Early morning slow-movement practice in a city park
Before the clinic opens
Slow movement in the park, alongside people who have done it for decades.
Chinese Medicine and Qigong in Beijing
Chinese medicine is usually explained to visitors as either mysticism or pharmacology, and it is neither. Spend a day with practitioners and what you get instead is a coherent, very old argument about how a body stays well.
- Duration
- One day, roughly 08:00 to 18:00
- Party
- Private, or a small group by arrangement
- From
- Enquire for pricing
- Best months
- Year round — indoors for most of the day
A practitioner taking a pulse at the wrist
Pulse and tongue
A working doctor explains what they are actually reading, and why.
The pharmacy
Two hundred drawers, and a blend mixed for you to take away.
The clinic is not a demonstration set up for visitors. It is a working practice with a waiting room, and the doctor will be seeing patients before and after you.
What that buys you is honesty. You watch a diagnosis happen at normal speed, with a real complaint attached, and the explanation you get afterwards is the one the practitioner actually believes rather than a simplified version for guests.
The pharmacy is the part most people photograph. Two hundred drawers, a brass scale, and someone who knows every one of them by hand.
Fine needles laid out on a clean cloth
Steam rising from a bowl of clear broth
The day
- Morning qigong and tai chi with local practitioners
- Sit in on pulse and tongue diagnosis at a working clinic
- Try acupuncture, if you want to — nobody insists
- Blend and take away your own herbal sachet
- Eat a lunch built on the same dietary logic
- Finish with a herbal foot soak
Included
- Private host and interpreter for the full day
- Clinic consultation and optional acupuncture session
- Pharmacy visit and your own herbal blend
- Lunch, and the closing foot soak
- Private vehicle and driver
- Not included: Accommodation
- Not included: Flights and intercity transport
- Not included: Any prescribed medication
- Not included: Personal spending
Questions
Do I have to try acupuncture?
No, and plenty of guests do not. You can watch, ask questions, and skip the needles entirely without changing the shape of the day.
Is this a medical consultation?
No. It is an explanatory day with practitioners, not treatment, and nothing here replaces advice from your own doctor. Tell us about any condition or medication in advance and we will brief the clinic.
Can I bring the herbs home?
Usually — dried herbs are permitted into most countries, but rules vary and some plant material is restricted. We will tell you what your customs allow before you buy.
Is qigong difficult?
No. It is slow, low-impact and taught from zero. Guests in their seventies manage it comfortably.
Will there be other guests?
Only if you want them. The day is normally private to your party; we also run it as a small group when travellers ask to share, and we will tell you which applies to your dates.