Shanghai - Hong Kong (Train)

Outside, the view flashes by quickly and he remembers the stranger asking him if he is happy with his life. He thinks of b. It's ridiculous how his happiness, his whole life, revolves around b. He looks back on his life from the day b came into his life. He's no longer the whiner b used to chide him for. And he's definitely more independent. He's far from perfect, having lots more to work on. But at this moment in time, he is happy with his life.

Inside, people sit by the windows and enjoy the scenery. Some eat their dinners, others chat. Some read whilst others play cards.

Outside, the view flashes by quickly and a smile appears on his lips. In the warm glow of the setting sun, farmers tend to wide flat areas of box-plot farmland. Ploughing, weeding and fertilizing. Stone or brick houses replace wooden houses of old but farmers still use old-fashion ploughs and hoes. In the warm glow of the setting sun, he is happy with his life.

He misses b this much. But he revels in his nostalgia. Lost. Both in time and space.

Riverside Promenade

The lights of the city have been switched off but the city itself remains lively nonetheless. The atmosphere here at the Riverside Promenade east of the river Huangpu has not dissipated one bit and he doubts it has on the Bund west of the river either. People here continue to savour their decadent Western coffee whilst enjoying the view like he is or having a good laugh with friends now that the week is over. He expects it to be the same on the Bund. Peddlars still trying to sell their curios whilst people walk along the promenade and enjoy the view.

After a week in Shanghai, he still hasn't yet grasped nor understood the Chinese. He has his hypotheses but they are largely unfounded, based merely on his limited observations. Everything seems pretty obvious on the surface. Things haven't really changed much in essence since dynastic China. Confucianism and Buddhism still seem to play a major role in Chinese lifestyle although they are slowly becoming less and less consequential in today's modern society, clearly evident in the lifestyle of the youth. However, certain deep-rooted practices will remain for some time yet.

As for Communism, China seems pretty much untouched by it. Well, at least for Shanghai. The economy is booming and most corporations apply the capitalist model of the West. It would seem that Communism only applies to the country's politics. But politics affects us all, whether we like it or not. And so he suspects that deep down, it's not really that simple. And this eludes him completely. It would take him a couple of years in China before he can comprehend this.

Leifeng Pagoda

Three Pools Mirroring the Moon

As the boat lolls from side to side in a lethargic manner, he imagines the three moons being reflected off the glimmering waters of the lake in the dark of the night.

Hangzhou

He sits by the edge of the West Lake and eats his lunch which he bought off an old lady peddling her home-cooked food. The waters lap lazily at his feet while boats ferry people to and from the Island of Small Seas directly ahead of him. One out of many dotting the lake. Overhead, leafy willow trees shade him and old men fishing on both his sides from the slight drizzle, evident only from the small ripples on the surface of the large lake. He hears the lively chatter of people strolling leisurely behind him along the disjointed causeways linked by graceful arched bridges spanning the lake. Pavilions refresh the weary with scenic views of the lake and the lush green mountains that surround and protect it. Solitary pagodas can be seen on their rolling slopes, propounding the Dharma and testifying the splendour of the Tang Dynasty.

Island of Small Seas

Jiang'an Temple

Heylo,

What a wet day it's been today. Didn't really do much. Explored a temple: Jiang'an Temple. Bought my train ticket to Hong Kong. Will be leaving on Saturday in the evening, a day shorter than initially planned but I'm not complaining. Much.

I mean, out of all the many banks in Shanghai, only the Bank of China accepts traveller's cheques. So I had to look for one in the rain and in the process, stumble into a shin-deep puddle. I kid you not.

Another person tried to cut in front of me at the ticket counter again. Not very surprising now. But I snapped back at him. Which I hope isn't becoming a habit. I've witnessed at least a fight everyday in Shanghai. Today, I saw two. So I think it's high-time I leave for Hong Kong, to at least some sort of order.

So yeah. Hangzhou tomorrow. Hopefully back in time to have coffee at the West Bund. And a last walk early on Saturday.

Hope your day went well. And thanks again for the lunch. I'll make it up to you someday. And do keep in touch. Hopefully, see you again in the near future.

Take care buddy,
k

Pan Gate

Life for the Chinese remains pretty much the same today as it has been since Tang times. Possibly even longer. This is especially true for the biggest social class of the population: the farmers back then or the working class of today.

Back then, farmers work their farms during the day, trying to coerce their crops to grow. At night, they return to their homes and families for dinner before retiring for the night. Today, the proletariat egg out a living by scavenging for every bit of money they can find during the day. In the evenings, they have their dinners by the roadside with friends and while the night away in leisure games of cards at the public park.

