The symbol of 21st century China, I would like to think, is a crane; not the feathered kind because that’s Japan’s signature animal, but one of those jutting into the sky, signalling to one and all that big things are happening below.

For those of you that haven’t been to China, take my word for it nothing prepares you for its cities.

Admittedly, I visited only two but eight days in Shanghai and Wuhu left me gobsmacked from the first minute to the last.

It wasn’t their “foreign-ness” that took my breath away, it was the skylines that left me alternately awestruck and horrified (sometimes within the space of a few hundred metres) at their beauty and rank ugliness: dreams and aspirations on one hand, stark reality on the other.

CHANGES. Even new buildings show historical influences. Picture: Jim Freeman

Light and shadows

It is in the latter, both downtown and on urban fringes, where you find the cranes as construction (and reconstruction) takes place at an incomprehensible pace.

My hotel room in Shanghai, located in the heart of the glittering business district, looked out over the 6 300km-long Yangtze River, the lifeline of commerce in that part of the country.

The Shanghai skyline is also one of the city’s prime tourist attractions, judging from the number of foreigners that flood through the turnstiles of the Shiliu Pu Pier before boarding multi-decked riverboats to watch a nightly light extravaganza that matches anything, anywhere in the world.

As is the case with much of modern Chinese life, it’s not so much bells and whistles (lasers and strobes?) as the simple scale of the production that impresses the hell out of the audience.

Wherever you look, glass-fronted skyscrapers shimmer with light and colour, literally reflecting China’s passion for these two vibrant elements.

(Shanghai, I think irreverently to myself, would be buggered if Eskom was supplying the power.)

Of course it’s a propaganda statement by the Peoples Republic of China (PRC), almost Ozymandi an: “Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair.”

The PRC is, after all, thoroughly engaged in its new Long March… to catch up with, and surpass, its Western counterparts in all spheres of life.

The swathes of darkness between the beacons of financial and commercial progress speak volumes.

The current metro area population of Shanghai is 30 million people – half the entire South African population in a single city – and growing at an average rate of 2.25% each year.

I grew up in Hillbrow in the glorious ’70s and I’ve seen the dystopian mess it and Johannesburg’s CBD has become.

FORESTS OF APARTMENTS. Property development and construction is big business in China. Picture: Jim Freeman

China’s most popular city: Shanghai

Imagine the place at some midpoint in that time, multiply it several thousand times and you’ll perhaps begin to picture inner city China.

Can you even begin to comprehend a single residential complex that comprises a dozen or more towers 25 stories and up?

I was dumbstruck seeing these coming in to land at Shanghai’s Pudong International Airport… and there weren’t just a few of them, there were scores.

At ground level one gets the impression of a vertical slum out of a Dark Knight movie – edgy during the day, frightening at night.

I suspect that’s just my Western perceptions at play and that the reality is very different.

CONTRASTS. Glass-fronted skyscrapers literally shimmer with light and colour, terally reflecting China’s
passion for these two vibrant elements. Picture: Jim Freeman

Also, I wasn’t in Shanghai long enough to go walkabout on my own at night but I had several evenings in Wuhu (about 370km upriver) to explore a nearby neighbourhood I can only liken to present-day Yeoville; a sprawling rather than highrise residential suburb.

I know that, by juxtaposing two cities and contrasting areas, I’m not comparing apples with apples but it’s the best I can do.

I won’t go so far as to say the residents were friendly towards me but they weren’t impolite or hostile.

The place was all ground-floor shopfronts – what the Americans call “mom and pop stores” – with apartments above.

It wasn’t particularly crowded with people but the place bustled throughout the day and early evening.

Then the lights went out as residents readied themselves for work the next day and I understood that worker bees need to dwell in shadows in order to sleep.

Who wants crane operators to fall asleep on the job? Given the rate of urbanisation, it probably won’t be long before the buildings are replaced by domino stacks.