I shared earlier that I was in Uzbekistan doing some documentary work on Chinese influence in Central Asia. Some of my photography has been appearing on the project site ChinainCentralAsia.com where you can read more of my colleague’s work.

By Raffaello and Sue Anne Tay

Published May 17, 2012

Last week, we have been visiting Tashkent, Uzbekistan as part of our ongoing research on Chinese interests in Central Asia.

Fortunately, on the flight here from Beijing, one of us had the good fortune to be seated amidst a boisterous group of 40 Xinjiang businessmen part of a provincial business delegation attending a trade fair in Tashkent. They had been forced to fly through Beijing from Urumqi – a geographically illogical route – due to the fact that there are no direct flights between Tashkent and Urumqi.

At their invitation, we visited the trade fair earlier this week. Held in an old exhibition hall in the outskirts of Tashkent it was a no-frills affair with basic booths lined up four by four. In its fourth year, the Xinjiang Trade Expo was sponsored by the Uzbek Chamber of Commerce, the Xinjiang government, and the bingtuan (the former People’s Liberation Army (PLA)-managed state owned enterprise (SOE) responsible for much of Xinjiang’s industries).

On the Chinese side, the participants were a mix of Xinjiang companies specializing in locally produced goods like Xinjiang snacks of dabanji (the famous big plate chicken), mushrooms, culinary sauces, an array of Uighur style clothing (and some fancily called ‘Turky style’ clothing) and more generic industries like uniforms/garment manufacturing and electronic equipment.

Other key participants were Xinjiang subsidiaries of holdings companies based in Guangzhou as part of the central government’s push for increased domestic investment in China’s less-developed hinterlands. One manager highlighted that they had started this work in the province at the Guangdong provincial government’s request. They were offering potential Uzbek customers property investment opportunities in Kashgar in southern Xinjiang, Chinese electrical gadgets like smartphones and Ipad-knockoffs tailored to the Uighur market (appropriately labeled with an Android character donning a Uighur hat), lightning equipment, police and factory uniforms. Many of the samples on display were manufactured in southern China and shipped to and assembled in Xinjiang.

With the pomp of the opening ceremony behind them, the reception at the Xinjiang Trade Fair when we went was lackluster to say the least. A thin traffic of Uzbek passers-by browsed with fleeting curiosity at what they considered well made but expensive Chinese products.

“The Uzbek market is too small and low-income compared to the vast opportunities we have in Xinjiang,” a uniforms manufacturer salesman named Tan Chao complained. Two locally dressed older Uzbek women stopped by to finger the bright Gortex jackets and browse a catalogue. A listless conversation in stilted Russian began with no conclusive business made.

Like Tan Chao, many of the Xinjiang businessmen were bored by the lack of opportunities offered in the trade fair. When we spoke to a pair of salesmen from an agricultural machinery manufacturer subsidiary of AVIC (the Chinese military aviation SOE), they acknowledged their presence seemed almost futile. Neither spoke Russian nor were there any serious potential clients for the cotton-picking machines they were peddling (Uzbekistan is one of the global top five cotton-producers). They responded to inquirers by waving a sheet with the prices of their equipment carelessly scribbled. Amusingly, curious onlookers seemed more interested in purchasing the model on display rather than the actual machinery.

A manager of a Xinjiang-based electricity infrastructure developer (with affiliation to Siemens) named Liu Zhao was one of the more enthusiastic and serious participants. His company had specially shipped in a landscape model of an electricity grid made up of parts manufactured by their company. Liu spoke fluent Russian thanks to 2 years of study in Almaty, Kazakhstan and extensive experience travelling to the region for work.

Several businessmen we spoke to, including Liu, acknowledged the difficulties of doing business in Uzbekistan. The government welcomed investment but not competition with local industries. Hence, the options for Chinese businesses in Uzbekistan are in the form of trade of specialized Chinese goods to the Uzbek market, attracting Uzbek investment to China and vice versa.

