The Pulse Of China

(3 of 7)
Zhang sounds the ferry's horn at an oncoming barge. He is in favor of the controversial Three Gorges Dam, which, he says, will deepen the water and allow big ships to sail all the way upstream to Chongqing, bringing economic development in their wake. "We are only half developed compared with the Mississippi, where you have dams that make the water flatter and easier for shipping," he says. Like most Chinese today, he is fascinated by the wealth of the U.S. and by its political system. "Mao started the Cultural Revolution on his own. Even if you want to start a war in the U.S., the President has to go through Congress first," he says admiringly. As he starts talking about China's drive to catch up with the U.S., the ferry draws alongside a large, modern cruise ship. "There, you see! That big cruise ship is America: big, comfortable, but slow. Our boat is like China: dirty, poor, but faster. We are developing more quickly." He gives another triumphal tug on the horn.

From high on the hill in the riverside town of Wanxian, Gu Xiaoli looks out over the boat dock from her kitchen window and sighs. She is cooking a modest dinner of rice soup, pigs' feet and steamed buns. In the past two years, she, her husband and her son have all been laid off from textile factories in the town. With their combined pensions of $100 a month, they also have to support her 85-year-old father. Her biggest worry is for her son. After being laid off, he opened a restaurant that failed; then he got a driver's license but soon discovered the town already had too many taxi drivers. Now he hopes to get a job with a Hong Kong company setting up in the town.

"We hope things will get better for him. He's 30 now, but he can't find a good wife without a job. Right now we are saving all we can." Her son chimes in for the first time: "In China it's like one big experiment now. And we are the test subjects." Gu Xiaoli ignores his bitter tone. "In China things will get better. But there are so many people."

From Wanxian, the river grows narrower, hemmed in by mountain ridges that tower above the boats. This is the start of the famed Three Gorges, a long, picturesque stretch with such place names as the Bellows Gorge, Drinking Phoenix Spring, Witches Gorge and Misty Screen Peak. The rapids that wrecked many wooden junks in the past have been tamed over the years by dynamiting rocks, and are now destined to disappear under 600 ft. of water after the dam is built.

Lei Xia travels through the Three Gorges twice a week. The 22-year-old English and business graduate from Sichuan International Studies University works on the Qianlong cruise ship, a gaudy floating hotel with a prow shaped like a dragon's head. After 18 months making the round trip between Chongqing and Yichang, she is getting tired of the scenery, of life on the boat and of the drunken Taiwanese tourists who make passes at her in the karaoke bar at night. Now she and a friend are planning to move to Beijing, where a travel agent she met on the boat last year has promised them jobs. There is even the possibility of traveling overseas as tour guides, now that Chinese are beginning to take foreign trips.