Café for migrant workers near Diaoyutai State Guest House

This improvised building has the characters "fandian" (hotel), which

are usually seen at the end of the designation of the many five star

hotels in Beijing. As it is on a building site, it is no doubt used

as a place of rest for the building workers, who are doubtless part

of the hundreds of millions of migrants from the countryside who do

not enjoy the status of urban residents. The characters are probably

ironic, but may also have been meant seriously. The size and quality

of this accommodation points up the contrast between the increasingly

affluent lifestyle of city dwellers in China and the armies of the

less affluent people who are erecting tremendous quantities of

gigantic buildings in Chinese cities.