The limited convertibility of the Uzbek currency – 1800 Uzbek som to 1 USD (at the official rate, we were told the unofficial rate was as high as 2800 som to the USD) – was another obstacle. It is prohibited to take earned foreign currency out of the country, meaning you cannot leave with more forex than you arrived. Thus, foreign companies are either compelled to reinvest domestically any Uzbek som profits or absorb foreign exchange losses made via the official foreign exchange centre.

Hence, the dilemma facing Duan Weiming, a Chinese producer of Western suits who had just made a modest sale of several tens of thousands in Uzbek som. He jokingly showed off his cash bundles to his friends. What is he going to do with all the cash he made? We inquired.

“Why, spend it all on dinner, drinks and karaoke!” he boomed smilingly in response. Maybe to go enjoy his new fortune, the group packed up early at four o’clock. With another day at the Xinjiang Trade Fair, the Chinese businessmen were determined to make the best of what remained a slow affair.

Greetings from Tashkent, capital of Uzbekistan! I’m here helping to document a few things as part of the China in Central Asia project headed up by my colleagues Raffaello Pantucci and Alexandros Petersen. You might recall I was in the region last October specifically in Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan.

On my flight from Beijing to Tashkent, I was off to a winning start when I encountered a large group of businessmen from Xinjiang. They certainly made my 6 hour flight quick and entertaining.

I spent much of yesterday photographing them at the Xinjiang Commodities Trade Fair in the outskirts of Tashkent, represented by a wide array of businesses from uniform garments production, cotton picking machines, electricity infrastructure development and Xinjiang’s best delicacies. Above is one Chinese businessmen who after selling a few Western suits showed off his bundles of Uzbek som, which unfortunately cannot be brought outside of the country. With 1800 Uzbek som to 1 USD, an individual bill is almost worthless.

What to do with all of them? I asked him, “Why, spend it all in Tashkent! Dinner, drinks and karaoke!” he boomed in response.

- One of Magnum’s leading photographers Chien-Chi Chang has put together a collection of photographs taken in New York’s Chinatown between 1992-2011 with audio. An estimated 100,000 Chinese people live in the Canal Street area of Manhattan, the largest Chinese community outside of Asia. Chang has spent the past 19 years capturing what goes on behind Chinatown’s façade. You’d be remised if you didn’t check out Chang’s incredible portfolio.

- I’ve been wanted to share this for a while. The debate of camera phone photography continues, this time, aided and abetted by apps like Instagram and Hipstagram. Can it be accepted as photojournalism if the apps dramatically alter the photo? Ben Lowy seems a viable spokeperson considering his stunning collection of Hipstagram photos shot on Iphone.

- Singaporean photographer Sim Chiyin (who is also represented by Vii Photo Agency) captures Burma in the wake of political opening.

- We’ve been seeing a great deal of photo essays on North Korean by foreign journalists following a state sanctioned (and heavily guided) tour. I particularly enjoyed Reuters’ Bobby Yip’s “Window into North Korea” which reflected a rather even view of what the government wanted foreigners to see to the mundane.

Interestingly, an insightful contrast is this edited collection of photos put out by the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), the state news agency of North Korea, which is very utopian in nature.

- Maura Elizabeth Cunningham discusses the complexities of China’s rural-to-urban migration and reviews a handful of new books, both academic and popular which explore the issue.

For more, you can follow me via the blog’s Facebook page and Twitter.

It’s Labor Day holiday weekend here in China and we get Monday and Tuesday off. In Europe and Latin America, we often see organized street demonstrations and marches by labour unions and left-wing (socialist, communist) parties to commemorate the cause. Nowadays, China celebrates it with the most socialist of all activities: large scale consumerism.

Special thanks to readers who have signed up for the book giveaway! I have refrained from replying to them so as not to interfere with the subsequent selection. Remember, entries close 5 minutes before midnight May 3, Beijing time.

This week’s links are all related to China – its border cities, Mainland Chinese economic migrants overseas and third world migrants living and eking out a living in China.

- I’ve always been intrigued by China’s borders with its neighbors – all 10 of them – and the corresponding cities on both sides, and how the various cultures come together to forge a certain economic and urban dynamics. China’s borders with Russia have particularly intrigued me, as with my language skills set and sly business sense, I’ve always imagined I could be a successful mid-sized blackmarket trader/ restaurant owner in Heilongjiang, Khabarovsk or Manchuria as illustrated in this photo essay.

