Dear Friends,
Well, I'm back home now and got through some business emergencies and Thanksgiving and I am ready to write my Canuck's post. I have lots and lots of pictures to remind me of our trip, so I should be pretty good at recalling things. I'll never forget this trip in any case.
After our meetings and great introduction to real Chinese food, we were treated
to a fantastic day of touring around Dalian, courtesy of Dear Dove. She provided her super impressive right hand girl Karen to give us the Deluxe Dalian Super
Tour.
We were off pretty early in the morning, into rush hour traffic. This was quite
an experience for James and I. There is a huge and fundamental difference in the philosophy of driving in China and the US and these differences caused significant anxiety while being driven around China. Americans have a much larger requirement for personal space, which is the distance that one person can come toward another without causing discomfort or annoyance. Cues in the US generally have at least a half meter between people and if one should brush another, there is
an instant "excuse me". In China people in cues have little separation and contact is ignored. Even a slight push is ignored. On the road, this space requirement is mirrored in driving style. Maintaining "proper" vehicle separation in
the US is hugely important and rigidly enforced legally and socially. By "legally” I mean that if a cop sees you driving close to the rear of another vehicle,
he would be more likely to pull you over than to capture a bank robber. By "socially" I mean that if there is no cop around, the victim of a "tailgater" (one
who follows too closely) is likely to take the law into his own hands and strongly indicate his/her displeasure with a variety of hand signals. In China, I've
seen lane changes where the clearance between cars was centimeters and no one paid any notice at all while James and I were cringing and sweating. The other
major difference in driving has to do with the concept of right of way. In the
US there are elaborate rules and laws that specify which vehicle can go and which must give way and pedestrians always have the right of way. In China, it seems to me that the rules are very simple: the vehicle with the most momentum has the right of way. The big truck or bus can cut off car, a car can push a scooter
out of the way and pedestrians must always be on guard to avoid speeding vehicles. When so many cars do so many unexpected and dangerous looking maneuvers (from my perspective) Chinese traffic is rather stressful for a new visitor to China.
Fortunately, on that day, as we traveled past the outskirts of Dalian to tourist
areas along the beautiful coast, the traffic decreased as we drove past beautiful monuments, the dazzling architectural wonders of office buildings, train stations and bridges, unique to China. We stopped at a very cool seaside park with
a natural rock arch that indeed looked like a dragon taking a sip out of the ocean. Just down the road we stopped at "Golden Rock Park" which is a true geological wonder, with thin layers of rock complexly folded and deformed into every conceivable shape and structure. For a geologist, this was an incredible playground and a simply lovely spot where many, many pictures were taken as we wandered
along the trails and crags. The weirdly eroded rocks formed many forms and shapes that looked like a Buddha (or Christ, depending on your
heritage) or wild animal shapes. I was amazed to see so many people appreciating the natural beauty of folded rocks and I then and there understood why China produces so many talented geologists. Chinese people love rocks. Ok, that is a
gross generalization, but over and over again I have seen in Chinese art and monuments, a sincere appreciation of the beauty of natural rock formations and land
forms. This character of Chinese culture makes me feel very comfortable, like
I have returned home after a long voyage.
After visiting the park we found a wonderful private museum of Mao Zedong memorabilia or artifacts of his life. I had seen a news report of this place in the US and I was anxious to stop in. Apparently, a very successful businessman from
Dalian took to collecting Mao pins from the era of the Cultural Revolution and due to excessive wealth, got carried away and found himself with millions of pins
and other items from Mao's life. With no logical reason to possess such a vast
number of symbols of the man whose motto was "Serve the People" the man became
a philanthropist and created a really wonderful monument to the popular image of Mao during his life. I found it fascinating, since like the founder of the museum, I am intrigued by Mao's life and impact on China. How did one guy become
a virtual god to a billion people as he founded and transformed a nation? I still don’t know the answer to that question, but I did get a really cool People’
s Army hat with about 15 Mao buttons. Whenever I wore one of these buttons on
my lapel I would always earn the kindness of strangers who noticed it by saying
“Mao Zedong” and giving the thumbs up.
We toured around the coast for awhile longer and then returned to Dalian and had
a very nice but late lunch. We then went through the Dalian Museum of Natural
History (needs some work) and visited the Dalian Centennial Park. This is quite
an amazing place, a phantasm of funny statues of athletes, skateboarders and policewomen with horses, sweeping monuments and a constant family picnic atmosphere. James and I are fascinated by this place, because it is such a cool example
of a government that knows how to have fun and isn’t afraid to spend the money
to plan a great party.
Unfortunately by this time James and I are pretty well exhausted and still full
from lunch so I decided to call Dove and postpone the dinner we had planned with
her family. I know that was a very bad thing to do, but I honestly couldn’t have eaten another bite and we were still suffering from 12 hours of jet lag. By
my way of thinking, it was better to be honest than to try to fake being happy,
trying to eat food that I couldn’t eat and being tired and miserable. I hope
that dear Dove could forgive me!
To be continued…
