Shanghai Scrap

Last year, on the occasion of Shanghai Scrap’s second anniversary, I swore that I wouldn’t do a post marking Shanghai Scrap’s third anniversary. However, recent events – namely, Expo 2010 (World’s Fair) – have convinced me that an anniversary post is definitely in order. Long-time readers may recall that I used last year’s anniversary post to list the top 5 most popular posts from the last twelve months. However, due to the fact that the most popular posts from the most recent 12 months were all Expo-related, I’m going to take this (self-imposed) opportunity to list the five most popular non-Expo related posts from the last months. The purpose of this exercise – and it’s quite sincere – is to remind myself and regular readers that Expo is not forever, and I fully intend to resume blogging about other subjects, and soon (a few more Expo posts in the works, though). Until then, allow me to exhibit to you just what happens in the Russian restaurant beside the Russian Expo pavilion after the Expo closes at midnight.

There’s a whole lot more of this Expo after-hours business available for those looking for it. And, if I were a certain local city blog, I’d try to find somebody who could get in and write about the phenomenon. Here at Shanghai Scrap, we’re interested in more staid Expo-related subjects.

Anyway, for the record, the most popular Shanghai Scrap post of the last 12 months – and, as of this weekend, the all-time most popular Shanghai Scrap post – is the recent Reporter’s Guide to the USA Pavilion Debacle at Expo 2010. But, as noted above, this blog has long been about more than the Expo. So, without further ado, the top five most popular non-Expo related Shanghai Scrap posts of the last 12 months.

1. Giant UFO Over Shanghai. [Sigh. Two years after I posted it mostly as a lark, it remains the #2 search result if you google 'UFO Shanghai'. Who knew people were still looking?]
2. Buddhist protests and Muslim riots. [Some thoughts on the initial media coverage of the riots in Urumqi  last July. It also touches on the untenable online correction policy at the New York Times - a subject to which I returned a couple of months ago.].
3. Why are 40,000 containers of scrap metal idling in Hong Kong and Guangzhou? [To my everlasting surprise, this was widely linked by blogs with no interest in Scrap, but considerable interest in how China operates.]
4. Interview: Monday Night Football’s play-by-play man in China airs it out. [Tied with the criminally under-appreciated 141 Shanghai Christmas trees post as my favorite post of the year. Considerable thanks to NFL China for agreeing to it.]
5. “I’m a big supporter of non-censorship” [My extremely unpopular but heavily trafficked criticism of Obama's performance at his November 2009 town hall in Shanghai. My critics suggested that it hailed a grand new moment in US-Chinese relations; seven months later, I'd say they over-sold it.]

A couple of quick observations. First, despite the fact that I consider this blog – primarily – a reported blog, the most popular posts – with a few exceptions (most of my Expo posts) – remain opinion pieces. Second, the foreign audience for serious China blogging (say, my 2008 posts about the iron ore trade) remains a niche; that is to say, if you’re an English-language China blogger in need of traffic, you’d best connect your China material with something that isn’t China-related (ie, the Expo, Obama, sex). Bluntly put, around here at least, the serious China blogging does less than 10% of the traffic that a one-off post about a disgusting new snack available at Shanghai-area Starbucks outlets does. And, to be honest, I’m probably with my readers on that one.

This evening I had the distinct honor of attending the opening of the Latvian Expo 2010 (World’s Fair) pavilion. It was a notable event for two reasons, in particular. First, the Latvian pavilion is the last of the stand-alone Expo 2010 pavilions to open (Expo opened on May 1); and second, and more important, the Latvian pavilion is built around something called an “Aerodium” – basically, a giant, vertical wind tunnel into which people – including, say, prime ministers – can be inserted for the purpose of levitating/flying. And so this evening, to his everlasting credit, Latvian Prime Minister Valdis Dombrovskis, donned a flight suit and helmet, stepped into the Aerodium, and – to the obvious discomfort of his security detail – levitated/flew. Below, Dombrovskis’s flight as witnessed by the staff of Shanghai Scrap (that’s 39-year-old Dombrovskis in the middle).

