EARTHQUAKE

Yesterday’s earthquake reached 7.8 on the Richter Scale. At this point, more than thirteen thousand are dead, including more than two thousand children, and the toll of dead reached 65,000. Russia, Japan and Taiwan joined China's rescue operation as troops poured into Sichuan province to free those trapped in collapsed buildings and it marks the first time the Chinese government has accepted foreign professionals to assist domestic disaster rescue and relief efforts. Even dogs have been deployed to sniff for signs of life under the wreckage. 

I read the figures, watched the reports on television, shed some tears and then consigned the afflicted to the same corner of my consciences as the hundreds of thousands stricken in Myanmar. What else could I do? I had been stripped of a large part of my reserves of empathy after living in Africa. For the time being, I had no more capacity to care about others because caring about others, crying for pain of others, witnessing horrors faced by others had left me cold.

And I am afraid I need to be cold for a bit, at least for the moment.

The following week China observed three minutes of silence to commemorate those who perished as a result of the earthquake. The country and its 1.3 billion people stood still to bow their heads as car sirens sounded in memory of the dead. The country was united for a moment but the government disappointed in the coming months, covering up their shoddy construction of schools, and refusing to compensate the victims. The grief of those who had lost their children was palpable, horrifying, and compounded in a country where a people are only allowed to have one child. Wealthy people often have more than one child since they can afford to pay the fine but the majority of the population is subject “to the 300,000 officials whose job is to enforce the One-Child Policy and mandatory abortion, which is often referred to as “remedial measures” (bujiu cuoshi) in government reports, is endorsed explicitly as an official policy instrument in the regulations of 18 of China's 31 provincial-level jurisdictions.”

The protest was so great that the Chengdu Population and Family Planning Committee issues certificates allowing couples who only child was killed to have another child, temporarily rescinding the one-child policy. In addition, the government has also agreed to allow those families who were left with a maimed child as a result of the earthquake to have another child, hence insuring their own security during old age. And for those women who are now unable to conceive? The senseless loss must be insurmountable. In terms of the one-child policy, the government is left with two options - introduce democratic mechanisms that allow families to have as many children as they would like (leading to further overpopulation) or control an individuals right to choose (fomenting social discontent).

Our move to China was recent and a part of me remained in Africa. While China mourned for its dead, South African mobs continued on their rampage, killing and raping foreigners, and pillaging foreign owned shops. The year is 2008 and political analysts have predicted a civil war of sorts for some time, a consequence of the quick erosion of social welfare and social rights.  How can black South Africans who were subjected to tremendous suffering at the hands of racist leaders, now propagate the same hate crimes? 

Pakistani Politics and Sex Manuals

Andy left for Europe this morning and my friend Guillaume came to stay with me for the weekend. Our new apartment was still in a state of chaos but men seem to be fairly dismissive of cartons-piles-of-books-and-stacks-of-paintings in the middle of a room. The guest room was filled with boxes of things-we-do-not-need-but-cannot-bear-to-throw-away, as well as an antiquated refrigerator that had traveled from Africa to China, only to find that it was not needed since the apartment boasted a modern refrigerator in its kitchen. Guillaume suggested that we keep the extra refrigerator to store drinks for all the parties we were meant to host in the coming months. I suppose that as long as a bed, bathroom, and beer-filled refrigerator are easily accessible, most male guests are quite content, eh?

That evening we met my friends Sal and Henriette at a local hole-in-the-wall that was renown for an excellent Chinese kitchen. We were greeting by the sounds of oil splattering in a pseudo open kitchen where cooks shouted, smoked and tossed about pans. Complimenting this symphony were customers who slammed their beer bottles on the tables, released a cacophony of deep burps, and snapped their fingers for the waiters to serve them. Bereft of decorations, the restaurant’s floor was covered with a deep layer of spat-out-bones, chopsticks, and crumpled up napkins. A smell of food that had been deep-fried in once-twice-thrice used oil hung in the air and it mingled with the stale smell of cigarettes and sweat. The fact that we were the only foreigners was a confirmation of our choice, and within the hour the cue of waiting diners began to snake onto the street, their stares boring into the backs of our heads.

