China follows a familiar road

July 2, 2006 4:15 PM

The Great Chinese Road Trip !
Beijing to Three Gorges Dam to Shennongjia to Nanyang etc.
posted by Tlogmer (8 comments total)

Great addition to a nyt sunday mag post.
posted by jmgorman at 4:43 PM on July 2, 2006

In related recent news...

If I get honked at again by some asshole in an "Armandi" suit on his cell phone in a Korean made, pseudo-luxury sedan driving the wrong way down the ring road in the bike lane, there are going to be at least a few less drivers on the road in this town.

Sorry, just needed to vent for a moment. Just as Beijing's air quality starts to show improvements from the factories switching to natural gas, we get a million new cars. Of course another factor to go with the rapidly expanding car ownership rate is a rapidly expanding rate of brand new drivers taking to the roads. Drivers in China weren't known for their safety in the past, can you imagine what it's like with hundreds of new drivers hitting the ring roads every single day?
posted by Pollomacho at 6:39 PM on July 2, 2006 [1 favorite has favorites]

beijing has been trying cloud seeding, but i do not think it will do much to clear the air of pollution, unless they introduce electric cars soon!?

more by ted conover btw :P
posted by kliuless at 7:06 PM on July 2, 2006

Meanwhile, state-run Sinopec will soon be teaming up with McDonald's to build drive-through restaurants at filling stations.

Holy cow... Chairman Mao's gotta be rolling over in his grave.
posted by chef_boyardee at 8:11 PM on July 2, 2006

Good link, Pollomacho.
posted by Tlogmer at 9:05 PM on July 2, 2006

It's hard to begrudge them the fun of a road trip even though I know the environment is effed and the sky is raining acid, if it rains at all, etc.. Shrug.

Thanks for the post, tlogmer. A nice read.
posted by shoepal at 11:36 PM on July 2, 2006

I knew you were going to like it there, Pollo. You've been there long enough to know they honk at everybody, for no reason, and you're still taking it personally?
posted by Kirth Gerson at 10:09 AM on July 3, 2006

I wouldn't say that I take every honk personally exactly, just the ones directed towards me by someone who's obviously doing something they shouldn't such as, say, driving on the sidewalk. No, I'm not going to get out of your way so don't bother!

Other than that, I imagine I'm nearly as big an asshole with my bike bell.
posted by Pollomacho at 6:12 PM on July 4, 2006