t C

he

hangzhou ove

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f f a i r

A Travelogue

Muhammad Jahangir Kakar

Jahangeer.kakar@gmail.com

Photo: Courtesy Mr. Revantino with many, many, and many thanks too, a sweet man with an impressive personality.

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The Tiannig Temple is a pennant of magnificence. Outside the Buddha dormitory, there were beautiful pendulous trees down which were the pendants of gently waving pulpits scribed in traditional Chinese language held by the red color strips of cloth. The beautiful magenta, oatmeal and lavender leaves were blown at gentle pace by the cashmere evening breeze, and as the sun was sinking in the west, it was becoming all too romantically bemusing in the temple. There was an invisible sense of contentment prevailing and whirling up in the temple premises. The whole temple seemed to dance around the curly whirls of the same. There was a soft dulcet message whispering in the ears that the walk had come to an end and then the both of us had to separate. There was no gloom, but joy. The sun was going down as we came out of the Tiannig Temple of Changzhou China. The Man is the most beautiful creature of the multiverse. The flight from Islamabad was smooth though delayed by a day perhaps due to bad weather over the northern heights, as it was reported and how much credible was the report, was best known to the reporters. The China Southern Airline flew us over the Hindukush and reached us Urumqi International Airport in a matter of three hours. It was an audacious and pleasant flight. Ops! Chill fried there! Urumqi was freezing in cold, but you would not feel cold unless you would step outside the airport as the airport was centrally heated and was warm enough that you could go in knickers or half sleeves, no problem. Urumqi airport was a master piece of modern day engineering. It was Olympian in size, and an international alacrity. Before reaching Urumqi, my crude idea about Urumqi was that it might have been a bantam town with little population and less aerial traffic. Blimey! It was the other way round. To my chagrin, the airport went on unfinishing. The airport was decorated with Chinese letters-or rather, characters all around. The ticket counter, the shopping outlets, the waiting area and the coffee shops were the places of attraction. Well the prices were phenomenally higher and more different than the actual market prices, but this went for the entire international and at places even domestic airports. Being a junction airport, the passengers had to take connecting flights, and they had to dish up for many hours. The seating arrangement therefore should have been good and ample. But strangely the seating arrangement or seating capacity was very poor at Urumqi. The people were strolling with their baggage in the carts and pulling off wandering. Some were even asleep on their carts while had kept the luggage on the floor as they had Hobsons choice. They could not have any seats. Others were killing time by drinking the hot green water or call it green tea, whatever, that they carried in their flasks. There were fewer chairs and those who had occupied them were blustering with their occupations of spoils, and seemed they were never going to vacate those chairs; so, none was supposed to grind the feeling that they would occupy those seats once vacated. How come this could have happened remained a mystery for us and we could not figure out how and why the seating arrangement for the passengers had not been made. I and my dear tall friend Shakeel wandered here and there firstly blown out of water by the beauty and size of the airport and when the toxic effect diluted a bit, we found that we had walked a lot and we felt drying pain in our legs. In fact, we were ladling by design as our next flight was still four hours away. He was wise enough to suggest going a coffee shop and resting a while. We had a coffee there. I had another coffee there. I was going for yet another coffee but was wisely stopped by my friend in face of the coffees economic aftermaths. The coffee was very good and the shop was managed by a little pretty typical Chinese girl with a young boy. We paid the bill, tipped them off as our flight to Beijing was ready. Oh lest I forgot it, it was necessary to be recorded. It was true at least as I saw it and I might be wrong. My tall skinny friend Mr. Shakeel was afraid of aerial journeys as I noted. He was sitting beside me and much before the plane could have been set to take off, he buzzed to me, my seat belt is not working. The buckle does not get fixed in. I got the idea and decided to fry it. I asked him, yar wait, there is still much time left to fly. He passed me disgust. After some time when his uneasiness hyped, I helped him get his seat belt fastened. Well, now was the take off. I instructed him that when the plane was taking off, he should not look around and especially at the windows. He listened to my advice very attentively! The plane somehow took off. I began to tell him that the plane flew faster than the speed of sound then I told him the speed of sound. Having gathered the information and having applied it on an unseen calculator, as we were flying over the Hindukush snow capped mountains; I sold him an ominous and very importunate idea when the plane produced some unusual sound. He was worried and I got the time perfect to hammer him. I told him look down. He did it. Then I told him, if the plane tumbles down, there are life saving jackets beneath the seat, do not forget these but we may not get enough time to get them on as these are just for the plane crew. We just have to fall down in a freesate. Well, down there are rocks and the chances of providence saving us are also zero to nothing! He got

choleric and gave me a tempestuous look and after a while tweaking his eyes and flipping his twinkling face said, please yar do not speak like that. I repeated the same discourse when we reached the part of flying over the Gobi. He gave the same remarks and looks. Another peculiar yet strange thing was his style of sleeping. As we flew from Urumqi to Beijing, it was almost mid night and having started our journey at eleven in the morning, we were so tired that we just needed a bed to stretch out on. In the airplane after having had the so called completely Chinese dinner, and when the lights were turned off and Chipmunks animated movie was being played, he informed me that he was going to sleep. I bade him good night. After some time when I looked at him, I found him in a very strange posture. He was six feet and an inch, this must not be forgotten. He had stuffed and stocked together his hands between his knees and his knees he had bent full up and his head with his long neck was hanging down in his lap. It was too eerie a posture. I rejoiced and slept over the idea as the plane went rushing to the Beijing International Airport scissoring through the winds. Beijing was different. It was bolstering with all the international pre requisites and innings. It was also beyond an end-line in size, beauty and rush. It was bustling with people running here and there, some waiting down the counters, others taking long yawns. In fact, the crowds had left such stressing imprints on us in Pakistan that when we saw the crowd, we first thought we had to miss our flight. But, well, it was a calculated crowd, a disciplined and a behaved crowd. We went through smoothly by the custom lines. They looked at our passports complementing us with their words Ni hau, and stamped them and handed us back smiling, sheh sheh. Right there, came to us a redolent of a wraith encounter! Hmmmpausemany would have gotten the idea from the pause what I should be talking about. Well, less said when all understood. Airports have always been so quixotic places. You find people from around the world travelling outside sound barriers and waiting for their journeys to begin. There is an invisible sense of attraction in being among the passengers. Being a traveler is an attribute they share, and sharing this they forget who they are, what their culture is, what language they speak and which religion they profess. It is on the airports that the concept of a globe sans frontier can be observed and felt. It is on airports that we experience the true worth of human relations. It is here where we find to see how political, social, religious and economic interests have divided us all. Oh I missed Beijing due to my lanky young friend, Shakeel! We were to be there just for the night and the night was so cold that we could not come out. We could have come out had we stayed in the city, but we were in the official executive residence of the Ministry of Commerce China. And we could have come out had Shakeel not delimited my courage. I tried to convince my friend to go out and see the great wall but he first insisted saying it was very cold but later on agreed. We talked to our guide who promised to send someone in the morning to show us the Wall. Well, that morning never came! My friend was pampering with joy and jumping off it that we had missed to see the Wall. Actually he was so cautious to get to Changzhou. He was afraid to have been left in Beijing had the weather turned bad. I missed Beijing, the Wall and the Forbidden City. He was over joyous sitting beside me in the Air China Boeing as we flew to Changzhou and now he was contended that yes we were to reach Changzhou at last.