- Moving south of China, I’ve shared before reportage and photo essays of the largely West African community in China, doing bustling goods trade out of Guangzhou. For those familiar with the city, the African community is largely concentrated in Yuexiu and Baiyun District, and colloquially known as “Chocolate City”. I’ve actually been there and had a stroll through small shops manned by Chinese owners of large-sized underwear, African clothes prints, long shiny wings, mobile phones and even military uniforms! CNN has a report and video bit here. Again, I recommend photographer Graeme Nicol’s Trade Winds: Guangzhou’s African Community.

- Moving far from China’s borders, the circumstances and eventual lives of Mainland Chinese economic migrants overseas may not differ greatly from past generations of overseas Chinese. But they have become a growing contrast to the droves of middle and upper class Mainland Chinese travelling to Europe and the US for holidays.

This is an old NYT report and photo essay shot by Nadia Shira Cohen of Mainland Chinese, settling (legally and illegally) in the town of Prato in Northern Italy to work in the garment industry which locals have angrily said are destroying Italy’s own fashion manufacturing business with the Chinese’s ”pronto moda” or “fast fashion” clothes.

- Malaysian-born and Shanghai-based architect Hong Yi uses alternative art-making methods to produce portraits of famous Chinese artists. The most recent is a 3D portrait of director Zhang Yimou (my preference is for his earlier works including Raise the Red Lantern and Red Sorghum) which took three weeks, 750 pairs of socks and thousands of safety pins to complete. She set up her installation art in one of Shanghai’s lilong residences which took 4 hours to set up.

- Jonathan Watts, the outgoing Asia environment correspondent at The Guardian, speaks about his experiences covering environmental issues in China over the last few years. He does a fairly balanced job of summing up the contradictions, successes and failures of China’s green policies. Some Chinese may argue they shouldn’t have to cave to Western pressures to meet green targets after the countries have had their history of industrialization, but there are also Chinese who are pleasing for the Government to save them from polluted air and poisoned rivers.

“China is an industrial teenager in the body of a 3,000 year old civilization. It’s communist and capitalist. It is mega rich and dirt poor at the same time. It can suffer from drought and flood on the same day. And it is trying to do something without precedent in world history: it is trying to decarbonise its economy even before it has finished industrialising. So, yes, you can find signs of a black superpower and a green superpower at the same time. Mostly, though, I think the colour I associate with this period is grey.”

For more, you can follow me via the blog’s Facebook page and Twitter.

UPDATE: Congratulations to Patrick, the 10th commentator! Random.org picked you out of 18 commenators. Drop me an email via the contact sheet and I will dispatch the book to you!

Thanks again to everyone who participated! For those who are in Shanghai, remember to pick up a copy! Amazon.cn has it on sale.

** I am giving one free copy to a lucky reader regardless of where you are in the world. Leave a comment below about yourself and why you’d like a copy. Entries close 5 minutes before midnight May 3, Beijing time. I will pick the winner at random. **

(欢迎中文读者！如果想用中文来看博科，可以在右边点下翻译钮 “Blog translated”)。 我会选出一位幸运读者送出《上海里弄文化地图》的一本书。请在博客文章下留下个人发言，介绍自己。比赛5月3日半夜停止。我会随机选择。)

For me, the hardest thing about documenting Shanghai’s ubiquitous lilong (or lanes) residences and shikumen isn’t the tedious amount of time invested in research and photographing them, but surprise, surprise, actually finding the hidden gems.

While there is substantial and organized information on Shanghai’s western architecture thanks to dedicated archivists including Tess Johnston and Paul French, there is no equivalent English directory for the hundreds of Shanghai shikumen and lanes, which is a challenge given their rate of demolition.

As an outsider without initimate knowledge of the city, I depend a great deal on the internet, Google maps and collecting anecdotes from residents to piece together the what, where and whys.

There was one key source I often turned to – a photographer on Flicker and the Chinese equivalent, Douban who went by the name of Gropius (the famous German architect who pioneered the Bauhaus School) or Xi Zi (席子). His work was a treasure trove of beautiful shikumen and lanes that I never knew existed, along with names and addresses, which I would use to guide myself around the city. He was receptive to questions and had a large Shanghainese following online.

