Explore #3: Nanchang, Jiangxi

Because of this job, I am thankful & excited (no sarcasm here!) that I get to visit funky cities in China (I use funky loosely here).  For example, I am writing this post while in Wuhan.  Where is Wuhan you ask? Wuhan (武汉) is the capital of Hubei province, and the most populous city in Central China; also sometimes (very very occasionally, actually almost never) referred to as the "Chicago of China". Otherwise known as a Tier 2 city. 

But the most lok city still has to be Nanchang in Jiangxi, which I visited with Victor and Pin Fen in September.  It is now the barometer of lok-ness for us - so that's how lok the city is.  Jiangxi is in the southeast of China and is rather poor compared to its neighbours and its people has one of the lowest wages in China. But it is actually the seat of significant historical events, which makes the underdevelopment of the city even more stark and unusual.

There are a few sights in the city, all of which are very different from each other and hail from different eras in Chinese history. The first and possibly earliest sights was the Tengwang Pavilion (滕王阁).  This is one of the four great towers in China and was supposedly first built in the year 652 (yes, 3 numbers only, I didn't leave out a 1 in front).  Apparently, it was such a beautiful pavilion that poets and intelligentsia gathered around it to compose poetry and prose about it. Ya, it was that swee.  But the tower has been destroyed and rebuilt a total of 29 times! And I felt super cheated after paying for the ticket to enter because this version (Ver. 29) was most recently rebuilt in 1989 (cue loud "chehhhh").    

 

Nanchang's skyline. Not bad right?

The above is a painting of 庐山 (Lu2 Shan1)  which is a famous mountain in Jiangxi. 庐山 (Lu2 Shan1) is oft-cited in the Chinese idiom 庐山真面目.  庐山 is usually shrouded in mist, so the idiom refers to the mistiness which, once parted, you get to the see the real side of the mountain, aka, see what someone is really like. We heard a guide tell a bunch of tourists that there is a village on 庐山where they have ONE cinema and ONE movie reel and they have been playing the same movie for the past donkey years.  That got us thinking about the ending of the movie that has kept the villagers enraptured for so long - it has to be an intriguing end right? Maybe the lovers finally get to see each others' faces at the end of the movie and are so fugly they jump off the mountain? Or when the mist finally parts, they see that they are both men and they change the name of the mountain to 断背山 (Brokeback Mountain). HA HA HA... The last one was contributed by Vic.

Moving on...

From an old dynasty, we moved on to the site where today's new CCP dynasty was created - the site of the Nanchang Uprising, the start of the Chinese civil war on 1 August 1927 ( 八一南昌起义), led by Zhou Enlai.  This date is now regarded as the founding of the People's Liberation Army (PLA). We visited an impressive museum that documented the battle between the Communists and the Kuomintang. 

The museum is housed in a old hotel which was also the base for the communist forces.

Calligraphy by Jiang Zemin

南昌起义永垂青史， 八一精神永放光芒！

 

So, given that this city is the cradle of such an immensely important event, it is a little strange that the city is so under-developed.  Right outside the well-kept museum is a half-completed building that looks like it has been blasted inside out, and the street is filled with potholes and there are strange characters hanging around.  My personal postulation is that, given that the communists started their battle here, and the fact that their base of support and power was the working class and peasants, it would be wrong for the city to be developed into a towering bastion of capitalism and consumerism where the rich rule. What do you think?

Anyway, after a serious afternoon of history, Vic and I decided to head off to the ferris wheel that we passed by a number of times from the hotel to meetings and back. Turns out the ferris wheel was only the start of a very strange, almost-creepy journey into a dark and deserted fairground. Got your attention already right?

First off, the ferris wheel. Cost us RMB50.

And what do we get?  Trash-strewn cabins and scratched windows. I told Vic in no uncertain terms, that if a cockroach started flying around the cabin, I will force open the door and JUMP.  As for the scratched windows... seriously man. The whole point of getting onto an observation wheel is to see the OBSERVE right?  

Wah kaos...

Kua si mi?!

Hilarious pic of Vic. He was super 配合 with my mood. Ha ha..

But the fun part started after we got OFF the wheel. The scene was straight out of a movie. Vic and I stepped off the wheel, and it lit up behind us. Oh so beautiful and romantic, except we were with er, each other. So it was wasted on us. But imagine the scene: Boy & girl step off (since it is so gross, maybe they jump off) ferris wheel, the wheel magically lights up, boy gets down on one knee (on incredibly dusty ground) and proposes to girl (with coke can-ring). Awww....

The night and place only got stranger after the wheel. As I mentioned earlier, the fairground was deserted. There were only a few aunties manning the ticket counters. Again, it was almost like a scene out of a movie, except it could go either way - either a horrific slasher movie or a sappy romantic movie. My imagination was veering towards a slasher movie, truth be told.  Here are some of the rides:

Romantic movie: The carousel lights up with twinkling fairy lights and music-box tinkles. Boy & girl laugh happily
Slasher movie: The dumb blonde runs up to the second level of the carousel and is trapped and slashed

Romantic movie: Girl and boy sit on swing and laugh happily
Slasher movie: Girl is tied to swing and screams non stop before she flies off her seat

Romantic movie: Boy bumps girl gently and they laugh happily
Slasher movie: Girl is bumped off the boat and gets kiaped by oncoming boat

Romantic movie: Boy and girl put feet in. Fish tickle their feet and they laugh.. well, you get the drift
Slasher movie: They put their feet in and the fish are actually small piranhas that bite all the way up their thighs!

Vic and I took a chance and tried out the bumper cars. One of the staff joined us as well and it was actually very fun!

That was a very nice end to a strange evening - bumped out the scares. Ha ha...

But when will I be going back to Jiangxi again? Hmm...

ok la, we managed to find one window that wasn't scratched. Isn't the city pretty?  : )

Xoxo,

Tracy

RED!