The Sentiment of Huangdao Road in My Heart~

The renovation of Dabaodao in Qingdao is nearing its end. It is not like the European villa area of Badaguan, nor like the cultural celebrity street of Xiaoyushan. It has re-emerged from the dust of history, and the most distinctive feature used to be Huangdao Road, which can be called a specimen of the old Qingdao market. Huangdao Road is a road that slopes from east high to west low, starting from Pingyuan Road at No. 1 Huangdao Road, heading westward through Anhui Road, Jining Branch Road, Zhifu Road, and Yizhou Road, and ends at the intersection with Sifang Road. This east-west Huangdao Road is close to Dexian Road to the east, and with Dexian Road as the central axis, the area to the east of the road is roughly known as the European District and Qingdao District, while to the west is the Chinese District and Dabaodao. Huangdao Road thus has the advantage of location, where Eastern and Western cultures blend... Touring Huangdao Road from west to east, from low to high, gives a better sense of observation. The road from Sifang Road to Zhifu Road is gentle; from Zhifu Road to Anhui Road is a stone stairway, with large stone slabs underfoot, humorously called 'one and a half steps'; from Anhui Road to Pingyuan Road is an asphalt road, which is also the narrowest section... In the early 20th century, some Qing officials came to live in Qingdao, and later bought land and built houses on Huangdao Road, adding European-style cottages among the scattered courtyards, adding a touch of beauty... From the 1920s to the 1950s, Huangdao Road had developed into a commercial street, mainly for daily necessities, agricultural and sideline products, as well as brothels, with the most famous being Pingkang Li. In 1988, when Taiwan opened up visits to the mainland, many retired Taiwanese soldiers came here to visit, reminiscing about the past pleasures... My grandparents moved here from Qixia Road in the 1950s, and I lived here for nearly ten years as a child, and stayed here again in the early 1990s. This place holds my childhood memories and adult sentiments, that courtyard complex filled with the smell of life, like the small taverns, seafood stalls, and Sanju Cheng on this street, flickering in my heart... In 2016, the dilapidated houses on Huangdao Road were expropriated, and all the sitting tenants moved away, and the street also faded away... In the south, many ancient streets retain the living ecology of the original residents, such as Tunxi Old Street, Sanfang Qixiang, Kuanzhai Alley, etc. Each street has its own flavor, like a delicacy you've tasted, or a past romance, does it often make you reminisce and flash back?... The renovated Huangdao Road has more appearance but less soul, the interesting and appealing flavor of life is the soul of this old street... The existence of the original residents is an opportunity for tourists to get a deeper understanding of the old street, and they are the ones who can keep the old street alive...