贺州（Hezhou) to 香港(Hong Kong)

I arrived in Hong Kong yesterday, on the very last day of my visa. The road from Hezhou was a little rough because of the pacing–136 km/85 miles a long day for me at this point. I’ll spend the next week working out visas, enjoying unfettered access to Google, and meeting local advocacy groups. Pictures from the last few weeks:

I’ve been biking through the rice growing season as I go south. Along the road, patties have transformed from the turned muck you see here, filling with rich green plants that fade to yellow and are harvested.

I met this guy and his friend on my first night in Guangzhou. He and his friends were rolling around the city on their fixies, practicing their bike messenger moves. Makes me wonder if China’s younger generations, after growing up in smog-filled cities, could welcome the return of the bicycle.

I spent a day taking in the wonders of the consumerist wonderland that is Guangzhou. Here is the lobby of the Four Seasons Guangzhou, “one of the top 5-star properties in the world,” according to Forbes

A China Southern Power commercial, suggesting citizens replace their light bulbs. The advertisement repeated nonstop in a busy tourist area. The city of Guangzhou, once one of the most polluted in China, has cleaned up its skies and waterways in the past decade

Arriving in Hong Kong, I was floored by how dense and vertical the city was. Less than a quarter of its land is developed, making it a potential model for green, low-footprint cities. For now, it’s yet another consumer island in Southern China, where designer stores leave their air conditioning on at 17 C/ 62 F and their doors open to the summer heat.

4 thoughts on “贺州（Hezhou) to 香港(Hong Kong)”

A very exciting place, Hong Kong!
Re your street scene pic:
Forty years ago I was part of a group organized to bring a growing proliferation of assertive, often trashy street signs in Eugene’s downtown under some sort of control. We succeeded in getting an ordinance that limited the size of signs, their projection, lighting , etc. It worked well, making Eugene’s downtown a tidy, orderly place, not at all like New York’s Times Square or the dynamic street you found. A proliferation of signs has to reach a critical mass, a certain density and extravagance and to be part of a high-rise context to become visually dynamic. The closed view and relative narrowness of the street also help raise the intensity of the experience because they fill one’s whole visual field. (Imagine the difference if the street were a hundred feet wide and open to a limitless horizon.)
Enjoy!

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fqwatkins says:

July 28, 2015 at 10:30 am

The people, the signs…everything is really packed in to a narrow field of vision, for sure. I can see how those sign complexes wouldn’t work in Eugene.

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