). Shops are open every day of the week, from 8 or 8.30 am to 7.30 or 8 pm (9 am- 7 pm in winter, 9 am-8. 30 pm in summer). Prices are fixed and a few of them will have an English-speaking staff. Most shopping centres and tourist shops also provide currency exchanging services.
2). The safest shopping places for foreign visitors are designated stores, where one can always be assured of quality and reasonable prices.
3). Antiques: Only items dating earliest from Jia Qing's reign(1797-1820) of the Qing Dynasty can be legally offered for sale and be cleared for export. They should bear a small red seal or have one affixed by the Cultural Relics Bureau in order to pass through customs. Keep all purchase receipts. The bureau has an office in the furniture hall of the Friendship Store which opens on Mondays and Fridays from 1:30 pm to 4:30 pm to appraise antiques. Good buys in Beijing are porcelain (especially blue-and-white porcelain), calligraphy, paintings, jewellery and jade, old costumes and furniture.