Breaking the Key

Yesterday, August 21st, I went on an adventure to Ghost Street 鬼街, a famous restaurant street, at Dongzhimen 东直门 to take a look at an apartment that is up for rent.

A very nice Chinese girl named Coco (short for Corinne, apparently) met me at the Dongzhimen subway stop and accompanied me to the apartment complex, which is only a four or five minute walk from the station. Convenience! Nice!

Anyway, we walked into the apartment complex through the front entrace that touches Ghost Street. The entire area consisted of a few different buildings surrounding a tree-filled, semi-lush courtyard, which is a rare find in many parts of Beijing. The buildings were old, and honestly a little more run-down than I was looking for, but I figured that I would give it a shot anyway because Coco had taken so much time out of her day to come and meet me.

Coco announced to me that the apartment I was going to see was actually not the apartment that I had seen on her advertisement, but actually a similar one that had three rooms for rent. She did not live there, but in fact lived in the building next door. Anyway, the apartment was the exact same layout as the one in the advertisement, so there was no problem.

We walked into the building, up six flights of stairs, and finally arrived at the door of the apartment.

It was pretty nice, though not quite nice enough for the price that was being offered, I think. The room that interested me composed the second floor of the apartment, but the bed was only a large sofa-style pullout bed. The current residents are a Columbian girl, a Chinese Girl, and an American guy, and since they were not there at the time, I am unsure as to whether or not I would like to live with them, etc.

Anyway, to make a long story short, the fun part of this tale occurred when we were leaving the apartment.

Coco accompanied me out the door, and I began to make my way down the stairs. After I few seconds I did not hear her following me, so I turned around and noticed her struggling with the key to the door.

"I just had a copy of their key made yesterday...." She began. "It doesn't seem to be a very good copy....I can't get the door to lock! Can you try?"

"No problem" I said, coming back up the stairs and taking the key from her.

I pulled it out of the lock, looked at it, then put it back in the lock and began to turn slowly.

I thought that the key turning in the lock was actually the lock coming unlocked, but actually it was the cheap metal twisting and bending upon itself.

"Snap!" I smiled, for clearly I had defeated the lock. But no, once again, just as in the case of the toe-nail clippers, the metal broke clean in half, leaving the front section of the ket stuck inside the lock of an apartment that I did not even live in.

Fantastic! None of the people who lived there were home, and now their door would be unlocked all day! I felt pretty bad that my clumsy self broke the key off in the lock, but in the end it was not my fault.


Chinese metal products defeated me once again!