PICTURE CHINA

The Pudong New District is located across the Huangpu River from Shanghai proper and is widely considered to be the financial and commercial center of China. The area is home to thousands of multi-national companies and has come to represent Shanghai’s ascent to the premier business city in China, if not all of Asia.

Until 1990 when it was granted status as a “Special Economic Zone”, the Pudong area was covered by rice patties and farmland and was inhabited mostly by poor immigrant workers. Today it is a maze of skyscrapers and apartment blocks stretching out in all directions. It is home to the world’s third tallest building (the Jin Mao Building), the new Pudong airport and the world’s only commercial maglev train.

This rapid growth has made Shanghai the most modern and wealthy city in China but has created many problems as well. A blanket of smog covers the city on most mornings, the roads are congested with traffic and a housing shortage forces many of Shanghai’s 10 million residents of share very cramped living quarters.

The former British colony of Hong Kong was returned to China in 1997 as a “Special Administrative Region” but still remains a world apart from the mainland. The Chinese government has allowed the area to remain a capitalist and quasi-democratic entity under the policy of “one country, two systems”, partly because Hong Kong’s robust economy is the single largest source of outside investment in the PRC and partly because the government would like to use Hong Kong as an example to show Taiwan than it can play nice and entice it to rejoin the mainland.

For such a small place, Hong Kong is extremely diverse- both in its people and its landscape. While the population is over 90% Chinese, Hong Kong has an international flavor as a result of its long occupation and large groups of immigrants from Europe, the Philippines, Africa and the Indian subcontinent. While many areas do live up to Hong Kong’s image as a densely populated city of towering skyscrapers, you don’t have to go far to find a secluded beach or a mountain hike through a sub-tropical rainforest.

All in all, Hong Kong is very different in many ways from the rest of China but has, and will continue to play a role in shaping the country in the future. Its strong economy has been a model for the liberalization of China’s economy, which has resulted in the explosive growth of the past decade. It is the hope of many mainlanders that the government will also follow the model of Hong Kong and introduce new freedoms to go along with their economic might.

The Mongkok district of Hong Kong is among the most densely populated places in the world with over 50,000 inhabitants per square kilometer. As a result of limited available land, Hong Kong’s city planners have decided to look skyward to accommodate the burgeoning population and the Mongkok area is no exception. The area is a dense garden of modern skyscrapers and aging residential blocks where whole families often share tiny apartments. On the street level the area is a lively shopping district with whole streets dedicated to markets specializing in pet fish, electronics and knock-off designer clothing.

The Pearl River Delta is one of China’s most developed areas and the provincial capital of Guangzhou is one of the countries main business centers. The area started to boom due to the economic reforms of the 1980’s and has not looked back in becoming a sprawling city dedicated to China’s new economy. After the Asian financial crisis in the 1990’s many businesses from Hong Kong sought to relocate to nearby Guangzhou in search of lower costs on the mainland and the area has since become a major center of manufacturing. Almost one-fifth of the cities population is comprised of migrant workers from the surrounding provinces who supply the workforce for the Guangzhou economy.

Less than twenty years ago the town of Huadu (formerly Huxian County) was just another rural Chinese village on the outskirts of the city of Guangzhou. Today it is a self-contained city of over 720,000 residents and an example of the “New Towns” that are being created throughout China to accommodate the surging urban populations. While some of the new housing is in the form of the bland Communist-style apartment blocks, which can be seen throughout China, many complexes cater to China’s neuvo riche and are styled after Mediterranean villas complete with red-tiled roofs and baroque fountains.