China First impressions

I visited China almost 3 years ago, and I vividly recall the words of our guide.
He said wisely-
"When you have been in China for a week - you feel like you could write a book; after a month, perhaps only a chapter- and after a year, it feels impossible to write anything accurately about the enigma that is China"

I am going to risk a few first impressions.....

Colour
RED - everywhere, day and night. Red signs, red paint , red lights, red lanterns, red shoes, red trucks. Get into the business of selling RED and you are made.
It is associated with luck and prosperity

Walls
I guess it is stating the obvious to say that the Chinese have an obsession with walls - given that they are the owners of the most famous wall of all time!
But it feels more than that. Walls line roads, they enclose compounds, they are often gated and they lend an air of secrecy. I am often left wondering as to the activities behind those intimidating structures..

Smells
My children will tell you that I have almost zero sense of smell - an attribute they think is ideally suited to my profession of medicine. However - here in China I am constantly accousted by strong odour.
In the country - animal odour fills the air, along with smells of chillies which lie drying in the sun. We pass beehives and honey smell fills the air. Next the unmistakable whiff of human excreta, mixed with heavy cigarette smoke, but we pass ladies in a town and perfume wafts into our nostrils.
Even hotels smell different. Is it the suspect plumbing, or kitchen smells wafting through the air conditioning?
Garlic, cabbage, fish, liver, - I seem to have smelt them all.
And a seasonal smell right now- melons of every type and their unmistakable smell as they age and rot.
The smell along the roads is often of diesel fumes and other pollutants - and I am sad about that.

Children
Definately fewer than are seen on African roadsides- and boys do predominate, although I suspect many of the girls are hard at work with their mothers. Toddlers while being potty trained have slits in the crotch of their pants- hence you often have to mind your step in towns.

Order juxaposed with disorder
Uniformed bank employees all out on the sidewalk in neat rows, doing Tai Chi to music while the traffic around them seems to obey no rules. Even the pavements are not out of bounds to motorised transport.

I am illiterate
I can neither read or vaguely decipher the simplest of signs. Town names remain a mystery. Warnings are meaningless, even writing down a name in Chinglish meets with blank stares. I feel like a dumb, rather slow child, totally at the mercy of those who know better than I do...

Smiles vs reserve
I meet both. Often there seems a pleasure at the meeting of a westerner - at other times distinct hostility.
I do wonder that if in this predominantly Muslim area, there is a suspicion of Westerners - seen as Americans, who may harbour anti muslim sentiments

Massage

The Chinese are the absolute masters. I had an hour long massage- every muscle in my body, face and head was beaten, pushed, rubbed, thumped - and I staggered out- almost gasping, but next day I felt like a new being!

Environment
Atrocious air pollution, but a national recycling programme. Scrap metal is all re- used and every last tyre seems to find a use. Many earn their living from scavanging recyclable items - makes for a trash free highway

Perhaps by next month I may have revised all of these!!