In east China’s
Shandong Peninsula (胶东半岛), there was a city
that had lush green trees inlaid with pitched
red roofs, and deep blue sea extended to meet
the clear blue skies. But this only
represented half of its face; the other half
in the downtown area was the image of a town
seriously run-down.
It all started in
1891, when Chinese army set up a military
base at a fishing village by the Yellow Sea.
Half a dozen years late, the area was
colonised by Germans who began to construct
Little Germany in the East, the result was
the splendid Eight Villas (八大处) and shabby settlements of
Chinese construction workers and labourers.
After one and half dozen years, Germany in
the East was lost to the Japan of the East.
During the later stages in the city history,
it had been repeatedly liberated and
re-occupied, until 1949 when all the invaders
were driven out of the mainland China. By
then Qingdao was a strange mixture of
astonishingly posh suburbs along the
coastline where the foreigners used to
inhabit, and a slum downtown area that alien
occupiers made the locals to live. And this
double-faced city scene hadn’t changed much
for next forty or fifty years.
Then a grand
opportunity knocked its door. That is not
just because it has joined the rest of the
country in China’s effect to reinvent
itself physically, but also because it has
been selected to host the sailing competition
event as part of the Beijing Olympics in
2008.
And that finally and
rapidly transformed the ugly half of Qingdao
to match the gorgeous half.
A happy ending seems.
But soon many people have discovered that its
beauty is merely skin deep, beneath the
dazzling appearance the disease of serious
malpractice and raging corruption spreads.
Right from the international design tender
for the Olympic Sailing project in 2002 to
recent global bidding invitation for the
Cross-sea Bridge construction, behind the
complicated decision-making process was a
simple deciding factor: bribery.
As the result of mayor
Du Shicheng’s active promotion, the city of
6 million people has crowded with nearly 800
real estate development companies. In some
areas the housing prices doubled every year,
well matching those in Shanghai or Guangzhou.
While as many as eight golf courses were
planed to be built, many city’s residents
still have to cram themselves into slum abode
penghuqu (棚户区) inherited from the
occupation eras.
For this Qingdao is
dubbed by the locals as Mop with Golden Lace
(金边抹布) – a slummy city
surrounded by luxury outskirts; and Mayor Du
Shicheng is nicknamed Dusicheng (毒死城 meaning citicide), reflecting
what they think he has done to the city, just
like what pesticide does to pests.
When he was formally
charged for property development related
corruption last Saturday, December 23,
firecrackers sounded everywhere in the city,
and the web site of a local news service was
flooded with responses to the point that the
network was soon crashed. The locals viewed
it as the best Christmas present they’ve
received.
For a man who began
his career as a humble village teacher in
Confucian’s home province and rose to a
position of national prominence, sadly he has
failed to deliver another example of elevated
humanity, but become a depressed footnote to
the history. And Qingdao, a double-faced
legendary city, has been transformed by him
and his associates into a double-charactered
metropolitan, half angel, half devil.