A few years ago, while shooting in a heap of what used to be a beautiful structure in Hongkou, I met a man in his late 30s, early 40s doing the same thing. Lo and behold, it was Xi Zi.

We became friends and I’d meet up with him on several occasions to shoot and even interviewed him for the blog. He almost never used a map and knew of hidden spots that even local Shanghainese had no idea existed. He photographed the same places over and over again, mapping a timeline of their demise.

After 5 years of continuous shooting, Xi Zi (whose full name is Xi Wenlei (席闻雷)) and his good friend Jiang Qinggong (姜庆共) (or Lao Jiang as he calls himself, a well-known publisher of history and the arts) have finally put out one of the best photo books on Shanghai shikumen that you’ll ever find. Both authors grew up in shikumens and as Xi Zi once said to me, for the younger generation, the shikumen will be just a concept as many of them have never lived in one.

“Shanghai Shikumen” or more accurately “Shanghai Lilong Culture and Map” (上海里弄文化地图) condenses explanations and diagrams of various shikumen styles, 40 shikumen lilong travel guides, 400 shikumen lilong directories and 120 accompanying images of both the exteriors and interiors of the shikumen.

Interestingly, Xi and Jiang have chosen to emphasize their work in images rather than in text, a departure from traditional Chinese publishing standards. The best part of the book is the litany of maps (both pre-1949 and the present) that help the tracking and identification of shikumen and lilongs more efficiently. All in both English and Chinese.

For the authors, the book is as much a way to reach out to the younger generation of Shanghainese about their history, as it is appealing to foreigners with a deeper curiosity of the Chinese aspect of Old Shanghai.

That this easily accessible shikumen guide has not been published earlier is baffling to me, which is why I recommend readers to pick up a copy and start exploring as some of these neighborhoods may not be around for too long.

Where to buy

“Shanghai Shikumen” (上海里弄文化地图), 162 pages, March 2012, Tongji University Press (RMB 42)

1. Dukou Bookshop(s) (上海渡口书店)

- 828 Julu Lu, near Fumin Lu, Jingan District 静安区巨鹿路828号, 近富民路

- 245 Madang Lu, B1, Xintiandi Style Mall, 卢湾区马当路245号新天地时尚B1楼

- Online bookstore

2. Link Shanghai Gallery in Tianzifang (搭界)

- No. 5 Lane 248 Taikang Lu, Shanghai 上海市泰康路248弄5号

There are moments when I feel like a hamster on wheels, moving through the motions of work, travel and welcoming Shanghai visitors, and having the cycle on rinse and repeat. Nevertheless, one of the upsides to sharing the city with visitors is the fresh new discoveries I find on old routes.

- In the last two weeks, I have discovered that the original French-styled villas across from Sinan Mansions are undergoing the second phase of heavy renovation to integrate the whole shopping F&B district. The plot of land opposite the former First Seventh Adventist Church on Wujin Lu has begun its first phase of a commercial office building. Shanghai moves at lightning speed.

- Attention all US-based readers! Writer extraordinaire Paul French is embarking on his US book tour this week. The author of non-fiction historical thriller “Midnight in Peiking” (most recently picked up for a TV series in the UK!) will be speaking in the following cities this week.

Atlanta, 24APR – Georgia Center for the Book
Virginia, 26APR – One More Page Books
Washington DC, 28APR – Politics & Prose

For the full list including the West coast for much of May available here.

- Bruno Quinquet’s “Salaryman” project is remarkable for its poetry and allure of the tease. Nothing better exemplifies the absence of individuality of the Japanese white collar worker.

- Beijing-based (when he is not traveling round the world) photographer Jonah Kessel traveled to the island of Socotra, considered the “Galápagos of the Indian Ocean”, via Yemen, in spite of repeated travel warnings by both the US and Yemeni embassies. He offers a guide on “how to .. everything” to Socotra.