This is how it's been done in China for thousands of years and he doubts it's ever going to change anytime soon. He's still wondering if the Communist ideology fits the Chinese perfectly or if the Chinese fit the Communist ideology perfectly.

Confucian Temple

Garden of the Master of Nets

I said fourteen kuai, not four kuai! You heard wrongly! You can't even speak Putonghua!

The old man couldn't have been more wrong. If anything, travelling around Shanghai for the past five days has taught him to listen and speak Putonghua. In fact, the xiao jie at the souvenir shop had said to him, 'ni de chung wen hao' despite his humble denials.

Impossible, four kuai! Even a taxi will cost 16 kuai!

Silly old man. The same xiao jie had told him it that wouldn't cost more than four kuai. He had done his research. The old man shouldn't have agreed when he had said four kuai while indicating with four fingers twice before hopping onto the trishaw.

Don't be ridiculous! Give me my money!

The old fool! You should be giving me my one kuai change. The old man's grubby hands grasp his five kuai note tighter. His speech gets faster. Louder. Cruder. The old man tries to rally the other locals to his cause but they avoid him. They stand on the sidewalk. Talking amongst themselves. Laughing.

Old master. The police are on the way, thanks to two ladies with mobiles who could speak English. I've done my fair share of travelling. Been cheated by others before you. You think you've got me now. But you haven't got any idea, have you?

The old man shoves a dirty crumpled one kuai note into his hands and disappears into the hectic traffic of the dusty street. Minutes later, he enjoys a good laugh with the locals at the Garden of the Master of Nets.

***

The Garden of the Master of Nets is designated as a World Heritage site by the United Nations. It's always the smallest that are the most treasured.

Temple of Mystery

Suzhou

Suzhou is definitely 'Venice of the East'. More accurately, it's 'Venice of the EAST. Dirty streets. Stagnant polluted waterways. Rude people. He sees how it can be pretty but when considered as a whole, it's nothing like the real Venice at all except for the confusing maze of narrow alleys.

Lion Grove Garden

Garden of the Humble Administrator

His fascination with China and her culture grows more and more ardent with each passing day. He'll never live in a house because it's against his principles but if he were to, he'd live in a Qing-styled mansion furnished in a style suited for a literati of high-post.

Shanghai - Suzhou (Train)

Islands of houses. Islands of houses dot a sea of crops. Islands of houses dot a sea of crops and whiz past the train. A flashback. A violent bite of the nipple. A flashback. A familiar stabbing pain at the heart. A flashback.

***

Of all the things you wished or hoped they'd be the least efficient at, they organize their seating arrangements on the train. Can't even issue standardized tickets.

Shanghai Museum

Trust the Communists to be this inefficient. He waits for more than two hours to cash in his traveller's cheque while the clerk has her lunch. It's mind-bogling why they do not want his money.

Old-fashioned seals stamp every document in red. Some capitalism and competition are needed in this country.

Jinmao Tower

The Dead walk the streets at night like insubstantial spectres. The Undead. With nowhere to call their home, they float aimlessly up and down Nanjing Street. Some resume their deathly sleep whilst others scavenge for food left over by the Living. Prostitutes and hustlers prowl the street and prey on stragglers. Peddlars sell stale foods at discounted prices. It's surreal. Like a ghost town. Shanghai reveals her other face. And it isn't pretty.

Grand Hyatt Atrium

He wonders what the suicide rate is.

Huangpu River crossing

Salty sweaty Shanghai. The air chokes. He's not sure if it's from bad body odour or the exhaust fumes of motorbikes. The air tastes salty. He can taste it at the tip of his tongue. Tip of Tongue. He learnt about it in his Psychology option. Funny thing, the mind. You could say it has a mind of its own. He wonders if the saltiness of the air is from evaporating sweat or the river. But are rivers ever salty? He wouldn't be surprised if this one was. With a river this polluted, it might even taste 'umami'. Umami. The fifth gustatory perception. Sweet, salty, sour, bitter, umami. You know. Glutamate. As in monosodium glutamate. Am-ass-gee. Something which the Chinese need to learn to use appropriately. Somewhere in the dark, a man clears his throat. There's an anticipatory silence before the inevitable spit. His mind turns to the view of the Bund.

Longhua Temple

He thinks. Because of its introduction around the time of the Three Kingdoms and Jin Dynasty, Buddhism remains only so much as a religion. It cannot compare to the older Confucianism which has become part-and-parcel of Chinese lifestyle.

It is said, 'the Western King of Far Sight holds a dragon in his hand, blessing human beings. The Northern King of Virtue holds an umbrella, protecting human wealth. The Southern King of Developing Merit holds a sword, protecting the Buddhist Law. The Eastern King of Protection for Buddhist Territory in Heaven and Earth holds a pipa, protecting all living creatures.'

