Shanghai Scrap

If you spend time in the Chinese countryside you’ll eventually run into factories filled with entire farming villages now displaced by industrial development. I’m not one to romanticize an agrarian lifestyle that I wouldn’t to live, myself, but I’d be dishonest if I didn’t admit that I find the disconnect from the land – and the skills to maintain it – occasionally disheartening. Thus, I present the photo below. It was taken a few weeks ago in northern China, in an area where plastics recycling has completely supplanted an agricultural economy and lifestyle that must have lasted for millennia. And yet, at least at the odd little factory where I took the photo below, it seems that certain instincts and skills haven’t quite disappeared. So, despite the fact that it looks as if the farmer in the photo is plowing dirt, he’s actually “plowing” wet shredded wire insulation to help it dry more quickly (for eventual reprocessing). Click for an enlargement.

After the jump, a closer look at the ‘crop’ … (more…)

In April I blogged about a Shanghai (Xujiahui-area) highrise cluster that had undertaken a very public protest against a neighboring real estate development threatening to take away their views, sunlight and – presumably – property values. Hoping to inflict maximum face-loss, the affluent residents hung large, inflammatory banners from the sides of their buildings, calling for the developer – Shanghai Film Group President Ren Zhonglun – to obey the law, “stop tarnishing the party,” and, well, stop building the new high-rise cluster. This would be notable anywhere in China, but particularly so for the location of these banners: they hang in busy Xujiahui, and look out upon some of the most heavily trafficked intersections in all of Shanghai.

April wasn’t the only instance of indignant banner-hanging in Xujiahui. I know of at least three others (in one case, the residents promised to exact a “blood-price” to preserve their views). And Sunday, I came across the most recent. I post this time mostly to give visual context to the earlier images. Here, for posterity’s sake, is the view from the construction site’s gate, facing the buildings – and banners – owned by the indignant property owners (click for enlargement):

Representative banner messages:

“Hoping Government Does Right and Enables the People to Live in Peace and Prosper.”

“The Only Correct Way Out is for Shanghai Film to Reduce the Floors” [That is, we're gonna keep hanging banners until you turn your highrises into low-rises]

As of yesterday evening, when I was down there yet again, the banners were still hanging and construction was continuing [UPDATE: still hanging at noon on Tuesday].

[I should mention that my interest in this protest was sparked by Ren Zhonglun's decision to demolish a 19th century Carmelite convent - until recently, one of Shanghai's oldest buildings - on the site of his sunlight-blocking highrises. Click here, and especially here, for more on that unnecessary tragedy.]

[Thanks to an admirer of General Grant for help with the translations.]