Walking Dangerously in Changchun, China

Walking in Changchun can be very interesting!  The sidewalks act as parking spaces for cars, especially at night.  Only where the sidewalks are too high for the cars to go up are these sidewalks safe for the pedestrians to use.  If a car is being blocked from leaving its parking space, the driver will honk until he can drive off!  The Chinese seem to take all these noises into stride.

Right now, the whole of Changchun city is undergoing construction as flyovers and two subway lines are being built. The construction started about 1.5 years ago but I have been told that it is being speeded up.   The winter takes its toll on the equipment and metal scaffolding left out in the open.  Apparently one lorry driver did not see the ditch in the ground.  I saw this on my way to the wet market last Saturday.

I did not wait to see how the lorry would be hauled out of its hole.  You can see the sidewalk on the right-hand corner of the picture.  Often there may be only a mud path for you to walk past the heavy equipment.  The paths could be the trails left by the tracks of the heavy equipment.

The young man seen walking almost next to the yellow digger was not a construction worker but a pedestrian.  The construction workers appeared to find it normal to have people walking among their work sites.  I guess the attitude is that people need to get to their destinations which may have been blocked by the construction work.  Once I saw some people waiting for the digger to allow them to pass it.  One young girl was impatient and she stooped down and walked under the digger!  She was more brave than I was.

That heavy equipment was coming towards me as I walked towards the opening where I could cross the road.  I must be getting used to the way people walk in China.  I know that when I am back in the U.S., I cannot be so aggressive in my walking.  After all, there is no need to do that in the U.S.

All the road construction in Changchun, China are projected to be completed within three years.  This goal includes two subway lines.  It appears that perhaps Changchun decided that since these construction will cause inconvenience, it is best to do it all at the same time.  The weather has started to cool and the fall is here.  My next posting will be about all the fruits and vegetables available now.

Okay, I guess it is time to publish a new page about my stay in Changchun.  It is more than a month since my last posting.  Here is a picture of the track where I walk every morning and evening.  Yes, it is boring but I can always run back to the apartment if necessary.

The running track at JLC, in front of the Student Dining Hall

Often I will have older adults walking with me and only a few students.  This appears to be the same on the main Jilin University's campus.  The older people are the ones exercising while most of the younger ones are sleeping in.

A friend took me to a downtown market to look for a mint or rosemary plant.  We did not find it but instead we found birds and cactus for sale.  No, they were not being sold by the same vendors.

Here are the birds.  I was hesitant about taking a picture with the birds but my friend said "go ahead."

Older Chinese men love their birds.  They take the birds out for walks in the morning and also in the evening.  These men and their birds will congregate in a shady spot, hang the bird cages in the trees, and have a chat and smoke with their friends.  I saw them in the past year but not this year.  This year I stayed mainly on campus because of the massive road construction in Changchun.  I really mean "massive."  The whole city is under construction!  I cannot imagine this happening in the U.S.