Sculpture in Shenzhen

Near Moonbay Park

OTC

At the OTC Area

On the street

On the building!

Right Next door

Also within a block

At Moon Bay Park, close by Shekou

Sculpture is everywhere. China really trys to add sculpture to many areas besides park areas. I have been very impressed with the design and quality of the art work that is displayed. These are just a very few examples of what can be found.

LoWu Jewelry Floor

Bev in front of the shop where she has tailored clothing made,

Lots of choices in costume and semi-precious jewelry.

Beads of all kinds

Fresh water pearls

Bev checks out some jade beads

We visited LoWu again to have Bev's tailor make a dress for Tracy one of our daughter-n-law's. While we were there, we looked at some beeds, jade, and other fun jewelry pieces. Some is available for very reasonable prices. If exactly what you want is not in sight it can be produced very quickly!

Shenzhen Daily, Articles on Bev

Click on the picture to see a larger view.

Wow Bev has been a celebrity here. She was in the Daily Expat Newspaper today! She was also in in it last month.

More Cars, More Gas

Haima 3 seen at the 2008 Shanghai Auto Show

As China tries to emulate the US in so many ways, it may cost most US households in a big way. The slide of the dollar and the fairly high inflation rate here. (numbers are never given) will continue to have a big effect in the cost of those "made in China" goods.

The next big purchase is a car! Owning your own car is the desire of every Chinese. In the past that could only be a distant dream. Today with the increased wealth of many that live in the Special Economic Zones like Shenhzen there is a rising middle class that wants to emulate the West as is evident in all the advertising billboards, TV, magazine and newspaper ads that bombard one here daily and look suspiciously like they were produced with US models and in US ad agencies.

Currently China has 33 million cars on the road. Most of them are newer. China's auto industry is already the world's third largest. The prediction is that by the year 2020 there will be 100 million more cars on the road. That still means that fewer than 1 in 4 families will own a car. I have talked to many younger adults. (They all seem younger to me as the average age in Shenhzen is around less than 30.) Every Chinese I talk to wants desperately to own a car. What will 100 million more cars on the road do to the price of oil? There may be a slowing of that growth due to the limitation of natural resources to build the autos and infrastructure needed to sustain their use. China's current per capita income is about 10% of the US but that is an average and it seems to be much higher than that where we live. It is predicted that if it ever reached US levels it would take a few Earths to supply the resources necessary for a total American style of living.

The US government and US businesses have been promoting an adoption of the American-style of high consumption and high waste since the opening of China. Right now China has all the Coal and almost no Oil. Your eyes and lungs know that is true shortly after you get to China. They use the coal in any way they can to increase manufacturing, it usually involves burning it. Roads and bridges are being built everywhere. The newly completed bridge (just opened a couple of weeks before we arrived) between Shenhzen and Hong Kong island is incredible and should be a "wonder of the world" elsewhere but here it is just another giant over 6 mile long bridge. I have watched small dirt lanes turned into beautiful 4 lane roads with lighting and wide sidewalks on each side. With the labor force that is available this kind of construction can happen in what seems like overnight, but really takes a few weeks to a month.

Without more production the cost of oil, gas prices will undoubtedly go up. Oh, interestingly the most popular cars are not small high efficiency models. Buick, BMW, Mercedes, mid-sized Mazdas are all the popular names that we recognize in the US. Others that are most popular are what we consider to be mid-size and larger cars! The giant sized Toyota, Lexus, or Cadillac SUV of a is a highly prized possession.

Sorry for my little rant and the grim news but that is what I see happening in China. I see no evidence and there seems to be no discussion of a major change from that direction at this time. High efficiency electric cars would work great here as most people travel short distances and use mass transit for longer traveling but it isn't happening.

Let me know what you think.

Links:

China’s auto industry takes off

Shifting into High Gear

China Seeking Auto Industry, Piece by Piece

Tall Shenzhen Buildings

Shekou and Shenzhen may have been two separate cities but today are totally linked together. The same bus system will take you from one end of Shekou to the other end of Shenzhen. We traveled by public bus for about and hour and a half from our home to downtown Shenzhen. It is big city the entire way. Here are some pics of the area Lou Who and some pics of the Cities large skyscrapers. There are about 14 million people in the greater metropolitian area. Believe me there are many people everywhere you look. Most of these shots where taken through the bus window so the quality suffers but you get the idea. I had to show you the window washers. The are near the bottom of a very tall building. What looks like a line between them is a water hose they passed back and forth. Note the single rope per person! Check out other Shenzhen skyscrapers at this link.

Off to IKEA

I have never seen more than 6 on one motorcycle

Interesting vehicle (there are many) going down the road.

Most trucks are blue.

Unbelievable! I saw so…. many wild and crazy things, I could write a book. What was suppose to be a 7 hour adventure, 2 hours to IKEA in Guangdong 3 hours shopping, 2 hours back ended up taking a total of 14 hours! Our driver had no clue how to get back home and apparently he couldn’t read the signs that we could read telling us how to get on the freeway. The school Interpreter fell asleep on the bus so … After 2 hours on the bus we had covered less than 10 km through the heart of Guangdong, kind of like driving down Seattle’s Aurora but much more colorful. If there is a long, slow way to do things the Chinese will find it. They are wonderful people and smile at everything, trying to be very helpful but this is a very unorganized society. On driving, “I will never drive in China.” Lets just say driving in China is crazy!!! You see everything from people sweeping the freeway with no warning signs or orange safety vest even to the semi on a divided four-lane freeway that was in our far right lane and headed toward us at about the same 50 mph that we were going down the road! We changed lanes and avoided it, he just continued on. Our driver stopped twice in heavy traffic and ran over to other drivers to ask directions. People where darting in and out of traffic on foot trying to sell just about anything. One guy had phone chargers for sale hanging on a wire hanger. Horns are used as the universal signal for any and all situations. The roads are primarily filled with buses and small to large trucks most of them faded blue. IKEA was just like any IKEA accept they had 5 times as many employees. The simplest task I observed was the job of dusting the plastic wrap on items. Oh! the other thing is that all large objects are kept in a warehouse that is a two-hour drive from the store. This meant that much of what people bought had to be trucked to us later. This made the whole process slightly more difficult.