will work for weed.” Loving the heart eye-socketed skull kneepads.

Believe it or not, marijuana was a popular motif at the festival.

I think this next photo is most representative of the Midi experience: beautiful verdant hills, trash everywhere, inexplicable headwear decisions.

“History will remember you” Woof.

Blue hair. Sure. Appreciate the Phish fan-feel he’s bringing.

Okay, we come across persons in our meanderings whom we recognize utilize a decision-making process so unlike your own, their mere presence on earth confirms that we inhabit a vast, diverse, seemingly unfathomable existence. Dude rocking a tiger silk-screened face-scarf and high-school lab-issued safety goggles is that person for me.

Sigh :(

I’m somebody who owned his fair share (a lot) of Rocawear and Sean John in high school, but you couldn’t have paid me to wear someone’s goddamn record label across my head. And especially not when their newest single is this tepid mess. Sorry, but you’ve got to be a fucking clown to wear a goddamn YMCMB hat.

I’m still mad I had to listen to that Tapout nonsense, so I’m going to make this short. Slip-on fake tattoo sleeves are the Confucius Peace Prize/Obama’s backbone when battling House Republicans/Avicii of the body modification scene.

They weren’t in uniform for anything, they weren’t working a stand, they were just three bros rocking the same shirt at a music festival. But wait, let’s consult some Chinese Rock literature: “Of course, the influence of my idol was obvious: just like Kurt, I never neglected to drop a ‘shit’ or a ‘fuck’ into my songs and soon I began aping Cobain’s blue-and-white striped sailor shirt and ripped jeans look. Fortunately, the Chinese navy uniform was based on that of the British army, so the military surplus stores in China were full of striped sailor shirts just like Kurt’s.” — Liu Jian (刘健), Rock Soldier (战士)

(Yes, this guy.)

So these dudes are rocking the original Chinese rock and roll shirt. O-fucking-G.

Who knew you’d learn something on Beijing Cream today.

Ostensibly friendly, but as a rule, I don’t trust any white people with dreads or people wearing Canadian tuxedos.

Great headwear. Big fan of the subtle him/hers matching leopard print. Also a big fan of the possible vag tattoo Selina Kyle is rocking next to the dead-eyed disembodied head on his arm there.

Only when I was going back through my pictures did I realize I took a picture of this couple twice, apparently thrown off by Mathilda’s transforming Leon: The Professional shades. Here’s the second time:

By far, the biggest missed opportunity of the day was neglecting to ask the FuWuYuan to combine all three into some kind of Elvis-themed American mouth bomb. But…wait a second, there’s something weird going on with that flag. Can we enhance? ENHANCE!

While it’s possible (likely) those non-stars are just the result of a shitty printing job, I’d rather assume it’s a limited edition Robert G. Heft x Invader sticker. Way better than the Jacques-Louis David x Mr. Brainwash print that is just the French flag splashed by a grad student/intern with a bucket of neon green paint.

I’ve been seeing this logo around, and I’ve been trying to figure it out. Mostly, why the Bulls? Have you seen the Bulls? They start two Dukies, the son of a French tennis pro, Kurt Heinrich, and a guy who tweets about making his own sushi. (To be fair, Jimmy Butler got abandoned by both of his parents by the time he was 13 and ended up a first-round draft pick, but still, 20% gangsta does not cut it.) So, right, not exactly the Jailblazers. [Note - this was written after the Bulls embarrassed my fucking Nets, and before they came out big-dick-swinging against the Heat.] Then what? Weird, slightly off-color, social commentary on the appalling Chicago murder rate? That would be… peculiar, but further digging reveals, alas.

“WHOOO, that’s a banging fucking hot dog.”

“Yo, that chick was kind of hot but kind of looked like Ronald McDonald.” — One of my aforementioned musician friends.

Gotta love the studded beanie. Less feeling the matching tie-dye watermelon shirts.

And finally,  let’s bring it home here. A lot to unpack. Sartorially, we’ve got a US flag bandana, the classic Chinese girl cute/morbid smiling skulls with roses, some solid tattoo work, a pink heart earring, and a lip stud. Homeboy has a great collection of random patterns inked on his arms, and then some sort of ICP clown head. We also have two, possibly three instances of leopard print going on in this picture, because, as those of us following the trends out of the fashion mecca Bangalore know, “2013 has anyways been dedicated to animal prints with many international apparel designers embracing the trend. Their inspiration has been the Chinese calendar which marks 2013 as the year of the snake.”