- Bangladeshi photographer Abir Abdullah has been photographing Dhakha’s growing fire hazards as a result of the stress of an overwhelming population on poor infrastructure, which is part of his larger project  “Death Traps: Tales From a Mega-Community,” He talks about his methodology behind his photography even in the midst of the chaos of a fire rescue, “I plan even when I shoot this kind of situation,” … “I follow the light. The rescue operation is almost the same in every corner, so I go where the light is beautiful, and mysterious. And I think that makes the difference.”

- Invisible Photographer Asia interviews Pablo Bartholomew, one of India’s leading photographers and the first from South Asia to win the World Press Photo (WPP) Award in 1975, when he was just 19. He talks about his long career, of chasing “cliche” images for Western news wires and later turning towards art and subjects closer to his heart.

- I lived in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan in the summer of 2001 when I was interning with an NGO assisting with internally displaced people from the Nagorno-Karabakh War with Armenia. Being from Singapore, the Caucasus was nothing that I have ever experienced – culturally and architecturally. I remembered standing at the peak of the Maiden Tower, overlooking the city curved along the Caspian Sea. I spent my afternoons walking through the old town and admiring the clash of Soviet influences with old Persian and Turkic cultures. All I ever heard about during my month there was how corruption was wrecking people’s lives. Decades later, it seems nothing has changed. I also heard that a bottomless source of oil money has modernized parts of Baku with lack of taste and grace. Sounds familiar? Here is an outrageous report on how government-hired brutes sabotage the structural integrity of old homes in Baku to justify demolishing them.

- Staying within the region, I always enjoy sharing work of less accessible (not necessarily geographically) places. Diana Markosian takes on Grozny to document the city’s efforts to rebuild themselves, specifically focusing on girls growing up in an Islamized Chechnya.

- A little perky and happy project. Beijingers in New York: New York-based Singaporean photographer John Clang takes tiny photo cut-outs of Chinatown folk and plants them all over the Big Apple.

For more, you can follow me via the blog’s Facebook page and Twitter.

Over a month ago, on a cloudy spring afternoon, I found myself standing in front of a spectacular Art Deco building, all eight floors of mustard yellow and mocha exterior towering over the surrounding low-rises.

The eye was immediately drawn to the apex where an elongated ornament embellished with a spire and sunrise motif sat atop a prominent column.

And like sunrays, the angular façade streaked outwards the length of a block along both Nanchang Lu (南昌路) and Maoming Nan (or ‘south) Lu (茂名南路). Steel-framed windows wrapped around on all sides and glistened ever so slightly as the clouds shifted.

Presently, locals refer to it as Nanchang Building (南昌大楼) though it was originally known as The Astrid Apartments. Built in 1933 by property company Wing On (owned by the Kwok family), the building had been exclusively occupied by foreigners with servants living in the back quarters.

The Astrid was designed by the architect W.Livin-Goldstaedt, though little is known about him. He worked with the shortly lived Eastern Asia Architects and Engineers Corporation and the only other record of his work was the King Albert Apartments, a cluster of elegant four-storey apartments a few blocks away.

Serendipitously, as I stood outside the building entrance writing notes, a young woman exited the locked gates. She looked quizzically at me and thinking I was a visitor, kept it open.

I avoided the creaky elevator and took the stairs, steadily passing doors of small businesses, associations and private residences. With each floor, I discovered eroded floor tiles, rusted windows and dirtied walls in the dim hallways.

Yet the parsimonious elegance of the Art Deco design was evident in the doors marked by the classic geometric header, as were the window grills and moldings.

According to The Astrid’s blueprints, there are three entrances and elevators, and flats ranged from studios, two to four room flats. I had traced each wing via difference entrances and discovered recessed balconies facing another cluster of old housing.

Some flats were boarded up; one had rotting floor and junk strewn about. Otherwise, most were inhabited and renovated with metal gates and linoleum floors. Doors were firmly shut and residents kept to themselves. There was little sign of overcrowding, just the creeping decay and neglect of public housing.

Upon reaching the rooftop, I was greeted by The Astrid’s spire and ornament in a sea of laundry hung out to dry. The eight floors allowed a bird’s eye view of the surrounding neighborhood – a mix of typical Shanghai lilong housing and 1930s low-rise apartments – yet was close enough to observe people going about their daily errands.