We were not quite ready to leave and asked for another round of beers. Our exchange with the waitress was a stunning example of how local rules of social etiquette differ greatly from those in the West. Smiling or being friendly to someone you don't know well can be considered rude or too familiar and in fact, diners can be aggressive, dismissive and outright rude to wait staff. As a result, not only was the waitress uninterested in the overtures made by our table of overfriendly smiling buffoons, she also seemed a bit frightened, recoiling from us like a confused deer. She brought our beers but they were lukewarm. We asked for cold beers and instead, she brought us a bowl of ice and some coffee mugs. A game of failed miming ensued and we reconciled ourselves with drinking the local white wine, whose taste bears a startling resemblance to a product I use at home to clean to deodorize the garbage disposal.

After dinner we crossed the road to a bar called Zapatas, and this Mexican watering hole was littered with drunken foreigners belting out the lyrics to songs from the 80’s and wiggling into the shapes of YMCA. We were told that a plethora of Asian prostitutes slithered about but in the sometimes-seedy nightlife of Shanghai there were many subtle shades of prostitution. How could one differentiate between the entertainers, Tiger girls, bar girls, butterflies, hostesses, and flirtatious women? The expectations of the girls waiting on the main road (Tongren Lu) were clear, however since they pounced into taxis if the passenger did not shut the door quickly enough. But for anyone confused about ones own professional inclination, help was at hand from the kindly bouncers at Zapatas as demonstrated by this sign:

Feeling a bit like a virginal maiden thrown into an American fraternity party at 3am after all the kegs had been consumed and the boys were blurry eyed, I stood and watched as people danced. A young man approached me and we started chatting. He claimed to be a young official from the Pakistani government and we began to discuss politics. Note to readers: never mix Tequila and politics. The conversation become quite serious and we were engaged in quite an inflamed, yet drunken, conversation about Pakistani and regional politics. I would spend the following day groaning and moaning about this poisonous drink called Tequila, utterly incapable of rapid movement.

Distracted by a woman who was eying him and realizing that our interaction would be limited to conversation - albeit torrid from a verbal sense - my new friend excused himself, under the pretense of going to the restroom. I resumed my mild voyeuristic journey and watched people interact-flirt-and-conquer from afar. One woman made an impact on me: wearing a midriff baring sequined tank top, plastic white go-go boots and a skirt that tickled the top of her thighs, her jet-black hair extensions reached her lower back. Men were gathered below her, handing her shots, while she danced seductively on the top of the bar. Gyrating and insinuating, I wondered which foreigner prey she would capture that evening.

Was this the new China? The government tries to convince us that overall poverty is lessening and the "Made in China" tag is also morphing into something with more panache and glamour that moves past producing higher-quality flashlights to be a revolution led by style gurus who are fashioning a modern Chinese aesthetic, redefining craftsmanship in everything from architecture, film and cuisine. Passé are the epic films with plum-cheeked peasant girls tilling the yellow earth, as are the urban soldiers marching in ill-fitting polyester Mao suits. Today, discerning Chinese dine on raspberry tea-smoked duck, wear Mandarin-inspired suits and buy contemporized calligraphy to decorate the Suzhou-silk walls of their weekend villas. The movies they watch - on pirated DVDs - portray urban Chinese sipping green tea cappuccinos from Starbucks and perusing sex manuals such as 50 Shades of Grey translated into Mandarin.

PUBLIC BATHROOMS AND SHOE SHINERS

We approached one of the many gigantesque malls recently constructed in Shanghai and entered, somewhat cautiously. The massive structures are connected via aerial and subterranean tunnels and house hundreds of shops, most of which were mid to high-range foreign brands. This was not a mall that catered fake brands being sold (at least not blatantly but does it qualify as commercial plagiarism when the shop is called Ralf Laurene? The mall is a testament to the booking Chinese middle class who, just as foreigners, wants to shop for clothing, accessories and electronics. I read about a t-shirt a woman saw on Tai Kang Lu that showed a little Chinese girl wearing a traditional Communist red uniform who was carrying a Louis Vuitton hang bag and listening to an ipod. Underneath the picture of the girl were the words "What Recession?"

Shopkeepers shout "huan ying guang lin" (welcome) when you enter a shop and for quite some time I was convince they were saying “Good morning” since I was a foreigner. In order to anticipate your every need, a sales person trails behind you but I found this to be genuinely claustrophobic, as though someone suspected I was going to slip something into my back pocket.

We tried to find a lunch spot in the mall where scents emanating from the lovely xialongbao and hot pot on offer made me swoon. Our stomachs were eager but the cues of hundreds of people were unappealing. The only vendor with a shorter cue was offering stinky tofu and over-fried-greasy-day-old-noodles.  Shanghai streets are teeming with diverse eateries so we decided to find an option outside of the mall.