I may see the city under the glistering face of the sun piercing through the eastern skies as I would wake up, I thought. Tut tut There was smog floating above the beautiful city of Changzhou as usual, beauty -stigmatic. It was 0930 am when we had taken breakfast and the city of Changzhou was all-come alive. Traffic was scampering on the road, all shops and markets teeming with people, and a hasty yet controlled hustle bustle. I and my friend decided to go out for loitering in the city as it was the rest day, half of course, and we had to return for the lecture and more importantly for the lunch before 1300 hours. The city was magnificent. Spacious shopping malls, amazing structures of modern day engineering, the sub ways, the electric train running overhead, the beauty and the cleanliness of the city was worth all appreciation. We walked for three hours in the magnificent city of Changzhou in Jiangsu province. The first two hours we walked enjoying, but the next one hour we locomoted searching for our lost Jinling Mingdu Hotel. The only thing we could remember was the decent romantic-walk that we took by the silent river in Changzhou city. We tried to reclaim our hotel by strolling-decoding beside the river but we failed. I was happy to be lost as I was on weight reduction program, but the fellow who weighed 54 and was 6 feet and an inch seemed almost dehydrated. He was feeling depressed and was complaining indirectly that it was due to me that we were lost. Well, I just followed him silently as he gave an inadvertent inkling of chop-chop and I could easily see that he was wearing a frown all over him. We were making hurry to find the hotel because if we could not reach the hotel by 1300 we would miss our lunch of which we had no intention at all due to two reasons First, we were hungry, and second, it was for-free as we were on training arranged and funded by the Ministry of Commerce Peoples Republic of China. The Chinese had disciplined themselves by applying themselves the laws and rules which were the regulators of behavior and attitude. All the billboards, the directional boards and the boards which might have assisted us finding our hotel amid the sky scrapers were un-understandable because they were written in Chinese. We asked a taxi driver to take us to our lost-destination but none would come because it was going to be the lunch time! Shakeel being an underweight guy was feeling tired and fatigued. As we were walking on the pavement, he all of a sudden went inside a bank and the guard was looking at him with suspicion. He scurried in to the bank like shrugging through the line, and found a guy sitting in the front desk. He first looked at him, twitched his eyebrows giving an impression as if he had lost something or had been at a mistake and then looked around. I was very afraid because if it were somewhere else, the next thing could have been the collar and the gun. Well, he rushed towards a lady in the corner and started asking in the pure Pakistani tonic-English, Can you please tell me where Jingling Mingdu Hotel is? my tall, lanky and scrawny friend asked a banker. No English, no English was the reply. We somehow found the hotel in the next thirty minutes at our own risk. Changzhou has attained the extreme development at the cost of extreme environment. The Changzhou people having had all the desired and much craved for development they wished, had lost the sight of seeing the blue sky. The sky of Changzhou was always enveloped in smog. The Changzhou people now implored for the rain or strong winds so that they might find to see a glimpse of the sun with the blue sky. Sometimes we had to lose something to have something. The Changzhou people had the development but they had lost the sight of the blue sky. If Changzhou Development Model was taken as sample, Peoples Republic of China had a lot to do to protect environment while keeping pace with the development. The Environment-Development equation needed drastic balance to avoid polarization to any end. The people of China could not be ready for a development bargain which would eclipse their shiny sun and would fade away their blue sky. Development is the contradiction of environment, remarked Mr. Robin Wei, Senior Economist and an ex-CIQ officer during a lecture at Changzhou after having had a few sneezes. In his seventies, Mr. Robin had seen much of the China changing episode. He was impressed by the rapid success they had achieved but his tiltation was more humanistic, too. The real beauty of Changzhou could only be measured once it was under the sun. The rains of Changzhou were very romantic and poetical. Mind you, you would be left so lonely if you were not accompanied by someone you liked that you be would become either a rainy poet or a full scale idiot. As it once rained for three consecutive nights, I experienced an utmost quantum of loneliness and yet it was so rejoicing that I wished I could be descriptive enough to put that in words. To save myself from falling and becoming a full scale idiot, I had an inspiration on the sixteenth floor and that came out to be the catharsis in homage to the exotic rain of Changzhou. _____________________________________________________________________________..

Changzhou day time under blue sky.

Changzhou similar time under smog.

Changzhou in Rain

Its all wet again Its rain, rain, rain Down the trees the drops dribble, On the windows they bubble. Lo the cars on road slobber, Like a tortoise does slabber. Heart is pumping love again, Like sweet love does retain. The clouds have come down the sky, The weather toasted chill to fry. My Umbrella, I had I forgot in my room, Now am thickly wet, but without a gloom. The Fragrance of the wet soil In my brains do make a coil. Its all so romantic down the town, Gains washed interests all blown. Its all human, and without a fare, Lesson us to do well and be fair. Its all wet again Its rain, rain, rain

Its all wet again

Chinese were still very original people intimately connected to their roots like many Asian countries do. They were loyal to their thoughts, to their apprehensions, to their culture, to their language and most importantly to what their forefathers had done, said and left for them. Their exterior might very much seem to have been westernized, but from the inner sides they were still very much Chinese. They had faltered not an inch by the dictates and actions of the past which had decided their present destiny. You would see that on the airports that it was harder to find coca cola or Pepsi than finding water on the Saharan sands. Very difficult! Yes, you might have green tea, boiled rice, noodles with chopsticks, salads and spices, burgers and etc. but all the food that you would find would be Chinese to the core and to the taste. From making to packing and packing to eating was all Chinese. But let me tell, their dishes were quite tasty provided that first one comprehended their dishes! It was observed that for the whole past many decades, their economic closure and isolation from the world had affected their social lives too. They were really startled to look at the foreigners. Some of them who knew little English would rush forth and try to speak and shake hands. This was very peculiar in the third world countries but China which was becoming the global power and was an economic giant also presented this social outlook to a great extent. This meant that the link between the economics and Sociology was deep and meaningful and Changzhou which was compatible in its beauty, advancement and infrastructure with any European city lacked the attributes of foreign intervention and intermingling. China needed as much of the social opening as much as the economic one, I thought sitting in my room resting on couch having been exhausted. A motorbike or call it a scooty slouched just off an inch edging me. I was startled. I have never had such a taciturn encounter with a bike not at least from the country where I belong, Pakistan, where the louder the

bike, the higher the price and the more is it feared and the more respected the rider. I was held back by my six feet and an inch friend who looked at me with pride as if had saved me from falling off the Mount Everest. Whenever, I would agree to what he wisely put should that have been an action or a proposal, he would repeat the thing for three times at least to give an impression that he was right. But these opportunities of internalization came very few and far between when he would be right either at what he suggested or what he did. Well, having thanked him for his timely-pull off the orbit, I realized I was walking in the bikes lane taking it for footpath. Well, I was not much to be blamed as we do not have these in country and we sometimes even run footpath with our vehicles. Having regained the position, I noticed the bikes were electric propelled. They had chargeable batteries. They did not consume fuel. Their silence was designed and not adopted. If they were to crash into you, they were silent killers. The buses, the cars, in short all means of transportation including the railways was either CNG-or-electricity-supported and thus there was no smoke from the silencers nor from the ejectors. The buses had televisions fixed in them. They were many, many and many in number. The pretty women sitting on the bikes and rushing, the men and women in buses, the people at the railway stations, airports, and everywhere you would see them running and making haste all smart, young and energetic. Kids had become a rare commodity in China and there were very few scenic experiences of them. You could not see the couple capitulated around with pulling a cot stocked with fluffy, flossy, fleecy, and fuzzy babies. You do not get such scenes to see. Chinese were humans but they were very uncommon ones. Sometimes being there, I thought of a Conspiracything, which the idle yet creative brains do often do. I began to prepare the hypothesis that these walking fast, smiling always; bowing decent might not be humans at all. The Peoples National Congress might have removed all the humans from the main Sino-land, and might have installed or chipped robots in human attires. I gave this theory its natural life span. But this theory of mine, like my all others, fell on its forehead when I realized the actuality that the Chinese were Humans on the basis of data collected and samples gathered. The whole theory swan under the effects of might but it was not mighty enough at the end. To this end my theory failed, and failed badly; but, it went successful in establishing the theory-thread that the Chinese are the most uncommon people on the face of the residential planet we call the Blue Earth. Take the cultural invasion, which was the worst of its types of invasions in the present day global village with the fast paradigm shifts creeping in. It was worse and more effective than Blitzkrieg. They still adhered to their Chinese traditions and sacrifices. They were objective but not insensible. Their family structures had not ruptured. They had kept adherence to their roots. They were professional each one them diving into their own lives, professions, tasks and works isolated from interfering in others chores. However, the test of their above attributes would be when and once the PRC really opens up itself socially and economically to the world. How much would they change remained the test of time. Economics travelled with the loads of its own characteristics from religion to society. The invasion of multinationals was yet to commence. And so far, the Chinese were very much ethnocentric but the rest is the matter of futurity timeline as the socio-economic tug of war is yet to commence in China The training was very nice and fruitful. There were participants from eighteen countries of the world from Asia and Africa. It gave the whole program a deep international touch which was cherishing as being together with the global citizenry. Our main lady language and the chief coordinator was Ms. Ashley with her sentinels Ms. Alisha and Ms. Sara. Well, you would think where these English names had come from but China being a very miser importer was lavish enough to have imported these names for our convenience. Ashley was commanding, confident, like a head-captain and the bully. She knew how to treat and mingle with the international citizens who were from various cultural backgrounds. She was quite successful at her chores. Her domination was very much viewed the day Mr. Mao Li came to lecture us. He was a young man-or at least seemed to be because never trust the

