Shanghai

Land of cranes and jackhammers.  Of chain-smokers, and taxi drivers that spend ten minutes snorting, and hocking before spitting out the window a baseball-sized accumulation of black phlegm.  A land of curious onlookers, who will gather to watch two men fight awkwardly in front of a mall.  Of boutiques and black markets.  Of chaotic freedom.

One morning, I awoke to the vibrations of jackhammers drilling into concrete, like the sound of God’s teeth chattering.  On television, a former high-ranking official who had been purged politically due to his support of the Tiananmen Square protesters, had died of pneumonia, and CNN International had made the story one of its top news items for the day.  I went about my morning routine, leaving CNN International on, like I did most mornings.  As I was brushing my teeth I overheard the anchorwoman giving a teaser to the story on the former Chinese politician; the story would air right after a short commercial break, she said.  Then came the commercials, mostly self-promotional advertisements for other CNN International programs, with the occasional spot reserved for companies that catered to the upper-class traveling businessman that CNN International attracts (commercials for investment banks, phones, computers, and airlines).  Then, the CNN logo and the little CNN jingle, signaling the end of the commercial break; the camera zooming in to the anchorwoman at her unnecessarily gargantuan news desk.  And then…static.  I flipped through the channels to see if I had lost the signal to all the channels on cable, but CNN International was the only one.  All the other channels were fine.

I didn’t think much of it; losing the signal to a channel happened from time to time, who knows why.  Maybe there was a technical failure at the offices of the local provider, or maybe there was a problem at the headquarters of CNN International.  I simply changed the channel, and waited for CNN International to come back on.  It didn’t take long for the signal to return.  When I lost the signal a second time, again after the teaser for the story on the purged Chinese official, I started to get suspicious.  By the third time (if there is one thing cable news is good at its repeating stories ad nausea), I was pretty sure somebody was deliberately disrupting the signal to censor the broadcasting of the story.

I spent the morning waiting to hear the teaser to confirm my assessment.  It was a curious way to censor a story, since they did nothing to block the regular news breaks that included an announcement of the former Chinese officials' death.  The viewer was also permitted to hear the teaser to the story, and the subsequent cutting of the signal after each teaser made the suppression of the story easy to detect (as I was able to do).  You would think those people censoring the story would want to leave no trace of the story, while at the same time making it seem as though no censorship had taken place.  In this case, the censors failed miserably on both accounts.  The crude attempt at purging the story reached new amateurish heights when during the fourth instance of the signal being dropped, the person in charge of switching the signal back on jumped the gun, and the viewer was allowed to witness a few seconds of the story, before the person realized his mistake and turned the signal off again (the part of the story that was allowed to air was, appropriately enough, an image of a reporter being told by Chinese soldiers to turn off the news camera).

I went out for a bicycle ride.  I have never felt as observed in my life as I did in Shanghai.  A vast metropolitan city, full of foreigners, and yet, a majority of the eyes in Shanghai trailed behind me.  To the point where, as I would stand parked at a stoplight, the large group of fellow cyclers around me would suddenly all turn their heads simultaneously in my direction, as if the red traffic light were a theatre spotlight aimed squarely at me.  Even the person in front of me would turn his head as far back as he could, and just stare at me in silence until the light turned.  A self-conscious and insecure teenager at the time of my visit, the attention was stressful and annoying.  Leaving the house to be stared at by every person I walked past did not instill in me much confidence.

That day, a family member who had lived in Shanghai for many years took me to the largest black market in the city.  It was a small town of alleyways lined with small shop stands displaying the latest in forgeries and replicas.  The entrance was crowded, and as a foreigner you were immediately approached by a man that would grab your arm and start leading you down one of the walkways, repeating in English the same words with the same tone: “Shoes? DVDs? Watch?  Underwear?….Shoes?  DVDs?  Watch?  Underwear?”  I felt a little like Jasmine entering the market in Agrabah for the first time (minus the almost getting my hand chopped off for stealing, and the falling in love with a street rat).

My companion (the family member) showed me how to bargain.  The first price given is normally three times the price you should pay.  Bargaining is simple: show interest (look at the item, grab the item, show the item to your friends, ask to try on the item, ect.), ask about the price, act shocked, and walk away.  As you walk, the salesperson will yell out prices that will get lower and lower the more steps you take.  Once you hear a number that you judge adequate, or once the salesperson has stopped yelling numbers, you turn around and purchase the item.  The family member had been in Shanghai long enough that her distrust verged on cynicism; then again, she loved the thrill and rush of the bustling, madcap, dog-eat-dog city.

China is ruled by a rigid, bureaucratic party dictatorship that places order and stability above all else.  And yet, Shanghai felt like a lawless town.  A town of millions of independent individuals, who place their own personal interests above all else.  On the way home, my companion spoke of the “freedom,” the lack of strict social etiquette, the bending of the rules, the carefree lifestyle.  As she sped through a red light, she said, “this freedom, you just don’t find it in Europe or the United States.”