Ghosts of the Future

Yesterday the Weis went off in search of good ol’ fashioned American barbecue.  (You’d think we would’ve gotten our fix of American food while on vacation last week, but apparently not.)  Matt met a guy awhile back who manages a Texas barbecue joint here, so armed with his business card to guide us, we set out for some pulled pork and buffalo wings.

And they were delicious!  But that, my friends, is not the point of this story.  The restaurant is tucked into a residential neighborhood that was created around the time of – and because of – the 2010 World Expo held in Shanghai.  So after lunch, we decided to take a stroll through the old expo grounds.

In true China fashion, the Expo set all of the records for grandiosity: largest site, most countries participating, most visitors*, and highest price tag.  Shanghai tore down hundred of factories and shipyards along the river, and displaced tens of thousands of people by leveling their neighborhoods to clear space for the many expo pavilions. 

Ironically, just a year and a half after the Expo ended, many of those pavilions have now been destroyed as well, clearing the way for the next wave of development.  However, enough is left for us to still get a sense of just how ridiculously gigantic this production was.  Walking through the old expo grounds today is eerie; the juxtaposition of futuristic architecture and abandoned spaces connotes a post-apocalyptic space-station.  The overcast day and scarce fellow sightseers only contributed to the sensation that we had travelled through time to an alternate universe.

We began our journey when we stumbled into this lovely garden, abandoned save for a chain-smoking cleaning crew.

moonboat & China Pavilion in the background

We then saw the giant “moonboat” – no idea what it’s for, but it was one of the few buildings that appeared to still be occupied.

apparently moon + boat = palm trees on the roof (deck?)

get married in a flying saucer!

We walked through the giant complex for the Mercedes Benz Arena, a top-notch facility that seats 20k people but, due to lack of demand, now advertises that you can rent it out for weddings.  Matt has read that the arena hosts only about a half dozen events per year – what a waste!

We passed by the main thoroughfare of the grounds, which alternated tents reminiscent of DIA and funnels reminiscent of the coin-collecting jars in 1990s fast food restaurants.

Hey TJ, photo proof that we took you to the expo!

We had to stop and take a posed photo in front of the China Pavilion, because apparently that is the thing to do.  We didn’t see too many people on our little tour today, but the most we did see were orbiting this structure to take photos.  We even saw a family park their car in the middle of the street (there was almost no traffic) and get out so that the grandparents could hold their infant granddaughter with the China Pavilion in the background while the dad snapped photos.

map of Expo grounds along Huangpu River

After winding our way through the expo site from back to front, we came across a collection of maps and directories to help guide visitors at the entrance.  We delighted in studying the map of the entire grounds, because it seems that whoever was in charge of placing individual country pavilions had quite the sense of humor.  We found Israel’s pavilion surrounded by militant Islamic countries, while North Korea and Iran nestled into neighboring pavilions that were removed from the others.  And then there was Japan, the one country out of 200+ that was given a site on the opposite side of the river.

Finally, we hopped onto a new subway line and headed home.  As silly as the whole expo site now seems – what a waste of time, money, manpower, and materials for a temporary entertainment venue! – I am thankful that Shanghai hosted this event just a year before we moved here.  In addition to this wasteland we toured today, the Expo led to the construction of several new subway lines, added a fleet of clean taxis (with seatbelts!) to the streets, and plastered the city in English translations.  In this way, the Expo did live up to its slogan: “Better City, Better Life.”

*Also done in true China fashion: after failing to hit admissions targets for the first half of the Expo, they sent buses out to random rural villages, loaded everyone on, brought them to Shanghai, and had them walk through the turnstiles.  Win for record-breaking visitors!