So, after my recent trip to Chengde, I decided to add a new feature to my blog: City Posts. For every city that I visit, I want to record my thoughts, experiences, and knowledge about that city. Every city is quite different and reveals much about Chinese culture, so I feel that it’s important to show my readers a little glimpse into the cities that I visit.
Anyway, the trip up to Chengde was interesting. We rode a bus all the way to the Jinshanling section of the Great Wall, which is the closest section to Beijing, as well as the most well restored section. I’m going to save this experience for another post, because there’s just so much that comes with visiting the Great Wall for someone like me. Then we headed out to Chengde.
What was mindboggling for me was how long it took to get out of the Beijing district. It took us 2 hours from Beida to finally get into Hebei. And then it was another hour or so to get to Chengde. Most of it was just mountainous hills and cornfields, and tiny little villages. It’s hilarious to see how many cornfields are stuffed into little crevices or tiny fields. A family friend of mine wanted to grow corn in their garden, but after some research, found out that corn can’t grow unless there are 5 or more rows so the corn can cross-pollinate. Apparently, the Chinese just don’t give a shit. Half of the cornfields I saw were only 3 or 4 rows wide, and it wasn’t uncommon to see just one row growing up against a hill.
Now, after reading that Chengde’s population was a measly 450,000 (remember, I’m in China. A population of 1 million is a small town), and seeing all this corn, I was expecting Chengde to be a tiny rural town. I was wrong. After turning out of a valley and coming down, I got a fantastic view of a bunch of high rises being built. It shocked me a bit, and as we drove, there were plenty more high rises. It was completely contrary to what I thought Chengde was. It reminded me of Konya, in central Turkey, where we came across many high rises with different colors and gigantic silver plated mosques after driving through the desert for a few hours.
Chengde is split in two by a river, and the west side is the city center and where the majority of people live. The east side is where most of the empty high rises are. A note about these high rises: the Chinese government heavily subsidizes construction companies, so it’s actually profitable to build, no matter what the conditions are. Some cities, like Chengde, have been hit by these types of developments, and now have the image of a large city, with a tiny population. My friend, Brian, commented that the night that we went out to hit the town, there were many buildings and many lights, but very few people.
Despite this, Chengde is a very cute city. The people are amazingly friendly, but much more shy than in Beijing. It’s a tourist town though. People mostly come just to see the Mountain Resort, where rulers of the Qing Dynasty retreated to avoid the stifling heat. I quite like Chengde, and I think I’d like to go back, even if I think it’s not a very good place to live.
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