Skyscraper City!

It’s no secret that Shanghai is a very modern city where skyscrapers have sprung up in rapid succession, each one taller than the previous, as if they were flower shoots vying ardently with each other to reach higher for the attention and the light. It’s even commemorated in this charming fan sold at tourist shops:

Shanghai Bund skyline fan

            The newly-built and constantly expanding metro so modern it puts London’s aged, lumbering 150 year-old system to shame, with every station having specific passenger doors that the train is programmed to stop at, and each carriage on every line boasting several TV screens showing their very own Metro channel with news, information and even cartoons. The metro is also very fast, taking only about 2 minutes between most stops. As mentioned in a previous post, work is now under way for a line 12, which is due to be finished at the end of this year, and no doubt there will be more to come.

For in Shanghai, there is constant building works, and they work long hours to get these flashy new buildings and metro lines popping up in a short time. Even in my campus, I can hear the hammering and electric sawing from 7 am, and my time in the lab is peppered with the rhythmic tones of pneumatic drills gutting and rebuilding a structure just next to us. Pretty much everywhere you go there is a building site round the corner (another brilliant way to keep the masses employed. There must be tens of thousands of builders working every day to keep up with the never ending developments in Shanghai).

I tried to take a photo to try to illustrate this, but it was awkward as many sites are covered up and I feel as much of an ogler as those people that try to take photos of me when they think I’m not looking. Anyway, this is the best I could do:

When I took this photo, several passing Chinese people burst into laughter, as they were probably thinking “Look at this stupid western tourist! Taking pictures of builders! Maybe they don’t have building sites in the west?” I guess stupid annoying tourists work both ways?!

I actually got this great view from some outdoor steps at an overpass across one of their many quadruple lane dual carriageways (that makes eight lanes in total!). Needless to say, some of these roads are difficult to cross even at the best of times, so the particularly busy ones have had overpasses built, complete with outdoor escalators!

The best one is just behind the Oriental Pearl:

          It leads up to a spectacular, circular overpass to help negotiate a very complicated intersection, and presumably also to help relieve the traffic from the interruption of a sea of tourists going to the Pearl.

Circular roundabout overpass to help pedestrians negotiate Lujiazui

These pictures don’t really give it justice though – it’s so huge, it really needs a panoramic shot!

              It’s also the only instance of a real-life, genuine roundabout that I’ve seen in China, which goes some way of explaining the complete chaos seen in all the roads, as people try to change lanes at the last minute.

       The nearest overpass to the uni is just a short walk away. This particular one is just next to a mall and a metro entrance:

Popular spot for photography is the overpass above a quadruple lane road in Xujiahui

            But it is also very popular as a photographic hot spot, where you get great shots of the bustling city. I took this photo from there:

            It’s hard to believe that this is only a five minute walk from campus. When you’re on the university grounds, the quiet and the old buildings laced with broken, pot-holed roads lulls you into a false sense of calmness and almost banality. But a quick step into almost any direction and you’re reminded that the campus is actually an oasis of quiet and peace!

            Although on this occasion, the pink and blue glow was from the fortuitously catching of some dusk light, I think it’s fair to say that the sky actually never really gets properly dark at night. There’s always an ominous pinky-orange glow, coming from the enormous light pollution fuelled by the Chinese love of bright lights, especially the ones showing off their skyscrapers. Yingzhou laments his inability to take any photos of stars, and I have to say, it’s pretty hard to spot even Orion’s belt sometimes, on nights when the sky isn’t blocked by a thick blanket of smog, that is.

            This overpass is also a great spot for long-exposure shots:

Long-exposure shot at Xujiahui

   But everywhere you go, the ever present “gleaming glass and steel” as described in the eyewitness DK guide to Shanghai, is over bearing, and nowhere more so than on the Pudong side near the Bund, where buildings come in all shapes and sizes, trying to outdo each other, in a way that makes the Gherkin, Walkie Talkie and the Shard look tame.

This one looks like it could be a dormant transformer, like the building toy from “Big” the movie:

But some of them do look quite elegant, and I particularly like this 20s-inspired building on the Puxi side:

 

Also, the communist monument on the left can also be seen in the above photo

The Pudong side boasts what was the second tallest building in the world, which can be seen peeking behind the others with its trapezoid hole through the top, which has earned it the affectionate nickname of “The Bottle Opener”. It was originally designed to have a circular hole at the top (a hole of some kind was required to to help such a tall building cope with the wind stresses experienced at that height), but apparently people thought a circle would remind them too much of the Japanese flag. Then they realized that a trapeze shape would be much easier and cheaper to make, so viola! The bottle opener was born, and actual bottle openers in that shape are now being sold there. It was originally designed to be the second highest building in the world, but as you can see a taller one next to it – the Shanghai Tower – is in progress, hoping to get a new record. They are both beaten by a skyscraper in Dubai.

