We all by now know the story of the new China.

A confident, powerful, even threatening nation to some, taking its place at the head table. A permanent member of the U.N. security council, W.T.O. member, inward investment magnet and now a country who's own money and people are spreading across the world. And at its center is Beijing.

I've been coming here for about 12 years and the changes have been extraordinary. A city of bicycles is now a city of cars, bumper to bumper along 12-lane roads lined by monumental new buildings. A city of glass and steel. An architect's playground where money is no object in creating something new, something different.

The Bird's Nest national sports stadium, the Watercube swimming center are not only centerpieces of the Olympic Games but symbols of the revival of a country no longer locked behind a bamboo curtain.

But there is another side to Beijing. The hutongs. Not the well-worn tourist areas where beautifully preserved century-old houses have been turned into high-class restaurants and offices for attorneys, but the older, more careworn parts of town.

The name hutong literally means alleyway. In Beijing they are more like a maze. Winding, tree-lined streets of cobblestone, bitumen or gravel, many too narrow for a car, where life goes on pretty much undisturbed by the blossoming city around them.
Brick houses with tiled sloping roofs and tiny cluttered courtyards, carved pillars and painted oak doors. In one courtyard we looked into, plump ripe grapes were growing across an arched entrance.

They are not all pretty, some look close to ruin. Some don't have running water and the residents share public bathrooms and toilets. But it's real. There's a sense of timelessness in the hutongs. And it's a welcome contrast to the new city that is rising up to engulf them.

I went to the Quanmen hutong area, barely a mile from Tiananmen Square. It could be a thousand miles away judging from the pace of life there.

But it, like many others, are disappearing. The government say it wants to preserve just a handful of hutongs to make way for high-rises with modern facilities. Fair enough perhaps, except many of the hutong dwellers don't want to go and the payout offered by the government (about $U.S.1,000 per square meter) is not enough to buy one of these new apartments.

They are being shunted to the outskirts of the city, the only place they can afford.

Even the hutongs under protection are not necessarily safe, says activist Hua Xinmin. She's been fighting the demise of the hutongs for the last 10 years. She says corrupt local city officials and property developers are in many cases ignoring protection orders.

Beijing is not the first city in the world, and it won't be the last, to bulldoze over history in the name of progress, but the sheer speed of development in the capital means that these areas are disappearing fast.

So my advice to you, if you are planning a trip to Beijing, is try to get off the main tourist track and visit some of these hutongs. Because once they are gone, they are gone forever.

-- From CNN Anchor/Correspondent Andrew Stevens