“Fai Zi Fai Chun” — From Near Demolition to Foshan’s Most Festive Street
Hello Agents,
Recently, our Mission Day organizing team revisited Kuaizi(Fai Zi) Road Fai Chun Street, one of Foshan’s newest Lunar New Year landmarks.
Today the street is quiet again. But during the weeks leading up to the Lunar New Year, this short arcade street — only a few hundred meters long — transforms into one of the most festive places in the entire city. Crowds gather to buy fai chun (traditional calligraphy blessings), filling the street with the unmistakable atmosphere of the New Year.
In fact, its popularity now rivals the famous Spring Flower Market, long considered the classic symbol of New Year celebrations in Guangdong.
Yet the story of this place is surprisingly recent. Although the street itself is over a century old, the Fai Chun market has existed for only a little more than a decade — and before that, the entire street once came very close to demolition.
Why Is It Called “Kuaizi(Fai Zi) Road”?
The street name dates back to the early 20th century.
“Fai Zi” preserves an older historical form of the Chinese word that later evolved into the modern term for chopsticks.
Because the street was named before the modern spelling became standard, the older version simply remained.
So while it may sound like “chopsticks,” Fai Zi Road isn’t literally “Chopstick Road” — it’s a small linguistic time capsule.
Arcade Streets and the Lingnan Cityscape
The buildings along this street belong to a style known as Lingnan Arcade Architecture — rows of buildings with covered walkways supported by columns along the street.
For Ingress Agents, arcade streets often feel like natural Portal clusters. In cities like Guangzhou, many of these historic buildings have been carefully preserved, and a single street can contain dozens of Portals. Along places like Baoyuan Road and Duobao Road, you’ll often find arcade buildings individually marked with titles such as:
• Guangzhou Historic Building
• Cultural Heritage Protection Site
• Traditional Architecture
• Historical Residence
Because the buildings themselves are historically significant, they frequently qualify as excellent Portal candidates.
The reason Guangzhou has so many of them is simple — the city preserved its arcade streets well.
Foshan, unfortunately, was not as lucky.
The Demolition That Almost Happened
In 2010, after seeing the redevelopment of the historic Donghuali district, local authorities launched an ambitious urban renewal plan known locally as the “Qingming Shanghe Tu Project.”
The project aimed to redevelop the entire historic neighborhood along the south bank of the Fen River, covering an area roughly equivalent to two Lijiang Old Towns.
Large parts of the district were scheduled for demolition — including Fai Zi Road.
Soon after the plan began, historic streets such as Nandi Road were cleared, and centuries-old neighborhoods were flattened. Areas slated for the second phase, including Fai Zi Road, were left with storefronts sealed in brick after residents and businesses moved out, waiting for demolition to begin.
Around this time, famed director Wong Kar-wai visited Foshan several times while scouting locations for The Grandmaster, his film about Ip Man, the legendary Wing Chun master from Foshan.
Ironically, in Ip Man’s own hometown, he could not find a single intact Republican-era arcade street suitable for filming.
In the end, The Grandmaster was filmed in Chikan Ancient Town in Kaiping, where a three-kilometer arcade street still survives — and the tourism boost went there, not to Foshan.
From Abandoned Street to Calligraphy Market
The massive redevelopment project soon faced growing criticism for its lack of planning and feasibility. Combined with funding issues, the project gradually stalled around 2011.
By early 2012, the government lifted restrictions on some of the streets that had not yet been demolished.
Meanwhile, the traditional Fai Chun (Spring Festival calligraphy) vendors who had previously operated along Yong’an Road lost their original market spaces when that area was demolished.
With nowhere else to go, they gradually moved into the still-standing streets around Kuaizi(Fai Zi) Road.
Over the following decade, the street remained largely unchanged — still looking like a place waiting for redevelopment. But every Lunar New Year, more and more calligraphy vendors set up stalls here.
Unlike factory-printed decorations, handwritten Fai Chun banners, brushed with ink on red paper, carry a stronger sense of tradition and human touch.
Innovation: Writing Blessings on Cars
Around 2017, some vendors began experimenting with a new idea: writing festive characters in gold ink directly on car rear windows.
These designs often combine multiple characters into stylized forms. Traditional phrases like:
招财进宝 — “Wealth and prosperity”
appear alongside more playful Cantonese expressions like:
捞乜都掂 — “Whatever you do, it works out.”
This new trend — sometimes simply called “writing cars” — became especially popular with younger people.
Soon, cars decorated with handwritten blessings began appearing across many cities in China, turning what started as a small local practice into a new Lunar New Year cultural trend.
And it all began here, on this quiet street.
A Second Life for the Street
After the pandemic, Foshan’s economy — long dependent on real estate, home appliances, ceramics, and building materials — began facing new challenges. As the city looked for new development paths, cultural tourism received increasing attention.
Kuaizi(Fai Zi) Road benefited from this shift.
In 2022, cultural heritage authorities reassessed the historical value of the street’s arcade buildings. Several of them were officially recognized as Foshan Historic Buildings, and a revitalization plan for the area was approved.
By the end of 2024, the entire street underwent restoration and conservation work, bringing new life to the historic buildings.
A Street Reborn
During the 2026 Lunar New Year, the newly restored Kuaizi(Fai Zi) Road Fai Chun Street quickly became one of the most vibrant festive locations in the city.
With support from the cultural tourism department and the long-accumulated traditions of local calligraphy vendors, the street has transformed into one of the most atmospheric places to experience the Lunar New Year in Foshan.
Mission Day Route
As locals who witnessed this street’s journey — from prosperity, to decline, and finally to revival — we are excited to share this place with visiting Agents.
When Mission Day takes place, Kuaizi(Fai Zi) Road may appear to be just an ordinary arcade street: not particularly new, not especially crowded.
But it stands as a quiet witness to the many ups and downs of Foshan’s urban history.
The “Fai Zi Fai Chun” Mission runs about 300 meters along the street.
One end of the Mission begins at a road monument installed during the 2024 renovation, while the other end reaches Tianhai Restaurant, the only century-old restaurant in Foshan that is still operating today.
The full route takes less than 10 minutes to walk — but the story behind it spans more than a hundred years.
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