The knife grinder, the street corner bicycle repairmen, the pavement pancake stalls, and the tailors who take one look at your clothes and run you up a perfect copy for next to nothing were easy-to-find in Beijing decade ago. However, local residents say those vendors are quietly disappearing.
"It's hard to find a stall to repair your bicycle now. We used to have all kinds of stalls in the neighborhood. It only cost you half a yuan to repair a zipper."
"The knife sharpener! My knife is blunt, and I've got nowhere to grind it."
Even young Beijing residents claim that the city is modernized but inconvenient.
"Now we have to shop in big supermarkets. It may only take you five mi
