An authentic if not auspicious welcome to the People's Republic of China, and the Port of Xingang.
The ship docked late, as the pilot arrived 45 minutes later than scheduled.
Smog and pollution so thick, that morning seemed to be just another shade of dirty grey.
Conflicting orders and instructions for ship's clearance and immigration requirements for about an hour:
a) If visitor is out for the day, just take stamped passport copy, if overnight, bring passport AND stamped copy.
b) Everyone needs to have passport and present themselves to officials for clearance.
c) Not required, now everyone just needs passport, which is to be handed to passengers individually in the big ship's auditorium. Half the passengers comply. before next order comes out.
d) No - wrong process, people who stay ashore overnight need passport, others just need copy, and need to pick up passport before re-entering ship when back inside terminal.
e) Oh, absolutely no passengers will be permitted to leave ship between 9:40 and 11:00 a.m. because second ship will undergo clearance.
It took some patience, but I got onto my delayed Great Wall tour before 9:40 am curfew, after wandering through a vast terminal hall (no shops, telephones, internet here ) with signage forbidding 'talking, cellphones and photos'. Uniformed stern guards at every bend, with their eyes straight forward and their hands by their sides, forefingers touching trouser seams.
Security check, remote body temperature check, passport check, bag scanning, bag opening (any contraband??) and out into what the People here know as 'fresh air'.
The bus ride (accompanied by a guide who had no equal for encyclopedic knowledge of Chinese statistics) would take between 2 and three hours, to Bejing about 130 km away. Misleading figure, as Bejing itself is proud of an urban sprawl that reaches 120 km down, and 180 km across.
Along the way, plains on either side as far as the eye could travel trough the thick layer of pollution: dust, morass, ponds, canals, sludge filled ditches, huge flat areas barren of anything but construction cranes, smoke stacks spewing stuff, the odd dilapidated village, sober housing tenements, half finished overpasses, small herds of dust covered brown tinged sheep guarded by a dark clothed man, cars and trucks with ragged red ribbons tied to their rear view mirrors, fruit plantations and road side 'reforestation' still without leaves, garbage everywhere except on the actual highway (which was picked clean by lone workers armed with sacks and pick), no birds or wildlife except mockingbirds, guarded toll gates.
Not too many people out and about either, third day of an important Chinese Holiday. Every few miles, in the middle of this Orwellian landscape, I could see individuals or small groups of people, gathered around a small earthen mound, laying flowers or burning small fires on top of it, their bicycles nowhere to be seen, human habitation nowhere to be seen. They were honoring the spot, where their ancestor are believed to be buried. Some burned firecrackers.
Illegal activity, and fires are not allowed - adds to the pollution, explained the guide, a very nice young chap, who actually smiled and giggled quite often.
But, illegal ancestor fires nonwithstanding, at intermittent locations along the highway, street cleaners burned heaps of garbage and any growth daring to sprout under trees. Garbage fires in the distance...
We passed through Tianjin, another multimillion people city (they all seem to be multi million), with its endless rows of concrete tenements, some dirty and dilapidated, some still in progress, all with laundry drying in front of their windows, no trees or greenery. Some groups of grey buildings were placed into the vast plain seemingly at random, as there was NOTHING else resembling infrastructure or shops around.
China used to have 800 Million famers. Now it has 300 Million 'farmers', people who work in the fields - rice, fruit, vegetable, whatever.
The other 500 Million are now 'farmer-workers', who have been 'reeducated' to work in factories built on their former farmlands.
Most of the area through which we were travelling seemed to have been bulldozed over into an endless wasteland, awaiting construction of factories and commercial enterprises. Whatever rural habitations or villages had been there, were reduced to rubble. However, neat stacks of bricks stood forlornly in the oddest places.
Most people belonging to the farmer-worker generation have no education, as the Cultural Revolution frowned upon educating the working masses. I understand that they now have 'identity books', which show their hometown, age and work and entitles them to healthcare and pension - but only in their home town, everywhere else they are treated as 'foreigners' without benefits. Keeps people in their place, so to speak.
The precurser to this pursuit of industrialization was the Great Push Forward, goal being to outdo the USA in steel production (a few decades ago). In order to reach steel quota, EVERY Citizen had to melt everything made of steel or iron and give it to the cause: pots and pans, nails, wheel rims, roof tin, spades, shovels.....the alternative was being killed. All complied.
Somehow the effort to leapfrog into super steel production failed. And through lack of farm implements the mostly hand tilled soil laid barren (no tools) and rice production diminished to a trickle, that the People suffered horrendous famine. Since that time, the traditional Chinese morning greeting has changed from the equivalent of "Hello" to 'Have you eaten yet".
Now, China suffers from draught, and rice production is falling to low levels again. Farmers lose most of their annual income from harvest, some falling from equivalent of 1200 US dollar income a year to 300US$, not enough to survive and keep maybe an only child at school.
We reached Bejing, the 'Northern Capital'. With 23 dynasties going back 5000 years, and too many Emperors to count, China had about six capitals. The last one before Bejing was Nanjing, the 'Southern Capital'.
Not too many high-rises, but tenement upon tenement. A small bare apartment costs 3.5 Million Yuan, about half a million US$. Most people rent their apartment, as only super-rich Chinese or foreign investors could afford those prices.
Our guide lives in a Hutong (more of that later) and has no wife or car. 1 girl for every 17 boys with the 'One Child' policy, so Chinese girls are picky when choosing a husband, based on the four 'C's: Comfortable apartment, Car, Career, and Credit Cards...the guide had none of the above.
But, he had a dog and a cat. Cats are allowed free of charge. But dogs need licenses - 350 US dollars first year, 240US$ second year, 120US$ all following years until dog dies. Only licensed dogs are walked through the day, the other ones are walked after dark. He had an unlicensed dog and walks him at night. He said, people walk their birds - put them in a cage and off they go. I was a family walking two chicks, who let them 'graze' for a minute in a park.
Hutongs, is a microcosm in a large city (such as Bejing) existing sometimes since centuries. The typical Hutong is a narrow lane linking two courtyards, but mostly it links an entire district of adjoining hutongs. The longest Hutong in Bejing is three miles long, with one section within it no more than 30 feet wide, and the centre section only being a foot and a half wide. Something like back lanes in the west, except narrower, no garages and no garbage pick up. And people live there by the thousand. No toilets either within the crowded Hutongs. So Public Toilets are available built into high brick walls in every block.
Use at your own risk. Toilets do not appear to be exactly a cultural priority...
Some of these 'villages' within the city are being razed and replaced with tenements, a couple are being gentrified into shops, and a few are going to be 'protected' from destruction, as they go back more than 900 years.
Bikes and curious metal clad boxes on wheels (taxis for the working class?) are the most popular above ground transportation. Buses, Metro and trains take care of public transportation. There are privately owned cars in the city since about two decades, and 1300 are added every day - mostly European, Asian and US made - very few Chinese made ones (they break down). However, each car is restricted to drive during certain days of the week or month, depending on the license plate number. So only a fraction of the existing vehicles actually fill the streets.
Post revolution avenues are so wide, that one need a GPS to navigate from one side to the other in the ever present smog.
Many streets look stark and sterile, no one would be inspired to a pleasure stroll along or across them, concrete buildings and more of them, all the way to the horizon.
We parked at a gigantic restaurant with attached 'Friendship Store', to enjoy a Chines lunch before visiting the 'Tourist Attractions'.
But, the tourist Bejing will be covered in a later blog.
