A Chinese podcast · Same story, 4 levels
11:28
在鱼缸里吃饭：保定网红餐厅的风水与生意
Dining Inside a Fish Tank — Baoding's Viral Hebei Restaurant Bets on Feng Shui
HSK 3 Chinese listening practice. Baoding's fish-tank restaurant goes viral in Hebei — feng shui dining draws crowds away from Beijing and Shanghai rivals.
This is an HSK 3-4 Chinese listening episode that runs about 11 minutes. The full Mandarin script is shown with tap-for-pinyin and a line-by-line English translation, so you can listen and read at once — comprehensible input in the sense of Stephen Krashen's i+1 theory. It teaches 14 key vocabulary words such as 吸引、竞争、规定 and walks through 5 grammar patterns, each explained in English with examples. The same news story is retold at 4 difficulty levels — use the level selector above to find the version that is challenging but still understandable for you.
Read the complete story in Chinese. Reveal pinyin and English only when you need them.
Speaking of a topic that has been particularly hot on social media recently, we have to talk about a very interesting restaurant in Baoding, Hebei.
This restaurant is very famous online, attracting many young people to go there to eat and take photos.
Why is this restaurant so special?
The main reason is that its decoration design is very different.
When you walk into this restaurant, you will find that you are not sitting on ordinary ground, but sitting on the water surface.
More accurately speaking, this restaurant has turned the floor into a huge fish tank.
The tables and chairs where guests eat are all placed inside this huge glass fish tank.
When you sit down and get ready to eat noodles or dumplings, you will see many fish swimming back and forth under your feet.
These fish are mainly koi and silver carp; they swim by your feet, and it feels very magical.
This experience is just like eating in an underwater world, very eye-catching.
Many people who have been there say that this is not just a meal, but more like a performance.
Let's analyze why this restaurant wants to do this.
First of all, this is definitely to attract everyone's attention.
The competition in the catering industry is very fierce now; if your restaurant has no characteristics, it is difficult to attract guests.
So, the boss came up with this method to turn the restaurant into a tourist attraction.
People go there not just to fill their stomachs, but to watch these fish and to shoot videos to post online.
This is the currently very popular "Internet celebrity economy."
As long as your restaurant looks beautiful on a mobile phone, many people will run over from very far away.
However, besides attracting eyeballs, this design also has deeper cultural significance.
We need to explain this matter from Chinese traditional culture, especially Feng Shui knowledge.
In Chinese culture, fish and water both have very good meanings.
Everyone knows that the pronunciation of "fish" and "surplus" is the same.
So, we often say "May you have surplus every year," meaning there is leftover money and food every year.
Especially koi, it is considered an animal that can bring good luck.
If you raise koi, or see koi, people will feel this can bring you good luck.
In addition, in Feng Shui studies, water is also very important.
Feng Shui masters believe that flowing water represents wealth.
Water flowing in means money flowing in, and business will get better and better.
Therefore, this restaurant placing tables in the water and letting guests eat in the middle of the water actually has significance.
This is not just for looking good, but also to make the restaurant's business better, hoping to earn more money.
This design combines traditional Feng Shui culture and modern decoration art together.
Although this idea sounds very clever, it also brings some practical problems.
We saw online that some netizens expressed worry about this design.
For example, how is the sanitary environment guaranteed?
If guests accidentally throw napkins or garbage into the water while eating, what should be done?
Or, if children think it's fun and throw candy to the fish to eat, will the fish get sick?
These are all very specific problems.
Regarding this, the restaurant side also has their regulations.
They require guests absolutely cannot throw garbage into the water.
Moreover, the restaurant stipulates that one can only use the fish food they provide to feed the fish, and cannot give the fish human food.
This is to protect the fish's health, and also to ensure the water is clean.
Although there are these regulations, managing it might still be relatively troublesome.
Waiters not only have to serve dishes and water but might also have to check the situation in the water at any time.
In addition, there is another interesting problem regarding taking photos.
Many people go there just to take a beautiful photo to post to their WeChat Moments.
But after going, they realize that taking photos is actually very difficult.
Because under the feet is all glass, and there are lights overhead, so there will be a lot of reflection.
You might not see the fish clearly in the photo, only seeing the shadows of the lights.
Some people even say that the feeling of seeing it on-site is much better than in photos.
Although there are these small problems, this restaurant still successfully made the city of Baoding popular for a while.
We know that although Baoding is a city with a long history, in terms of tourism, it used to be not as famous as Beijing or Xi'an.
But now, because the video of this "fish tank restaurant" is circulating online, millions of people have seen this place.
This made many people who originally didn't plan to go to Baoding start to become interested in this city.
This also reflects a new trend in current Chinese tourism, called "reverse tourism."
What is reverse tourism?
Previously when everyone had holidays, they all liked to go to big cities, such as Shanghai, Chongqing, or Hangzhou.
But those places have too many people during holidays, and there are queues everywhere.
So, now more and more young people are starting to choose to go to some smaller cities.
They feel that traveling to small cities is more relaxing, the pressure is smaller, and spending money is also relatively less.
A city like Baoding fits this demand exactly.
Tourists can make a special trip to Baoding just for this one restaurant.
After going, they might discover that besides this restaurant, Baoding has other fun places.
This is a very good thing for the city's development.
Let's return to the design of this restaurant to discuss a bit.
Practices like this that combine special scenery and eating are actually not appearing for the first time in China.
In the past ten years, many restaurants in China have put a lot of effort into decoration.
Some restaurants decorate the inside to look like ancient times, with small bridges and flowing water.
