When I lived in Shanghai, I had maybe two dozen visitors come see me. I'd like to think that was because of my charm and good looks, but really Shanghai's an easy sell:
"Come see me in one of the most dynamic and talked-about cities in the world. Known as the Whore of the Orient, or the Paris of the East, there's the world-famous Bund and tallest laundry chute in the world! Also, everything's really cheap, and you'll have a place to stay with a 60-inch TV."
Harbin's a different matter:
"Come see me in the 'Ice City', China's coldest major city. Everything's even cheaper, but not appreciably so, because Shanghai is already very cheap. There's a nice church, and a super graphic museum dedicated to Japanese war-time atrocities. Also, there are no direct flights, and you can sleep on my floor."
To date, Wase is the only person to come visit me here.
The airport is a convenient bus ride away, but if you're lazy like me, you'll try and take a taxi instead. Apart from the 100RMB (£6.70) fare, there's a 20RMB toll fee that goes towards the construction of the airport expressway - as much as the airport shuttle bus!
This post is mainly about a problem I've encountered a few times in China - sleepy drivers. For some reason, every taxi driver seems to work a full 24-hour shift, starting in the early hours, then take a day off. The idea seems to be that this allows for a normal family life a couple of days a week. No wonder then, that drivers often look tired.
To my dismay, I noticed that my driver kept nodding off on the airport expressway. I tried to engage him in conversation, which worked to an extent, but as soon as things tapered off, his eyelids would droop and his head would loll forward. He was aware of the problem as much as I was, slapping the back of his neck, smoking cigarette after cigarette and opening the window wide despite the rain. The problem was compounded by the road itself - straight, and about the most boring road I'd seen.
The drama was broken up by a bit of light entertainment. A couple of kilometres from the airport, the driver suddenly pulled over under a bridge. Cars continued to rip past us, at or above the expressway's speed limit, whipping up mists of dirty rain. Was I about to get mugged? Did the driver want to take a nap now?
Seeing my alarmed look, he stuck his head back in
"I have to convenience myself".
In the rear-view mirror, I could see him pissing up against his own back tyres. After that, he seemed to perk up. The rest of the journey was punctuated by the odd neck-slap but significantly fewer cases of eye-shutting or head-lolling.
I arrived at the airport determined to take the shuttle bus in future.
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