In the real world, Shanghai is a very green city. The Pudong business district has utilized the very good growing climate to establish wonderful borders between the wide sidewalks and the roadways. And there are very colorful boulevards separating the traffic flows. Pudong also has a tremendous number of parks on both sides of the Huangpu River. Our travelers were fortunate to have a room overlooking the Lujiazui Central Green and also had the good fortune to visit the gigantic Century Park as well as other parks, while in-country. They agreed that the closest similar urban area they know is Singapore.
Pudong's pedestrians enjoy very wide sidewalks and due to the width of the streets and their green borders, very long crosswalks. Flanking Lujaizui Central Green are a second level of walkways about 10 meters above the ground level sidewalk. These upper walkways run for several blocks to the Pearl Tower from the Four Seasons Hotel and enter the second levels of some higher-end, multi-level malls, along the way. The combination of the two levels of pedestrian walkways provide lots of space on two levels for pedestrians in the high season but they were pretty empty when Gym and Mrs. Gym were there in the Fall.
Cleaning things up a little more, there are absolutely no billboards in Shanghai. In fact, there are no ads of any kind anywhere in sight. There is also absolutely no trash anywhere to be seen. There are ample waste baskets for recyclable and non-recyclable waste every 30 meters or so. It was also noted that there was an absence of drive-through fast food places and ugly gas stations in the city. These establishments are there, they are just hidden well. Corner grocery stores, liquor stores and gas stations are located off the main drags in the side-streets below the 5-storey walk-up apartment buildings where the locals reside. Some of the best restaurants are also located on these side roads but Gym wasn't allowed to try them.
So now what did our intrepid couple notice about the residents? The consensus was that they are well-policed. There was at least one policeman on every block and Gym heard they are there to dissuade panhandlers and street merchants. But there are no street people in Shanghai. No bagel carts or "Rolex" merchants are in evidence. Gym never saw any undesirables while in Shanghai and he was left alone by hawkers during the week he was there. The only residents that approached him while he was there were in what must have been a camera gap because the entire city is covered by cameras, almost every square meter. Gym kicks himself when he realizes the investment opportunity that he missed just before they bought all these cameras. Someone cleaned up and he is probably living in downtown Pudong.
During our traveler's stay in China they also noticed several special units of police patrolling Pudong and the Bund which is across the river. There were groups of armed police marching about, including swat units and several men in black suits with identical bags for their fly-fishing rods and thick black briefcases. Gym believes there is one of two possible reasons for this special police presence, as follows:
1. Gym and his boss were in town and the people of the PRC wanted to make sure that a good time was had by these friendly Canadian world travelers, knowing how big this blog had become; or,
2. Chairman Xi would be there to address an International Trade Conference and they were worried about Trump's Radicals Republicans.
You pick which one you think is right. They are probably both right.
To finish our discourse on the Chinese residents that were spotted, the average office worker was young, well-dressed, polite and tech savvy. The majority of the transactions that were witnessed were closed using mobile phone apps and not credit or debit cards. Jeans were usually designer labels and were worn around the waist and not the upper thigh (no butt cracks in evidence). The point being made is that Shanghai was much closer in appearances to the utopian society that has been envisioned by many authors, like Aldus Huxley. Every city in North America fails to come close to the look of Pudong. But is this loss of freedom worth it??
The millennials working in the banks realize they a re under 24-hour surveillance and they have two points of view, which were made known to our travelers in a private conversation.. One faction of the workers believe that the constant video intrusion keeps them safe and they are therefore happy with it. The other group obviously do not like the 24/7 conformity that is required but can't do much about it. This latter guys would obviously not want to discuss their position outside, when someone is reading their lips.
In the next article we will talk about archetechture and some of the places our heros have visited.
Stay tuned!
PS. Obviously our heros have left China because Gym can access Google blogspot. The Chinese people aren't allowed it because it contains too much information that can get ithem nto too much trouble.
At time of writing, Gym and the boss are enjoying a nice beach in the Maldives which will be reported on in future post.
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| This is not even a Main Street and you can see the nice green boulevard |
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| This is a typical boulevard on Century Avenue in downtown Pudong. It is November now so I am sure it looks better in June. |
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| This is an elementary class marching behind a brownoser carrying a flag. They are on some sort of outing during school hours. All boys sport matching blue backpacks and the girls have pink ones. |
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| This is looking across a huge lake at Century Park. The waterfronts are very nicely landscaped with multiple parallel pathways for bikes and pedestrians. |
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| An expletive of landscape art in the middle of a major intersection. |
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| This shows how wide the sidewalks are in Pudong. |
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| And if you have all those green strips, wide sidewalks and roads, you get very long crosswalks. |
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| A picture of the flowers in in Lujiazu Central Green |
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| Rich people live here! |
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| These are the 3 Kings of the Pudong skyline. These help give it the futuristic feel I was talking about. I will chat more about these in the next post. |
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| Mrs. Gym |
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| A bull on the Bund. |
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| A man in Gucheng Park writing Chinese characters on the pavement with water. |
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| Poinsettias! |
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| Looking down from the upper walkway at a floral display. |
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| Looking down from an upper walkway at a tunnel which goes under the river and the base of the Pearl Tower which we will talk about in the next post. |
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| Looking across the Lujiazui Central Green at another futuristic view of downtown Pudong |
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| "Bladerunner" or "The last feline of Pudong" |
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| Another pic of the Huangpu River |
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| Ditto |
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| Another cool floral tribute to the 70th anniversary of modern China |
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