Still here in Hanzhou
Vast cities scare me. I like it in Glasgow, where I can walk to the canal in five minutes, and then out into the country in less than an hour. Excited I wasn't about the bus trip from Shanghai to Hangzhou. Over twenty million live in Shanghai – though it's tricky to be precise with six million migrant workers hanging around. (We could do with a few of those in Scotland to get our strawberries picked.) Anyway, Shanghai is growing by at least half a Glasgow every year and I was wondering if we would be able to drive fast enough to see any green before Shanghai joins itself to Hangzhou, 110 miles away. After miles of housing blocks, and then miles of the new middle class condominiums, I found myself looking more carefully. We skid through countries, barely having time to read the guide book before moving on. The greening of motorways here is stupendous. Billions of young trees, shrubs and flowers have been planted. Azaleas, willows, cherry – you name it; tough, bendy stuff to cope with the heat and pollution. We were passing a stretch of many miles of this 'hedge' and I saw a chap cutting it........by himself, with a pair of hand shears, no yellow jacket and no traffic cones. Think long term. Is he the key to China? There's 1.3 billion more where he comes from. The job will take generations – someone will be there to finish it for you. Millions of hanging baskets on crash barriers; and they don't close lanes to water them. The housing thinned out and still every square inch is cultivated. The biggest machine I saw was a motor scooter. We passed hundreds of square miles of tree nurseries. The figure in a coolie hat, bent down to the ground, just working, and working, and....the timeless image. A forty foot high illuminated billboard advertised the 'Lingshan Buddhist Scenic Spot'; I'd loved to have stopped and checked that out. But, wait for this, the highlight of the trip: a urinal. Instead of the ceramic or steel wall to pee up against, it was a glass screen, water running continuously over it, and behind the glass......lilies and orchids. Picture it, though if you've a delicate disposition you'll need to look away, a row of willies, not just any willies but ´óÏó´«Ã½ Scottish Symphony Orchestra willies – impressive – all enjoying the soothing relief of such a scene.
We got here, with a last minute change of hotel. Allan (see my last blog) had a miserable time expediting our kit down here. For his birthday treat he was stuck overnight in a seat less lorry cab; a decrepit heap, barely big enough for our kit. They don't throw things away here, lorries or plastic bottles. Even if you did, somebody would pick it up and use it, recycle it. We could do with some of those along our roads; all the bags and bottles are harvested. Whatever speed you drive, you stay only three feet from the vehicle in front; just far enough for an old lady (oldster) to wander across. When she does, and she often does, you kick your foot hard down on the brake. You use your horn continuously, not to say, "f... off, you tube", but to say, "It's me, I'm one inch from your blind spot and not intending to slow down". Here, your personal space is respected. Uninvited physical contact is very bad manners. Even Allan looked a little shaken.
The Concert Hall is massive, the shape of a slice of water melon, beside a nearly finished twenty storey golf ball shaped building.......och, I'll not run that 'big' routine again. And I'll not talk about the concert, except to say that we really were big and impressive. We are the first band ever to get the whole audience spontaneously to their feet in applause. The hall is a five minute walk from the start of the canal. Not just any canal.......this one goes out of town and all the way back 1100 miles to Beijing. It was started in 486 BC and finished in 609 AD. You see, they needed to get all that nice food being picked down here, back up there to Beijing.
Anthony