Chinese and never calculate their age by their appearances. They never get old. He was seen as hiding behind the formidable shield that Ashley was. She could be imagined as a Lady-warrior from the Chinese tales of ancient literature and riding on a white Horse with her hair blowing in the air and the shine of the sword striking on the beholders riding to save the minor prince from the savage warriors of the North before the Great Wall had been constructed. When questions would be asked Ashley would inject him with confidence and he would reply. Alisha and Sara were innocent and very cooperative. But this never meant that Ashley was not but the commanding take that Ashley took was different. Sara was poetic or at least had a poetic person in balance. Looking at her was always like reading Keats or Wordsworth flowing soft and musical. One day while performing the tasks of interpretation, as she began she went well but after elapsed three hours, she could be seen wearing an about to weep posture on her face. She seemed dehydrated as her health was just as Shakeels. She was a very positive, cooperative and innocent person and all these qualities were quite visible at her face. She had a nice and kind personality. She was very caring always asking and solving all the problems of the participants. She was never in a mode of self praise or playing such hidden or bypassing tricks. She was an open book that you could read all in a sitting. And she was kind hearted person. She would have a wonderful and excellent life as the attributes and characteristics that she combined in herself were such that could never bring her failure. Actually their task of interpretation was so challenging that it was always an aberration springing activity. Firstly, they had to comprehend the variety of strange English language never heard before spoken by the participants. After attempting to comprehend what the participants meant, the same was to be transliterated into another version of Chinese and then the answers would be re translated into English and such cumbersome was the process. The communication gap was wide and it was the flaw of the selection procedure by the training selection authorities who should have maintained a certain level of working English efficiency. Alisha was modern day rip-rap person and was cooperative enough. She was haughty a bit as she would see you very well but would behave as if had not seen you and would pass by you fast and gave no chance to saying, ni hau. She was wearing a mask on her face and a cloak on her personality. The mask hid her true personality whereas she had a very good and positive personality. Masks never could assist anyone go a long way. Well, ladies are ladies at last, the most complicated creatures on earth to understand. Those who even attempt to understand them become like Mr. Chia whose description shall ahead be rampant. The team was very nice and it assisted all the participants a great deal. They were very good at what they were to perform.

Tinning Temple Evening

Asking questions from the resource person was also one of the most comely fractions of the sessions. Some would ask questions for the real objective sake and others would ask because they had to! A self imposed debenture. A guy from Namibia, who later on became the question-man, though he seemed more like a question mark, one day asked when the lecture was about the way the Chinese government granted accreditation or permissive certificates to the production and producers, and the untimely question that came was quote-to-quote, Sir, Can you telled me what good quality items found in China markets by energy information label giving? the question was pragmatic and figurative. It was a sea of multiple questions that had variegated interpretations, and sundry explanations. The resource person was to be transliterated this question and then relayed. The interpreter first tried for ten minutes to decipher the question as it was not comprehensible in the strange English that it was spelled out in. it seemed like a coded message from the Cold War times. Well, having the question been translated the question did not die down. That day the Namibian guy went on explaining the same question which was truly replied again and again. Oh heavens, God knows what he meant and what in reality he was asking! There was another very nice Egyptian guy. He would ask the question for the sake of obligation. The question would not be heard by anyone because it was never a question in its compact form. Like the resource person would be lecturing on the airport clearance and the Egyptian guy would step in saying yeah, yeah the same. The resource person would r e-iterate, yeah, the

same, very good. The Egyptian guy would look secretly behind and sneaking through the corners of his eyes to see whether all the heads were pointing at him or otherwise. Such was his joy and he rejoiced it a lot. Others would ask questions the answers of which would already be given. The question answer session was always filled with joy. For the trainers, it was the most important part through which they could assess the flow of the candidates whether flowing in the right direction or otherwise and also assessing the success of the smooth lecture. The observations could have also helped the organizers to analyze the need assessment and focus their trainings in more directed and well calculated postures. The communication skills of the majority of the resource persons were too weak. There once came an ungainly gentleman named Shi Ya Shen along with an external interpreter. As he arrived I sensed there would be problems because the new interpreters always had problems as they did not have much interaction with us and their interpretations were never too pellucid. So, as the uncouth lecture started off, Mr. Shi took the mike and straight away went to the white board. He was wearing a pent which did not seem as his or perhaps he might have been wearing it the time before he had grown in height a bit by inches. Well, as the blanch Mr. Shi went to the white board, he was confronting Chia. He looked at the Chia and with mike in his hand, he least bothered to use it for the constructive purpose of being audible, he began to ask Chia questions. Questions were such that Chea could have never, in his life-replayed, answered as he slept for most of the part of the lectures and further his language machinations were not at home enough. The interpreter was hurtling after Mr. Shi from here and there as he wandered like loitering in the romantic park. Chea was just looking at him obviating all social norms and giving an impression as to do we know one another? Chia looked aside and gnawed. The interpreter could not translate the matter nor could she know what the pattern for the lectures used to be in our classes. Well, thanks to Ashley who came from the back benches and convinced Mr. Shi that he should sit in the chair and began his presentation solemnly. After he began, the interpretation was not as it was done by the three permanent translators-Ashley, Sara & Alisha-who did far better than was done by the current one. She would speak on things the meaning of which we tried to muster but in vain and we could not as she was speaking abstractions. In the mean while an Egyptian guy started posing questions in his crude and continual English. Well, English when spoken in Arabic or French tone would always be something different than English. When words failed, and even the interpreter was looking askance at the guy, the Egyptian guy went to the white board and drew a mirage effect lined sketch translating his irreticulate question from words to characters. Well, as wisdom stays at dregs, so be it. The trainers needed to be trained first as communication was the most effective tool in transmitting the knowledge and sharing experiences and being irksome would be its death. This would not mean the resource persons had to speak fluent English but it did mean that at least their presentations should have looked like presentation like those of Mr. Edward and Mr. Feng which had all the effective communication layers. They would make eye contact with you; they would not loose you in the way; they would not bore you should the lectures be even drier; they would walk your pace and they would keep up the elements of awe and interest all throughout their presentations. The language capacity would have nothing to do with the communications skills as the facial expressions speak no English, a little smile needed no English, a little intermingling with the listeners needed no English and etc. The speaking of good English had to do nothing with good communication skills. The two are poles apart. There should also be kept a certain language proficiency level for the internee-participants as was seen in the course of the training that many could not express themselves and thus the whole group got divided into peaceful factions speaking their own which hampered international sort of interaction. This was not meant to be stricture but creative analysis because there is always room at the top. Next such day of terror was when Mr. Dr. Hu Quan came to lecture us. Firstly he refused to take an interpreter as he considered his quaffing English was communicable enough. Well, the English language proficiency being not the base and never the intention of this discourse and English language skills all set aside, he started off his lecture with drawing something on the white board and doing some arithmetic for a while. The next six hours, the white board rallied under the loads of mathematical calculations that went on unstopped and unprecedented. He could not maintain eye contact and seemed as if he shied. He looked at the white board with his back towards us and holding the mike in his hand and doing calculations speaking. After a while when the lecture had begun, there were stretching and yawns in each chair. Some were playing with the digital tools; some were trying safe positions of hide and seek to sleep and others looking helplessly at the white board. Chia was emboldened enough to take a nap sitting in the very first row just a feet from the white board where Mr. Hu was conducting his statistical surgery. Revantino also sat just under the nose of the resource person. He used to always sit at the back and there he would take enough sleep and as the class would halt for a tea break one could easily see the blossoming face of Revantino who

would have waken up by then. But the management was shrewd enough to have unseated him from there. Now he was the front liner and he was rubbing the wet towel that was kept before him against his face. In three hours, he was seen rubbing the towel on full scale on his face and getting relived off sleep. Well, in fact this was the most tiresome day that we relished in the august company of Hu.

Mr. Dong, The Best.

