Shanghai Sounds

Living in an overpopulated city you know the usual street sounds: car horns, screeching bike brakes, and loud engines can make you deaf within themselves. They actually made it illegal to beep your horn in downtown Shanghai about a month ago. Maybe it is a bit quieter, but I am not convinced.

So you have these usual sounds and they seem quite normal. But let's put additional sounds on top of that.

1. The first sound almost has a slight resemblence to an ice-cream man, but at 6am, it is no ice-cream man it is the man with the watering truck. Yup, he isn't sweeping the streets, he is watering the streets. They have to think of any way to employ people to "clean" something in this city. I actually don't think that the street can possibly get clean. Maybe the granny's that come out with their handmade brooms after the watering episode and happily clean their stake of street/sidewalk make some sort of dent?! Hmm.

2. Another sound is the constant rinking of a bicycle bell. People on bikes tugging a small cart usually ring bells to collect recyclables. Now this is entrepreneurial! Right. Thanks to the Chinese gov't. people have made a living through daily collection of recyclables..hop on your bike and ring your bell! You can get in on the recycling frenzy and continue to keep fit.

3. Bodily function sounds. Yes, everything happens on the city street. If it doesn't come out of the mouth, it comes out the other end in broad daylight. Normally this is the difference between old and new Shanghai. After walking on a bustling modern city street you might just turn the corner of a small shack community where only public toilets exist (more or less in the street). Where there is a construction site as well, the workers live at the site in make shift housing and also use the land around them to "feel at home." So, the sounds that come out of the mouth doesn't really constitute a normal spitting sound. No. This sound resembles the type of "hock a loogee" spit. The sound comes all the way from your guy and literally these people are removing something from deep down there to bring it to the surface. This even happens in the office (thankfully not as frequent).

Needless to say my iPod has become my best friend while walking on the city streets and the volume keeps getting louder and louder!