With the balmy wind to keep me cool on the roof, I watched scooters weave in and out of traffic; children play in lanes across the street and older residents gossiping along the sidewalks.

Over several weeks, I returned to The Astrid to photograph in better light, and always wound up whiling the afternoon away on the roof. It was a quiet retreat from the buzz of the neighborhood, and Shanghai’s hectic pace. I often wondered if the roof, when it was first built, had been a special place for residents or servants to steal away to as well.

March 2012

Note: For a more compelling visual and historical insight into the influence of Art Deco in Shanghai’s heritage architecture, I recommend Deke Erh and Tess Johnston’s “Shanghai Art Deco” (Old China Hand Press, 2006).

The Qingming holidays was spent with a pleasant 2.5 hour drive to Ningbo, a trip that would otherwise have taken 4 hours if not for the never-ending Hangzhou Bay Bridge, an impressive feat of Chinese infrastructure.

I was particular excited about visiting the Ningbo History Museum after learning that its architect Wang Shu became the first Chinese to win the prominent Pritzker Architecture Prize awarded by the Hyatt Foundation of Chicago. His style leans towards simple and angular lines with an emphasis on Chinese refurbished materials but rarely with traditional results. (Here’s Wang’s interview with Architects Newspaper)

From afar the museum looked like a stone ship that ran ashore, looking particularly stunning against the bright blue sky. The exterior is made up of asymmetric lines punctuated abstractly with small rectangular windows. The walls are colored by a blend of salvaged stone and brick from old houses with the occasional spot of red, lending an overall aged look. Inside, the huge atrium is mapped by giant angled slabs running along all sides of each floor.

The museum is huge, almost too huge in contrast to its exhibits – 3 floors detailing the history of Ningbo (or Mingzhou (明州) as it was earlier called) from Hemudu culture in 4800 BC (cave men-like with stone tools) through the dynasties as a seaport and part of the southern silk road. I watched a father clutching his son’s hand, patiently explaining the opening up of Ningbo’s trade after being closed off during the Ming dynasty. The mother stood behind the duo, a wry smile playing on her lips.

The vast interior meant that visitors had plenty of roaming space which is always a rare treat in China. Equally pleasant was strolling around the expansive wooden-deck roof under the warm sun.

The touch of modernity was appropriately complemented by several other historical sites for the trip which I highly recommend, including the beautiful Tianyi Pavilion (天一阁), one of the oldest library estates in the country and Chiang Kaishek’s ancestral home (将氏故居) in Xikou (溪口) which is a 40 minute drive from the city. For lunch, I urge you to visit one of the several branches of the hugely popular GangYaGou (缸鸭狗) (the logo is a duck and dog around a tank) for Ningbo’s best snacks. Clean, (relatively) cheap and very cheerful.

 April 2012

Apologies for the prolong absence. I’ve been away from Shanghai 3 weekends in a row, friends visited and work proved to be a little hectic. On the bright side, the weather has improved dramatically. Cherry blossoms are out and sun is shining so while I feel guilty about neglecting readers, I have been basking in delightful weather. Here’s a few links to kick off your week.

- I met Katya Knyazeva over Flickr years ago when I started photographing around Shanghai’s Old Town, which she has been meticulously researching. Here, she shares a few structures in Old Town that have been dying from neglect and vandalism. It’s hard not to be infuriated by the lack of respect and care for these Chinese historical structures that date all the way back Ming dynasty. Government officials and some locals have often complained about how preserving former colonial structure were an afront to China’s painful history of ceding control to foreigners in the 19th century. But how they can they excuse themselves for the vulgar destruction and careless neglect of authentic Chinese homes that hold the key to Shanghai’s earliest history is beyond me.

- An incredibly meaningful project where Singaporean photographer Stefen Chow and economist HY Lin (who turns out to be an alum from my high school) “calculate a per-person, per-day rate of a national poverty line, and to create a visual portrayal of items found in that country that could be bought by a person living at the poverty line.”

