Still Breathing

Well I'm in China.  Bundles to say, but hard to do it.  Blogger is blocked.  This is being posted by going in through my office portal; threading a needle through an Internet buttonhole... or something.  It's late, I'm 14 hours ahead, way late on my sleep, and back into a transformational world.

As a shortcut I'm going to lift from a couple of emails I sent earlier, thinking the blog would have to wait until my return.

China is as I remembered, same smells, same food - but more international, more English language signs and ads, a lot more commercial. Tons of malls with high-end shops.
The flight from Shanghai to Shenzhen was on China Southern, which used to be kind of scary. Now it carries the third-most passengers of any airline in the world, and it was a very respectable flight. The flight was packed, 97 percent Chinese, a decent meal even in coach. The people are well-dressed, polite, and seem comfortable with an American in their midst. They say "excuse me" and "thank you" in English, all of them. Only one other grey-hair on the flight - everyone else, black hair and pretty young. Funny what you notice. On the sidewalks in Shenzhen, lots of people walking dogs.  The dogs seem doggy, unafraid.  Downstairs at my apartment, a Corgi.
 
Shenzhen looks a lot like Hong Kong did in the '90's, only flatter and with no history.  It's huge, 14 million people, lots of very tall buildings, ill-designed roads, clutter.   Not garish, which is how I remember it from before.  A city of migrants - mostly speaking Mandarin, not Cantonese, in the middle of Cantonese-speaking Guangdong province.  About 25 years ago this was a village.