This article was supposed to be about a series of bars and other interesting nightlife in one area, but it was midnight on a Wednesday when I went out. Not surprisingly, Wednesday night in Beijing has little to offer.

　　Anywhere outside Sanlitun, you have…an empty bar. Really. I went everywhere. Houhai, Nanluoguxiang, the areas in between, Wudaokou, Women’s Street, Lucky Street, Guomao…they looked like The Stand (a Stephen King novel where 99.9% of the world’s population dies in a plague). The bars were lit up and full of wait staff, so if you like meeting waiters, there is a good option. Number two is the mega-club, where you can have your senses firebombed by techno or rap turned up so high that conversation is impossible and nobody wants to talk to you anyway, because you obviously do not have enough money.

　　So after three hours of driving and searching for something hidden, I gave up and went to The Rickshaw. The Rickshaw is in plain view off the intersection of Sanlitun and Gongti North Road, but if I mention it, nobody seems to know what it is. I say it is simply the best that Sanlitun has to offer any time of day, and essentially at Thursday 3:30 A.M.

　　People make a bar what it is, and Rickshaw is a bar by and for half-pats. A half-pat is a foreigner who comes to work and live locally, is paid local salary, lives in local housing, eats local food, and speaks the local language. This makes Rickshaw a multilingual, friendly environment, with a clientele of intelligent, hard-working half-pats and locals who just want a drink, good music, good food, and good company. At Rickshaw, they get it in spades.

　　The Rickshaw was planned to be a sports bar, a sort of “man’s bar” where guys could get together and talk about sports. The owner, Kris Ryan, happens to be a major cricket fan, and he wanted a comfortable place to watch it with his friends, and it has been his tastes and desires that have driven this and his other bars to be simple, comfortable, affordable establishments that offer good food, cheap drinks, and excellent service without unnecessary frills. Cox and The Saddle, are his other two bars famous respectively for their chicken wings and Mexican food, but Rickshaw is his crowning achievement.

　　After opening this summer, Rickshaw has been selling both the Mexican and chicken wings pioneered at Ryan’s other bars, along with fantastic burgers and very nicely done personal pan pizzas. You then can eat your proper bar food surrounded by TVs on the walls broadcasting ESPN twenty-four hours a day. But what really makes Rickshaw worth the visit is Kris Ryan, Chad, and Luga (his hardworking managers) are the kind of people who remember your name. They want to know what you do, what kind of music you like, how you like your drinks. And then? They listen.

　　It is not that everyone who goes in is a friend of the manager, it is that they become a friend of the manager, and very often a friend of the other patrons. The people friendly and down-to-earth, and with the food and drinks on top of that, it is the best place to go on a Wednesday night (or any night) when you have almost given up trying to find the perfect little bar.