I was going to devote a whole "reading a bit too much into the way different cultures do things" post on the subject of whitewater rafting in China, but events are getting in the way.
First, a bit about the place, which is a small resort area called Hongkou, up in a mountain valley a few hours' drive to the northeast of us. We went there last October on a tip from a friend, and liked it so much that we went back with Jane's folks there this summer. We had a very relaxing couple of days there. Sitting by a rushing river, drinking tea and chatting while watching the kids wade and throw rocks, a great dinner (salmon! in China!) at the hotel restaurant, that kind of thing...
Such a good time, in fact, that we were thinking about going back there for a day trip last week with our friends Tony and Louie, and Wang Tong, our Chinese tutor and friend, as a kind of language class field trip. Turned out Louie had a couple of appointments on Friday, so we went into Chengdu for lunch at an amazing vegetarian restaurant instead.
And a good thing, too. Turns out that the whole river valley was hit by flash floods and mudslides that Friday and Saturday - not as bad as the massive flooding to the far north of us in Gansu province that made world headlines, but enough to kill 13 people and affect about 500,000 in the general area. No knowing how our favorite resort fared, since specific details in English are hard to come by from the Chinese press.
This was the same region that was hit hard by the 2008 earthquake. (The hotel we were staying at, for example, had to be rebuilt, and had just reopened its rooms last March.) So, while I'm feeling quite thankful that we weren't up there getting stranded by a washed out road or possibly worse, I'm also thinking of all of the people who were affected in ways much more seriously that my fortunate self can imagine.
Now back for a sec to whitewater rafting in China vs. whitewater rafting in the States. Notice anything missing in the photo above? Paddles, perhaps? That's because for about 10 km upriver, the rocks have been moved from the center of the river to the edges, creating a carefully managed chute that rafters float down. If you're in a big boat, two guides pilot you downstream, but if you're in a two person raft, you're literally up the creek without a paddle. Employees of the rafting company are strategically stationed along the course with long bamboo poles to nudge wayward boats back into the main current, and at the end, you cascade down a 6-foot waterfall into a small holding pond where the river glides you to a concrete landing and you can safely get out of your boat.
See how this gets to be a temptingly metaphor for cultural difference? I mean, can you imagine American vacationers readily surrendering individual control of their rafts to a faceless company? Oh wait, there's Disney World, isn't there... And multinational media, industrialized agriculture, petrochemical corporations and so on and so on. Guess we ain't so different after all.
Which leads us back to disasters. I am certainly no expert on Chinese hydroelectric projects and infrastructure development in western Sichuan Province, but I wouldn't be surprised in the least if this latest round of flooding and landslides wasn't exacerbated in some way by forces other than simply the weather. And then, hello, can we talk about the weather? Anyone out there (who's not a scientist employed by a petroleum-industry think tank) still think that human activity isn't significantly changing our environment for the worse? I don't know about you, but I'm going to make myself a paddle and start rowing...
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