We stopped at the restroom before leaving the mall and I entered to find a mob of women waiting around the stalls. Nobody had lined up in a general cue but rather, they paced back and forth protectively in front of a particular stall. Aware that I needed to quickly learn the rules of this game, I memorized who entered and in what order so that I was strategically positioned. A woman who gave in after me pushing past me to enter a vacating stall but I gently took hold of her elbow and said ‘no’, wagging my finger as if she were a schoolgirl.  She looked confused and tried to shake me off and push her way into the stall but I was thought the door, simultaneously grumbling in English, Polish and Spanish. I should have concentrated less on this woman since I stepping right into the Turkish toilet, but luckily I was not wearing open-toed shoes. Many argue that squat toilets are more hygienic than seated ones. The older generation in China rejects the notion of sitting to the degree that signs are often hung in bathrooms asking people not to stand on the toilet seat. And nevertheless, one often sees footprints on the seat.

Feeling accomplished, I exited to find Andy waiting in the hallway trembling and white. It seems that his first-time-in-a-public-bathroom-in-a-Chinese-mall was not a positive experience. Without dwelling on the topic of public bathrooms for too long, the overview is that Andy entered the men’s restroom to find a man sitting on the toilet, grunting and moaning as he read the newspaper and smoked a cigarette. There was no door on the stall and restroom was filthy, covered in muck and cigarette butts. Flies were rampant and yet, this man had a plethora of bags resting by his side, all boasting the names of high-end fashion brands!

(Fast-forward a few years to May 2012 when Leo Lewis wrote in The Times: “China's draconian 'one-child' policy is well known. But now a new code has come into effect: a two-fly rule now governs public toilets across Beijing. Central to the campaign is ensuring that the number of flies in each facility is never allowed to exceed two. The rules offer no suggestions on how to achieve the exacting standard or how to measure the fly population. The two-fly rule does not specify whether the quota refers to living or dead specimens, or whether to count a fly that, after entering, shows no sign of wishing to prolong the visit. One Beijing toilet cleaner, who gave her name as Wang, said that the rules were vague on what to do if the fly count was precisely two: "Are we obliged to destroy the surviving two, or leave them be?")

We left the mall and walked towards the Bund, discarding our aspirations for a meal as Andy recovered. Vendors selling real Rolex watches or Prada bags swarmed about offering good price. Weaving away from them was quite difficult and they adjusted their walking pace to ours so when I found myself trotting, the watch vendor trotted beside me, exhibiting an impressive level of balance. Smiles and no-thank-you only made us more vulnerable so we finally reverted to an aggressive-hand-up-bark-no-attitude.

We arrived at the Bund (Zhongshan Road), that is the waterfront area of Puxi (West City) facing Pudong (East City), the newer part of Shanghai. The Bund has been regarded as the symbol of Shanghai for hundreds of years, is less than one mile in length, and is a popular destination for tourists since it offers a glimpse of old Shanghai. Walking along the Bund at night causes sensory overload since the entire Pudong skyline is illuminated, including the Oriental Pearl TV Tower and Jin Mao Tower (the 2nd tallest building in the world). In terms of the buildings facing the river on the Puxi side, many of the major firms of the Far East used to be headquartered in these Gothic, Romanesque and Baroque style buildings but now most house high-end fashion brands or haute couture restaurants.

Just do not look at the river where you will find tons of plastic garbage floating in the waters. 

When walking away from the Bund towards some less tourist-ridden streets, an older woman with a shoeshine box blocked Andy on the sidewalk. He shook his head to decline but she insisted and squirted some cream on the tip of his shoe as we walked away. He started to walk faster but she began to swat at his feet with a rag. Hopping-trotting-and-then-running, I watched the old woman take after Andy in full pursuit. He dodged into a German pub and I joined him, my sides heaving from the laughter.

After a few stiff Bloody Mary’s we walked to the Metro to take the train back home.  We stopped at the pharmacy and I almost fell over since a saleswoman aggressively pulled me towards the mirror. Tapping furiously on the glass, she shouted that I had many terrible and ugly eye wrinkles. She shoved a bottle of eye cream into my palm and said my husband would no longer want me unless I became beautiful. 

