where two (or three) wheels can take you

These commuters drove past me just a few minutes apart on the same Chengdu morning. A local wouldn't even give them a second glance.

Have a large piece of foam core that needs to get somewhere?

Just make sure you can still reach the handlebars.


Need to go where where cute shoes and tights are appreciated?

One of you can just stand on the running board.


What about a family of three?

Hop on. You can even fit a bag of groceries between the driver's legs.


Have some cardboard that needs to get recycled?

Just tie it on and don't get hit by the truck with the tree trunks while lighting your cigarette.


And this stuff with a lady's face on it. Can you get it where it needs to go?

Of course. I can even cross my legs along the way.

this is not fog

Today the AQI was 453 when we woke up. For those of you who happily don't need to know such things, this means the air quality was scientifically defined as "hazardous." At levels beyond 500 the chart simply says, "Beyond Index."

With these levels of pollution the air takes on weight. It makes the dog's fur feel gritty. It obscures the view. Just ask the buildings in the photo above.

Buildings? Yes. A whole missing backdrop of them. (See below for a day when the air quality dipped to about 80.)

I wore a mask when I went to walk the dog (and take these photos) but most people did not. And I was surprised to see that the neighbors still had their windows open. 

Sure, high levels of pollution are considered normal here. Anything even close to the numbers that we regularly see would cause alarm elsewhere. For example, New York was at 35 the last time we checked and on a trip to Singapore we saw newspaper articles in a state of panic when their numbers spiked near 80.

But today's pollution was bad even compared to Chengdu normal. The photo above is from this morning. The photo below is from the same spot a week ago. 

I'm not asking for blue skies. I know better than that.

At this point I'd be happy just to see the buildings on the ground.

not the same as usual

This is the Chengdu fog. 

This is too.

People here have a habit of calling any grey pall that fuzzes the city “fog.” Admittedly it’s way less depressing than pointing out the brew of chemicals and particulate matter that we’re all sucking down daily.

But this past Sunday if you said it was foggy you weren’t sugarcoating the truth. We woke up and couldn’t even see the building whose appearance we normally use to gauge the pollution.

Our first thought was to check the AQI. It was only “unhealthy” so we turned to nature.

Nature?

It’s good to be reminded there is such a thing since we don’t go outside much. We also don't let the air come in if we can help it.

We might be alone in that. We were talking with a western doctor about air pollution and he said his local patients don’t believe him when he says they should close their windows. They respond that fresh air is healthy and that living in a closed house isn’t good for you.

He explains how 50 years ago it was a good idea to open the windows - what with diseases at the time and the cleaner air - but not anymore. Now… now fresh air is no longer good for you.

He told us they don’t believe him.

(We believed him and we enjoyed the fog from inside.)

what do you want for your birthday?

A cake.

It’s a simple answer but not so simple when you get to the part about making the homemade caramel and whipping together the buttercream; trimming the cake ends and cutting the layers. This is what 15 eggs, 8 sticks of butter, and 5 cups of sugar can become. A brown-sugar layer cake with salted caramel buttercream frosting. Made from scratch. 

Thank you Shi-wen.