天津一日游 – A Day in Tianjin

Posted byrandy@letters-to-rachel.memorialPosted inAdrift in the World, Along the Way, Video LoggingTags:, , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Dearest Rachel –

Unlike Beijing, where I was basically skirting around the city I’d visited quite literally once upon a time, Tianjin is a city I’m not particularly familiar with. When I was in China the last time, we arrived by plane, not by ship, and as such, while this is “the port of the emperor” (that’s what its name means), I had no opportunity nor reason to visit it – and indeed, it may have been a literal backwater in comparison to the capital of the nation that my professors saw as a leading economic light for the global future, and not worth our attention.

And while I had every intention of doing a research article on the city anyway, between the fact that I’ve returned to the ship so late – and that I have to wake up so early in the morning for the excursion into Tianjin – not to mention that I seem to be dealing yet again with the sluggishness that is the Great Firewall – that it’s basically going to have to be the ex post facto report I do of what I did in the city, rather than any actual background of the place as a whole.

Besides, it turns out that – according to Miranda – most of the port area was part of the ocean barely a decade ago, but China did a reclamation project and built up the area considerably. Then again, I can’t seem to find details about it on Wikipedia (not that everything there is true, either – hey, it’s the internet)

Anyway…

***

I set my alarm to go off at 5:30, since my excursion into town required us to meet at 7:30 (which, if I’m being honest , is way too soon after such a long day yesterday). although – and you can apply credit or blame as you choose – I was up at a quarter to five, thanks to the cough I was talking about at the end of our trip to the Great Wall. The good news about that is that allowed me time to clean up and head up to the gym to check my weight, which, thanks to climbing the wall and skipping dinner last night (yes, I could have hit the Windjammer upon returning, as it was open until two in the morning), was under 225 for the first time since I boarded the ship. And that’s while somewhat dressed.

Granted, I’m sure that I went back over that barrier when I went to breakfast, but… tiny victories, right?

After so many excursions where it didn’t seem to matter if I showed up ten or fifteen (or more!) minutes late, I probably dawdled over breakfast (and getting changed from gym togs) longer than I should have.  I left with fifteen minutes to spare, but unlike the usual routine, our ticket instructed us to meet in the Safari Club Lounge on the other end of the ship.  I got there in time, but only just, as our group was called in a mere ten minutes.

Those of us who are returning have been given new key cards, with a blue sticker on the back where the barcodes are (as opposed to the green sticker my current card bears).  We’re to check out using the old card, and we’ll check with the new one upon returning.  I reached into my pocket to present my card, only to discover that it was the new card; I’d put the old one in a different pocket.

Well, at least I had it with me.

***

As we pull out of the terminal parking lot, our guide walks through the bus, insisting that we put our seatbelts on.  Oddly enough, there’s no way for her to belt herself in as she walks around.

There’s also a slight kerfuffle when she announces that our tour will be returning to the terminal at three; certain ones among us point out that evidently, the all-aboard call has been moved up from four to two-thirty.  Then again, it’s not as if the ship won’t wait for us, especially since it’s a tour specifically sanctioned by the cruise line.

Also, the bus ride seems considerably bumpier than yesterday; it must be the bus, as I assume we took much the same roads to leave the terminal as we did yesterday.

***

It takes us well over an hour to get from the docks to the city that it’s supposedly a part of, leaving me to wonder, why build the city so far from the ocean that is presumably its life blood?  At a distance of seventy kilometers, it takes us an hour and a half to get to the city from the terminal, which seems illogically far.

It would be like leaving Manhattan Island as pristine as the day it was purchased from the Lenape Indian tribe, apart from a few places with shipping containers stacked like either cordwood or apartment cells – take your pick – building a city about where Philadelphia is, and calling it New York City. That’s how the locals react when I point out how far the city is from the port; “Oh, but it’s all Tianjin!” They don’t see anything strange about these circumstances.

I realize that the terminal is of relatively new construction, and it’s logical for it to be surrounded by warehouses from the unloading of goods, but wouldn’t people who work in the area live in the area, and thus need and have access to the basics of city life?  But then, I suppose that’s a command economy for you; if you’re in charge, you put what you want where you want, and the will of the people is irrelevant.  Never mind that this is supposed to be the “People’s” Republic.

Another form of control (although by no means limited to the PRC) is a rule limiting the days certain cars can be on the road.  Weekends are okay for everyone, but for the five days of the work week, two license numbers (based on their ending digit) are forbidden from being driven.  This applies only to cars with blue plates, indicating standard ICE models; the electric cars (with green plates) are naturally exempt, as they don’t contribute to air pollution (as long as you don’t think too hard about what’s used to produce the electricity in the first place).  Nor are cargo trucks, tour coaches and public transportation.  To be sure, I’m not certain as to what any of that has to do with the fact that just about all trucks have their license numbers stenciled on their back, but I imagine that’s some form of rule rather than an aesthetic choice on the truck drivers’ part.