Sometimes the resource person would skip the questions the answers of which had a literal impression or effect on their institute or governmental policies. The Chinese not only respected their organizations but also did fear them much or let it be put this way more properly that they first feared the state bodies and buddies in the then transforming China, but had with the passage of time consequently established an invisible link of love. They would regard and take quite literally their organizations sayings & doings unlike in our country. They were disciplined and followed the rules be them big or minute. Collectively, one would observe them as very law abiding and disciplined chunk of global-people. When I asked a Chinese officer from the AQSIQ a question that effective August 1, 2013 the PRC had stopped all its activities regarding the exportation inspection, and since it stopped its inspection activities on the WTO notes of free trade and less Human resource at the AQSIQ, so how would it ensure the quality of products not being compromised by using the same limited human resource of the AQSIQ and Customs and added whether the scheme was seeing an y success. The gentleman smiled, paused for a moment, though a while and said shrugging his shoulders, well, I do not have the answer to that question. They would not cross their line and official limits by an inch even. Since he was the representative of the Government, so he could not be made to speak anything which amounted as a piece or remark of critique on Government which further showed wide that still there was a lot of centralization in China, be that Politics or other affairs. The Chinese did not worship gods, but rather they worshiped their State and they were justified to do that for the givings to them so many by the state. There seemed to be floating around a virtual and perpetual state of surveillance. The Conference Halls were altissimo places worth seeing. The conference halls were presumptuous and highly purple with decorative index. Mighty pillars raising high the building with an extraordinary front, the center, and the outer-space. The chairs were arranged in red color cloths. The color red was the most visible and dominant color around. The hall was well carpeted. The tables were kept for the participants and they were arranged from front to back. It seemed like a red- class. Well, carried away by the thoughts of the long Gone by and shut down past, I began to recall the rhapsodic conferences of the ex- Communist Power USSR which arranged such meetings where the Comrades were given instructions under the communist temperatures and colors. aye aye Comrades was still evocative in the mighty hall. The hall we were sitting in was just or at least appeared so to be the continuation of the same picture quintessentially. It was as refreshing for such little socialists brains as mine. The idea of communism was still resonant there and th e Chinese had not let it die down. It was like a sonorous opera ending at the apex of tranquility. Mr. Chia was also taken aback by the beauty of the conference hall. He was sitting with me and Revantino came along. He looked in his typical jolly style at Mr. Chia and murmured with himself. Mr. Chia thought it better let go and he did. Revantino next smiled a bit. This was unacceptable. Revantino was in hot waters now. Chia asked him what the matter was. Revantino said, do you have comb or not? In Indonesia the person who does not comb his hair or does not have a nice hairstyle, he is not considered as smart or gentle or handsome no matter what ever

costly things he may put on his body, and taking a puff of his cigarette further said, go and buy a comb and comb your hair. And please tell me what hair style your hairs fall in?Chia who was moments ago sailing in the romantic cruise of socialism with me, was now drowning in the deep dark waters of Pacific. He looked around and said nothing. Mr. Chia had a very strange hair style. He was 45% bald from the front terrain. The upper terrain had some bushes which would always be seen standing tight and erected in the air. The lower terrain would again go as under as till where ears ended. This was a kind of a style which could not be clubbed into any of the hairstyles. Well, it was called the Chia-Style! Chia could not wait longer as he was so eager to see the Tiannig Temple. He was buddhatist by religion.

Mr. Chia Savron to the right

The Tiannig temple was an epitome of Buddha the great. The Tiannig Temple or pagoda is a super structure of art, creativity and modern day engineering techniques. The wooden pagoda and the Buddhas from Korea and other Buddhas are gigantic and designed with most crystalline sophistication. The wooden Buddha which is the biggest wooden Buddha worldwide also is the focus of attention for the visitors located on the Heping Road. The temple is located beside a spacious park which has a beautiful artificial lake with boating available in it. The pagoda rose to a height of 505 feet which made it the tallest pagoda in the world. It cost more than 38 million USD for its construction to be completed. The entrance fee was 80 Yuan per ten people as we went in group.

It was late afternoon then when we got to the pagoda so there was rush and people were visiting the sight of history and religious center for the Buddhists. The atmosphere as usual was smoggy. We missed the crimson and burgundy sun.The 13 stories building is a sky scrapper in the vicinity. It is well lifted up. There were lifters up to the 12th floor so to get to the top; therefore, to get to the floor numbering thirteenth one was required to make a little trout walk if one was not bulky enough, and here was where the lankiness won over the bulkies. The stairways were very narrow but then they could not be wider enough as they were to be compatible to the overall structure of the temple. My Indonesian ebullient friend Revantino was as usual very dulcet and with his professional camera we were catching snaps. He would sit with the statues and make poses which might have been otherwise not permissible had he been caught by the monks. Well, alive as he was, he was enrapturing in his full rhythm. Yeah, Mr. Chia was wandering with his maladroit steps careening here and there looking outside his spectacles and speaking a language which was the strange blend of Cambodian and English. Some of it was the English and the remaining the Cambodian, so he was incomprehensible, even for the chief interpreter Ashley! Whenever he would ask a question, the replier would wince and Mr. Chia could accept any answer provided that it was in English! He said that evening as we walked through the silent Buddhas that he could not cross the road as there was a lot of traffic and further narrated that back in his Cambodia there was very little traffic on the roads. Very few cars could be seen but even then there were a lot many accidents! Our

guide Ms. Sara gave a flicking smile and innocently asked, if there are so few cars, how come the accidents Take place? Mr. Chia gave a look of grimace and looked away in the direction that no one was looking at! We thought we had to take care of him and I held him by hand and helped him cross the road. He never used to go out of the hotel. The farthest he ever went alone was the front of the hotel where he used to enjoy smoking his cigarette in open air and come back, thanking God that he was back safe! And there was but the last, our Nigerian friend. He lay in front of one statue and took snap. He sat in the Buddha mediation style in front of the Buddha Lion and took another snap. That day he took so many pictures that all of us collected did not, and could not take. He was photogenic or not, but it was commonly agreed upon that he was at least anatomically graphic. Whatever, he was a jolly young man. But yeah of all the pictures we took that day, we missed one thing and one sight terribly. We missed the Monks whom we saw dressed in their typical attires expressing spiritual felicity, idyllic humility, incorporeal peace, lilt simplicity and myriad love. But we just missed them. The Tiannig temple seemed to be little maintained which was very strange given the meticulous sense of cleanliness of the Chinese. You would never see any garbage on the footpath, in the market places or anywhere in Changzhou though Nanjing was somewhat different. The management of the pagoda premises was very strange to be noted for its incompatible cleanliness management with that of the city. As we were entering, there was dust and swarf collected and sprinkled all around. The walls at the entrance were eroded off paint which seemed to have been painted quite some time ago. The statues in front the tallest Tiannig pagoda were not well taken care of. This was painful as the pagoda was the treasure in the world heritage and it deserved treatment at par with its status which was not seen there. Well, it was a fine visit to the temple and the interpretation of the pretty guide, Ms. Sara Yu helped a lot otherwise it was again, All Made in China! Sometimes I thought, with excuse and no religious prejudice, that perhaps the Buddhas also spoke fluent Chinese and may be they did, who knows. History is just a chest of interpretive debatable secrets! The socks of Mr. Chia were also as interesting and as unusual as his person. He used to wear very small socks which would just cover as long as till toe. The Union Jack printed on the socks was visible which was situated on his toe. He used to keep the right leg on the left and rub his lower feet. The sock was an open secret! The interpreters used to face great difficulty in translating the variety of English which was spoken in that classroom. They had to do a dual job. First one was to correct the English already spoken and the second was to convert it into Chinese. Very commendable. Sharing another secret would be proper at this juncture. One of the biggest factors of strength of the Chinese economy from the eras of reformation to the so called opening up to the world had been the domestic production and its maxima domestic utilization. Everything was produced in China except human beings very wisely remarked by Mr. Shakeel. They produce domestic and this was circulated in all over the China. This being the domestic edge, they had also controlled the biggest world markets. But there still persisted a threat to the economic sustainability and continuity, and perhaps due to the same phobia, China was not completely opening up to the world. In China, there were two economic and social classes only: the rich and the poor. The middle class which decided the destiny of the state had not been produced. Pondering back a bit in sandy times, it would be learnt that it had always been the middle class from where the ideas, thoughts, theories and criticism were filtered out. The middle class always generated a bridge between the success and sustainability equation. Now, should the multinationals step in mushroom, there would be to the threats to the Chinese untested machinations as these international entrepreneurs would capture both the groups: the rich in a way of friendship as they would like to prefer buying the international brands such as Levis (as the common and basic richness characteristic) than locals and the poor in the way of exploitation which had been the trademark of the multinationals. This fear still lingered on in the Chinese plants of decision making and policy sizing. Another factor would be whether the domestic products of China would be able to compete to that of the multinationals or other global bodies-corporate, a big question mark. The domestic skills or ways and means of production which had sustained the Chinese economic growth would then be questioned and perhaps doubted as whether the same would be able to stand the test of international economic games. Much in China that had been done till now had been state run and state owned. The state factor might be a success but limited only to closed economies where economic planning and management felt not challenged by such groups and parties which had their own interests. Similarly, the traders, the trade and the producers in China had always been pampered, directed and guided by the state rather than their intellect, confidence and self

