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Published: February 12th 2011
Well, it is my final blog from Beijing and if there is one thing I will always think of when I look back on my year it will be the extremes and opposites of life in China. Behind every glossy department store is a narrow street bursting with local life, vegetables being sold on the pavement alongside myriad tiny independent stores, all thriving. The vendors sell baked sweet potatoes and corn on the cob next to towers of cardboard and plastic bottles, hoarded on the back of a bicycle cart for the few pennies they bring. In one area the rubbish will be piled high and happily ignored by people perched on kid sized plastic chairs in the gutter, eating noodles or standing on the street corner with skewers of meat, yet around the corner an old guy with a traditional broom will be monotonously sweeping an already spotless pavement. Crowning every high rise modern tower block is a mini pagoda style structure – architecture with ‘Chinese characteristics’ - and remains of the city walls and temples vie for space with the endless concrete ring roads. On one side of the street there will be a kid sticking phone number advertising
stickers on the pavement as he walks along, and on the opposite side 6 council workers hosing them off again………. every day. And the people ………strangers will physically push you out of the way until the minute you are introduced and then you become ‘family’ and they simply cannot do enough to help you. Girls giggle behind their hand too embarrassed to ever lose face, and yet there is no concept of personal space or privacy, life is out there on the street and karaoke holds no terrors! The city constantly surprises you with its contrasts and contradictions.
10 things I hate about you ………..
Spitting in the street
Cutting me up on the sidewalk
Shouting at serving staff
Calling meetings where only one person speaks – the leader
Eating the same kind of food at every meal
Skies grey with pollution
Lack of respect for personal privacy
Caring more about work than family
Plastering the pavement with advertising stickers
The traffic
and 10 things I love ..............
Peking duck and pumpkin patties
Dancing in the park
People’s kindness and generosity, the minute they know you
Anything goes attitude
Respect for older people
Constant food – and for
every food there is a reason it is good for you – or so they tell you
Impromptu conversations with strangers
Temples
Curiosity, especially about foreigners
Beijing subway – 20p right across town
But I do understand - being one of about 1.5 billion impacts on daily life in ways you just don’t realise until you stop to think – while other things are purely cultural - we are all shaped by our history and education.
My own year has swung wildly from 5* luxury to bed-sit basic, from international conference to migrant school, from UN seminar to grass-roots workshops, and I suppose this has all been part of the fascination. I have just had a brilliant leaving party with most of the people who have been my supporters and champions here, sharing and making my experience possible. They have offered me a quite exceptional level of friendship in just one year so even though they don’t read this I would like to say ‘Thank You’ to them all – it’s really all about the people in the end isn’t it.
Zai jian Zhonguo
Ji Li An
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leaving party
