Severinghaus family: City Sightseeing

On Saturday afternoon, we ventured out. We caught the bus outside the campus gate and headed into Chongqing. It was quite an experience to travel by bus, and we got a flavor of the local population. An empty seat disappears in a flash even if it means pushing and showing someone. The bus' TV is blaring although seemingly nobody is watching it - most if not all passengers had a phone in their hand and was watching something, texting someone, or most commonly playing a game. My phone that recognizes networks scrolled through pages of available networks - 'everyone' has a cell phone and use it continuously.

We got off the bus at one of the stops on the bank of the Yangtze River. This river is deep, murky, and fast-moving although rather narrow at the point where we saw it. The bank was dotted with people with fishing poles in the water. What were they hoping for, wishing for, planning for, we wondered? It seemed inconceivable to us that anyone would want to consume anything caught in that water.

On the opposite side of the river rose massive skyscrapers - some complete and others under construction. We wondered how they got the cranes to the top and marveled at the engineering feat of constructing a curve building. Behind us, as a contrast were dilapidated sheds, overgrown vegetation, and broken stairs - a city of contrasts.

The city has several interesting bridges. We followed the trail of people to the stairs that would bring us up to the bridge and walked out to the middle before our stomachs called for food.

After two weeks of Chinese food, the thought of a good hamburger was enticing, so we opted for trying a newish Australian Hamburger place. The menu was in both Chinese and English, so we could read it and know what we ordered. The only unusual item on the menu was the croquet of homemade mac'n'cheese. For dessert, we perused the upscale bakery located next door and headed home with a bag of pastries.

Two buses later and some walking we were back home. As the bus drove up the hill to our suburb, we got a great view of the city with all its lights. The cityscape that during the day was mostly gray and dull came alive with thousands of lights at night. We are adding a night visit to Chongqing to our 'to see' list.