entrepreneurship. They had been treated and guided by the state like did a Madam in a school classroom or like the interpreter Ms. Ashley did with/to us! The question then would be whether the business humanity of China could employ their genius once the economy was fully opened up? Whether they would be able and honest enough to produce and maintain the quality of their products as the Government instructions and quarantine under the dragon AQSIQ would no more be effective? Whether they would be able to sustain and balance the gain and loss equation which hither to now has been unknown? Whether the government would be able to stop the production of quake items like Apple iPhone being sold out for just 150 Yuan in the Nanjing streets? Whether AQSIQ would still remain to ensure quality or had it been able to ensure quality so far? The economic opening up of China stood as a challenge at a maze for the Chinese as encountering the global money makers were always a formidable task. It was never easy to control them by strict laws, strictures and regulations as free trade in a free world is above law.

Inspection and Quarantine office Wuxi City

Away from the plethora of economics, Mr. Chia was sitting in front my desk and I asked him about his health and the night. How much time you slept last night, said he looking through his spectacles? I understood the crux of the question and replied, last night I slept at 2am. Oh, I sleep 3am. No sleep comi ng. I tell my eyes, shut, sleep. Not listening to me, said he. I passed a look of common good. His interest further immersed in and turning his neck much around then said, I run, run, run in my room night time. No sleep coming. Now I had got the idea of his perpetual absence of mind, insomnia and continuous presence of wander wall effect. A person who would run in his room at the night trying to catch in sleep was supposed to fall asleep very soon! The same night after dinnerthe Chinese dine after the sun setas I and Shakeel were walking out of hotel for a gentle digestive toxin walk, we happened to cross by Mr. Chia who was holding an ipad and talking to it. I just called at him, Hey Chia, and he cried out, my wife, my wife, I am talking to my wife . Very strange man and yet so magnetic and so appealing he was. He was simple, pure and unaffected by the worldly sins, such a contended soul as he was. It was pretty fine morning. The sky was cleared off all the smog. The bus was packed with the participants and the lady hawk sat in the front of the bus like the does the captain in a ship. The bus went through the wide avenues of Jingming Road and passed through the beautiful buildings it reached at the JISQ-Jiangsu Inspection and Quarantine-office building. The JISQ was one of the most powerful departments that had been in trade and inspection in China since the economic reform and until now. It was like one of those Mighty Dragons from the Chinese folklores keeping watch on each movement of the economic mortals. It was the sole controller of inspecting the items for production, assessing their quality and certifying the same. The laboratories were highly equipped. The institute had been responsible for some outsourced tasks too including the management of foreign aided programs such as trainings, and other ventures. It was a nineteen storey building and of all the stories we liked the nineteenth floor the most. It was the rest resort of the JISQ officers and officials. The posh rest storey had many rest rooms and sports desks. There was a hall which seemed more like a ball room as the multimedia spread out the front wall and beautiful Chinese music was being played on. Revantino switched us from China to USA when he played on the American rocks. Mr. Chia was as usual standing with his hands in his pants pockets. He was an uneasy creature. Revantino sang some songs with the videos that were played. No sooner had we begun enjoying the songs, there came Mr. Sunny of the sunny Nigeria. He

took charge on the microphone and began to molest music with his thundering warrior like voice. It seemed, as he sang, as if he was calling on the archers to form in a line and get their bows in position for the strike. How much music was molested and how much trouble our ears had to hear that day could not be put in words. We were also taken to the conference room of the building where the JISQ held their meeting and video conferencing. As Mr. Chia entered the hall he cried out in his shriek-some voice, oh, is it cinema? Everyone looked at him in a strange way, but Mr. Chia paid very little heed to all such looks. He was an Independent Man, a king within himself!

The Changzhou museum is also a place of great allurement. It just stands in opposite to the official building of JISQ-Jiangsu Institute of Inspection & Quarantine. The museum had many sections which presented the Chinese and explicitly the history of the Changzhou city. The museum also contained the past, present and future sections of the Changzhou city where we were shown and described the future development plan of Changzhou. It was going to be a world within itself. Changzhou at times appeared as if the whole city had been demolished and was constructed anew. It was so perfect.

The Chia factor was further puffed up by the Namibian guy who once again asked a question and this time it was completely out of this world. We could here just some strange sounds of alphabets collapsing into one another in a clumsy way. My tall friend Mr. Shakeel came to recourse this time as not only the pretty interpreters but each one of us too could not make anything out of the collapsing alphabets. Shakeel was kind enough to narrate and paraphrase the question and asked, Madam he wants to know what to do if there is negligence in the wires? whether this negligence was criminal or normal was not defined. A wire and negligence, in fact the word he was looking for to throw in was Resistance. Well it happens, sometimes we slip our tongues. Like one day the resource person said that after the police caught the defaulters or criminals suspected in a case, the police kidnapped them where in fact he wanted to say that the police arrested them! However, the word Police and Kidnapping are compatible in Pakistan. Area to area varies the meaning of words. Well, it was the breakfast lobby of Jingling Mingdu International Hotel Heping Road Changzhou again. We were sitting there having done our breakfast and, some of us were having juices and the others the goodmorning cigarettes. Mr. Revantino had caught cold a night ago. He had taken some medicine and was pretty carefree and composed then. Mr. Chia was smoking cigarette standing. He used to do most of things that we saw standing and his was the rationale that he did not like sitting because it would bulge out the belly and he was so cautious about his personality. Mr. Chia came with his back lowered a bit and with his thumb, the index and the middle finger pressed the throat of Mr. Revantino slightly and he did that like a professional physician. Having done that, he moved back in a backward direction and said, oh, bad. Too bad. Have you call your home? No, what for, said Revantino and before he could figure in the answer, Mr. Chia said, Oh, it may be cancer. You call your home. Quickly, and hearing this, next was a jocular burst. In the mornings usually there are no laughter packages, but wherever Mr. Chia used to be, there was comedy and

humor, unaffected and unseen before! He was a very humble guy. He said one day that his hotel room was too large and he did not need that because back in Cambodia they have very small home and small rooms. His small room and small home is a paradise for him as it had his kids and the wife. This was very scholarly of him and he was a man of roots. In his inarticulate and tough to follow talks there was always a sequence hidden which needed to be decoded. Beneath the crazy and miss-jotted words, sometimes used to burst out the real laughter and the big truth. Finding a place in Changzhou was a hard nut to crack. It was just as performing a Hercules task. Our two friends from Pakistan, namely Zafar and Kareem Memon, who were attending another workshop, had been in Changzhou for over a month by the time we arrived. They were very well aware of the Chinese psyche. They gave us strict and all aloud instructions the very first night as how to make purchases or shopping. They taught us the golden principles of bargaining. We spent a little time with them but it was so absorbing a time that it seemed we had been together for quite some time. They knew the city well. When we expressed our interest in buying an iPod, they instructed us to get it from the Computer City which was on Heping Road. Well, they told us the direction and we decided to get there and make the purchase. They could have accompanied us but then they were leaving in the early morning for Shanghai and it was therefore not convenient to have asked them for the same. I was sitting beside Shakeel in the class room. He threw an idea of bunking the class as the shop would close down early and we were to be free in evening and the same was followed by the typical early Chinese dinner! I convinced Shakeel of not leaving off the class as it was the matter of national respect. I wish our leaders before selling out our national image could think for a while on the same. Shakeel agreed and we went after the class was dismissed. We walked the direction we were told. And we walked for one complete hour without finding any computer city in the Changzhou City. There were directional and sign boards but as usual all of them were written in Chinese. This was very stressing in Changzhou, Urumqi and Beijing as we noticed. There may be foreign tourists visiting, it would be too difficult for them to get to any place. Not a single board could be find which might have helped us get to somewhere. What was the factor involved behind it would be again a conspiracy theory to establish negative-conservatism. It was never difficult to attach English words made of simple alphabets to the Chinese boards but it was not done. So before one visits any part of china, one has to master the Google map of that place. There were many parks one might visit in Changzhou City. The city had been planned for development in quite a calculated method not doing away with the resorts for public recreation. The park beside the Pagoda Temple on Heping Road was one of its kinds. It was spacious and green orchestrated. There was an artificial lake. As I separated from my friends, and a little bit tempted to fall in the habit of loneliness which I sometimes admire more than anything, I caught sight of a white swan. It was a scene that I wish I could describe in words. It was filled with chastity of thought and was indeed, really a thing of beauty is a joy for ever. A spontaneous overflow came all over which I recollected in tranquility and thus:THE WHITE SWAN! Beauty is not reciprocity. Beauty is not seasonably. But, Beauty is immortal! Beauty if self existent; Beauty is infinity! Beauty never dies, Beauty is never forgotten, and Beauty is never forbidden. To fall in love with Beauty, Needs no permissive license, no nays no ayes because, Can someone command the cashmere evening breeze? Never, any can. Beauty is a moment: A moment of chastity, A moment of festivity, A moment of absorption, A moment of inspiration, A moment of infinity, and A moment of eternity. Beauty is non-corporal, Beauty is not a touch, but a bliss, Beauty is not physique but a psyche. Beauty is a time machine that can:

