- Architect -

This was the very letter I sent to my friends from our hotel in Shanghai:

“Outside is raining cats and dogs, I’m sitting quietly to the lounge with a surreal Lighting scheme and the last awake foreign visitors scattered on the sofas. Shanghai and Bejing have one thing in common: they are cities going through a mayor Trasitional state due to a vast spreading/developing economy. The ‘cranes of the new Order’ move fast erasing  any mess left from the past. The old cities (hutongs) with the narrow pavements, the characteristic green roof tile and the dragon statues on the entrance  give their place to big modern glass towers. I saw a part of  history and tradition being erased like footraces on the sand. Chinese leave behind the world of ‘Spirits’ and enter the world of cold neutral mirrors reflecting wealth, money and power.

I feel lucky I had the chance to see the last remaining traces of places that reminded  me of the movies of Zhang Yimou ,when Combined with western culture: the background images of Studio Ghibli (although this is Japanese animation) and some pictures of the adventures of “Tin-Tin in China” that I was reading when I was young.

The Chinese I found difficult to understand, probably because I couldn’t communicate verbally. Generally they are very intense, behind a face of restrained politeness. They shout a lot, drive like mad, eat a great deal of garlic, and spit with passion. On the other hand they are very close to their families, very sociable, they love: games and gambling, dancing and doing tai-chi exercises in the public squares,  keeping any kind of pet, including grasshoppers and all kind of insects in tiny bamboo cages.

To sum everything up,  I will conclude with a saying from famous Confucius: "Everything has its beauty but not everyone sees it".

That’s all folks from mysterious China, tomorrow starts the great day of visiting the Shanghai Expo.”