Life and Travel in China

After the train disaster in Wenzhou, one may wonder about the sense of functioning of high-speed railways. China's problem is that these trains basically run 'one after the other' at intervals of 10-15 minutes. The failure of one train causing a delay of several minutes immediately creates a huge risk of an accident. I have traveled on such trains myself, fortunately without any breakdowns, I also saw such a train passing the station at a speed of about 300-350 km/h and I admit that it is difficult to even imagine an accident. It is such a speed that there is no time to put the camera to your eye to capture such a fast train. However, the noise and gust of wind are similar to those when an airplane takes off. Can you imagine a disaster of two trains traveling at 350 km/h in opposite directions on the same track? I guess such situations don't happen, but in China anything is possible. The problem is that transport here has to be profitable. Tickets are not the cheapest, but of course, with this population of passengers, there is no shortage of passengers, trains run every 15-30 minutes, and the whole enterprise must bring profits. And in the Middle Kingdom, profits mean sacrifices, unfortunately! There, the value is always Yuan, not human life.

We often read about various forced displacements, protests in distant provinces of China, or even about throwing people out onto the streets and demolishing old settlements and villages to build factories, highways, dams or power plants. This is everyday life in China! Only now, however, have I encountered this problem more directly. Well, in a village in Hunan, the authorities are forcing people to build new houses (instead of the old ones). The land does not belong to them anyway, but to the Chinese authorities. In recent years, the village has grown, a new road was built, factories, a hotel and court buildings, and local government buildings appeared in the area (I wrote about it once). For example, my wife's uncle had to demolish his new house (2 floors) because it was too close to the road. He received some compensation, but I know how much work such construction requires. They do not build villas with a garden, they are rather simple houses made of red brick, not always even plastered. There is not much furniture inside, there are old tables and chairs. No one there has a home theater, a DVD player, or a leather corner sofa, and the living rooms resemble a threshing floor where even crops are dried. There was a fashion for building tall, multi-story houses to show which family had more money. Unfortunately, the burden of such home remodeling projects often falls on children who work in cities and send all the money to their parents. Old people are forced to build better houses because the local authorities apparently want to please the central authorities in Beijing and show them an extensive, prosperous village. Wasn't it similar in Mao's time when fertile fields around the route of the chairman's train were moved? In the Middle Kingdom, behind every success there is a larger or smaller human tragedy.

Shenzhen is currently experiencing the Universiade, but I see that in the world this event passes without much notice. Many foreigners come to the conclusion that the Chinese can organize such events, but they cannot enjoy them. The problem is that the Chinese authorities want to provide perfect security for all events, thus keeping the audience and ordinary onlookers at a distance. Roads, bridges and ground crossings are closed and thousands of kilometers of barriers are placed. Of course, the crowds are still trying to catch a glimpse of something, waiting for hours for, for example, a torchlight marathon or some VIP speeches. However, everything is 100% controlled. There is no question of spontaneous reactions of the audience or viewers. Many foreigners also feel changes during the Universiade period. Some people are already complaining that bars and nightclubs are to be closed before 2 a.m. In addition, some streets were completely closed to traffic, the airport was even closed for one day and, as usual, there are additional, scrupulous security checks everywhere. I wonder if there is more joy in such events or more difficulties and changes? From the point of view of people who come to Shenzhen for the Universiade, everything is probably well organized and secured, but the 'locals' do not have an easy life now, they have to make many sacrifices. And all this so that in a week the Chinese authorities can congratulate themselves on how well they did a job and once again delighted the whole world.

Such funny situations can be observed in China. You can go, for example, to Nanjing Lu Street in Shanghai or the MixCity shopping center in Shenzhen... that's where many rich Chinese people go to the brand stores of Louis Vuitton, Rolex, Pierre Cardin, Cartier, Giorgio Armani, Dior, Chanel. At the same time, crowds of Americans, Russians, Poles, Italians and French are looking for cheap fakes, they are tempted by street touts, they walk around the alleys, enter the basements of tenement houses, into apartments covered with plywood to find their dream Rolex, LV handbags, fake iPhones, copies of Vertu Ferrari phones, Breitling and Patek Philippe watches almost like the original ones. There was such a reversal of stereotypes there. Seemingly poor Chinese working for bowls of rice (probably gold bowls) walk around company air-conditioned showrooms. During this time, all white people (assumed to be a better race than Asians - this is not my opinion, but it is accepted in the world) run around stinking tenement houses looking for cheap fakes. The whites have gone to the dogs! Ha ha.

It seems to me that the Polish media - especially the Internet and the press - write differently about China. While the foreign press has a fairly objective opinion about the Middle Kingdom (especially the United States and Germany), Poles are starting to admire China. A few years ago, there was a general wave of criticism of China, and all columns could be shortened to one conclusion: "so what if the cities are rich when there is poverty in the countryside, where 70% of the population lives?" In fact, according to the latest statistics, about 50% of China's total population lives in the countryside. Currently, the media are more and more fascinated with China - not only with the economy, but also with sports and film news, curiosities, etc. It seems to me that an increasing number of Poles have seen China with their own eyes (exhibitions, fairs, economic missions or trips, studies) and now they admire it. I guess that in about 20 years we will change our view of the Middle Kingdom again and it will become more objective, more mature. The voice on Chinese affairs will be neither too critical nor too flattering.