Just to be clear: the Prime Minister is, in fact, a Prime Minister, and so the staff of the Latvian pavilion took extra care with his flight. But when it came time for the staff to take flight and show the full capabilities of the Aerodium, they didn’t hesitate at all. Photographic proof, after the page jump … (more…)

Over the weekend one of Shanghai’s sweetest and best loved characters, Gary Heyne, passed away [obituaries here and here] [UPDATE: my friend Jim Fallows has penned a lovely remembrance of Gary, here]. Many folks knew Gary as the brewmaster and partner at the esteemed Boxing Cat Brewery. And that’s how he wanted it: he was a great brewer (according to people who understand what that means better than I do), and an amazing conversationalist. Truly, I don’t think anybody who ever spent more than thirty seconds with the man ever forgot him. Now, as it happens, I’m not much of a drinker, so I never got to know Gary the Bar Stool Philosopher as well as some folks. But I am a writer. And writers tended to have a special relationship with Gary. First, because he was incredibly well-read. But also because Gary Heyne had a book that he wanted to write. Or, more precisely, he wanted somebody to help him complete the book that he’d already started.

I’m not sure how many Shanghai-area writers he approached about the project over the years, but I suspect that I might’ve been among the first: the 11,000-word manuscript, adamantly titled “Get Sent,” arrived in my email inbox at 8:50 PM on March 23, 2007. For lots of reasons, I wasn’t the writer that Gary was seeking, and I’d mostly forgotten the manuscript until this weekend’s sad news. So, for his friends in Shanghai and around the world, I’m going to post the short first chapter. If you knew Gary, it’s going to make you laugh with recognition: everything ‘G-Man’ is in there. If you didn’t know Gary, you’re going to wonder why I didn’t agree to work on the book with him. The chapter will start after the page jump, and in honor of Gary, a total gentleman in all things, I feel obligated to warn you that it contains some adult language and situations. (more…)

The other morning I received an out-of-the-blue email from Pete Ford, Creative Director for the Australian Pavilion at Expo 2010 (World’s Fair). He was going to be in town, he told me, and he wondered if I’d be interested in a “front and back of house” tour of his creation. Absolutely! As I’ve noted elsewhere on this blog, the Australia pavilion is one of the best of the national pavilions at Expo 2010; it’s also a bit of a technical marvel. The centerpiece is a theater-in-the-round featuring a – how to describe this? – a rotating set of movie screens that surround several set-pieces that emerge from a stage. The screens, meanwhile, feature projections showing scenes from Australia and – this is the real kicker – views of the set-pieces inside of them as if the screens were windows rather than white surfaces, providing each seat with a unique view of the show. That’s no small trick. See below.

So last week, without hesitation, I met Ford at the entrance to the pavilion. It was, like every day at the Aussie pavilion, a busy day: lines wrapped around the building, folding over and around each other. As Ford led me up the ramp, past artworks specially made for the pavilion, we were jostled by the dense crowds rushing through the wide corridors, and he laughed: “I knew it was going to be busy – but MAN!”

Ford, and his company, think!OTS, aren’t newcomers to Expos. As we walked through the pavilion exhibits, he told me that his first was Expo 88 in Brisbane, Australia, and that think!OTS designed the Australian pavilion for Expo 2005 in Aichi. “So it was easier for us to begin work on this one,” he explained. Formal work began 3.5 years ago, but the current pavilion wasn’t a given: think!OTS first had to be selected in open competition against other firms and groups. Obviously, it was.

Outside of the theater itself, I asked Ford how he came up with the idea of screen spinning around a prop that emerges from a stage floor. “I was drinking beer,” he told me. “And I was holding the bottle, and the coaster, and I had the idea of the coaster going ’round and ’round the bottle.” (more…)

Late this afternoon, while leaving the Puxi side of the Expo 2010 (World’s Fair) grounds, I happened to pause at a bus stop which – to my great surprise – provided this (presumably) inadvertent commentary on Shanghai’s Huangpu River.