- San Francisco Gate has a multimedia and photo column called “City Exposed” which portrays the wonderful array of wacky and bizarre characters that roam the streets. From tattoo artists, street artists to the occasional exhibitionist,  you have to love Mike Kepka’s job as SFGate’s staff photographer.

- “10 Photographers You Should Ignore”. This has been making the rounds on the internet. A highly amusing, tongue-in-cheek read.

- I discovered the work of Ikuru Kuwajima via a profile in the New York Times of his work on Astana, Kazakhstan. I’ve only been to Almaty (and yet to share much of my work) but am not sure Astana is in the cards anytime soon. From what friends tell me, Astana, which was created by President Nursultan Nazarbayev when he forcibly relocated from Almaty up north to be closer to Russia (but really, to keep an eye on), is too new, too cold and too large.

- An excellent example of how a bit of creativity and resourcefulness can go a long way of refurbishing Paris’ older public housing instead of tearing the entire structure down. I know this does not necessarily mean the same can be done in Shanghai, but I feel a greater effort should be made to drive a certain mode of thinking: refurbish rather than demolish.

- Evan Osnos from the New Yorker has written an excellent piece on the gambling haven that Macau has become.

Macau, whose population is half a million, feels like China amplified and miniaturized. It is animated by the same formula of ambition and speed and risk, but the sheer volume of money and people passing through has distilled the mixture into an extract so potent that it can seem to be either the city’s greatest strength or its greatest liability.

For more, you can follow me via the blog’s Facebook page and Twitter.

-  I want to thank Paul French, who has been vigorously travelling to promote his historical mystery thriller book “Midnight in Peiking“, for giving Shanghai Street Stories a plug during his podcast session with Beijing-based Sinica hosts Kaiser Kuo and Jeremy Goldkorn. Listen here (our mention at 45:30).

I have often mentioned Paul as a walking encyclopedia about Old Shanghai and if you haven’t, do check out his novel Midnight in Peiking and his blog, China Rhyming.

- Photographers and adventurers Fabrice Nadjari and Cedric Houin travelled to the almost unreachable Wakhan Corridor of northeast Afghanistan to photograph the local Wakhis and Kyrgyzs. It dawned on them to capture them holding Polaroids of themselves. Incredible details on the portraits against breathtaking, untouched environs. A simple and often repeated concept that doesn’t seem to get old. I mean the gifting of portraits, not travelling to remote Afghanistan.

- Tricia Wang is an American ethnographer who studies how China’s youths and migrants use digital tools. Based in Shanghai, I like how she interviews and sometimes live with her subjects as part of her fieldwork, the details of which are  well reflected in her writing. Her one piece on the day-to-day frustrations and challengers street vendors face in China, such as struggling with rising food inflation, pressures from authorities, was particularly compelling yet sad.

- I spent this weekend in southern Zhejiang to see the world’s factory goods on display, indulge richly in Middle Eastern cuisine and mingle amidst Muslim prayer centres and bubbling hookahs. If you know my penchant for bazaars and congregation of international traders from all over the world, you might have guessed. Otherwise, here’s  an excellent article about it. More from me this week.

- Yanick Yanidel is an incredible street photography who is currently embarking on a year long trip around the world. Armed with his Lecia, he is having a ball of a time and blogging almost everyday. I first discovered him in his long, detailed essays on better understanding your rangefinder and applying and learning as you hit the streets. While I don’t use a rangefinder, I have found his writings on street photography appealing in being able to relate to photographers at all levels and clarity of thought.

For more, you can follow me via the blog’s Facebook page and Twitter.

Kyrgyzstan’s street bazaars are awashed in a dizzying array of colors – the vintage hues of the former Soviet Union cling onto the infrastructure, the blaring contrast of bold plastic on all Chinese mass manufactured objects, and the undercurrent of Middle Eastern influences in clothing and culture.

The colors sometimes burn a little brighter under the shards of sunlight piercing through the incongruous slates in the roof.

Even amidst the thronging crowds on a busy afternoon, where voices raise in negotiation and shuffling bodies press close, it is not impossible to seek isolated moments, thanks to the delightly play of light and shadows.

You can read and view more of Kyrgyzstan’s street bazaars here.