 The Chefoo Club BY TED, BARON de BANQUE-RUPCY The present-day Chefoo Club, home of the first bowling alley in Asia, was built at a time when Yantai was known to foreigners as Chefoo. The name Chefoo is a misnomer and a strange Romanization of the name Zhifu. When foreigners first landed in Yantai following the Treaty of Tianjin one of several unequal treaties forced on the Chinese, which allowed, among other things, more coastal cities to become Treaty Ports, the first to arrive disembarked at a small fishing village on Zhifu Island When asked what the name of the place was, they were told Zhifu. So instead of using the original name of Yantai, named after the fenghuotai - smoke platform - they called it Chefoo. The original structure was built in the late 1860s, and housed two billiard-rooms, a card-room, a bar, and a reading room, which, for its time and size,had an impressive collection of books and magazines. Later when it was rebuilt in 1894, a bowling alley, meeting rooms, dining room, and ballroom were added. 
The Chefoo Club Ballroom Circa 1930s The Chefoo Club became the centre of the socio-political life in the small Treaty Port of Chefoo with representation coming from various nationalities, whose governments had set up consulates on the Committee, which constituted an administrative body in charge of the foreign quarter, and comprised of foreign business people and diplomats, held its regular meetings at the Chefoo Club. During holidays and other special occasions, the Chefoo Club was a beehive of activity. At Christmas, children's concerts were held, and on New Year's eve, strains from an orchestra could be heard along The Bund, which stretched along the sea from Yantai Shan to present-day No. 1 Bathing Beach, as invited guests danced their way into the New Year. When the Japanese entered Chefoo in February 1938, evening activities at the Chefoo Club were seriously curtailed due to a curfew imposed by the Japanese military command. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, all foreign nationals were rounded up and interned in Japanese Internment Camps located in present-day Weifang.Thus the Chefoo Club as a foreign enclave ceased completely. 
The Chefoo Club and Golden Gulf Hotel After Liberation in 1949, part of the club became a hotel, while in 1999, it was turned into a fashionable restaurant attached to the Yantai Foreign Affairs Office. Designated as an important historical site by the local city government, the Chefoo Club was recently closed. More than likely the Chefoo Club will join the ranks of other prominent buildings in the Yantai Shan area and undergo renovations. Rumoured plans are afoot to convert it into a museum.
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Winter Swimming For all of you who have been complaining that Yantai’s winter is taking a toll on your immune system, here is a possible cure all, Winter Swimming or Dong Yu in Chinese. 
My liver's better than yours! The largest group and only official club in Yantai meets at No.1 Bathing Beach at 6:00am. Most members get there by 5:30 to chat and do some exercises. There are smelly changing rooms and cold showers at the beach for a few RMB. Some people prefer to use the facilities at the nearby Marina Hotel. Here is what one old timer says: "I feel uncomfortable if I can’t swim every day and I take a cold shower at home if I do. I also miss my friends; it’s partly for my health, but also it’s a great way to start my day." Before any of you would-be walruses head out for your first winter dip, it is recommended that you start swimming in the ocean at the end of the summer and hold on till winter. Before you swim, you need to do some warm-up exercises. Don’t perspire, or undress too fast. The swimming time also needs to be carefully regulated and increased gradually. Some regulars can swim in 32F(0C) water for up to 15 minutes. Warning! This is not a sport or traditional medicine to be taken casually. A long-time club member had a heart attack and died in late December after a 20 minute swim. On the day this photo was taken by Yantai-Life staff, the beach temperature hovered at 32F(0C) and the water was between 41F-50F(5C-10C).
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Indoor Swimming
For those of us who have more sense or less spunk, Yantai-Life has located a number of in-door swimming pools. Make that in-door heated swimming pools with less smelly changing rooms, warm showers and no used condoms floating about. This is more than we can say for No. 1 Bathing Beach. Yantai-Life staff love, love the pool facilities at the Oriental Beach Hotel. It got us through the winter of 2006 with nary a rash or ear infection. Be prepared however, to be set back 50RMB per visit unless you fork out a pricey membership which is priced in 1, 3 & 6 months packages and includes all the other amenities. Check out the website for more details. You’ll also have to buy a bathing cap for 20RMB unless you bring your own. The pool is located on the hotel’s 11th floor and overlooks a sometimes snow-capped Yantai. Beautiful! The changing facilities are professional and you have complimentary use of the dry sauna. The ubiquitous massage of various sorts is extra. For apre-swim you can relax in the heated pool area, order a drink and be thankful you’re not at No. 1 Beach. Bin Hai Rd. Tel: 688-8199. (Bus #17, but you still have to walk up the hill.) For a change of venue or to plan a family fun day out of the house during the holidays, try the pool at Yantai Hotel. It’s located just beside the library on #1 Huan Shan Rd. This is the poorer cousin to the Dong Fang Hai Tain previously mentioned, but for only 30RMB you get a reasonably sized pool, use of the sauna and a small work out room. Some days the water is cleaner and warmer than others. Tel: 6917264. (Bus #10.) Another other site is the basement pool at the BinHai Hotel 236 NanDaJie although they seem more interested in offering massage services than a clean swimming pool. The Natatorium across the street and down the hill from NanShan Park has the most professional and inexpensive facilities in the city. However, you have to pass a blood test and jump through a few other hoops before you can dive in. If you buy 30 passes, you only pay 10RMB per visit. The whole pool facility can also be rented by the hour for only 1,500RMB. (Tel: 664-2033) Mentionable, but not rated pools: Overseas Chinese Hotel, Pacific Hotel, Yantai Air Plaza Hotel and Golden Gulf.
