Getting a fix of fitness at city's open gyms

When I first moved to Beijing almost a year ago, I was greeted with several new experiences and sights that I was unaccustomed to living in Vancouver, Canada - jam-packed streets with motorized tricycles and rickshaws, street vendors selling sweet potatoes and the omnipresent squat toilet.

Throughout my strolls in the capital, one thing that particularly caught my eye were the open areas featuring blue, yellow, and orange iron contraptions of every shape and size. Not until I saw local residents sitting and stretching over these colorful bars did I realize that what I had stumbled upon was a mass outdoor gym.

But there were no hard bodies parading around in skimpy exercise outfits or beefy men showing off their biceps like you'd see in Western gyms. Instead, the majority of exercisers were mom-and-pop-types and elderly Beijingers working up a sweat. The chilly February weather did nothing to slow them down - I was startled to see one man who could've been my father's age roll his back over one machine and push his legs straight up in the air.

It turns out these outdoor exercise parks were installed in the years leading up to the 2008 Olympics. The government has built more than 4,000 of these gyms in the past six years in Beijing. London is following Beijing's lead after announcing last year that a chain of outdoor gyms will be built in the city hosting the 2012 Olympic Games.

At first I was shy to try out the equipment. There I was, the awkward laowai who hadn't stepped foot in a gym since high school. I had already made a fool of myself countless times in Beijing from boarding public buses through the wrong door and dropping food on my lap from incorrectly holding chopsticks. Why add another embarrassing moment to my Beijing diary?

But after curiously observing the locals using these exercise parks, I finally waltzed up to one machine at an outdoor gym in the Sanlitun embassy area and got to work. The machine was a stand-up device where you place each foot on a flat board, hands on a steady horizontal bar, and swing each leg back and forth. It was effortless and dare I sayfun? Performing the swinging motion back and forth was a breeze, and with each thrust I felt my muscles stretch and tighten, all the way up to my pigu, or hip.

Who calls this exercise? Here I was, out of shape and not having done a lick of exercise in months, getting the hang of this machine, feeling the burn and enjoying myself at the same time. I was so impressed with myself until I glanced over at the little old lady beside me who was practically doing high kicks. She was a petite thing and probably in her 70s, but with each push I made with my leg, she left me in the dust with her long, even strides.

Maybe she'd been doing it for years? Perhaps she was one of the first to tackle the equipment when it started popping up around the city? Whatever the case, she was in great shape for her age, as were the dozens of locals around me working out. There's something to be said for the Chinese and their commitment to physical activity. It's refreshing to see people decades older than myself going for their morning and evening strolls and taking advantage of these outdoor gyms.

It's something the West could definitely learn from, instead of plunking down hundreds of dollars in gym memberships. Here I witnessed people of all ages dressed down in jackets and comfortable trousers, simply exercising. The great thing about these gyms is there is no dress code, no opportunity to prance around and judge each other's physiques, and thankfully, no sweat to mop off the equipment afterward.