It’s true: despite monumental efforts to improve Shanghai’s riverfront (including wonderful work at the Expo site), the river which runs through this great river town remains highly polluted. I actually did a bit of looking into this subject a year ago, and if you’re interested in the details, you might consider paying the fee necessary to access this paper. Gross river, indeed.

[ed. note: The staff at Shanghai Scrap believes that there's rather too much writing about Chinglish in the foreign media and blogsphere - especially by people like me who really have no business making fun of someone else's foreign language ability. And that's why we maintain a "One Chinglish Post Per Year" policy at Shanghai Scrap. Needless to say, there was very little discussion about whether or not the above entry should be this year's example; not only is it funny, it is -arguably - an apt commentary on a pressing environmental issue. Congratulations, Expo 2010.]

[Addendum: Additional Shanghai Scrap thoughts on Expo 2010 English, from 2009, here.]

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stopped by the USA pavilion at Expo 2010 (World’s Fair) this morning and, according to numerous media outlets (among them, the New York Times and the Washington Post), had this to say when asked her opinion about the USA pavilion which she was instrumental in building/saving: “It’s fine.”

Not great. Not spectacular. Not even good. Just plain old “fine.”

To be clear: responsibility for the uninspiring design and programming of the USA pavilion does not belong to Clinton, but rather to Shanghai Expo 2010, Inc, a non-profit organization designated to design, build, and fund the pavilion by the Bush State Department (with the steadfast, key, and ongoing support of the leadership of the US Consulate in Shanghai). For those members of the media looking for additional details – including names named – on how the United States ended up with what the Washington Post’s John Pomfret suggests “resembles more a convention center in a medium-size American city than a showcase for the United States,” I direct you over to this helpful ‘Reporter’s Guide to the USA Pavilion‘ and “A Sorry Spectacle,” my March 2010 summation of the situation at Foreign Policy magazine. Further information can be found under this blog’s Expo 2010 – USA Pavilion category.

[Addendum: Both the New York Times and the Washington Post quote Frank Lavin, Chair of the USA Pavilion's Steering Committee, in their reportage from the Clinton visit. This is unfortunate. In June 2009, at a point when the USA pavilion non-profit was nearly broke, Lavin - a former ambassador to Singapore under George W. Bush - publicly claimed that the US Congress had adopted a resolution in favor of his non-profit organization's effort to build a pavilion at Expo 2010. However, Congress did no such thing, and Lavin's statement was quickly retracted - though without apology to the pavilion's donors, much less, Congress (Shanghai Scrap's coverage of this disreputable moment in USA pavilion history, here). In the wake of his lie, Lavin disappeared from public view. Many - including me - hoped that - in the interest of his and the pavilion's dignity - he wouldn't reappear. Too bad that he did.]

In the midst of all of the Expo madness, I find myself on the road working on a couple of somethings completely unrelated to the Expo. So, despite my best intentions this week, I’m going off-line until next week. For now, I leave you with an image taken inside of the (wonderful on the outside) Shanghai Corporate Pavilion. Came across it while going through some photos on a flight earlier this evening. Despite appearances, the folks in the theater are not doing the wave or engaged in a prayer meeting. Rather, they’re manipulating the light array in the theater ceiling – at least, that’s what the animatronic woman on the screen (see back of photo) said was happening.

Before signing off I feel obligated to note that, despite the All-Expo, All-of-the-Time theme that appears to have overtaken the blog, it is my hope to return soon to some of the other topics that defined this blog for its first three years of existence. That is to say, the staff at Shanghai Scrap has no intention of keeping this up for another five months. See you next week with some high-quality posts, including – and we’re very excited about this – a very cool insider’s tour of one of Expo’s very best pavilions.

