Zhanghuashan, China: Week 10, Part 1 (We Are What Has Been Built)

[cswallow]

Old buildings, in China, fall before the new. Outside of Hunchun, mud walls crumbled before concrete ones. On the outskirts of Ningbo, it is also happening. A horizon that used to stretch straight with farmland now adds circumference with the rise of apartment buildings and office towers.

Like all cities that back against cropland, Ningbo and its

Comments

[anonymous]

when the chinese housing bubble bursts, all that will be saved.

Well, then...

[anonymous]

...I am very pleased, again, that you are snapping photos like crazy. Your ancestors' social conscience is alive and well and living in you, Jennifer. How fascinating that you are able to stand in the places and feel their presence there.

It's sad to hear that even in China, one day these places will be gone. I always tended to think that Joni Mitchell was only talking about the US when she sang "They pave paradise and put up a parking lot...Don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone."

What a grand photo of you and your brother here. You'll hold these memories close forever.