Wangping Street

This guide to Wangping Street in Chengdu starts with the two competing stories behind its name: a 1924 wish for peace scrawled by exhausted residents during the warlord years, or an older tale of families waiting for soldiers to return. From there it walks you into the lane as it exists after dark today, where red lanterns and Qing-dynasty brick walls sit beside coffee bars, and vendors fry egg cakes and ladle out numbing-spicy noodles a few steps from craft-beer pubs and Thai kitchens. Listen for the sizzle of stalls as you follow the smoke down toward Xiangxiang Alley.