中国: Day One

Twelve hours on an air-plane in the window seat imprisoned there by a sleeping old man in the aisle seat who wouldn't wake up resulted in a few things. I couldn't go to the restroom for a very, very long time and thus irreparable internal damage has likely occurred. I read one Harlen Coben novel front-to-back and the better part of a John Grisham and have to admit that the bladder thing definitely will have a stronger long-lasting impact on me. And I ended up Suzhou, China.

Suzhou is a great microcosm of modern China. It's a 'small' city of 11 million people situated about one hour from Shanghai. But it's being built for about 30 million who it seems are scheduled to arrive any day now. There are literally hundreds of very, very tall skyscrapers built and in the process of being built: office buildings and condominiums, stretching all the way into the clouds, with no residents. We arrived into Suzhou at night and nearly all of these apartment buildings were pitch dark. The city has multi-lane highways designed for the influx of eventual Suzhouians getting to work, but for now they are as empty as the 407. The MS building where I'm working is only eight stories tall and we're sitting on the eighth. But don't worry, because the government is building three (3) new 20-story MS buildings next door for expansion.

On the way from the airport we passed many Audis, Mercedes, BMWs, and other expensive cars. There were gleaming glass (empty for the most part) skyscrapers on either side of the newly-paved highway. And then all of a sudden for a short stretch we passed through the old China. The road turned to dirt and there were tiny wooden carts and huts selling food. People were bicycling in the rain and others were on antiquated scooters with all of their possessions tied to the back. There were people everywhere in the road going about their business (in the pouring rain) and after our driver nearly killed some (well, most) of them through his extremely aggressive and frightening driving, we got through that yet-to-be-upgraded part of the road and were back to modern China.

Alert: China is no longer cheap. Our ride from the airport to the hotel with the angel of death cost 350 CNY. That's about 50 EUR, and apparently 25 more EUR than it was exactly one year ago. Our dinner last night was about what you'd pay for a similar thing in Munich (but of a much more frightening character [the food here, I mean]). I've seen Maseratis (yes, plural) and Porsches.

And things are Westerner than ever. The next massive building over from the Four Points Sheraton (which, according to the poster in the elevator, has locations all over the world including London Ontario, Cambridge, and Kitchener-Waterloo!) is a Starbucks. The buffet breakfast this morning had an omelette station, and I filled up on pancakes. At the shopping area in the 'downtown' ("Times Square") where we had lunch there was H&M, Gap, Hugo Boss, Adidas, etc etc etc. Apparently this is how Times Square would look if it hadn't been pouring rain and rendering visibility more than 50 m ahead of you impossible:

Notice the three under-construction buildings. They don't built something and wait for it to fill up and then build something else. They build 30 buildings, then they build another 50, and then a further 100. And then, eventually, I guess people will show up.

If it stops raining tomorrow then perhaps I can put up some of my own pictures!