Heaven on Earth
Shanghai - Pudong, Skyline. Barely 15 - 20 years ago this land was all paddy fields.There is heaven in the sky and Hangzhou on earth goes a Chinese saying. As Chinese sayings go this was fairly straight forward. Otherwise most of the Chinese sayings one hears tend to be full of Confucian wisdom, full of gravitas and make you feel guilty that you have not fully understood the saying despite being from the 'East'. However to get to this heaven on earth early enough for a 10.30 AM consumer group - I had to take the 7.30 AM train from Shanghai south station.
It was only a short 20 minute ride early in the morning to get to the station. Coming in to the station I barely recognised it as a railway station. It looked and felt like the access to an airport. Coming from India i am used to two alternate looks in railway stations - grand colonial structures that are Chennai central, Mumbai VT or some of the more picturesque small town railway stations the Brits left behind or modern eyesores like lets say Dadar station or Eluru (actually substitute that with thousands or hundreds of thousands built post independence). The Shanghai south station was very different. Missing was the general dirt, squalor, mass of humanity and a sense of chaos that surrounds railway stations in India. [Things have improved in recent years in places and a little bit more neat and orderly but nothing compared to what I encountered here]. The approach to the Shanghai railway station was like approaching the Mumbai domestic airport. The building itself was a sleek modern structure - all glass and steel but interestingly shaped enough to save it from the morass of modern architecture. Once you enter the place your baggage goes through a security check and you are led to a 'waiting room' - comfortable, not very spit and polish neat but as good as the Delhi or Bangalore domestic airport passenger waiting area. You wait in the warmth of this waiting room (early morning in Jan, shanghai temperatures are close to zero, invariably less than that). About fifteen minutes before the departure time the doors open and you go to the platform and board the train quickly before the morning chill can get a grip on you.
En route I got to see the general countryside of China. It looked neat with grasslands with frost on them, and the few towns that we passed looked clean, neat with nice looking buildings that would not be out of place in the Western European country side. I did not encounter the dirt, the smell, the mass of humanity defacating on the side of the tracks that one sees riding through Indian rail.
Apparently one encounters deep poverty as one travels deep into rural China. Hangzhou was after all in the more developed east of the country. Of course there must be the poor in China. I see the beginnings of the great mass migration of people that begins for the Spring Festival (Jan 26 - 29 this year) when all the 'migrant' labour from the deep interior return home from the East and South to be with their families. The labourers looked dirty and scruffy but adequately dressed against the cold and looked like normally fed human beings. Not the wretched, poorly nourished, frail looking labourers that you often see back home.
I wonder where we went wrong and how we got it so wrong. 60 years of independence and vast majority of the population lives in abject poverty. Yes there are pockets of 'world class' development (if the new development in Bangalore is to be called development) and some industries that do high technology labour work and some companies that have genuinely started becoming multi-nationals. But side by side resides abject poverty the likes of which i have not seen elsewhere. Living at the bottom of the pyramid in India is sub human. One sees poverty in other countries too - for instance Thailand, The poor person there perhaps lacks great comforts and a car and a plasma TV but the day to day life is not a heap of misery. Even in rural Thailand poverty is a clean home (no appliances and only a BW TV) with some land to till to get good rice, fruits and abundant fish and seafood that keep one nourished and healthy. The abject misery and poverty of India is truly egregious.
We have a third of the world's poor, our infrastructure is pathetic. I cringed when i read the Economist’s depressing article on India's infrastructure a few weeks ago. More so because it was insightful and true. Hangzhou is building it's own metro. Bombay has been talking about it for 15 years. In an year or two while travelling to Hangzhou I expect to ride in their new metro. I am certainly hopeful that my children will ride the Bombay metro.
Why? We were a rich land once. Columbus did not set forth to find Americas. He set forth to go to India a vast, rich and fabled land and to trade with it and profit from it. Indians do well as individuals - prosper in most of the countries they live in.
May be we made the wrong choices. May be democracy was not for us. May be Nehruvian socialism set us on the wrong path. May be we have a corrupt political class that puts itself before the people. May be the middle class and the elite don’t do enough for the country.
Many possible answers and one reality.
Yes, Nehru's policies ensured that we did not become a 'market' for MNC s and we developed our own infrastructure and a strong domestic market and some good educational institutions. I would argue that it was his daughter that pushed us backward. But, China's initial set of policies were a disaster with millions dying as a result. So well our beginnings can’t be blamed.
Corrupt political class - Hmm. I was reading this morning that Chinese officials from the party and the public sector are amongst the biggest spenders at Macao casinos. Quite a few have been in recent times imprisoned or executed for embezzling their company or party funds to gamble at Macao.
