A group of men gather outside a newly reconstructed home in the earthquake-stricken area north of Chengdu. In contrast to entire towns that are being reconstructed, cookie-cutter-style, by state-owned construction companies from faraway places like Hunan and Guangdong, many of the individually reconstructed homes feature traditional styles as well as intricate woodwork and colorful designs.
By Evan
The Sino-Tibetan fusion family of Emasiji, Duosiji, and Mr. Sun, by Andy
It’s been only six days since we left Chengdu, but it feels like a year ago already. Fat reserves replenished and bikes passably maintained (poor Andy’s bar-end shifter crapped out in a part of the world where only mountain bike parts are available), we made our way to Dujiangyan (都江堰). That city, located in the northeast corner of the basin, is named after one of the engineering marvels of the ancient world. It is a complicated flood relief system that redirected the tempestuous Min River (岷江) into the irrigation system that allowed the Chengdu plain to become “the Garden of China.” The plain is now so covered by sprawl and industry it could be called the “New Jersey of Western China,” but the irrigation system works today just the way it was designed to way back in 256 B.C. Sweet!
From there we headed north on G213 following the Min River valley up through the scads of giant green mountains that delineate the low basin and the high plateau. The road, the only one for hundreds of miles around, happens to be the preferred biking route from Chengdu to Lhasa, and so we were repeatedly asked if we were on the classic Chinese “prove your biking mettle” path. Andy pointed out that a long time ago, a pilgrimage to Lhasa, was a deeply significant affair reserved for devoted Tibetan Buddhists and the occasional Brad Pitt. Nowadays it’s the destination for all self-proclaimed badass bikers. That is to say that basically any pedaler worth his spit has either been there, is en route and already ran into us over the last few months, or is planning to go just as soon as he gets his chance. We met several groups making the month-long trip, including four cool dudes from the Beida (北大) cycling club and a bunch of old folks from the Chengdu Retired Persons Association — power to them! (more…)
An ethnic Qiang (羌族) survivor of the May 12, 2008 Wenchuan earthquake, which killed some 68,000 people, sits alone outside her husband's convenience store. The couple's home, originally on the slope of a nearby mountain, slid into the canyon during the earthquake. Fortunately, neither husband nor wife was home, although the wife was injured and now walks with a cane. The couple is awaiting the completion of their new home in the reconstructed village in the background. For now, they are just "maintaining the situation (維持狀態)" by running the convenience store/wholesale rice warehouse, now the focal point of what remains of the original town. The woman was still shaken and wouldn't talk to us, but her husband described "thinking the world was ending" as he collapsed on the convulsing earth, vision obscured by thick clouds of dust and deafened by the clamor of the mountains collapsing around him.
By Andy
2010/06/01
A few minutes before midnight, as we’re rushing to get the last of our internet work done in Baoshan before heading for Dali, there’s a loud crash and our fifth-floor hotel room rocks with a jolt like it’s been given a quick whack from the side with some heavenly pugil stick. We throw on some room slippers and head down the five flights of stairs to take a walk.
The street outside is full of people, all the faces lit up with the blue glow of cell phones screens held in front of them under the yellow streetlights. Everywhere the word “earthquake” is being whispered.
After about 15 minutes of wandering around, we head back to the hotel.
“Do you get many earthquakes here?” Evan asks the hotel owner.
“No, not often. But don’t worry! This hotel is brand new and it’s built to withstand a magnitude eight earthquake!”
My mental eyes roll far back into my head at the thought of how many cartons of cigarettes the builder of a hotel in western Yunnan province must have to hand out to the local geological bureau to get a building classified as magnitude-eight earthquake resistant.
“That one was about a five,” a random woman ejaculates as she pokes her head in through the lobby door.
We return to our room and wonder in bemusement at the willingness of LBXes to state things they have no idea about in terms of concrete fact. There’s nothing on the interweb yet on the earthquake, so we figure it must have been a small, local one.
An hour later we jump up again at a crash, a jolt and the sound of voices in the street again. Fortunately, that’s the only aftershock we feel.
This morning, Evan checks the Internet again and finds that the small earthquake was magnitude 4.8 and centered about 30 kilometers from us! Thankfully, it was tiny — just enough to freak us out and send us into the streets. The woman in the lobby was just about spot-on though.
Anyway, the last time there was a big earthquake in China — a magnitude 7.9 in Qinghai province when we were just moving into southern Yunnan — my mom scolded me for not informing the world that we were okay. I’m sure no one heard about this earthquake unless they follow our Twitter feed, but we felt it, and we’re okay, Mom!
Powered by WordPress | Theme: Aeros 2.0 by TheBuckmaker.com
Twitter links powered by Tweet This v1.8.1, a WordPress plugin for Twitter.
