Chengdu: an Outsider's Eye View 
An outsider's general perception of an Asian city is one of teeming, chaotic
crowds of people surging through a narrowly regulated space filled with everything from bicycles
and buses to food stalls and fortune tellers. In this regard, to the Western imagination, Chengdu
certainly doesn't disappoint: its streets are incredibly full of life. However, here, as in many
other quickly developing and economically booming Chinese cities there is a fantastic juxtaposition
of the new and the old, the grand and the humble.
Chengdu's various districts offer its visitors and residents a number of competing vistas onto contemporary city life today in western China's vast Sichuan province. The sometimes odd, but always exciting, combination of the traditional and the modern is certainly not a quality unique to Chengdu, but there is something here, perhaps its in the air, that lends the city itself a strikingly singular atmosphere. There are countless photographs taken throughout China, where skyscrapers fill the sky behind much more modestly constructed ancient temples and pagodas. In many places the slick, shiny, authoritative look of modernization doesn't just threaten to blot out the more muted and delicate architectural detailing of the ancient, it already has. I'm sure that Chengdu has lost more than its share of historic sites and cultural relics over the past tumultuous decades, however, it has also managed to retain more than just an aura of the ancient and traditional.
The traditional in today's Chengdu is reflected in its peoples' attitudes towards life. People here have a striking sense of joie de vivre. In the mornings, while people commute to work early they aren't too busy to stop and buy a yogurt, a cake or some soy milk from the woman who has just recently arrived at the corner with her carton of wares to sell before 10am. At lunchtime the streets experience greater crowding than that of rush hour: people simply flow out of their office buildings and homes in small groups of three, four and five, searching for a cheap but satisfying meal. (Lunch here is more leisurely than in other places; with those on the higher echelons of the labor ladder occasionally enjoying meals for upwards of two hours.) If you are unlucky enough to have a mere hour or thirty minutes for your lunch break, don't despair: you can always meet up with friends for a slow glass of green tea at one of the myriad tea houses along the river.
On evenings and weekends locals abandon their apartments, air conditioned or no, for the far more social atmosphere of the street. Light, moveable card tables are thrown up outside almost every store front and restaurant along the streets in residential neighborhoods, providing a relaxing place for owners and patrons to gather together to eat, to chat, or to play games. At the riverside park close to my apartment dogs and their owners gather in surprisingly large groups. The dogs frolic with each other, careful not to stray too close to the busy streets, while their owners chat idly with one another about the finer points of grooming or house training their like-breed pets.
I find the activity on the streets of Chengdu to be more than exciting: it is compelling. Despite the killer humidity and the short but frequent rain storms I find myself drawn more and more often towards the friendly hubbub outside. Sitting in the round amphitheater just around the corner from my home, I can watch a series of activities as they unfold. First come the little rollerbladers; some as young as 4. They often arrive with a coach or two, as well as a parent in tow, and after the tiny orange cones are arranged in various figures around the smooth granite stage they begin to race about. After the bladers, as dusk begins to crawl in from the east and the sun sets the tops of the buildings across the river on fire, come the dancing ladies. These ladies are usually about the same age as my mother, and they congregate here in groups of up to thirty strong, depending on the fullness of the particular evening, bringing with them one large boom box, and various other smaller, lighter props, including scarves and fans. The women don't chat long before forming lines, turning up the music and dancing, mostly in sync.
A few nights ago, returning by taxi from a night spent in the company of friends at their cross-town apartment, I came face to face with another reality of much of Chengdu's nighttime activity. Chengdu is a developing city, like most of the cities here in China, and it is due, in large part, to this continuously ongoing rapid development that the city never truly sleeps. I'd like to think that Chengdu locals' affinity for life lived out-of-doors is related to a close connection with a more instinctive, ancient part of human nature, however, it is impossible to divide it entirely from the realities of modern development.
As we rounded the corner of our street, there was no way to miss the gaping hole in the sidewalk filled by a massive hunk of metal machinery crawling with three or four workmen in orange hardhats and yellow mesh vests. I am unsure exactly what sewage problem they were busily attending to, during the only time period within twenty four hours that our street was free from the traffic which generally clogs it, but I do know that they were some of the only people to be found in the road at that hour. As we skirted their digging machine, I looked back and caught an interesting sight: one of the workmen, apparently on break, was sleeping on his ladder. The bamboo ladder was laying flat on the sidewalk, and he was sleeping on it, on his back, with his hard-hatted head propped on a coil of dark wire.
Chengdu's myriad residents are drawn out-of-doors for just as many reasons. However, I find that, whatever the reason, whatever the timing, their certain brand of hustle and bustle tempered with relaxing entertainment is rather intoxicating.