For the weekend, the first of a couple of random notes on Expo 2010 (World’s Fair) that I’ve had scribbled on an envelope next to my keyboard. First, Future v. Past …

Expo 2010 has grounds on both sides of the Huangpu River, with the Pudong side being home to the national pavilions (China, Japan, USA, etc), and Puxi home to the corporate pavilions (GM, State Grid, Coke, etc). For reasons both obvious and not so, most visitors tend to prefer the Pudong side, with its impressive architecture and long lines. But, as I’ve been saying and writing for two weeks, the Pudong-side pavilions rarely live up to their architecture, relying instead on stale video arrays to project their “national brands.” Meanwhile, in Puxi, the organizations that actually know how to project a brand – multinational corporations – have deployed some truly fun and innovative displays inside of pavilions that don’t – on the surface – look particularly compelling (Edwin Schlossberg’s playful ‘Shanghai Corporate Pavilion’ is a notable exception – but only at night). For example, my absolute favorite pavilion at Expo 2010 – the SAIC-General Motors pavilion – has a spectacular 4-D film that includes some wonderful imagined images of Shanghai circa 2030 (it has a whole lot more, too). Partial image of the very large screen …

I don’t want to give too much away, because some of these buildings – including SAIC-GM – contain some real surprises. But – to borrow author Virginia Postrel’s phrase (as spoken to me on a ferry between the two riverbanks) – they’re “more World’s Fair-y,” where “World’s Fair-y,” as a phrase (to my ears) summons up images of a gee-whiz 1950s America (relevant to note that Postrel is the author of the marvelous ‘The Future and Its Enemies,’) . That is, World’s Fairs (Expos), in the American imagination, at least, speak to a better future filled with technology that’s not only useful, but fun and tantalizing. The national pavilions, on the other hand, are very much backward-looking, disproportionately relying upon their history (I’m reminded of an animated video of armor-clad cavalry riding across the plains showing in the Polish pavilion) and values rather than their futures. Find out for yourself: go watch the somnolent audience reaction to, say, the film featured in the Chinese provincial pavilions (the fair factories of Liaoning Province!) as compared to the excited audiences that exit the GM-SAIC pavilion. That’s not to say that history can’t be fun – it certainly can be – but as deployed at Expo 2010 (at least) it’s much less engaging than the attractive glimpses of the future available in Puxi. So, to repeat myself – if you have limited time, go to Puxi (where the lines are usually shorter, anyway).

[And yes, I'm aware that there are exceptions on both sides of the river - one of which I'll be discussing at length next week. Stay tuned!]

Spend a bit of time poking your head into some of the 170-or-so Expo 2010 pavilions, and a few things become clear right away: few, if any of the national pavilions have programming that lives up to their architecture (hello, Russia); people are waiting hours in line to view eight minute videos that are destined to end up as in-house programming at hotel chains around the world (I’m looking at you, Singapore); and those countries too lazy to be truly different (see: truly different Hungary) are spending money on so-called 4D movie experiences. What is 4D? Basically, a 3D film with a few physical effects – say, some wind in your hair, some rain in your face, and a vibrating seat. Some call them “Ghetto Disney;” and others brings their umbrellas. Whatever you call them, though, just take a walk around Expo, and it’s hard to trip over yourself without landing on top of a movie theater that isn’t cueing large arrays of fans to filmed thunderstorms. A couple of examples, starting with the Chongqing pavilion:

And then the Oil pavilion (which, frankly, has the Expo’s only 4D experience that has an actual 3D film to accompany the water that it spits in the audience’s face):

So the question then arises: how, in an era when 3D is the sensory equivalent of a rotary phone, and 4D is as common as an iPhone, do you differentiate your multi-media experience? Well, if you’re Expo 2010′s host city, and in no mood to suffer fools, much less come in second or third place to anyone, you ratchet it up not one, but two notches and present the masses with a …

So what, precisely, happens in 6D? Does a multi-dimensional wormhole open into Shanghai’s opium trading past? I wish I could tell you, but the line has always been too long to justify exploring this physically challenging side of the Expo. For those who’d like to explore it without waiting in line, I sort of recommend the six-dimensional space wiki.