Our first stop is Yangliuqing Ancient Village; more specifically, the Shi family compound. Built in 1857 by a family made rich through grain transport (I’d compare them to the Maersk family today), the place contains a theater (for a small-scale form of the Peking Opera that was common at the time, and patronized in particular by Empress Cixi of the Qin Dynasty; the family would bring in famed artists for a private performance), a private garden, a counting room (for a staffer – probably a member of the family – to keep track of the finances) as well as various living quarters and even separate houses for the various family members within its walls.

But we’re rather rushed through the compound, leaving me pressed to actually try to record bits and pieces of what we glean from our guide about the place.  I guess it keeps me from going on too long, like I did in Busan.  Still, I couldn’t help but tease her about it as she tried to hurry us along; “let’s move it people, there’s nothing to see here, nothing interesting,” which was patently not true, as the ‘ancient village’ was pretty colorful in and of itself, literally and figuratively.

We drive for another thirty or forty minutes in order to arrive at lunch, and when we get there, there’s only three rooms for us instead of the promised four.  Eventually, our guide finds the fourth room at the opposite end of the corridor, and escorts the last of us in. It’s another lazy susan meal, with staff bringing in new dishes even as we work our way through the ones we already have.  It’s challenging to determine what we’ve been served, and when I return to the bus, I find one of our number nibbling on potato chips. She’s a vegetarian, apparently, and the dishes of broccoli and bamboo shoots weren’t sufficient.

Our final destination is the Ancient Cultural Street, which is the typical ‘shopportunity’ stop. And of course, it takes half an hour to get there; there has to be a more efficient route around Tianjin than this, but hey… I’m just a visitor here; what do I know?

On the subject of “what do I know?” I’m still stymied by calling such a place an “ancient cultural center.”  That was the case when I was first here – although the “cultural center” then was just a large room selling various local products – and the situation has only exploded since then.  I think that something has been lost in translation, to be honest.

After wandering around for fifteen  minutes, I found myself accosted by a small, two-person camera crew, wanting to interview me.  Not me in particular; I’d passed them and others talking to several members of the tour.  Our presence as foreigners is something unusual, I suppose, and the story behind it – the whole ‘world cruise’ thing – even more so, so I suppose we’re something of a curiosity to them, even as each port of call is a unique experience to us.  I pointed out that I hadn’t time to actually shop as such, and was just taking in the sights.  The woman interviewing me had me follow her to a stall, where they were displaying various sculptures on sticks, and asked me to try; the shopkeeper pulled out a quantity of a semi-molten substance, put it on a straw, and (through the door interviewer interpreting for him), instructed me to blow into it, slowly.  As I did, he would pinch the substance here and there, to the point where, when he was finished, he was holding a little pig, which he proceeded to give me.

It turned out to be some sort of honey-based candy – if initially assumed it was some form of glass or plastic, to be honest – and the interviewer asked me what I thought of it, since “Americans love candy, right?”  I replied that I was more partial to chocolate, but allowed that everyone has a sweet tooth, to some extent.

The conversation ranged between whether I’ve been here before (and there was some confusion as to what she meant by “here,” as I had to mention that I was in China in 1989, but not in Tianjin) at what I thought of the place, and how Tianjin – and China in general – compared to other ports of call.  I basically said that we didn’t have a lot of time to really take a good look at the city, but that part of it was that the place was so remote from the port in the first place.  I hope I would be considered to have been sufficiently diplomatic about it; I don’t really want to wind up on some list or anything, but my presence here in China was probably already public knowledge, as I had to go through all that paperwork in order to get myself into the country in the first place.

By this time, we were in front of the buses, and our guide (and several of the passengers) was already calling out to me.  It was hard to disengage, though, as the crew I’ve been talking to had now been joined by two other people with a microphone and camera.  You’d think they were trying to keep me here.  Although, for what it’s worth, they seemed friendly, I suppose; of course, there’s always the question of ulterior motives.  I’m rather glad I won’t be publishing this until such time as we’ve already left, just in case my opinions get me in trouble.

I will say that I’m glad to be leaving China behind; the drives between locations are interminable, and I’m not sure if this sensation I’m dealing with is because my lungs are trying to deal with the pollution, or that I’m coming down with yet another cold, but I’m rather looking forward to another sea day.

In either case, honey, keep an eye on me, and wish me luck. I’m still going to need it.

Published by randy@letters-to-rachel.memorial

I am Rachel's husband. Was. I'm still trying to deal with it. I probably always will be.

Leave a comment