Take you back in time, Relay the played ones, Transform both time and space, Anytime, anywhere, Refresh the thoughts and rekindle the temple, Inspire each moment and each moment equates a life. That which does above, That is Beauty, that is Beauty. Beauty is immortal!

Before I could travel more in the sweet world, I was held back in the real world by the innocuous voice of Mr. Chia Savron which had its own type of pitch and its own kind of beat. As soon as it fell on my eardrums and was converted into an understandable message by the nerves, I found Mr. Chia complaining about a disease that he had been infected with. Like his queer some personality, his disease was also questionably interesting. He had scrubs on his body. He was always saying he felt itchy and he had the same disease which required a lot of rubbing and non among us was ready to perform such task of degradation and moral turpitude! Well, Ashley managed to arrange the Rubbing Tube for the gentleman Mr. Chia, the itchiest. He showed me the tube. On inspection of the tube and the body of the person on which it was to be applied, I was disappointed. The Chia body might not have been lubricated for more than a decade. Such thirsty a body and so full of scrubs and the little Chinese Tube for itchiness, it was proverbially paradoxical. I surrendered and left Chia to mingle with the tube. Chia was overjoyed not because he had got the medicine for treatment of his problem but because he had got that free of cost without wasting any of his precious Yuan. Changzhou traffic was very well managed. It was very huge in size and quite intensive in pressure but the city was so planned that despite all the rush, it never disturbed one. The roads and the express ways very wide and well maintained. There was a network of subways, underpasses and flyovers. The white train used to pass each morning and I could see it from my hotel room sitting by the glass table with my darling laptop. The traffic was also decorated by the traffic lights and the pedestrian lights and they were duly followed except for the cyclists who did not abide by the law and the traffic police was never seen to have caught any one of them. This was serious and dangerous given the heavy traffic there were chances of fatal accidents. At night the city would burst into illumination. The roads and the highways were very much illuminated. The side lights beside the roads would run all the way along the road which further beatified the city at night. The level at which the energy or electricity was consumed was indicative of the level at which it was produced. The roads were never abandoned off traffic scampering and running on the roads. This traffic fear was the reason why Chia always feared going out. Chia often used to say that he could not sleep well at night. Sleep came to him but quite in the deep last part of the nights. He was talking about this all over again in the coffee lobby encircled by the Pakistanis, Srilankans, an Indonesian, Kenyans, a Namibian and a Nepalese. He said that in the first session of the class lecture, which used to start at 9am and lasted as long as until 12pm, he used to sleep with his right eye closed. In the session after lunch, he slept with his left eye closed. A Srilankan said if both the eyes had slept already in the day, how come they could sleep at night with ease! His misfortune was that he used to sit just in front of the resource person in the very first row where his heartbeat could be heard by the resource person. One day being very tired, he decided to sleep in the class with both eyes shut down. I was sitting right behind him and always noticing his each movement. He put the palms against his cheeks and the structure was assisted by the ankles which held it up. The fingers went over the ears too so that having slept if someone had called out for him; his sleep was not perturbed as he would not hear anything. He went to sleep. The first slumber jolt came. He managed and survived. The second, more frequent, jerk came and this time the head was lowered a little more than previous but he survived. He intended that by this pose the resource person would assume that he was looking at the lecture notes: Self deception is the worst of all kinds of deception. Well, there came the third jolt, and this time the structure tumbled to the ground. The Chia structure of slumber tossed apart, fragmented and put into ashes. It knelt over. It collapsed into pieces. However, Chia was all-safe-awake-again. The express way that took us from Changzhou to Wuxi was seen never anywhere deserted of plants and trees. You would never feel alone even if travelling alone as the greenery would accompany you inch by inch. We were not alone and we were more than lucky as we had Chia with his notorious disease with us. The momentum of development archived would not make you feel as going out of a city or you could not feel as

entering into another city. The twin cities are so developed that one facsimile fell into the other. The drive in the bus was almost for an hour. I wished we could wander around in Wuxi, but the Lady hawk was watching us all never getting loose of sight any one. Mechanical and Electrical Products Testing Center of the Jiangsu Entry-Exit Inspection and Quarantine Bureau-JISQ-Wuxi City is the most sophisticated laboratory center for certification of the products viability and quality. This lab is mandated with the responsibility of ensuring that the mechanical and electric products are duly checked before they are provided as certificates such as CCC-Compulsory China Certificate and CE and others. The lab gives the glimpse of like a space station where all the equipment and personnel are seen in uniforms and busy in performing strange experiments. Dr. Yu the Director of the Lab gave us the presentation which was followed by thorough visit of the lab. The Chinese model of inspection and quarantine is ideal when taken in the conceptual meanings but there are some questions which have not been answered yet. Is the lab sufficient enough to look into all the electrical and mechanical, produced in Jiangsu because the province adds more than half to the national GDP which means its production levels are quite high? This could not be ascertained as to whether the lab was performing a satisfactory task or otherwise in terms of how many cases had been reported to it, how many it discharged and how many it gave passage to. The mechanism has nothing wrong within itself but given the fast expanding size of the economy, are the Chinese government thinking of some other faster and more convenient settlement as the present state-of-operation is rife with complications and time-consuming. This would stand in contradiction to the ever expanding style of the Chinese economy where time would matter a lot. With the present status in place, the lab of Wuxi would not do sufficient job which is putting on a huge bureaucratic size and pressure. This would be more than just admissible that the task which is being performed by the Wuxi Lab merits all considerations, and is a model of modern day certification-standards. Watch Man in Black, MIB-1&2. Watch their final scenes. What would you see? The door is opened into a world of robotics; robots all around performing task in huge numbers. Such would be the scene when you would happen to enter in the Little Swan-Midea factory of Washing Machine and other household appliances in Wuxi City. The factory is a modern day magic and awe for the spectators. The factory has been working since 1980s. it has gathered numerous international and national awards and certificates for its quality products. The Chinese Government due to its repute and recognition has relived it off the inspection and quarantine as the provision of the same is present in the relevant laws. But this immunity reached after the putting together of struggle for 25 years. The Little Swan factory is the Chinese most valuable goods company too. Its household appliances are present all over the global markets. The factory has many units and one unit would take hours and hours if one would want to visit it thoroughly. A birds eyes view of the factory would even consume two to three hours. The Chinese interpreter was guiding us on the performance and processing of goods at the factory and we were given headphone as there was noise. Mr. Chia came close to me and said, you look American FBI, as I pinned the headset on my coats upper pocket. Well, I looked at him and smiled. MR. Chias knowledge about the female gender was seen unleashing as the number of days for going home was drawing closer. Having taken the lunch and standing in the open square of the JISQ, Mr. Chia began to tell his horrible truth, the China developed. Chinese woman no developed. No beautiful. I no found. No seen. We were shocked as the ladies who passed y us could have heard all that and must have been hurt could they understand English and especially the Chia-type-English. Well, as we looked at one another, Chia said further, they all alike. Looking same. There was a roar of laughter. Chias heart has been aching due to the fac tor that all the ladies looked alike and thus he was not to see any variations. Actually Chia was counting days at his finger tips. He was homesick!
Down on the earthen couch Lies the beauty of east, In slumber so sweet, In innocence of beats. The silk is shaken on her face, The hair blown in midst of grace, So terrific an attire, So sweet a satire! Rising like the neck of perfection, There is so much of the affection, A little smile at a little pace,
THE CITY AT SLEEP

Where is my time, where is my space? Some call her illusion, A matter purely delusion, But she is so well sedate, Yeah true, she is but a maze. And beauty sleeps on the couch so soft, The air, the sky and the space around, All still, all void of motion, thus halt, Is she real or just mine a mental fault?