Some restaurants even put tables on boats, letting guests eat on the boats.
The purpose of this approach is to provide guests with a special experience.
Because people's living standards have improved now.
Everyone goes to restaurants to eat not just to fill their stomachs, but to enjoy an atmosphere.
If a restaurant can make you feel like you are traveling, or like you are watching a movie, then you are definitely willing to spend a little more money.
This koi restaurant in Baoding is an extreme example of this trend.
It has taken this "experiential consumption" to the extreme.
Of course, this design also has its downsides.
For example, the maintenance cost will be very high.
To keep such a big fish tank clean requires changing the water frequently and requires someone to specially take care of these fish.
If the water becomes unclean, or the fish get sick, then the guests' appetite will be affected.
Once the guests' feeling is bad, the restaurant's business will become poor.
So, for the boss, this is both an opportunity and a challenge.
He not only has to know how to cook but also has to know how to raise fish and how to manage such a complex environment.
This is also why although many restaurants want to imitate, not many can really do it well.
However, judging from the current situation, this restaurant is very successful.
It proves that as long as you have creativity, even in an ordinary city, you can create a project that people all over the country pay attention to.
For us ordinary consumers, this is also a good thing.
Because we can have more choices and can see more interesting designs.
Maybe next time you travel to Hebei, you can consider going to experience it.
However, remember to abide by the restaurant's rules, do not feed the fish casually, and protect the environment there.
After all, only when the environment is good can the fish swim around healthily, and we can enjoy this special scenery.
Actually, besides this restaurant, China has many similar places worth us discovering.
In many not-so-famous cities, there are many things hidden that surprise us.
For example, in Yuncheng and Datong in Shanxi, they have also become very popular recently because of a game.
There are many ancient buildings and temples there, very beautiful.
For another example, in Pu'er, Yunnan, you can go to tea gardens to drink tea and enjoy the slow life.
Although these places are not as bustling as big cities, they have their own flavor.
Just like this restaurant in Baoding, although it is just a place to eat, it gives us a new angle to see the world.
It makes us think that life can actually become more interesting and more imaginative.
This practice of moving the natural environment indoors might become a direction for future design.
We hope to see more such creative restaurants appear.
Of course, all creativity must eventually return to service and quality.
If the food is not delicious, or the service attitude is not good, then no matter how beautiful the decoration is, it is useless.
Only by making the taste good, making the service good, plus a unique environment, can guests be attracted for a long time.
This is the logic we see from this Baoding restaurant.
It is not just a story about fish and water, but a story about innovation and management.
If you are interested in this kind of special restaurant, or if you research Feng Shui culture, this is indeed a topic worth discussing.
Watching the fish under your feet and eating the noodles in your bowl, this feeling is indeed very wonderful.
It breaks our impression of traditional restaurants.
Maybe in the future, we will see more designs that break conventions like this.
For example, eating in a forest, or eating in the air, these could all become reality.
Human imagination is rich; as long as technology permits, we can create all kinds of experiences.
And for the city of Baoding, this restaurant is like a new business card.
It makes more people remember Baoding and understand Baoding.
This shows that in this Internet era, any small highlight might be magnified and become a huge opportunity.
Whether it is business people or city managers, everyone can learn some experience from this.
We must be good at utilizing the characteristics of the internet to display our own advantages.
At the same time, we must also pay attention to protecting our own reputation and solving practical problems.
Only in this way can one change from a temporary "internet celebrity" to a lasting "classic."
Hope everyone can enjoy real food and happiness while pursuing freshness.
Try it without the transcript and notice what sounds clearer.
Common verb meaning to draw interest or attention.
Refers to rivalry, often used in business contexts like 'fierce competition' (竞争激烈).
Can be a noun (rules) or a verb (to set a rule).
Used to emphasize a case that pushes the limit.
Refers to learning through practice or personal involvement.
Describes something average or lacking special characteristics.
Often paired with 而且 (érqiě) or 还 (hái) to mean 'not only... but also'.
Combines 'social interaction' (社交) and 'media' (媒体).
Refers to the interior design and fitting out of a building.
The deeper meaning or symbolism behind something.
Traditional Chinese practice of arranging the environment to harmonize with energy forces.
Short for '网络红人' (Internet red person). Can describe people or places (like a viral restaurant).
A type of carp often associated with good luck in Chinese culture.
A modern trend where tourists visit less popular/smaller cities to avoid crowds in major hubs.
* beyond level超纲词
把 + Object + 变成 + Result
The 'Ba' construction used to indicate a transformation or change of state. It means 'to take [Object] and turn it into [Result]'.
更准确地说，这家餐厅把地板变成了一个巨大的鱼缸。
于是，老板想出了这个办法，把餐厅变成一个景点。
A progressive structure meaning 'Not only [A], but even more so [B]'. It emphasizes the second part.
很多去过那里的人都说，这不仅仅是一顿饭，更像是一场表演。
大家去那里不仅仅是为了吃饱肚子，更是为了看这些鱼。
Preposition indicating purpose, meaning 'in order to' or 'for the sake of'.
首先，这肯定是为了吸引大家的注意。
这是为了保护鱼的健康，也是为了保证水是干净的。
A conditional pattern meaning 'As long as... then...'. It introduces a sufficient condition.
只要你的餐厅在手机上看起来很漂亮，就会有很多人从很远的地方跑过来。
它证明了，只要你有创意，即使是在普通的城市，也能做出让全国人民都关注的项目。
Used to negate one thing and affirm another, meaning 'It is not... but rather...'.
你会发现你不是坐在普通的地上，而是坐在水面上。
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