Letter from China

There are various types of taxi in and around Moganshan. Most numerous are the “bread vans,” so-called because they look like a loaf of bread—although no one around here eats bread, let alone has seen a loaf. (The name comes from Beijing, where bread is a common foodstuff.)

Bread vans have six seats and will go anywhere, anytime. Most locals have favourite bread van drivers. But the vans are too cramped for long-distance travel and aren’t allowed into big cities. Not that it stops them going anyway: you pay your fare at the city limits and hope for the best.

Next up are real taxis, saloon cars with number plates that begin with eight (a lucky number because it sounds like the Chinese word for “make money”). The drivers are bandits who assume every passenger is late for his own funeral, or wants one. But they have meters and can go anywhere. We don’t have favourite taxi drivers because they live in town, too far away to call up at short notice.

Then there is Mr Zhu. Mr Zhu used to be a taxi driver until he sold his cab and invested in a Buick seven-seater. He started ferrying the increasing number of foreign visitors around. He puts beer in his onboard fridge, English-language magazines in the seatbacks, and shows video clips of the area. He also drives like a royal chauffeur. After two years in business, Mr Zhu has four Buicks and his own company.

I dare not tell my bread van friends, but Mr Zhu is actually my favourite.

Just the time for building

Bang on time for the start of the tourist season, the high street, Shady Mountain Street, has been sealed off and work has begun on renovation of one side. This includes the gutting and refurbishing of one of our biggest, cheapest and most run-down hotels, the Shady Mountain Guesthouse. Just along the street, the Moganshan Grand Hotel (anything but) is also being done over, as is another one just above our key tourist attraction, the Sword Pond. The work will be over in seven months, which is how long the tourist season lasts. This year it’ll be a noisy one.

A Shanghai company has taken a lease on the Grand, so there’s a remote hope that the new version might be an improvement. But the Shady Mountain Guesthouse has no prospective tenant. The village Administration Bureau might run it themselves or invite bids from suitably connected outsiders. The renovations won’t make the place any nicer than it was, which was pretty nasty. It will simply be new nastiness.

The Bureau hasn’t learned its lesson from when it rebuilt the opposite side of the Shady Mountain High Street five years ago. The buildings they put up in place of some thriving restaurants have remained empty until now. They are providing smart accommodation for several dozen builders.

High speed

The high-speed trainlines being built across China are a hot topic. They were built at incredible speed, the trains run extremely quickly and, most recently, the man responsible, chief of China Railways, has come under investigation for corruption (fast women are allegedly involved).

I tried out the elevated Shanghai-Hangzhou trainline and, as someone who used to hitch rides on donkey carts around Beijing, I was impressed, verging on the mind-blown. The bilingual ticket machines worked. If you had trouble with them, assistance was on hand. The waiting rooms were spotless and comfortable. The train was beautiful and so were the attendants—even the cleaners. It left on time, arrived on time, and when the return train was a few minutes late no one complained. (Then again, they didn’t admit it was late—just changed the departure time on the spot.)

At the new transport hub in Shanghai, I transferred to the city’s new metro. That involved a hike, but nothing compared to trekking to a boarding gate at Heathrow.

On the metro, still reeling from the ease of my trip, I looked at the city people and admired their poise and manners (I’ve become a bit of a peasant in my mountain hideaway). I couldn’t help being amazed at the neatness and order. The London Underground is never like this. Where were the tramps, drunks and buskers?

That’s when the beggar appeared. He too was nothing like you see on the Tube. His arms and hands were contorted like broken twigs, his face scarred, shoulders twisted. He moaned and limped down the carriage leading a blind man with a tin cup. That snapped me out of my dream world of perfect modern China.