URSABLOG: Shanghai Revisited

In the last week I have had to admit to myself that reading about China, however diligently and widely, is not the same as being in China. In fact, I have been somewhat dismayed by how western media is portraying China to us, because the reality, on the ground, is not the same. This biased reporting is harmful both to the Chinese and to us; assumptions made – at many different levels – can blind us not only to the realities but to opportunities. And funnily enough – at least in my point of view – the Chinese that I met in the last week are a lot better informed about us than we are about them.

I hadn’t been in China since before COVID so I was naturally curious to see how things had changed. Seeing is believing, so when I received an invitation to give a lecture to undergraduates at the Shanghai Maritime University I jumped at the chance.

My flight arrived in Shanghai early morning last Sunday – eye-blearingly early – and I witnessed the first change: the ubiquitous use of apps, in particular WeChat, AliPay and DiDi to deal with all areas of life. Despite my brain working at jetlag speed I nonetheless managed to navigate the taxi rank, and get a cab to the hotel, and pay the driver all through my mobile phone. This was to become the pattern of the week: I didn’t touch the spare cash I had brought with me left over from my last trip.

Now before you start complaining about surveillance culture and Big Brother, cashless travel has also been my experience in those bastions of liberal based democracies – Sweden and  Denmark – in the last eight years or so. WeChat is however something else: it’s WhatsApp, Uber, Instagram and TikTok  and all your bank cards in one place for use everywhere and at the same time. I never felt as though I was being monitored; I was aware of surveillance and cameras but it wasn’t oppressive – it didn’t feel that Big Brother was watching me. In fact in most places as I was walking around, it felt like the cameras – and police presence – were on a par with your average medium-sized UK city.

My initial impression was that the city was very efficient, well laid out and calm. In fact it felt at times – especially on the Pudong side of the Huangpu River – like Singapore – green, clean and boring. There’s nothing wrong with that of course, but I wondered why.

The more time I spent there, the more I understood. Firstly, electric cars are everywhere. All of my taxis were electric of various brands – some I had heard of, some completely new to me – so this cuts down on exhaust gas and noise. Indeed, all the scooters were electric too, but I found them dangerous: they crept up on me with silent intent down dedicated lanes on either sides of the wide boulevards. As long as they stayed within them they were safe, but once around the intersections they gleefully crisscrossed pedestrian crossings and went against the traffic leading me to jump out of the way in alarm. A silent stealth version of Athens perhaps – so once I knew what was likely to happen I was better prepared.

Secondly, there weas very little new construction taking place, in Pudong and downtown Shanghai at least, so there was very little dust in the air and dirt on the roads. Things looked great, but there was no real evidence of further growth, or the upgrading of buildings from the 1990s and early 2000s – which I remember going up at the time. These were looking a bit tired and dated; they have not aged well.

Thirdly, was the omnipresent  impressions of a post-COVID trauma syndrome. Most people I met spoke of this: people were not going out as much, preferred to stay at home, and spend their money online. The consequent effects on daily life and – so I imagine – the local economy, are evident.

I felt that the people I spoke to about this had a need to get it off their chests, as if by speaking about it – again – they could somehow heal and move on. They talked about their families being separated, not being able to even go outside their apartments, not for exercise, not for shopping, not for anything. This was in the last stage, at the end of 2021, when spontaneous protests erupted in Shanghai everywhere. Those locked in their flats could not order food to be delivered, from supermarkets, restaurants, from anywhere. They had to make do with the food they had in the house, and rationed it because they did not know when relief would arrive. They were told that the state would provide, but it took the state at least two weeks to begin delivering food to households. No wonder they are still trying to get it out of their systems.

And the poor guys that were delivering food had to live in makeshift tent cities – under flyovers, alongside trainlines and motorways – isolated from their own families, and quarantined amongst each other. The protests – when they did happen – were unorganised and therefore uncontrollable, and the only response in the end was a universal lifting of restrictions. But the damage had already been done.

I felt this keenly. I remembered Shanghai as a party town, a busy town, a buzzy town where random connections were possible, and drink, fun and noise were part of the landscape much more so than in other cities in China. And whilst my various hosts were very generous and hospitable during my time there – the food was amazing – there wasn’t the same easy-going atmosphere I remembered.