Buildings in Shanghai come in all shapes and sizes, like this upside down cone:

            This one below I think is supposed to be two cups:

but it just reminds me of one of Lady Gaga’s bras:

         Occasionally, they try to balance this out by installing a little bit of greenery ion the pavement for pedestrians.

Rare bit of greenery in the city

                But this only happens if there is a big event about to be put on which would attract a lot of foreigners (like the World Expo in 2010), so they have to suddenly plant some greenery to make it look good.

                You can also escape to Century Park, a large park with lakes and entertainment (and a 10 RMB entry fee!), for a spot of kite flying:

Kite flying at Century Avenue, Shanghai

         At the end of the day, these structures are so huge and imposing and will be around for years to come no doubt. I sometimes wonder what will happen if or when the US defaults, either in this recession or the next, and when the whole world implodes, what future cultures would make of all these structures? It makes such a contrast to the traditional architecture of the Yu gardens, which are so admired and revered now. Will they still be standing in their full glory for future generations to marvel at them, wondering what drove these people to build into a seemingly never-ending competition for height? And what will replace them? Or will China just step into the spotlight left empty by the USA and keep on developing?

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     I’ve been wanting to add an addendum to this post for a few weeks, ever since I discovered how these skyscrapers are built so quickly! In actual fact, its that the builders live on the building site! They sleep in little carboard-box-type mobile homes, probably with many bunk beds in like the university dorms. I should not have been surprised that the economic boom was literally built on the toil and sweat of the poor, but the initial shock on finding this out astounded me so much I could only respond with “but what about their wives, children and families?!”. Living away from home is very common in China, where it’s difficult to make ends meet and find a job with so many people in the market. Many people have to move for jobs and the primary carer of many children are grandparents, while the parents strive to earn money for the family. I was told that these builders were probably people from the countryside, who come to the city for work, and send the money back to their families who are often people running farms or other agriculture. They even have a special phrase to describe these kind of “migrant workers” as Nóngmín gōng (农民工).

The Builders accommodation just behind the building site

         At first I thought it is very sad, but in some cases people have to move to a whole new country to earn enough to send back to their families. And since they live on site, no time is wasted on a daily commute, and it also explains why I can hear hammering from 7 am every day, so the system must be very efficient. And the workers seem to have a good camaraderie, and in the evenings we can hear them playing music or shouting excitedly about a card game or some such activity.

   It does seem unfair that the government is benefitting from people’s poverty which pushes them to work like this, but with the huge numbers of people, it can be difficult to compete for jobs, so there is no shortage of people willing to volunteer for early, late or holiday shifts, even for what seems like very little pay for us. So in a way, yes, some money is going back to the poorer people out in the countryside, but I doubt many of these workers would ever go into one of these skyscrapers when they’re finished. Many of the skyscrapers charge a fair amount for the entry to the viewing levels, I doubt many of the poorer people could afford such a luxury. The lower levels of skyscrapers are usually devoted to office spaces and hotels, so again, out of reach for poorer people.

   The conflicting socialism/capitalism is an odd issue here, as due to the huge competition, sometimes the only way to get ahead is to be friendly with the right people. There is no way a government could truly provide equally for 1 billion people. There are many features of Chinese culture that don’t seem very socialist – for example all healthcare is private as in America, and can be very expensive – so it seems funny to call “Obamacare” socialist! Things could not be further from the truth here, as everybody is striving and competing, and there is no welfare state to provide for those in need.

   China today is very in awe of the Western world and curious to learn and replicate the successes there. I can’t help but feel that their recent strides in development could only have happened by taking on capitalist attitudes, and business and trade pretty much run in the country the same as in capitalist places. The Chinese people are very practical, so they are willing to do whatever it takes to get things done. The end result is the most important for them. So overall, I would say that since the backlash against the Cultural Revolution in the 80s (people often talk here of the “post-80s generation”), China’s socialist reins have loosened, and increasingly the communist rule is in name only.