All that said, I think this picture best captures the essence of disparate styles and influences that Voltrons into a coherent culture. Despite our understanding of how or why an “authentic” scene is constructed. So yeah, while rock and roll in China was only introduced 30 years ago by a Korean (minority) in Beijing, and seems to be solely inhabited by people who dress by Baidu image searching “rock fashion” and buying just whatever appears on the screen, the experience of being amongst this energized community on the hills couldn’t help but give you the sense that there’s something real here, even if it looks nothing like we imagine (but for the most part sounds exactly like you imagine, which is a whole other blog post).

And anyway, sixty years of intimate engagement with the history and presence of rock and roll in the West has culminated with the Coldplay afterbirth that is Imagine Dragons, so I mean, like, fuck, whatever, you know?

Gabriel Clermont is BJC’s video editor. Follow him on Twitter @gabrieltrane and check out his work on Three Shots With.

Welcome to Three Shots with Beijing Cream, where local personalities spill their beans 1.5 fluid ounces at a time. Produced and directed by Gabriel Clermont and Anthony Tao.

Our guests this week aren’t local per se, but Beijing honararies by virtue of their attendance at last month’s Bookworm International Literary Festival. Writers from around the world converged on the Bookworm from March 8 to 22, but two were intrepid enough to plant themselves in front of our cameras’ uncomfortably hot lights to field ridiculous, droll questions such as, “What is your favorite bar game?”

Sophie Cookie is the author of the novels Under the Mountain (2008), inspired by the author’s childhood home in Kilmahog, and The Glass House (2004), which was shortlisted for a Saltire First Book of the Year Award. She also writes about her globe-trekking adventures for the Guardian (Portland made a good impression). Purportedly Scottish — currently living in Edinburgh and running the Skriva Writing School – Sophie was strangely unable to distinguish between highland and Speyside single malts, though we won’t hold it against her. For the record, “getting home” is her favorite bar game. After which, swimming… apparently.

Three Shots With Sophie Cooke was filmed at the Bookworm (Building 4, Nan Sanlitun Lu).

Building 4, Nan Sanlitun Road, Chaoyang District 朝阳区南三里屯路4
号楼（老书虫）

Edited by Gabriel Clermont (@gabrieltrane). Special thanks to Kadi Hughes and Mengfei Chen of the Bookworm. Follow Sophie Cooke on Twitter @MissSophieCooke.

Previously: Three Shots With… CJ Bowerbird

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Welcome to Three Shots with Beijing Cream, where local personalities spill their beans 1.5 fluid ounces at a time. Produced and directed by Gabriel Clermont and Anthony Tao.

Our guests this week aren’t local per se, but Beijing honararies by virtue of their attendance at last month’s Bookworm International Literary Festival. Writers from around the world converged on the Bookworm from March 8 to 22, but two were intrepid enough to plant themselves in front of our cameras’ uncomfortably hot lights to field ridiculous, droll questions that began, “If you could start an east-coast/west-coast-type feud with any writer…”

In a bloodsport dominated by the young, the foolhardy, the high-strung and hammy, CJ Bowerbird, a family man from Canberra, stands out with his incisive and topical insights, intelligence grounded in experience, casual humor and elucidating wit. He is also a champion: winner of the 2012 Australian Poetry Slam. Performance poetry often vacillates between art and presentation, but the best practitioners straddle that line so expertly that the air stills, as in the brief silence between one’s final line and applause, and in the aftermath the world grows blank and cold (to paraphrase Mark Strand). For a sense of that, check out Bowerbird on Tipping or Rocking May Cause Injury or Death and Clicktivism.

CJ performed at the Bookworm on March 16, and we caught up with him not long after. Shooting tequila like a true champ — sans salt, the condiment for the callow — he discussed the meaning of poetry in this day and age of hip-hop, and other stuff. We would kindly advise he stay off the mean streets.

Three Shots With CJ Bowerbird was filmed at the Bookworm (Building 4, Nan Sanlitun Lu).

Building 4, Nan Sanlitun Road, Chaoyang District 朝阳区南三里屯路4
号楼（老书虫）

Edited by Gabriel Clermont (@gabrieltrane). Special thanks to Kadi Hughes and Mengfei Chen of the Bookworm. Follow CJ Bowerbird on Twitter @CJBowerbird.

