Mark Kreidler: Shanghai: Where old, new coexist
By Mark Kreidler -- Bee Sports Columnist
Published 5:45 am PDT Wednesday, October 13, 2004
SHANGHAI, China - If you had to pull up a single image as the representation of China at this very moment, Tuesday in Shanghai, mid-afternoon, might have worked.
Sliding almost sideways across the seat as the taxi slammed from left lane to right, I caught a two-second glimpse of the whole deal before my vision blurred (jet lag). Here we were, in a nearly new car, traversing an incredibly old street, blowing past a cutting-edge upscale salon that sat next to a decrepit and empty building, and in the process nearly bumping a Mercedes and knocking over a young man on an ancient bicycle pulling a wagon piled high with what looked to be random scraps of metal and pipes.
Shanghai is a city in which old meets new, and neither side actually wins. They simply find a way to coexist while the government decides which value it holds most dear - for now.
And at the moment, new is in, which explains the baffling array of shiny skyscrapers and ultramodern architecture that greeted the Kings and the Houston Rockets as the teams made their way here in advance of Thursday evening's (4:30 a.m. PDT) NBA exhibition game.
It also explains, frankly, the Kings and the Rockets being here at all.
While Yao Ming's presence on the Houston roster is the reason for this trip almost in its entirety, the other news at play is the Chinese government's continued awakening to the ways and the money of the West, a fact that might best be explained by my saying I'm sitting in the lobby of a Ritz-Carlton hotel, looking across the walkway at a Starbucks and a Tony Roma's rib house, while writing this little note back home.
The Kings and the Rockets are here, and it's a big event in every way that can be imagined. China's love of Yao, coupled with the fact Shanghai is his hometown, has created a mania over Thursday's game that is hard to describe.
When the Chinese authorities put tickets on sale a few months ago, they intended to open the offices at 10 one morning. The queues were so long and so difficult to manage that authorities finally gave up around 8:30 and ordered the booths open.
Every seat (the place holds a little more than 11,000) was sold in an hour.
Yao was on hand briefly Tuesday, making a Beatle-esque appearance at a news conference at Shanghai Stadium that had people on the sidewalk outside hanging in the window sills to get a glance of the great man saying things like, "I think we have a chance for a good season."
But, then, Yao understands. He understands the enormity of the NBA coming to China after an absence of more than three decades - and, really, the enormity of the NBA being here at all. This two-city event, which concludes with a game in Beijing on Sunday (Saturday night in California), might or might not stand as a watershed event in China-U.S. relations, but it almost certainly marks one more step along the road to the Beijing Olympics in the summer of 2008.
Beijing by that time will scarcely resemble the city so many people have known for so long. Just as here in Shanghai, where the towers and office buildings of PuDong sprang up over the past decade in a place where rice fields once sat, Beijing is tearing down and rebuilding itself for the '08 Games at a pace that would make industrialists bluff.
It all makes for a strange and compelling scene. Mike Bibby stood in the lobby of the hotel Tuesday, trying to talk on a cell phone, signing autographs for fans who stood utterly transfixed by the size and scale of this human being - and Bibby's only a guard. When Rockets assistant coach Patrick Ewing and center Dikembe Mutombo turned a corner, every other hotel activity ceased.
Out on the street, however, it was business as usual. Shanghai is still adjusting to its newer reliance on cars, which is a nice way of saying you've never taken a more terrifying taxi ride in your life than through the streets of this city, and in general, the place looks totally in flux - a part of the world where the old, old, old is still around, yet giving way rather quickly to all the new that is to come.
The Kings are sort of the Washington Generals in this whole basketball play, and I say that with all due fondness. Their role is as the designated opponent, and beyond a general goodwill and a chance to grow a little bit as teammates and human beings, they don't get much out of the deal - long plane rides, abbreviated practices and the two games.
Rick Adelman's bunch arrived late Monday after the long flight from Sacramento (via Anchorage), and so Tuesday, he basically just had his guys shoot a little while, then leave the old game venue, a place Chinese workers are desperately trying to dress up before the game. The workers spent much of the day rolling out thin red carpet around the walking areas inside Shanghai Stadium, covering up the bare floor or thin mat underneath. They'll have it ready in time for the game - or they won't. Either way, the NBA is in China and will be for the balance of the week. It's a very new thing. Which makes it, just now, the right thing.
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**the mods can put this in the "china games" thread if necessary.. i just put it here cause that thread has a lot of pages already..