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Saunas
Now let’s really get things warmed up. The saunas in Yantai are far to many to mention. Most are the seedy version whose grime and vice give the decent ones a bad rap. For comparison sake and for those Yantai-Lifers that enjoy grime and vice, we dropped in on some said saunas located near the train station. Among other things, these 24 hour saunas double as resting spots for travelers who get into town too early or too late to get much use out of a hotel room. The sign for Sunny Day Bath and Recreation Club alone is enough to start a novel. Eden Bath isn’t much better. For those of you who would rather pretend you are a Roman senator and not a serf, try the Victoria on 83 Xing Yi Rd on the right side up 2 blocks up from RT Mart. Tel: 6281988. Think Filleni goes to Vegas and gets the white glove treatment. 28RMB gets you a hot and cold soak, a dry sauna, a small exercise room with 2 tread mills, 2 stationary bikes and 2 universal weight machines. The xiuxi outfit and room are extra along with the optional massage and all the trimmings. Need we say that these are family establishments. Women on one side with adjoining exercise room and men on the other. Children are common. There is no better place or time than a Yantai winter to shed your qualms of public nudity and try some clean family fun. The other Yantai-Life recommended place is located just up from the Yantai Daily Newspaper office off BeiMa Rd. #57 BeiDaJie & HuaTunJie. Tel: 6619777. Warning: one of the pools can be hot enough to make soup out of a child. There is a medium hot pool as well, but no cold pool. Our final recommendation is the ________ located at ______, Tel:____ . This one has more entertainment and therefore more noise. The ___ price also includes a buffet lunch or dinner served at ___ & ____. Watch out for stampedes when the food comes out. You can get a rejuvenating skin scrub for about 25rmb at all places. You’d be surprised at how much dead skin they can scrape off making you as rosy as a baby’s bum. Warning: optional salt scrub packages can be very painful on sensitive skin. Dip & skip or rent xiuxi outfits for about 15rmb to cool down in the lounges with pedicures, manicures and foot baths. Yantai-Life staff has not contracted Hong Kong foot, etc. at any of these sites, but don’t go expecting a spit or smoke-free environment. And stay away from anyone with lots of tattoos.
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Winter Eating
Hot Pot Restaurant Review A sure way to put some fire in your belly is to slurp down some Hot Pot at the LuNingXiang Huo-Guo restaurant located on BeiMa Rd. near the Hong Kou Hotel. It’s a chain restaurant originating from Chong Qing in SiHuan province. It arrived in Yantai in 2000 with several official credits to its name, such as "Golden Prize for Huo Guo" by the SiChuan province tourism administration. The average Huo-Guo restaurant only has one kind of broth for the pot, but LuNingXian has several that range from 18-100rmb. On the low end you get boiled pig, cow, chicken and duck bones. The high-end versions drop in soft-shelled turtle, and other special ingredients said to be nutritious as well as yummy. Yantai-Life staff went for the plain hot pot until we are more experienced at ordering. The special dishes here are Ningxiangcui maodu, Jinjifengfu, duck tongue, duck blood cubes, eel, fresh sheep bowels and of course, great Yantai sea food. These ‘meats?can be mixed with vegetables such as baiye, mushrooms, fensi, potato, lettuce, rape, and tonghao. The wait staff claim that the mutton is brought directly from the Kereqing steppes of Mongolia and the vegetables are fresh and organic. Certainly there is no better way to enjoy Hot Pot than to drink plenty of beer. We’ll let you decide if it’s room temperature or cold, but the restaurant only carries Yantai Beer. With winter here, this place is always packed. Come early or late for best seating, but don’t come alone. There are two table sizes that seat up to 5 or 10 people. Final recommendations are to fully boil your meat. If you have someone at your table who doesn’t eat a certain type of meat, you can always order a divided pot.
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Puppy Pot This is a slightly different version of the Hot Pot, more popular in Korea and many parts of China. Dog meat is said to keep you warm in the winter and cool in the summer. During the Cultural Revolution Red Guards rampaged through the country killing dogs, even those raised for food, because of their stigma as an extravagance of the bourgeoisie. If you are feeling a little cold and/or bourgeois, there are several dog meat restaurants in town. The contributor to this article dined at the one near QingQuanJai (the stone gate near Yantai University). It’s a real mom & pop operation so bring your plenty of your own bourgeois spirit. Mom was more vocal than pop when it came to talking about the food. The menu lists the following types of meat: fir, leg, tail, foot, soup, spicey, BBQ, stew, mixed, short and long ribs, etc. The combo platter looks and tastes like beef except for the tail segments. Mom says that the animals are collected from neighboring farms where they have repeat 'growers.' "They are not pets!" pop maintained over and over again. He was leery of offering more information on the process of farm to table. In hindsight how hypocritical these questions must sound. Does one question where rabbits, fish or goat come from yet alone the favored chicken, cow or pig? Do we usually connect the dots between baby animal and dinner? By the way, the best part of this meal was the home-made rice wine with 'don’t ask' ingredients and special sauce for dipping the meat. Call ahead for reservations - 13723988165.
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Street Food: How to pick a good sweet potatoIt may not be your grandmother's Christmas sweet potato casserole, but the sweet potatoes you can buy on the street (the guys with the steaming metal barrels) are pretty tasty - perfect for a wintry Yantai evening. The price of sweet potatoes (bái shu) is somewhere around 2.5rmb per jin (1/2kilo). They are soft and very sweet. To pick a good one look for one that is soft and wrinkly on the outside. When you push the skin with your finger it should give way quite easily. This... Read the entire post at Shanghaiist.com ?More
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He was wearing nothing but a towel draped over one shoulder, as he casually sauntered towards the steaming pool of water in Yantai's Roman Holiday bathhouse. He inched into the water and soon he was fully submerged except for his head and one arm--his hand holding a lit cigarette. He puffed away happily in the hot bath. Welcome to China--the world's last paradise for smokers.