Previously: Three Shots With… Morgan Short

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Three Shots With Beijing Cream is a weekly series in which local personalities are interviewed over shots. New episodes are posted every Sunday; if you would like to nominate a future guest, please get in touch. Produced and directed by Gabriel Clermont and Anthony Tao.

We caught wind of Morgan Short’s imminent arrival to Beijing last summer, with our informant adding without equivocation that Smart Shanghai, of which Morgan is the chief editor, was the best expat website of its kind. Specializing in longform pieces, witty commentary and incisive reviews, the Smart franchise has indeed planted itself in our fair city, with Morgan doing double duty and editing both the Shanghai and Beijing versions. He also DJs at Temple Bar on Thursdays, among other establishments, and writes a fantastic Friday Night Musical Outro column. For bizarre and hilarious reasons, he’s been compared to this man.

Three Shots With Morgan Short was filmed at Temple Bar (206 Gulou Dong Dajie, Building B, No. 202), owned by Gao Xu and managed by Clement Berger (formerly of Salud). Go for their coffee shot, or any of the other 100 or so on the list. And the live music every week, of course. Happy hour every day (except Monday, when it’s closed) from 7 to 10 pm.

206 Gulou Dong Dajie, Door 202 in Building B, Dongcheng District 东城区鼓楼东大街206号B楼202

Edited by Gabriel Clermont (@gabrieltrane). Additional photography by Stone Yu. Special thanks to The Good Doctor and Grace. Morgan doesn’t tweet, but you might as well follow @smartbeijing.

Previously: Three Shots With… George Ding 

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Ed’s note: Welcome to BJC’s newest weekly series, Three Shots With, in which we interview local personalities over shots. New episodes are posted every Sunday; if you would like to nominate a future guest, please get in touch. Produced and directed by Gabriel Clermont and Anthony Tao.

George Ding, the Beijinger’s backpage columnist, catapulted to notortiety last fall after his columns Why I’m Leaving China and Why I’m Coming Back to China, both satire, were translated into Chinese and misread as sincere essays. When he’s not unintentionally angering readers across cultures, you can find him having fun, enjoying life, contributing to VICE and Miniharm, and simply being an all-around decent human being. Also, making sex tapes, as we found out in our interview. Here he is dancing in “Low Carbon Style.”

Three Shots With George Ding was filmed at Brussels Bar and Restaurant in Sanlitun South. (UPDATE: Now called The Local.) We almost hesitate to tell you, because Kenn might realize we’re all ripping him off, but Brussels has the best food deal in town: its Tuesday half-price menu, which includes a 160-yuan steak for 80 yuan. Happy Hour from 5 to 9 pm every night.

Courtyard 4, Gongti Beilu, Chaoyang District 朝阳区工体北路4号院（1949西门对面）

Edited by Gabriel Clermont (@gabrieltrane). Additional photography by Josh Chin. Special thanks to Kenn Bermel of Brussels, and Irene. Follow George Ding on Twitter @dingsanbai.

Stick around for Episode 2 of Three Shots With, featuring Morgan Short, which will be posted later this afternoon. Update: and it’s here. 

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While checking out coverage of the “invisible console” unveiling of the Playstation 4 in New York, I was struck by a familiar sight. No, not Diablo III. During the gameplay footage of Killzone 4, I recognized a certain oft-blighted building here in Beijing. Amidst the the civil unrest between the Helghest and Vektan loomed the unmistakeable curves and orbs of the Zaha Hadid-designed Galaxy SOHO.

Why? In a bid to convince the often pride-motivated Chinese government to end its June 2000 ban on video game consoles, perhaps Sony ordered a launch title to feature a building from the capital city. Or maybe, with the civil strife and sectarian violence of Killzone 4 eliciting the long repressed memories of the pre-July 14th revolution in the Baghdad of her childhood, Hadid is compelled to design for the game a building evoking life under the rule of an authoritarian regime.

More likely, it’s just a case of designers in one field taking inspiration from designers in another.

That being said, you’d think if you were given the blank slate of a future world to create architecture not bound by present conventions, construction capabilities or even physics, you wouldn’t resort to copying an empty office building in downtown Beijing.

(Images Gizmodo [from 55-second mark of video below], People’s Daily)

The traditional dress of the Chou, China’s 57th ethnic minority group. Here we see what must be a quite wealthy member, for as one of China’s most notoriously frugal ethnic groups, they usually travel 10 to a car.