#15: Lost on Planet China: One Man’s Attempt to Understand the World’s Most Mystifying Nation by L. Maarten Troost (2008) The first time I landed in Shanghai, I couldn’t believe how big everything […]
Revisiting "Planet China" with J. Maarten Troost
China at the World Expo: Larger than larger-than-life
Part three in a series from China China is larger than life. It boasts the world’s largest population. It has the world’s fastest growing economy. It embodies the most dramatic social contrasts. […]
Around the world in a day
Part two in a series from China “Welcome to Shanghai,” the banners along the highway say. “Better city, better life.” At first I mistake it for propaganda promoting some kind of urban […]
China: The land of tomorrow
Part one in a series from China The daylight never leaves us. We race against the earth’s rotation, our speed varying anywhere from 495 miles per hour to 600, forty-thousand feet up. […]
China, Day Three: Shanghai, the new dawn for China
Third in a series Shanghai wakes up quietly, as if it doesn’t want to rouse its inhabitants. The Shanghai skyline at night along the west bank of the Huangpu River. In Yu […]
China, Day One: Shanghai and smallness
First in a series China has a way of making me feel small. It started the moment I stepped into the terminal at Pudong International Airport in Shanghai. It was about ten […]
Progressive Culture | Scholars & Rogues 