Another thing I noticed was that there were very few expats around, or Western tourists for that matter. I was reliably informed by various friends that at least 80% of expats had left since COVID. That may explain the lack of noise too. A friend and I stopped off for a final drink on Friday evening in the lobby bar at the Langham Hotel, right in the centre of fashionable Shanghai. I could not get the Negroni I asked for, it could only be one from the prescribed list. There were no other customers. It was eleven o’clock.

Outside on the street – waiting for my Didi ride to arrive – I saw a young woman talk harangue a mobile phone on a stand at head height. This was, my friend told me, another feature of Shanghai these days: everyone – I mean everyone – was glued to their phones. I spent some time scrolling through the various stories on WeChat. Life is – apparently from the small sample provided for me – money and brand driven AI-enhanced impossibly beautiful women in various suggestive – but not too explicit – poses, cooking and food, various episodes of conspicuous spending in exotic locations, action scenes and funny sketches about ‘normal’ family life. I got bored very quickly.

But back in the real world, other things remained the same, very much so.

The students I taught were like undergraduate students everywhere – 10% super keen, 40% showing some interest, the rest on their phones, but the interested 50% were surprisingly engaged. I had been given guidance on how I should lecture, what I could say, and what I shouldn’t – I was told not to expect much reaction – so I was rather concerned I would be teaching to a wall of silent blank faces. But I need not have worried; by the end I had the attention of everyone.

Their main concerns – nothing about work-life balance thank God – were about USTR 301 (in fact this was the concern of many I talked to), and what skills and qualifications were needed to work in shipping. But generally I was pleasantly surprised how well informed they were about the global shipping markets.

The Trump administration came up a lot everywhere, and after a while I began to see why. Outside of China – and America I guess – we are coming to terms with how this affects us and what steps we can take to mitigate – or take advantage of – the situation. Inside China – dangerously so in my view – they are taking it personally. The more thoughtful people were hurt and puzzled why an old friend is not only no longer talking to them, but why are they making up stories behind their backs that are simply not true. Whilst this was particularly true of those involved in shipbuilding and finance it was evident elsewhere too.

That said, compared to my last visit there was less obvious and general anti-foreigner feeling, and more genuine warmth in the normal and ordinary people I met. I had the feeling they were glad that I had come.

As for shipping itself I think that the market there is maturing in such a way that is undercutting established ways of doing business as China increases its power. What I would call ‘colonial style’ investment by western business is being eased out – or becoming less relevant – as a more grass roots (or maybe lotus roots) culture develops. The assumption that bribery and corruption can still get you places is fading. Drinking is still part of the culture – thank God – but there is an increasing desire for professionalism, and home-grown professionalism at that.

Or is this wishful thinking? Maybe because I engaged with the students at the SMU makes me a little rosy eyed about the energy I found there. Maybe it was the fact that I went almost everywhere by Didi ride, and it went so smoothly that I will miss it. Time will tell.

But Pudong is not Shanghai, and Shanghai is not China. It is very hard to get an angle on the whole of the country just by a week’s visit to Shanghai, Pudong, and the Shanghai Maritime University. But in my travels in the region, limited as they were, I would say that the consumer market is subdued, animal spirits are low, and there is little construction – residential or otherwise – taking place anywhere.

There is a picture above my desk at home, as I write this now: an original ink painting of a lotus flower that I bought during my last visit to China pre-COVID. I thought of it often when I was in Shanghai as the flower represents many interconnected things in Chinese culture:

Purity and sanctity

Integrity and honesty

Good fortune and auspiciousness

Love and romance

Beauty

Friendship

Granted, not all of the above immediately come to mind when thinking of shipping – especially shipbroking – but the general theme is that the flower rises every day and opens out of muddy swampy ground rising above the muck to become a thing of beauty. We are a part of our daily lives, messy and murky as it may be, but we can rise above it. I sensed this regrowth, this desire for better things in almost all of my time in Shanghai.

And as I made the final leg home this morning – after a long sleep-deprived flight back to Athens – my head was buzzing with memories, impressions, ideas, plans, opportunities. But as the taxi (a Tesla as it turned out) wound its way around Imittos, and I gazed fondly out across the city scape towards the familiar mountains looking protectively down on this ancient city, I felt at peace, like a ship that had travelled far, and voyaged into seas and ports that had been visited before, but had now been seen anew, with fresh eyes, eyes open for opportunity. The ship has now returned, and is in its home port, resting, refuelling and absorbing the lessons learnt, all the while impatient to set off again.

Simon Ward