Soong Ching-ling's Former Residence

Soong Ching-ling's statement upon receiving the Stalin Peace Award 1951:

'It is a most profound honour of my life to be named among the winners of the Stalin Peace Prize. It is a privilege to be associated in the fight for peace with Stalin. For peace is what the people of the world want most. And Stalin is the name which personifies peace.

In accepting this most valued honour, I do so as a representative of the Chinese people. It has been their unrelenting revolutionary struggle which has placed the might of our nation on the side of peace. It has been their victory, in conjunction with the Socialist strides of the Soviet people and the courageous advances and stands of all other progressive elements, which has re-aligned the world for all time in favour of peace and people's rule.

The united front of all people today continues at a most intensified pace the fight to maintain the peace. The moneyed moguls of the United States and its satellites, befouling the word 'Peace' by claiming to act in its behalf are sustaining serious defeats. As a result, they have become mad. They would mercilessly destroy all peaceful construction, as they have trampled into dust the achievements of the valiant Korean people. They would fiendishly tear child from mother or destroy both, as they are doing in Korea, Malaya and other parts of the world. They would strap all mankind to their exploitative service, to be reduced to slaves and cannon fodder, as they are attempting to do at home, in Western Germany and Japan.'

Like they say, 'behind every successful man is a woman.' Funny how they normally tend to outlive their men and reap the rewards sown by them. Soong Ching-ling certainly did, from the documentary of her life. To be fair though, she did do a fair share of her part.

Sun Yat-sen's Former Residence

The impression. Austere. The furnishing. Adequate.

It's a surprising contrast to the opulent and wasteful palaces of the emperors. It's obvious that Sun Yat-sen had nothing else on his mind except the people and future of China. It's intriguing however, that emperors Kangxi, Yongzheng and Qianlong brought about the Golden Age of Chinese civilization despite also having the time to cultivate within themselves the finer arts such as calligraphy within the tall walls of the Forbidden City.

Could such be the mind of a Communist? It's very interesting indeed. He wonders to what extent does Communism influence Chinese lifestyle. Food is bland and it is possible that it has permeated much deeper into the tenets of daily than most people really think it has.

Pity. A week just isn't enough to understand the Chinese.

That said, he's impressed by the running of their museums. Exhibits are displayed with state-of-the-art technology and no measures are spared in ensuring their protection, including plastic shoe-wraps. They're proud of their history. And they're not going to forget it nor let the world forget it either.

Zhou Enlai's Former Residence

Site of the First National Congress of the Communist Party

'The founding of the Communist Party of China is the inevitable outcome of the development of China's modern history.'

How true. He is of the opinion that Communism was the only way forward for China back then. There was no other form of government suited to unite and control a country as large as China. Or even as diverse a culture or as rich a history as China.

Democracy would not have worked, not when the majority of China's population was the uneducated proletariat.

It was the only way. Even today, it is the only way. But change may come about in the future. May. It might not. But then we'd see the rise of a world superpower under Communist rule and that would be certainly be something.

Nanjing Road

And which city would be complete without its own shopping street?

Shanghai City's God Temple

Confucius Temple

Yu Garden

He thinks. Shanghai is such a polluted and dirty city. Despite the heavy downpour yesterday, it's still very hazy today. And it's not just because of the traffic, not that it's very congested. Rapid urbanization results in countless construction sites churning out tonnes of dust. It doesn't help either when its inhabitants do not understand the meaning of cleanliness and personal hygiene. Shanghai still has a long way to go.

He thinks. It's very easy to underestimate the impact Confucianism has on Chinese lifestyle. Visiting the Yu Garden, social hierarchy is so apparent in the seating arrangement of its halls.

The Bund

The rain lets up. He decides to explore the Bund after a quiet dinner at a local restaurant. He thinks it's stunning.

His guess is that it's modelled after Hong Kong. It's a younger city after all. Across the Huangpu River, East Shanghai's skyline reflects that of Hong Kong Island's skyline. There are influences from the Bank of China, the Hong Kong Convention & Exhibition Centre and 2IFC. It's younger age is obvious from the smaller number of skyscrapers. The Bund itself resembles Hong Kong's Avenue of Stars. Minus the stars and street performers.

But that said, it is unique in its own way. The dominating Oriental Pearl TV Tower of East Shanghai is definitely something on its own with its three 'pearls' and the colonial buildings with their characteristic Graeco-Roman columns of the Bund are something to behold. It's a very nice starking contrast.

