Adam’s Not Here

I finally got a bike last week. And I’m not going to sugar coat it: it’s stolen. Basically, in Shanghai your bike will get stolen. The newer it looks the faster it happens. As a foreigner, you get noticed all the time, which means your stuff gets noticed. And being noticed is the fastest way for a bike to get stolen. So instead of paying more for a new bike which will get stolen, I paid 60 RMB (~$9) for this one.

Riding a bicycle in Shanghai is in some ways safer and in many ways, more dangerous than back home. It’s safer in that traffic moves slower and vehicles are used to cyclists. It’s more dangerous in that you are sharing the road with a gazillion cars, motorcycles, scooters, bikes, carts and pedestrians. And many people here don’t like to look around before changing direction, they just go. So getting into some sort of collision is just a matter of (short) time. And while no one wears helmets, people are generally going slow enough that you’ll end up with some bruises and not much more. The bike has been fantastic for improving my mobility. There is a quote that I read somewhere that a bike is the perfect vehicle for seeing the world. You travel fast enough to keep it interesting, but slow enough not to miss things. I couldn’t agree more.

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Date: 04/14/2006Views: 518

I’ve been working a little more this week as some other teachers have been sick. Being a substitute teacher in China really is fantastic. The kids are happy to see a new face, so I rarely have discipline problems. Working full-time last semester, the kids would get bored of me after a few weeks. This way, I come to class and have 25 nine-year-olds lining up to get my autograph (I’m not kidding!).

Other than that, not too much is happening. I am in the midst of looking for a new apartment, as my lease expires next month. Damien is coming to live in Shanghai for the summer, so I’m looking for a 2 bedroom place. The timing actually works out perfectly as they will soon be blowing up the building across the street due to construction on a new metro line (one of 11 that will be constructed between 1990-2010!).

Lastly, my September situation has finally been sorted out. I’ll be returning to U of T for a Masters of Planning. And once again, I’ll be dancing through the halls of UC as a Don. So look for me come the latter part of August.

I just got back from a short two day trip to Yangzhou and Nanjing. My Chinese teacher is from Yangzhou and she invited me to the town as she is preparing for her move to the United States. I refer to Yangzhou as a town, but it has over a million people. The main attraction in the town is a park area known as Slender West Lake. Over here the Spring blooms are out in full force, so it was a lovely time to visit. I took a rest at a spot known as Five Pavilion Bridge and was mobbed by school children on a field trip. It was sort of like being a star surrounded by a throng of reporters as they took turns trying to out-shout each other with questions. Then some of them had a go at tugging on my arm hair, which in China is only rivalled by my large nose in terms of attracting attention.

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Date: 03/29/2006Views: 483

From Yangzhou I headed over to Nanjing; about 3 hours from Shanghai, it has 6 million people. It is supposed to be one of the greenest cities in China and I did notice that it had a lot of streets lined with wonderful old trees. However, the air was absolutely awful. Noticeably worse than Shanghai, I think Nanjing suffers from it’s proximity to manufacturing along the Yangtze river. Shanghai benefits by being near the ocean, which seems to have some positive impact on air quality (which still isn’t great). Nanjing was one of the nicest cities I have visited in China, but like Beijing, it had a tendency for mega-blockitis. This is where a city block will stretch from 300-500 metres, which serves to give the city a spaced out feel that makes it a pain to walk around. I think the compact form of downtown Shanghai is one of the things that I like most about the city. Everything you need is within a 10-15 minute walk. And the streets are so animated and alive, so that the walk is always interesting. People complain about it being crowded, but personally I think that a little bit of congestion is much better than wide boulevards that make you feel like an ant.

At my hotel in Nanjing I ran into an older English gentleman who buys reeds from China for making specialized calligraphy pens. When I mentioned that I was from Toronto he related to me that he had visited a couple years ago for a Hernia operation. He said that in England he would have had to wait for 1.5 years for the operation, so instead he found a clinic in Toronto that was willing to do it for a reasonable price. The price included his flight ticket and he had a a wonderful experience with the operation and the service he received. I though it was funny to hear of someone from another country receiving medical care in Canada to escape long wait times.

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Date: 03/30/2006Views: 579

In my effort to be as cheap as possible (it runs in the family) I took local buses for all my sight seeing. This gave me a great chance to practice my Chinese and I was able to acquit myself quite well. In the afternoon I visited the memorial for the Massacre of Nanjing by the Japanese in 1937. Also, known as the Rape of Nanking (Nanjing), the Japenese killed, raped and tortured the people of Nanjing after taking the city in the lead up to World War II. Over 300,000 people were killed in 4 weeks. The memorial seeks to preserve memory of this event through art pieces, and a museum containing historical documents and photographs. All the displays are quite graphic, the most chilling of which is a mass grave that has been excavated so that you can see the skeletons in their burial position. Each one has a picture detailing how the victim died; many were children. You can read more about the Rape of Nanking here.

All told, I had a nice time on this little excursion. One gripe though: Chinese tourist sights really gouge you on entrance tickets. In Canada, most government run sights have fairly reasonable ticket prices, usually around the price of an average meal. In China, the tickets generally cost 5-10 times the price of an average meal. Going to Slender West Lake cost 80 RMB, which I think is ridiculous considering that is probably a day’s wage for the average person in Yangzhou. It’s like being charged $60 Canadian to go to the Toronto Islands. I can understand countries like India and Cambodia charging $10 US for major tourist attractions, especially when the price for locals is a fraction of that. China charges these high prices for everybody and on all attractions. I don’t get it. I spent as much on entrance tickets as I did on hotels.

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Date: 03/30/2006Views: 513

Only the memorial for the Massacre at Nanjing was free. I guess they want everyone to know about that one. The Chinese government and media love to bring up past victimization at the hands of the Japanese. Strangely enough, there is no ill-feeling today towards all the European countries that invaded in the 1800s and forced the “unequal treaties” upon them. The way they always bring up the Japanese reminds me of the ‘we’ve been victimized for by everyone for over 2,000 years’ attitude that the Jews have. While this sometimes prevents both cultures from moving forward, to their credit they have both been able to use this narrative to generate a strong sense of identity and use it as motivation for developing prosperous nations. So we’ll call it even.

Well, that’s enough rambling and tangents for now.