Below, a photo of the ticket lines, near gate 6, at Expo 2010 just after 4:00 yesterday. This was but one line; there were roughly twenty of equivalent length stretched down the ticket counters. Only one week earlier, at roughly the same time, there were no lines, and only two ticket windows open for business.

It’s only been a week, in fact, since commentators (including yours truly) began to openly doubt whether Expo would come close to meeting its projected 70 million visitor goal (an interesting piece on that subject, here). At this point, it looks as if 70 million isn’t in the cards – the Expo would need to average in excess of 380,000/people day for that (and it’s currently averaging just under 200,000). That noted, the official Expo attendance figures – updated hourly! – show a definite recovery, and upward trend, from last week’s crater:

What accounts for the strong walk-up business after a week of people prognosticating Expo attendance doom? Well, one factor might be that the Expo organizers started selling RMB 90 evening-only tickets at 16:00 – rather than the previously announced 17:00. I haven’t seen anything in the papers – or on the official Expo website – about that change, but clearly the people waiting in line (most of whom were locals) were well aware of it. The gorgeous summer night didn’t hurt, either. (more…)

For more than a year, the USA pavilion at Expo 2010 has been shrouded in inexplicable secrecy. To this day, for example, the State Department won’t reveal the process by which Shanghai Expo 2010, Inc [SE 2010] – the non-profit it authorized to design, fund, build and manage the US pavilion – was selected; who and how a Canadian architect was chosen to design the US pavilion; or, for that matter, release a detailed budget on how SE 2010 was spending its $61 million in tax-deductible contributions. Unfortunately, the first two questions are still mysteries: the State Department, SE 2010, and the US Consulate in Shanghai have been obstinate in their refusal to answer questions on these matters. However, the last question – a detailed budget – received a partial answer last week when I published a cost estimate that SE 2010 had filed with the IRS in June 2009.

Readers will recall that the IRS documents indicated that SE 2010, Inc was spending US$23 million for the three short films that are featured in the USA pavilion (a sum that exceeds the cost of 4 of the ten Academy Award nominees for Best Picture). No surprise, the producer of the three films – BRC Imagination Arts of Burbank, California – is, according to the June 2009 IRS documents, the pavilion’s top-paid contractor [click to enlarge].

In the above document, BRC is promised US$10 million for Production Design/Fabrication; according to individuals associated with two other national pavilions, that $10 million most likely folds into the $23 million for “show construction & installation” in the cost sheet. In any case, no other contractor is listed in the IRS filing; BRC is the largest. (more…)

Kaiser Kuo, Beijing-based writer, tech-watcher, and guitar-player (and prolific tweeter), recently launched the Sinica podcast, a weekly look at “politics, economics, international relations and how it all relates to China.” It’s an interesting and enjoyable listen, featuring some of the more prominent folks in China’s internet and media industries. Among the many reasons that I like it – actually, the very reason that I like it – is that it’s a chance to hear writers and thinkers with a deep interest in China, talking about that interest in an informal way. Speaking from experience, the conversations you hear in the Sinica podcast aren’t unlike the conversations you’d hear if these same people were out for dinner. I can’t speak for writers and journalists who cover other beats, but it’s my long-standing observation that the people who think and write about China spend a lot of time talking passionately about China, too.

This week’s podcast – “Dimensions of China’s Soft Power” features Kuo, Gady Epstein, the  Beijing Bureau Chief for Forbes, Jeremy Goldkorn of the essential Danwei blog, and Evan Osnos, the Beijing-based staff writer for the New Yorker. It also features a short dispatch from Expo 2010 (World’s Fair) in Shanghai, featuring me, Mr. Shanghai Scrap. You can download and/or stream the podcast here.

And a brief plug for a recent Sinica podcast- Gady Epstein’s reading of Tom Friedman’s secret memo to Hu Jintao. Not to be missed!