Chengdu's various districts offer its visitors and residents a number of competing vistas onto contemporary city life today in western China's vast Sichuan province. The sometimes odd, but always exciting, combination of the traditional and the modern is certainly not a quality unique to Chengdu, but there is something here, perhaps its in the air, that lends the city itself a strikingly singular atmosphere. There are countless photographs taken throughout China, where skyscrapers fill the sky behind much more modestly constructed ancient temples and pagodas. In many places the slick, shiny, authoritative look of modernization doesn't just threaten to blot out the more muted and delicate architectural detailing of the ancient, it already has. I'm sure that Chengdu has lost more than its share of historic sites and cultural relics over the past tumultuous decades, however, it has also managed to retain more than just an aura of the ancient and traditional.
The traditional in today's Chengdu is reflected in its peoples' attitudes towards life. People here have a striking sense of joie de vivre. In the mornings, while people commute to work early they aren't too busy to stop and buy a yogurt, a cake or some soy milk from the woman who has just recently arrived at the corner with her carton of wares to sell before 10am. At lunchtime the streets experience greater crowding than that of rush hour: people simply flow out of their office buildings and homes in small groups of three, four and five, searching for a cheap but satisfying meal. (Lunch here is more leisurely than in other places; with those on the higher echelons of the labor ladder occasionally enjoying meals for upwards of two hours.) If you are unlucky enough to have a mere hour or thirty minutes for your lunch break, don't despair: you can always meet up with friends for a slow glass of green tea at one of the myriad tea houses along the river.
On evenings and weekends locals abandon their apartments, air conditioned or no, for the far more social atmosphere of the street. Light, moveable card tables are thrown up outside almost every store front and restaurant along the streets in residential neighborhoods, providing a relaxing place for owners and patrons to gather together to eat, to chat, or to play games. At the riverside park close to my apartment dogs and their owners gather in surprisingly large groups. The dogs frolic with each other, careful not to stray too close to the busy streets, while their owners chat idly with one another about the finer points of grooming or house training their like-breed pets.
I find the activity on the streets of Chengdu to be more than exciting: it is compelling. Despite the killer humidity and the short but frequent rain storms I find myself drawn more and more often towards the friendly hubbub outside. Sitting in the round amphitheater just around the corner from my home, I can watch a series of activities as they unfold. First come the little rollerbladers; some as young as 4. They often arrive with a coach or two, as well as a parent in tow, and after the tiny orange cones are arranged in various figures around the smooth granite stage they begin to race about. After the bladers, as dusk begins to crawl in from the east and the sun sets the tops of the buildings across the river on fire, come the dancing ladies. These ladies are usually about the same age as my mother, and they congregate here in groups of up to thirty strong, depending on the fullness of the particular evening, bringing with them one large boom box, and various other smaller, lighter props, including scarves and fans. The women don't chat long before forming lines, turning up the music and dancing, mostly in sync.
A few nights ago, returning by taxi from a night spent in the company of friends at their cross-town apartment, I came face to face with another reality of much of Chengdu's nighttime activity. Chengdu is a developing city, like most of the cities here in China, and it is due, in large part, to this continuously ongoing rapid development that the city never truly sleeps. I'd like to think that Chengdu locals' affinity for life lived out-of-doors is related to a close connection with a more instinctive, ancient part of human nature, however, it is impossible to divide it entirely from the realities of modern development.
As we rounded the corner of our street, there was no way to miss the gaping hole in the sidewalk filled by a massive hunk of metal machinery crawling with three or four workmen in orange hardhats and yellow mesh vests. I am unsure exactly what sewage problem they were busily attending to, during the only time period within twenty four hours that our street was free from the traffic which generally clogs it, but I do know that they were some of the only people to be found in the road at that hour. As we skirted their digging machine, I looked back and caught an interesting sight: one of the workmen, apparently on break, was sleeping on his ladder. The bamboo ladder was laying flat on the sidewalk, and he was sleeping on it, on his back, with his hard-hatted head propped on a coil of dark wire.
Chengdu's myriad residents are drawn out-of-doors for just as many reasons. However, I find that, whatever the reason, whatever the timing, their certain brand of hustle and bustle tempered with relaxing entertainment is rather intoxicating.
About Me
I
'm
Julia Maher, and I have been living off and on in
China since the late summer of 2001. I have spent my time here both studying Chinese and teaching
English, sometimes simultaneously, and others not. Most of my time has been spent living in Jiangsu
province, but I have just recently moved to Chengdu hoping to experience life out west.
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