I have finally touched down in the southern Chinese city of Nanjing and I am very impressed with this city. It seems like the city has bike lines everywhere with all types of bicycles and scooters using them. I understand that the growth of the Chinese economy has been changing the landscape of many Chinese cities to reflect the development of the country. Car ownership levels are steadily increasing with this newfound wealth which increases congestion levels in big cities. It is good to see this once widespread aspect of Chinese culture still being maintained. Even though many of the bicycles are battery powered, there are a good number of traditional manual bicycles commonly seen as well.
I have also noticed that many families here in China raise pets. I had no idea that having pets would be popular here. A large majority of people that I’ve seen who have dogs have this breed of dog. I built up the nerve to chat with a local about this a few days ago. It was a good opportunity to practice speaking and learn about dog culture in China. This breed is called 泰迪犬 in Chinese and it’s the ever popular Poodle in English. The local I spoke with informed me that although there are no breed registry organizations in China (such as American Kennel Club) like in America, there is a very active and growing segment of the population very interested in raising pets like cats and dogs.
The weather hasn’t been as rough on me as I initially imagined. Before arriving here, many of my Chinese classmates at my university reminded me that Nanjing is known as one the “furnace cities” of China. There are three cities that have the hottest weather consistently in China and they are Chongqing, Wuhan and Nanjing. It is said that the temperature in these cities is normally above 95 Fahrenheit for most of the summer. I can personally attest to that as the weather has been hot and muggy since I touched down here. This is a bit different than the dry heat that I’m accustomed to in Hawai’i but it hasn’t been unbearable so far.
One potential reason for the weather being better than expected may be because of this. The above picture is an image of a truck with a cannon like apparatus installed on the back of it. At first I thought this truck goes around and sprays water into the air to make the weather more bearable but actually the purpose of these trucks is to help with the air pollution. The water is misted out the back of the truck and it mixes in with the air pollution to make it less compacted and harmful to inhale. In all my travels, I must say that I have never seen something like this before. I was told that on very polluted days, these trucks run almost non-stop. There is another truck that looks very similar to the truck above, but it sprays water on the road instead of into the air. I’m not totally sure of the purpose of this truck but it seems like this is done to keep the roads clean. All in all, this work by the city is very thoughtful and I am thoroughly impressed with the effort.
Tony in China 