So that's not it then.
I look at myself in the mirror and say may be it’s me or the PLU s. I go about my life earning a living, spending and saving prudently, don't litter, segregate my garbage and contribute to charity occasionally. I don’t see the educated Thais and Chinese living any differently either. So it's not me either.
I don't know what it is.
I hope to god we can find out and fix it. Parts of India already seem to. The West and the South of the country are pulling away with better infrastructure, education levels and peace and calm that enables commerce and allows for a climate where prosperity can be attained.
A great many Indian commentators and some American ones seem to talk about China's skewed development model and how the internal tensions within the country, differential development will tear it asunder and that the whole china phenomenon is a bubble it will burst. Many of those commentators also say that the Indian model (whatever it is - I presume democracy and free market capitalism) will prevail in the long run. I was certainly one of those people who believed in the inherent superiority of the Indian 'model'. But it is such a F***ing sanctimonious and smug view. [It belongs right there with Jr. Bush's belief that history in some way will redeem his record as a president.]
I am happy for the Chinese and what they have achieved in their country. I am indeed jealous that for all our vaunted Indian superiority, ingenuity and democracy we have not managed to do the same. I am sure there are challenges with the Chinese model and probably all parts of the country have not developed equitably and that the communist party gave it's populace little political freedom in exchange for prosperity. Perhaps a Faustian bargain. But I hope the Chinese can pull it off. I hope they are able to develop all of the country, keep it intact (the challenges of creating a vast nation and keeping it together are often more complex than most of us realize) and continue to progress as a society. In the coming years there will be challenges as a well off population demands more freedom, i hope they manage the transition skilfully.
Whatever happens in the future, this development in the last 30 years (almost to the week it’s the 30th anniversary of the new liberalization policy in China) ranks as one of the most stunning economic miracles in the modern world. Nowhere have more people been made so prosperous in such a short span of time. I hope they are able to keep it going for long.
There is much to learn for the entire world in this. Instead of deriding it (while continuing to do business with it and make their profits) or trying to find fault with it the world should wish the Chinese (the government included) more years ahead of such fantastic development. If on the way democracy comes – may be it will, if it doesn't, so be it. Am not quite sure a billion happy people would mind terribly.
It was only a short 20 minute ride early in the morning to get to the station. Coming in to the station I barely recognised it as a railway station. It looked and felt like the access to an airport. Coming from India i am used to two alternate looks in railway stations - grand colonial structures that are Chennai central, Mumbai VT or some of the more picturesque small town railway stations the Brits left behind or modern eyesores like lets say Dadar station or Eluru (actually substitute that with thousands or hundreds of thousands built post independence). The Shanghai south station was very different. Missing was the general dirt, squalor, mass of humanity and a sense of chaos that surrounds railway stations in India. [Things have improved in recent years in places and a little bit more neat and orderly but nothing compared to what I encountered here]. The approach to the Shanghai railway station was like approaching the Mumbai domestic airport. The building itself was a sleek modern structure - all glass and steel but interestingly shaped enough to save it from the morass of modern architecture. Once you enter the place your baggage goes through a security check and you are led to a 'waiting room' - comfortable, not very spit and polish neat but as good as the Delhi or Bangalore domestic airport passenger waiting area. You wait in the warmth of this waiting room (early morning in Jan, shanghai temperatures are close to zero, invariably less than that). About fifteen minutes before the departure time the doors open and you go to the platform and board the train quickly before the morning chill can get a grip on you.
En route I got to see the general countryside of China. It looked neat with grasslands with frost on them, and the few towns that we passed looked clean, neat with nice looking buildings that would not be out of place in the Western European country side. I did not encounter the dirt, the smell, the mass of humanity defacating on the side of the tracks that one sees riding through Indian rail.
Apparently one encounters deep poverty as one travels deep into rural China. Hangzhou was after all in the more developed east of the country. Of course there must be the poor in China. I see the beginnings of the great mass migration of people that begins for the Spring Festival (Jan 26 - 29 this year) when all the 'migrant' labour from the deep interior return home from the East and South to be with their families. The labourers looked dirty and scruffy but adequately dressed against the cold and looked like normally fed human beings. Not the wretched, poorly nourished, frail looking labourers that you often see back home.