By Mark Kreidler -- Bee Sports Columnist
Published 5:45 am PDT Wednesday, October 13, 2004
SHANGHAI, China - If you had to pull up a single image as the representation of China at this very moment, Tuesday in Shanghai, mid-afternoon, might have worked.
Sliding almost sideways across the seat as the taxi slammed from left lane to right, I caught a two-second glimpse of the whole deal before my vision blurred (jet lag). Here we were, in a nearly new car, traversing an incredibly old street, blowing past a cutting-edge upscale salon that sat next to a decrepit and empty building, and in the process nearly bumping a Mercedes and knocking over a young man on an ancient bicycle pulling a wagon piled high with what looked to be random scraps of metal and pipes.
Shanghai is a city in which old meets new, and neither side actually wins. They simply find a way to coexist while the government decides which value it holds most dear - for now.
And at the moment, new is in, which explains the baffling array of shiny skyscrapers and ultramodern architecture that greeted the Kings and the Houston Rockets as the teams made their way here in advance of Thursday evening's (4:30 a.m. PDT) NBA exhibition game.
It also explains, frankly, the Kings and the Rockets being here at all.
While Yao Ming's presence on the Houston roster is the reason for this trip almost in its entirety, the other news at play is the Chinese government's continued awakening to the ways and the money of the West, a fact that might best be explained by my saying I'm sitting in the lobby of a Ritz-Carlton hotel, looking across the walkway at a Starbucks and a Tony Roma's rib house, while writing this little note back home.
The Kings and the Rockets are here, and it's a big event in every way that can be imagined. China's love of Yao, coupled with the fact Shanghai is his hometown, has created a mania over Thursday's game that is hard to describe.
When the Chinese authorities put tickets on sale a few months ago, they intended to open the offices at 10 one morning. The queues were so long and so difficult to manage that authorities finally gave up around 8:30 and ordered the booths open.
Every seat (the place holds a little more than 11,000) was sold in an hour.
Yao was on hand briefly Tuesday, making a Beatle-esque appearance at a news conference at Shanghai Stadium that had people on the sidewalk outside hanging in the window sills to get a glance of the great man saying things like, "I think we have a chance for a good season."
But, then, Yao understands. He understands the enormity of the NBA coming to China after an absence of more than three decades - and, really, the enormity of the NBA being here at all. This two-city event, which concludes with a game in Beijing on Sunday (Saturday night in California), might or might not stand as a watershed event in China-U.S. relations, but it almost certainly marks one more step along the road to the Beijing Olympics in the summer of 2008.
Beijing by that time will scarcely resemble the city so many people have known for so long. Just as here in Shanghai, where the towers and office buildings of PuDong sprang up over the past decade in a place where rice fields once sat, Beijing is tearing down and rebuilding itself for the '08 Games at a pace that would make industrialists bluff.
It all makes for a strange and compelling scene. Mike Bibby stood in the lobby of the hotel Tuesday, trying to talk on a cell phone, signing autographs for fans who stood utterly transfixed by the size and scale of this human being - and Bibby's only a guard. When Rockets assistant coach Patrick Ewing and center Dikembe Mutombo turned a corner, every other hotel activity ceased.
Out on the street, however, it was business as usual. Shanghai is still adjusting to its newer reliance on cars, which is a nice way of saying you've never taken a more terrifying taxi ride in your life than through the streets of this city, and in general, the place looks totally in flux - a part of the world where the old, old, old is still around, yet giving way rather quickly to all the new that is to come.
The Kings are sort of the Washington Generals in this whole basketball play, and I say that with all due fondness. Their role is as the designated opponent, and beyond a general goodwill and a chance to grow a little bit as teammates and human beings, they don't get much out of the deal - long plane rides, abbreviated practices and the two games.
Rick Adelman's bunch arrived late Monday after the long flight from Sacramento (via Anchorage), and so Tuesday, he basically just had his guys shoot a little while, then leave the old game venue, a place Chinese workers are desperately trying to dress up before the game. The workers spent much of the day rolling out thin red carpet around the walking areas inside Shanghai Stadium, covering up the bare floor or thin mat underneath. They'll have it ready in time for the game - or they won't. Either way, the NBA is in China and will be for the balance of the week. It's a very new thing. Which makes it, just now, the right thing.
--------------------------------------------------
**the mods can put this in the "china games" thread if necessary.. i just put it here cause that thread has a lot of pages already..