Wuxi City Lab & Little Swan Factory Wuxi City Jiangsu Province

Chia was a man who could not be controlled by the use of words. Expressions control was useless as when words could not work, how come the expressions could. His was a discreet personality which would sometimes precipitate and other times sublimate and at times crystallize. He had a chemistry of his own. Well, we had no option but to run for recourse to Digits which have been always powerful, more powerful than words. Indeed digits existed when words were not born even. So taking Chia to mathematics was a good idea. The variations found in his personality when gauged in the simplest arithmetic terms came out to make such combinations:Ch=S/InAc+ {(C-So) + (Wn+Ab)2 } Where;

The equation was named as Chia equation of Personality Discontinuity. We could never get the guts to fill in the numbers and further end the mathematics. It fell beyond our sphere of power. It was impossible then as it is impossible now. Actually the above equation could not be done mathematics with also due to the fact that we never got to know which of the above symbols were to be how many numbered? It might have been the short time we had with Mr. Chia. He was a person with such a versatile personality dimensions that comprehending him in totality was a hard nut to crack especially when your teeth were your own! Being international citizens requires its own norms, conditions and pre requisites. In fact to be an international citizen in this globalised world needs some pains and some sacrifices. If one remains within the whims and designs of ones own much owned world, he cannot be said to qualify for being an international citizen. The world has shrunken into a household where interactions are so rapid and so frequent that it is all the same if being in your country this night and tomorrow staying elsewhere. The broad mindedness is one of the basic and fundemtal features of being an internationalist. For instance you are visiting the Pagoda in Changzhou and as you are standing by the great bell in its head tower, and your soft phone begins to play Azaan and you allow it to be played, this would be embarrassing. Actually the matter is not objectionable but it has its own impressions and impressions are stronger than realities. Playing Azaan in the Pagoda full of Buddha statues would give a very awkward state and a mirage impression. The problem with us all is that we do not walk the pace of time. What we need to do at some point of time we do not do it, and at other improper times, we do it vehemently which is not only wrong but by all means unjustifiable. Respect is always two way traffic, and thanks to Shakeel who agreed with at least one of my proposals. I recalled the tale of Hazrat Omar RA who when entered Palestine as a conqueror and it was the time of prayer so he decided to go for it and began

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

Ch definite stands for Mr. Chia, S stands for seriousness in thought, InAc stands for innocence in action, C stands for care freeness, So stands for sobriety, Wn stands for wander wall effect, and Ab stands for above average Normalcy.

coming out of the Church. The clergy threw an ironic proposal that since the Muslims believed each land if clean was okay for prayer so why Omar RA was going out. And the great caliph of Allah replied, if I offered
prayer today in your Church, my followers tomorrow would convert this Church into a Masjid and your Church would be a tale of antiquity and I verily do not want that to happen.

As said earlier, our friends Memon and Zafar were masters with the Chinese then. They had been in the city for longer than a month and they were quite good at ditching the Chinese bargainers. We had a venture with them as one day they threw an idea of visiting a mall. We were in the Creefree Mall on Heping road. It was a two storey mall and had all the necessities of life from edibles to garments and from toys to crockery. We were blessed to have the company of Zafar and Memon. As we were making purchases in the mall and checking for things, Zafar did one drawing there with a saleswoman. Zafar made her a painting. The drawing was such that I wished I could have had reasonable aesthetic number of words to describe it. It was more elevated than Mona Lisa and was drawn on such a fabric or canvass that even Picasso would fail to do. It was a drawing showing the utmost natural needs of a man. A man when pushed to the very ultimate end of survival generated such impressions. There were no colors used in the painting yet it was so absorbing that the watcher would paint it with his colors and it was therefore too colorful. It was an open drawing which needed no explanations because it reflected the human need and the need was shared by the entire human all alike. The painting was above all sketch rules of design, lines and space. It could go out of the frame and yet it could be well understood. Another most critical point of centerpiece interest in the painting was that it was drawn within a very short period of time and just as it was drawn it was displayed for public eyes. The saleswoman had never seen such a painting before. She ran before us and was showing the painting to other girls and guys in the mall. Actually, Memon sahib was the cause and reason of this painting as it was drawn by an impression that was gathered from him but once drawn it became to represent each one of the six billion people of the world. At that evening we discovered how great an asset in form of Zafar we had. Other than that, the language of lines was also discovered. Painting is the language which is commonly spoken and understood by the six billion people of the world and by that qualification it is the largest language spoken in the entire history of mankind. We really appreciated the rich painting talents that Zafar mastered all the way from the mall to the hotel where we separated and went to our rooms. The night went toxic under the loads of his sketch-art. Chinese were very mountebank business men. They were profit oriented. Of the loss, they had never imagined and could never bear and this fell to stand as the flaw as it reduced their entrepreneurship spirit and also set aside the sense for competitiveness. Much pampered, controlled, dictated and guided by the Government in all throughout the reformative economic era, never cognizant of the loss they were. Dealing with them would be just as dealing with the traditional and tricky Pathan business man. We found the reason as to why the Pathans were such formidable business men and the reason discovered was that they were having the imprints of the Chinese. Much affected by them, the relation had been fortified by other allied agents such as wisdom, prudence and above all profit! To quote just an incident, there was a computer shop that we visited one day as Shakeel was interested in buying a laptop. We, just for the sake of convenience, noted the price of a laptop that was Dell Corei3. We went there again to revisit the shop on December 15, 2013. It was all different. It would be in notice of many who might have happened to visit England or any European country and the USA that as and when the Christmas arrived, the prices of the things would begin to reduce. The prices of the things would be lowered to as much as 90% of the original prices on different commodities in the last week before the Christmas. It was usually called the Christmas austerity. The Chinese had also decorated their shops with all the sales women and men wearing the Santa Claus dress. I was happy as I thought it was hot time to shop but all the hopes were washed away by the economic steel wits of the Chinese. The laptop that we had checked on the other day cost and labeled as Yuan 3200, and as we checked it the next time, the Christmas proximity time zone, it was raised up to Yuan 3999. Very clever! But was it clever enough to satisfy the inquisitive brains such as ours or of other foreigners? No, it failed to get that end. And cleverer was their label which they had then, from nowhere, pasted at the very top of the laptop readable clearly as 20% OFF. It was too clever but it was not digestible. Christmas was celebrated in the west the same way as in China but in the west the prices would lower down and in China they skyrocketed! Much expensive a Christmas shopping it were, we dropped the idea of buying the laptop as we thought it would be better to buy the same once the Christmas was over! The Chea equation of personality discontinuity was fully operational as days went by and as we stepped closer to the closure. Sometimes he would talk childish and at times he would go so abysmal in thoughts of

peroration. Sometimes he was like an open book and at times totally recondite. As we sat across the table one night after dinner when the Christmas Carroll lighted and blinked outside the hotel window, Chia took to debate Love. First it started off bad and casual but then he said some things which could be said only by some brains. I had to reproduce his messages because if stated in his English, it would be understood by only few-by few I mean just those who were present in that discussion that night. The imperative spirit of Chia-dictum had not been tampered with in the reproduction.
It is not definitive in love to achieve certain ends with regards to human desires. Love is one such feeling which is very m uch human, but at the same time it departs from the fundamental human principles of desire, fulfillment and accomplishment. Love is one such feeling that perpetuates itself and gets multiplicity as time walks on it. Under the heavy sands of time, love never dies. It prospers into more glamour and it flowers beneath the apparent sands of time. The interior of the desert flowered by love is more beautiful than the gardens of Eden. It is one such feeling that lives on despite the physical existence of people may not remain to sustain it. The blessings remain prevailing and like clouds they remain floating on our heads. Those who believe in the true spirit of doing it do it and once done it lives on. Love is a matter of remembrance and remembrance of calmness and contentment. The timely seemingly actions may bring us joy but then recalling them in remembrance will always jolt the conscience and one would implore, oh Lord, snatch my memory. What great an ailment the memory is. The remembrance of true love always has the otherwise positive appeal for remembering t he things in very odd ways. Somewhere someone may be holding up you in appeal and inspiration, and that would cause positive energy and we know energy is faster than light. It is the accumulative energies of love that has held together the mighty universe which has now grown and expanded into a multiverse. Attraction is the basic cause that has given existence to this celestial cluster of ours. But then again, it is the force of attraction and not repulsion that has held together. Love in other words is the gravitational force of attraction that through its forces and elements of celestial energy has sustained that very universe or set of universes that we so proudly claim as ours. It can extend to any part in no give time. It is the mechanical superiority of love that it remains eternal to its core. These are the attributes which have qualified love to be termed as Immortal.