I wonder where we went wrong and how we got it so wrong. 60 years of independence and vast majority of the population lives in abject poverty. Yes there are pockets of 'world class' development (if the new development in Bangalore is to be called development) and some industries that do high technology labour work and some companies that have genuinely started becoming multi-nationals. But side by side resides abject poverty the likes of which i have not seen elsewhere. Living at the bottom of the pyramid in India is sub human. One sees poverty in other countries too - for instance Thailand, The poor person there perhaps lacks great comforts and a car and a plasma TV but the day to day life is not a heap of misery. Even in rural Thailand poverty is a clean home (no appliances and only a BW TV) with some land to till to get good rice, fruits and abundant fish and seafood that keep one nourished and healthy. The abject misery and poverty of India is truly egregious.
We have a third of the world's poor, our infrastructure is pathetic. I cringed when i read the Economist’s depressing article on India's infrastructure a few weeks ago. More so because it was insightful and true. Hangzhou is building it's own metro. Bombay has been talking about it for 15 years. In an year or two while travelling to Hangzhou I expect to ride in their new metro. I am certainly hopeful that my children will ride the Bombay metro.
Why? We were a rich land once. Columbus did not set forth to find Americas. He set forth to go to India a vast, rich and fabled land and to trade with it and profit from it. Indians do well as individuals - prosper in most of the countries they live in.
May be we made the wrong choices. May be democracy was not for us. May be Nehruvian socialism set us on the wrong path. May be we have a corrupt political class that puts itself before the people. May be the middle class and the elite don’t do enough for the country.
Many possible answers and one reality.
Yes, Nehru's policies ensured that we did not become a 'market' for MNC s and we developed our own infrastructure and a strong domestic market and some good educational institutions. I would argue that it was his daughter that pushed us backward. But, China's initial set of policies were a disaster with millions dying as a result. So well our beginnings can’t be blamed.
Corrupt political class - Hmm. I was reading this morning that Chinese officials from the party and the public sector are amongst the biggest spenders at Macao casinos. Quite a few have been in recent times imprisoned or executed for embezzling their company or party funds to gamble at Macao.
So that's not it then.
I look at myself in the mirror and say may be it’s me or the PLU s. I go about my life earning a living, spending and saving prudently, don't litter, segregate my garbage and contribute to charity occasionally. I don’t see the educated Thais and Chinese living any differently either. So it's not me either.
I don't know what it is.
I hope to god we can find out and fix it. Parts of India already seem to. The West and the South of the country are pulling away with better infrastructure, education levels and peace and calm that enables commerce and allows for a climate where prosperity can be attained.
A great many Indian commentators and some American ones seem to talk about China's skewed development model and how the internal tensions within the country, differential development will tear it asunder and that the whole china phenomenon is a bubble it will burst. Many of those commentators also say that the Indian model (whatever it is - I presume democracy and free market capitalism) will prevail in the long run. I was certainly one of those people who believed in the inherent superiority of the Indian 'model'. But it is such a F***ing sanctimonious and smug view. [It belongs right there with Jr. Bush's belief that history in some way will redeem his record as a president.]
I am happy for the Chinese and what they have achieved in their country. I am indeed jealous that for all our vaunted Indian superiority, ingenuity and democracy we have not managed to do the same. I am sure there are challenges with the Chinese model and probably all parts of the country have not developed equitably and that the communist party gave it's populace little political freedom in exchange for prosperity. Perhaps a Faustian bargain. But I hope the Chinese can pull it off. I hope they are able to develop all of the country, keep it intact (the challenges of creating a vast nation and keeping it together are often more complex than most of us realize) and continue to progress as a society. In the coming years there will be challenges as a well off population demands more freedom, i hope they manage the transition skilfully.
Whatever happens in the future, this development in the last 30 years (almost to the week it’s the 30th anniversary of the new liberalization policy in China) ranks as one of the most stunning economic miracles in the modern world. Nowhere have more people been made so prosperous in such a short span of time. I hope they are able to keep it going for long.
There is much to learn for the entire world in this. Instead of deriding it (while continuing to do business with it and make their profits) or trying to find fault with it the world should wish the Chinese (the government included) more years ahead of such fantastic development. If on the way democracy comes – may be it will, if it doesn't, so be it. Am not quite sure a billion happy people would mind terribly.
its amazing what they have done.. the olympics is the best example of it all. There will be critics, afterall a 5 year old spending 10 hours a day doing gymnastics will have critics! But i disagree with 2 points. It is the politics of India, there can be corruption but there should also be an intent to do some good. That seems to be completely missing. Most govt's make money for themselves but they are atleast commited to doing general good also while in our case its only doing good for oneself. And the 2nd point is that we are to blame cause we have not entered politics yet. We can make a difference but for that we need to get more involved. I hope one day i find the courage to follow up on my intentions.
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