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Wong ladies with Jerm & Jules..... after lunch.

2 words describe modern China... BIG(read: immense) and BUSY(read: chaotic)!

Bustling along on crammed pavements of Hong Kong is a cakewalk compared with the immenseness of urban China.

2 experiences will not be forgotten by first-time visitors to urban China... (i)a taxi ride in a big Chinese city, where lane markings mean nothing, indicators are for pussies & where scooter drivers have No Fear... (ii)stepping casually onto a pedestrian crossing with 4 or 5 lanes of traffic approaching is fine, as long as you don't do anything sudden, then cars, buses, scooters & trucks etc will simply drive around you... just like the locals do!

Guangzhou's population is a vast 10 million or so & everything seems to be currently constantly under construction, although it does already boast a Metro underground system at least as good as HK's.

Old Guangzhou (Canton) architecture, both traditional Chinese shop-houses & post Opium War European 'concession area' edifices remain.

A couple of pics of Shamian Island, the mid 19thC English/French 'concession' area, now restored, tranquil, with canal-side promenade enjoyed by modern Cantonese & tourists.... oh I mean, that's Lil in quirky Hong Kong sunhat & new Versace Versus prescription sunglasses (that's another story)...... Owen

Someone really needs to stop the likes of Starbucks stealing Chinese intellectual property, here's the evidence in Guangzhou...

[PS. Hey nice to receive your comments guys... Rose L, Ichiban Chin, Derek & Maggs!...
Sorry, offline a couple of days, trouble finding internet cafes in China, unlike HK where computer game parlours are HKD7/hr if you can stand the ear-bleedingly high noise levels...... Owen]

This is the well known 'Ladies' Market', Tung Choi St, Mong Kok, set up for the evening...

One thing that the Peoples Republic of China know how to do, is to mobilise manpower.... 120,000 PLA soldiers were sent (by helicopter, river-boat, parachute-jump & on foot) to remote Sichuan regions, some later injured in landslides caused by rain. Premier Wen Jiabao has been covered extensively on CCTV, visiting Sichuan.

Here in HK, the Sth China Morning Post reports:

- 15,000 confirmed dead to date.
- HongKongers have donated HK$600 million.
- The Sichuan dead will be acknowledged at the August Olympic Games.
- Many Yangtze dams are damaged, but the downstream Three Gorges Dam is (officially said to be) unaffected.
- Talk of govt underfunding of rural education & shoddy construction of schools... remote regions don't seem to be subject to the 'Grade 8' earthquake engineering requirements elsewhere.

Geologically the Sichuan basin sits on the edge of the Tibetan plateau & there are 100s of irrigation dams & several hydro-electric sites. .....Owen