Recycling

Garbage, it brings both challenges and opportunities

Standing on the edge of the Huangpu River, one is overwhelmed by the millions of lights emanating from the skyscrapers on Shanghai’s downtown skyline. Beneath the deceptively-glittering-postcard-picture-perfect image however, float tons of garbage. Far from being perturbed by this literal undercurrent of detritus, a smiling couple parts hands as the man opens a pack of cigarettes and tosses the plastic and foil into the water below. The woman drops her soda can to the floor but this is quickly snatched away by an older woman shuffling by, dragging her clinking-clanking black garbage bag with one hand and a rusty supermarket cart with the other. She has tied plastic supermarket bags on top of her coats sleeves to protect the fabric from dirt and looks frail but then heaves a stack of folded cardboard boxes and newspapers into her cart.

This shuffling bag lady is one of the many people who scour the city streets looking for recyclable garbage, motivated by financial incentives rather than environmental concern. Although recycling is not institutionalized in China it is socialized: nothing is wasted and for many people garbage is a means to financial security. For example, there is always a flurry of activity in city alleyways as dozens of housewives or their maids sell their recyclable garbage to waste-collectors, supplementing their household incomes. Although many of these waste collectors are listed in the phonebook, the recycling industry is not strictly regulated. Even so, 1.8million tons of waste paper were recycled in 2007 and 200,000 tons of glass and 200,000 tons of plastic in 2008.

The collector stacks items on his portable scale and pays according to weight. When he is finished he peddles away on his dilapidated tricycle, drawing his cart behind him, filled high with stacks of paper and even a small refrigerator. Children run behind him shouting as he makes his way to a waste collection station. The station will then sell the materials to recycling companies or to manufacturers who can use the materials. Electronic scrap facilities have even begun to apply low-tech, profitable, and environmentally sound approaches to the recycling of e-scrap in China. Nothing is wasted. Recycling is a fact - and a way - of life.

While the collector is doubtless not immune to the challenges imposed by the shift in the world economy and a related fall in commodity prices, he is still able to support his family, on average earning 500RMB (70USD) a week. In addition to approximately 60,000 individual collectors like him, countless small business owners owe their economic survival to recycling:  the woman in Fuxing Park who sells purses made from recycled milk cartons to both tourists and locals; the man who wheels about a modified barrel oven (on close inspection made from a discarded manufacturing container) filled with coal to roast potatoes; and vendors who have scraped together enough money to purchase the 2.35USD permit and have set up small flimsy stalls made of recycled plywood and chunks of scrap metal. These are all a step towards empowerment.

The effect of these recycled bits and pieces of construction material, and of these recycling-dependent lives, is somewhat chaotic. Since the close of the Olympics the police no longer patrol the streets to eliminate the most tangible and visible vestige of this floating population – its garbage.  The government has taken steps to promote recycling but the effect of these measures has been limited. For example, shops were banned from giving away plastic bags in January 2008 yet a country wide poll of 40,000 Netizens found that consumption has not decreased from the average three billion a day. ''It is too difficult to change a long-term habit,'' said Wang Ling, a Shanghai housewife. ''I always forget to bring bags with me when I go to the supermarket and buy a few plastic bags. The bag isn't expensive, anyway.'' The government also placed recycling bins in four colors (blue for recoverable garbage, green for glass, red for harmful garbage and black for other) in neighborhood alleyways but most people simply toss their garbage in whichever bin is closest. But never mind, a few minutes later someone will sift through the garbage and remove that which has a re-sale value.

Economic changes are taking place on an accelerated time frame in China but the social base is still largely structured on traditional values and as such, people are not generally concerned with protecting the environment without compensation. One is very conscious of people tossing garbage - on the road as they walk, from car windows, from apartment blocks – and of the speed with which recyclable materials are picked up by collectors. The theme of the 2010 World Expo Shanghai is "Better City, Better Life," and the government claims that environmentalism and recycling are principal components of this purported ‘better’ ness. However, when speaking with a young Chinese person or with an older migrant worker, their responses echo one another. “I will not bother to recycle since someone will always come and get the garbage that can be recycled; this is the job of other people.” 

Since nothing is wasted in China, more than 70% of the materials that feed China’s recycling industry are imported, according to China National Resources Recycling Association. However, Western values of over consumption and the related production of waste are slowly being integrated into the Chinese social fabric. Disposing of excess materials as prices for scrap and recyclables are dropping (50% in the past months according to the Shanghai Waste Material Recycling Association) will become an increasingly contentious issue in a country where traditional cultural attitudes about garbage and waste management exist. Is Paul Gilding, the environmental business expert, correct in claiming that China is nearing The Great Disruption, a point where nature and greed can no longer be compatible?