That night each one of us went to our rooms with a different thought on heads. The impressions are like snow on the deserts face. They can change in the shortest of moments. The Chia impressions of ours had changed, a lot. Well, the next morning as we woke up, we woke with a new vigor. Chea was now to us a different person. A person who had both superficial and abysmal postures. The excursion was towards the scenic spots of Wuxi city and we had waken up though I got delayed by little time for which I presented my apologies to the lady hawk and to all the participants panting in the bus. The Lingshan Grand Budddha and the co-existent scenic infotainment spot of the Wuxi City were one of the citys most extolling attractions. The grand Buddha stood rock solid and high in the air on the Lingshan terrains in the Wuxi city. It even as seen from the downward slope would seem rising higher than the mountain that fell in its backdrop. The grand Buddha statue was a more than 700 tons of copper being piled up and shaped into a Buddha on the chest of which was an embossed swastika. The Buddha was visible as soon as you entered the premises of this center of heritage. The day we visited was chill cold and the air was surfing with clouds. It was again as usual an admixture of smog and cloud. With this blending weather, we were in hot cloths. It was a great elevation from the ground thus the winds blew horrific. Shakeel however was trembling in wake of his very little health and the weak body which had the clothing of flesh and meat in very sparing amounts. Well, the day his hands would tremble was my bad day because all my pictures would come out to be trembling too thus falling off the index and getting beyond the digital canvass. There were beautiful gates or gateways which one crossed on the way towards reaching the rising grand Buddha. The gates were reminiscent of the old and ancient Chinese cities such as the Forbidden City. The grand Buddha was an 88 meter in height. It was made of 725 tons of copper. More than 2000 iron ore plates had been welded together to raise the structure. Standing on the so called ground where from the grand Buddha could be seen lifting high in the air, the Buddha seemed to be at an altitude of more than 1500 feet. These 1500 feet were covered and broken into stairs. The number of stairs fell in perhaps hundreds of hundreds. The stairs were elephant-styled and easy to rise up to. There were some cars too which were like trolleys covered in plastic sheet that took people from the entrance gate up to a certain height. We were however not facilitated with that but it was better because we saw a lot of attractive places in reaching there at the lap of the grand Buddha which we would have missed had we gone by that transportation thing. Well, standing by the feet of Buddha one could see the whole of the Wuxi in a beautiful manner but we could see a certain distance as we had an admixture-day-in-air! Chea was blessed enough as he offered a jiffy prayer in front of the grand Buddha kneeling down on his knees and praying a while. The whole of the area around was covered in green; the mountains, the plains and the hills, all in green attires. Down the grand Buddha in the dormitory were hundreds of Statues and the so called temple were lit in red, yellow and other kinds of lights. The watchmen or the guides who were sitting there were yawning with slumber and tired of sleep. The one

was sleeping badly and the other was half awake. In China such irresponsible officials at duty are very rare to be seen but we saw them that day. Beside the grand Buddha as we came down, there was a theatrical performance on the ancient Chinese cultural traits and folklores. The doom in which we were to be shown the movie or performance as it was live was a mega structure. It was illuminating with different lights. There were hundreds of chairs and perhaps thousands could be fit into the hall. The screen went throughout the hall. The performance was superb. At times as the music would go wild and the up beats would create a heart thrill, I really craved to stand up and lead the show. But I had a friend like Shakeel who was always present with his nice and timely pieces of advice like the travel guide who accompanied us today. She was very friendly and cooperative though our Egyptian friend was very interested in establishing peaceful and coexistent relationship everywhere as he was quite cool-a-guy, friendly indeed. He was so found of creating and establishing relations whether he was ever welcomed or not. Well, his was the concept that it was never important to have been invited to a dine or not, but rather important thing was the dine itself. He began to ask very strange questions of opening-up like asking how to get married with a Chinese girl etc. There was a syndrome! The guide was good enough to reply all his questions though the PRC had not yet begun the social-opening like the economic-opening. The thing I liked about her the most were her expressions. These were not just expressions mastered by practice but these were too real as these were uttered as and when the English would fall into a difficult situation. She would suck together her teeth giving an impression of cold. She would talk in different voices and different tones when narrating a story that involved a conversation between various characters. Her language was full of expressions and perhaps this was the need and demand of her job, too, as travel agent. Her expressions were created out of art on one side and the deficiency of proper English vocabulary at the other. But like all the travel agencies, her agency was also ways and ways after lucrative profits and savings.

The Mickeys show of words decorated in expressions was really seen the day we visited Shanghai. She was phenomenal in terms of her expressions. She was very expressive and making faces with actions of body and words and then she was not fake enough not to smile and laugh at what was perceived as comic. She laughed and enjoyed it as much as did we. In shanghai we took the night ferry cruise. Oh, it was filled with whimsicalities. The wind was blowing bitterly on the deck. All our dear collogues just went and sit in a well heated hall as we strolled and enjoyed the shanghai night with all its glamour and pomp. I wish I could have stayed and overstayed in shanghai. It was New York by all means. Revantino was well enough to suggest it was the city if lights. The return to Changzhou took place in the heart of night and the night journeys have always been so fascinating for me, so much full of romance and truth. Sometimes like an aberration, I thought she looked back, and she looked back just to look at me! She looked back in fast and she looked back in action. But that was just for a moment, but it is as true as death that happiness is the creation of the shortest Moment. Shanghai was joy.

The Changzhou mantra went sweet and lyrical. The management Sam, Ashley, Sarah and Alicia all offered the traditional assistance that China is well known for. Shakeel, my accompanier, I wish to have more journeys with him again. Abdullah from Sudan a smiling young man with lots of charismatic qualities. And of course

how can I drop mentioning the Beautiful Sri Lankans, our dear, youthful friends, the loving Palestinians and the dear Egyptians and all other friends. The only lady Rachel and Mikey, oh yeah, they were too social. And Felix, Namibian, who most of the times rallied under the terror of Mr. Chea was also a friendly guy. In the last but none the least, a million praises toguess who?...yeah, right, the twin stars, the binary-system-the lovely baby like stuffy, softy, and fluffy REVANTINO and the ever mercurial and the heart full of love, my dear Chea Savron! It was very well spent a time at Changzhou with all its beauties and memories. Life at the end is but a collection of memories and memories may excite just as they may haunt. Memories are the bits that form up the world of a man, they are the beads of wreathe. Life being like a tree, it gets its autumn and the autumnal leaves are scattered broking from the branches having seen the tides of all seasons. The life and time are so perpendicular to one another that the one lives on the other and other sustains on the former, and thus the cart is pushed forth, the clock is ticking and life moves ahead. We are unknown to one another, and then without our notice, we become so intimately close, and then again without our notice, we separate, and then again we remain connected till death in terms of beautiful memories devoid of hidden interests and bad opinions. Better memories are priority number first in ones life as at the end life is but a collection of these memories and better memories are the causes and effects of better acts, so life demands nice, kind and pleasant actions all the time as each elapsing moment of life is converting into a bit of memory. The Changzhou love affair was filled with love, glamour, romance, lessons and excitement-a nice memory bit to the mega thread-pile. ***

Life is a making of memories, and Memories are the offsprings of life-actions.

Dr. J. S. Brown