Forced internationalization: Police ordered to eat western food

Our friend Nick Mackie, journalist in Chongqing for the BBC amongst others, recently reported on a quite remarkable aspect of internationalization: the police force in the city is ordered to eat western food and drink coffee for lunch in an attempt to change its culture. The story got picked up on other media, amongst others RTHK:

Police chiefs in the mainland city of Chongqing have ordered officers to eat western instead of Chinese food in a bid to change the culture of the force. They believe that the initiative will help an ongoing drive to wipe out endemic corruption in the force. The city’s former chief of police was recently executed for his close links to organised crime gangs.

11 reasons to love Chongqing

There are a lot of reasons to fall in love with the city of Chongqing, this seductive mixture of Beijing, Hong Kong and L.A. …

1. Not all buildings are finished

2. Disc shaped buildings on top of other ones

3. The city combines flyovers, skyscrapers and neon in an unpolished way

4. Double elevated highways constructed over buildings

5. Mountains with Swiss villas

6. Super elevated highways!

7. That in some views, without too much effort, it is possible to see only concrete, and a pool

8. …or only concrete..

9. ..and more …

10. ..and even more..

11. That the bridge over the Jianling river seems tiny but is in fact huge.

Today we were back in the city we liked from the very moment we saw her…take a look…need we say more..?

MAD architects: urban forest

MAD Architects, Beijing recently revealed their plan for the so called ‘Urban Forest’ scheme in the city of Chongqing. Read more on this designboom post: MAD architects: urban forest.

Slideshow China’s floating villages on www.vn.nl

This week, the Dutch weekly Vrij Nederland publishes our story about China’s ‘floating villages’. We spend a week on a construction site in Chongqing and talked to the workers and small businessmen who inhibit the place. A slideshow of pictures from the floating village in Chongqing you can find on the website of Vrij Nederland.

China’s floating villages

This seams to be a regular building site in Chongqing, one of China’s fast growing mega-cities. But it also is a so called ‘floating village’ : a temporary residence of migrant workers around one of the thousands of construction sites in China. The inhabitants work as a chef,  a shop owner or a prostitute. China’s ‘floating population’ counts 150 million. After work is finished, the whole village moves to the next building site.

For one week we walked through the village on the picture. We talked with restaurant owner Deng and his wife about their business model, and with manager Wen who dreams about retirement. We tried to reveal why the 800 inhabitants leave their homes and kid and move into a container or under a corrugated roof. What seems to be a slum, turns out to be a vibrant village with its own fresh market, health center and cinema.

The whole story about the floating village in Chongqing is in this weeks’ Dutch weekly Vrij Nederland.

Check also: Eeuw van de Stad » Go West Project (5): China’s ‘dolende dorpen’.

Chongqing to have rail link with Rotterdam — Shanghai Daily

The story is already some weeks old, but I stumbled upon it today. The vice mayor of Chongqing (a city of >30 million souls in central China) has said his city will have a cargo railway straight to Rotterdam, the Netherlands before 2012. This will greatly boost economic potential of central and western China. More on Shanghai Daily.

City one minutes - chongqing - 02:00

On the website city one minutes you can find beautiful small (one minute - hence the name) movies about big cities all around the world. Also about Chongqing, the city we visited last May. Check out this movie about the nightlife: shooting heart shaped balloons at one of Chongqings squares: city one minutes - chongqing - 02:00.

The megalopolis you’ve never heard of

An article from The Guardian newspaper about Chongqing, a city with over 30 million inhabitants that most people outside of China don’t know. Apart from that, it’s one of the cities the Go West Project visits. Read The megalopolis you’ve never heard of | World news | The Guardian.