Going to School

It started raining yesterday. Again. And it continued through to this afternoon. I woke up somewhere around 3am last night to flashes of light and crashes of thunder. It got unbelievably loud. I think it was because all of the sound echoes on all of the tall apartment buildings surrounding me, amplifying the noise.

My driver (remember, my tricycle driver) picked me up a bit late this morning. Usually this wouldn’t have been so bad, except that my umbrella isn’t big enough to shield both me and my backpack from the downpour, and there’s nowhere to stand to keep out of the rain while waiting for him. So, I just let myself get soaked. While standing on the corner, I watched numerous buses pass by. I would really consider riding the bus if I were a bit more confident in my abilities to get off at the correct stop.

Here are people sitting, waiting for the bus. I took this photo when I was with Mrs. Wong trying to go to Chengdu last Friday. We never actually made it onto the bus because there was no room. Apparently there are 30 universities to the west of where I live, and the buses pass them by before reaching me. This means that by the time I have a bus in sight, it is already so jam-packed with college students that I can see their faces practically plastered to the windows.

So, since I can’t communicate with my driver, and I have no idea what his name is, I've decided to call him Alonzo. I know it’s not exactly a fitting name, but it’s a name that I like. Also, I don’t really know any Chinese names as all of my students have English ones.

So, mister tricycle driver, I hereby christen thee Alonzo. Hope you like it.

On my way to and from school, this is all I see:

I have made use of the time I spend sitting in the backseat, flying down the street, narrowly missing other oncoming vehicles, by putting on headphones and closing my eyes. This way I don’t notice the dozen or so times we nearly avoid a head on collision each day.

All along the 4 and-a-half blocks between my house and school #7 there are new apartment buildings being constructed.

They look nice now, but give them three years and they’ll look as bad as a 50 year old building in the US. Thanks to shoddy Chinese craftsmanship, my apartment, which isn't more than a couple years old, is also falling apart. I guess if there are always buildings that need to be built, it's just one more way to make sure there are always jobs for everyone. 

The streets here are very wide. Each side of the road has three lanes, and the intersections are gigantic. They are made even bigger when you take into account the bike lanes. Now, these bike lanes are meant for bikes, but more often than not they are also used by the slower scooters, mopeds, tricycles, and pedestrians - all of which can legally use the lane. However, occasionally you will find impatient motorcyclists, small cars, and even large trucks driving down the lane. This is never a good thing, because they tend to take up the entire lane, and are often going the wrong direction.

These photos were taken from the middle of an intersection. Alonzo was waiting for the bigger vehicles to pass, as we both wanted to avoid dying at that particular moment. If you look at the top of either photo, you can see that the main street is separated from the bike lane by a large grass island. It is on this island where the bus stop is. Also, notice in the photos that to the right of the grass island is a van.  

In the bike lane.  

Going the wrong direction.

Typical.

This photo is a better shot of the bike lane. Also notice that there is a small white car driving on it.

But at least it is going the proper direction...

Mrs. Wong told me that a few years ago the city of Wenjing (by the way, I was told by my students that this is pronounced “When-Jian”) spent a lot of money to install traffic cameras so that they could make sure that drivers were actually following all of the traffic signals. However, about a year ago, the city simply stopped paying the bills from the video surveillance company, so none of the cameras work anymore.

It is now common knowledge that although there are cameras everywhere, no one will get ticketed, because I have yet to see a single drive take any of the traffic lights or signs seriously.