Sep 14 2005
The Smell of the Cities
Some of the streets in Beijing and Shanghai smell really really bad.
In my first night in Shanghai, I was awoken by a piercing smell of baaad swage. The same way how noise worked, that faul odor first entered my dream then totally pulled me out of it.
When I came to Beijing, the smell was a little different but equally nauseating. Man must have a stronger aversion to faul smells than to disturbing noise or sight: for I found myself utterly lack of lingual capacity, in either English or Chinese, to describe or differentiate the smells.
Beijing’s taxi drivers told me the smells came from the drainage ducts along side the streets. Many restaurants used them as dumpsters.
I am not sure I am totally convinced by this. But visitor be fore-warned!