Urban culture: graffiti and a milk-tea store

The 10-year-old Milk tea store has attracted people with its unique graffiti. (Ycwb.com)

It isn't rare when walking Guangzhou's streets to come across plenty of milk-tea shops. In recent years, milk-tea has become a fashionable drink both for young and old Cantonese. With bright colors and clean interiors, these shops – let's face it – look all the same. But one milk-tea store has found a rather unusual way to distinguish itself from its competitors. Its secret is in its young and urban decoration: graffiti.

A space for expression in the middle of an urban jungle

For youngsters in Liwan district, the milk-tea shop on Duobao Road is one of their favorite places to hand out. Inside the shop is a huge wall on which has been painted a long comic strip. It tells the story of two lovers, their joys and their sorrows. They court, get married, have children, and happily grow old together. This might not sound like an avant-garde painting to you, but Mr Huang, the owner of this store, says this comic strip encourages people to cherish everything they have in life.

Next to this optimistic painting can be found what the kids really come here for. Every spare part of the wall is made available to them to write a few lines or paint a quick picture. This is where you find Chinese youth expressing its hopes and feelings.

Rising popularity of graffiti

The store opened over 10 years ago but it was only five years ago that kids started drawing on the wall. If Mr Huang might have been skeptic at the beginning, today he is glad to be able to offer them this space of free expression. Seeing his wall slowly covered with graffiti, Mr Huang asked a young art student called "Xiao Yu (little fish)" to create the comic strip that today welcomes visitors.

Xiao Yu, designer of the graffiti in the old Milk tea store. (Ycwb.com)

Becoming a famous milk-tea store

The graffiti wall become famous in the district and gradually has gained a considerable reputation amongst teenagers. The owner said: "This beautiful wall, plus tasty cheap milk-tea attracts more and more students who are into graffiti. Many of them even return years later to see what they wrote in their high school years.

Mr Huang has now enlarged his store and has started to sell snacks as well as milk tea but he hasn't forgotten where his fame came from in the first place. He says: "I like all of these graffiti and I will continue to let kids expressing themselves."

(Liang Jiaxin and David Keyton)