Early yesterday afternoon I found my way down to the Expo 2010 (World’s Fair) site for what was supposed to be a ninety-minute visit, at most. But when I arrived the grounds were so empty (under 100,000 visitors yesterday), and the weather was so good, that I found myself spending the remainder of the day, into the night, down there with a friend whom I texted on the spur of the moment (“Nobody’s here. You should come down.”). Below, the view of the UK pavilion and, in the background, the Lupu Bridge, as viewed from the Dutch pavilion (Happy Street) around 8:30 PM.

It’s a gorgeous view, and what’s best about it is that – despite all of the reports about lines and waits (yes, at Shanghai Scrap, too) – there wasn’t any waiting at all. We just walked into Happy Street, just as we walked into every other pavilion but the UK and German ones (30 – 60 minute waits at both). It was a good antidote to all of the negativity that’s been swirling around Expo since the first day of the soft opening.  For an evening, at least, you could see that the Expo is an interesting and fun place to go (I try to get at the fun in this recent interview with China Beat) – especially in the dark, when the crowds mostly disappear.

And the night-time benefits go beyond just being able to walk into pretty much any pavilion whenever you like. Restaurants are empty. Entire squares are empty. Best of all, the grounds are filled with terrific performances. Last night, alone, I came across a wonderful jazz-funk outfit from Italy; street performers from Prague; a boy’s choir from South Africa; chamber music from Austria; some kind of wicked wild percussion thing (not sure what that was) in the square in front of the Pacific pavilion; a folk ensemble from Romania; and some skinny, hairy Danish dudes rocking out with toy-store keyboards in front of the Little Mermaid at the Denmark pavilion. Why the Expo organizers aren’t doing more to promote all of these great performances in the face of so much negative publicity about long lines, I’ll never understand. But whatever – take it from your friendly Scrap blogger and go to Expo after dark. It’s great.

A couple of additional notes on visiting the site … (more…)

Say you’re a mid-sized Eastern European country without much of a public image in China. More or less suddenly, in 2006, you receive an invitation from Premier Wen Jiabao, inviting you to attend Expo 2010, the biggest and most expensive World’s Fair in history. You accept, of course – why wouldn’t you want to take advantage of this unparalleled opportunity? – and convene your country’s best minds to decide what, in fact, you’ll do with your national pavilion. You’re not a superpower, so you certainly aren’t going to take the approach of Germany, France, or the UK and (try to) build an architectural masterpiece; but you’re not Albania or San Marino, either, and you’re surely not going to occupy a glorified booth in one of the European group pavilions.

So what you do? Well, if you’re Hungary, you install a two-meter tall silver plexiglass geometric curiosity in the center of a 1000 square meter building and hire a handful of Chinese volunteers to explain what it is. No, really. That’s what they did. Here it is: the Hungarian Gömböc:

And here, next to the big Gömböc are three volunteers, with several pint-sized Gömböcs, trying to explain – in Chinese and English – just what this thing is to those (like me) utterly perplexed as to why Hungary would construct an entire pavilion around one.

Seriously, and this bears repeating: there is nothing else in this pavilion but that thing, that Gömböc. The display cases? Empty (seriously, they’re empty). No goulash. No Bela Lugosi. No Bela Bartok. No even a hint of Zsa Zsa Gabor. Just. this. orb.

So what is it? Well, according to this article (and there are many, many others) a Gömböc is:

… the first known homogenous object with one stable and one unstable equilibrium point, thus with two equilibria altogether on a horizontal surface. It can be proven that no object with less than two equilibria exists. The discovery of the inaccessible path has led to the idea of GÖMBÖC.

Needless to say, two Hungarians discovered it. In 2006, no less.

There was no queuing for the Hungarian pavilion when I visited it yesterday. Let’s hope – for the sake and safety of the good-natured Gömböc Explanation Team – there never is.

[In other inexplicable pavilion news, the New Yorker's Evan Osnos collects some early reviews - Chinese and foreign - of the USA pavilion. Worth reading.]

[Clarification: As noted below in the comments: as weird as this is, I actually really like it. Nice change of pace, and the only pavilion that I was still talking about - and blogging about - hours after leaving the grounds. Kudos to Hungary.]