People's Hero Memorial Column

Nanjing East Road

It's raining absolutely cats and dogs. A proper tropical storm complete with brilliant flashes of lightning and threatening rumbles of thunder. Cats and dogs.

Pedestrians without umbrellas scurry along sidewalks from shade to shade. Others huddle beneath what little protection their umbrellas give from the heavy rain. Himself. He sits out the rain in Western decadence. Starbucks no less. Shame.

At least the rain will wash away the haze. In fact, the lights of the city look brighter and more vibrant in the rain. The skyline should look fantastic once the rain stops.

It's a dog-eat-dog world here. People are rude and cut queues at any opportunity. His British accent keeps them at bay. It's hard to determine if the impressive skyscrapers of East Shanghai reflect this 'competitive' nature or a deceptive facade of its inhabitants' true attitude.

Dubai International Airport

Dubai International Airport. First leg. A two-hour delay due to a missing passenger. Another two-hour delay due to a sick passenger. He's thinking he should never ever travel to a place more than two hours away by any means of transport.

Beautiful today

You were beautiful today. Not that you aren't any other day. But today. You were beautiful.

In the bleak weather, dreary post-war buildings overshadowed opulent Baroque monuments. The black river finished the mournful glum of the city.


It was beautiful despite its sadness.

It was beautiful in its sadness.


The more I visit London, the more captivated I am by its beauty. Its many faces. Its many moods.


Everytime I visit it, there's always something surprising around every corner. Something interesting at every nook and cranny.


Save me. I am love-struck.

Post-exam hedonism

After six continuous days of drunkenness and debauchery, I've finally copped out for a night of sobriety and propriety. But despite my patchy memory, I'll try to recap the past week.


Day 1 (Tuesday)
Immediately after my last paper, I rushed straight to the Mill for what would be my first alcoholic drink of many to come within the following days. It took a Herculaneum effort to contain my happiness. I could hardly stop myself from jumping up and down and skipping along the road.


Whilst waiting for the rest of team to turn up, I had a nice warm cup of tea with Peter at Pembroke College and caught up with him. It's been too long. The last I saw him was probably last term. Dinner followed soon after with some of team at the swanky Zizi's. Sweet wine flowed freely and we had a nice buzz going by the end of it.


More drinks followed at the Maypole with more of team turning up. Cocktails accompanied general banter and before long, we were too far gone to be saved. The rest of the night was spent dancing at Life.


Day 2 (Wednesday)
Celebratory drinks at a pub in commemoration of Andy who finished a day later despite doing the same course as I am. The small affair ended with more wine back at college.


Day 3 (Thursday)
Retail therapy with my beloved Sam from late morning to early afternoon. Drinks accidentally started at around 4.00 pm. We were drunk surprisingly early. But who would ever resist Cherry Brandy? Mmm! The alcohol was accompanied by thumping music and texts were immediately sent out to the rest of team. 'Spice up your life! Come to k's room! You know you wannabe! Say you'll be there!' You get the idea.


Tired and hungry, we retired to a quiet meal at the classy Pizza Express. With the night being so young, more drinks were in order after dinner. Same went for music and dancing. Second round. An episode with the vodkamelon followed of which more to come at another post. Like previous nights, the entire sordid affair ended early in the morning at around 5.00 am.


Day 4 (Friday)
When you're with team, you come to expect every night to begin with drinks. Cocktails and dinner began at Old Orleans where we were tipsy enough to chat up the waitress and play pictionary.


Satisfied and satiated, we trouped over to the University Centre for General Dancing. More drinks followed after at the bar before retiring to my room for even more alcohol. Once again, music and more dancing ensued. Twister is always a good idea when you're drunk and with team. Before long, we were progressing on to Advance Twister which can only be left to the imagination.


Day 5 (Saturday)
All I can say is: Special day. Also, Ali's birthday celebration with lots of alcohol and random banter. Didn't stay for long because of too much alcohol and general happiness.


Day 6 (Sunday)
Team Garden Party at Darwin Island. Alex prepared the Pimm's whilst his boyfriend Dan got the barbecue started. That was until I replaced Alex who had diluted the Pimm's way too much with Lemonade till it was just as good as Lemonade. Oh and not forgetting the much anticipated vodkamelon.

It's unbelievable how inappropriate team can be and the fact we put up with it. Life followed immediately and boy, was it packed! But again, when you're with the dance team, it's not a problem getting our own space on the dancefloor. We're not trying to make the others look bad. Honest.


Funnily enough, my room became the last stop after Life where we had nice cups of tea and good soothing music. It was a good relaxing way to end the night.

And so, I rest on the seventh day. Only to ready myself for the coming week: May Week. And the rest of my Summer break.