Road accidents in China

As most of you probably heard the roads in China can be dangerous and also very congested. Specially the traffic in Beijing is really bad and they are heavily restricting people to buy new cars here. When we came back from Dong Ying the buss suddenly came to a stop. The driver looked on his GPS that there was a 15 km long que ahead of us. It turned out that a truck had caught fire some 15 km ahead of us by a toll station. I do not know the damage it caused but obviously it was enough to have the whole highway closed for 5 hours. This highway is usually a very busy road between Beijing and Tianjin. Now it was possible to stand in the middle of it and not a car in sight. The other side however was totally packed with trucks and cars. Some people were trying to turn their car around and continue the way they came fro, really smart. It only caused a worse jam between the cars that were behind us...

One of the most busy highways, completely empty! 

 A car trying to turn around and go in the other direction...

 Everybody wondering what was going on

 Stuck

 People were climbing up on the trucks trying to get a glimpse of what was going on

 And it happened here...

 One of the first trucks passing after we had been waiting over 1 hour

 After 2 hours we were finally on the move again, sunset was beautiful and not a sign of pollution here

Japanese Protests in China

In recent days protests have broken out all over China against Japanese. Chinese have been having banners with "kill all Japanese", "Out with the Japanese Devils", "Diaoyu island belong to China" etc etc. This small island group called diaoyu in chinese and senkaku in Japan are just some rocks in the sea. Some have said they contain rich energy resources but I find that almost impossible since it is a volcanic and earthquake sensitive area. If there ever was any oil or gas it would have burned away long ago because of the activity below the sea. 

A lot of people have been trashing their own cars because it was Japanese made and people started boycotting Japanese products and some factory assembly lines in many palces all over China were sabotaged. If this helps in the long run I'm not sure, seems to meet its just about destroying Chinese property and not a direct blow to Japan. 

The Japanese embassy area was totally shut down, they let in people in groups of 100 to protest outside the embassy. People burned Japanese flags, threw eggs and fruit on the embassy while shouting all kinds of things. No one was hurt in the demonstrations that lasted for about 4 days. Now it has cooled down and when I passed the embassy yesterday there were no protesters at all. Interesting that feelings can boil over so fast. One of the reasons for this is the history, Japan occupied China exactly 81 years ago now so there was a memorial day for that. I just hope that the island dispute can be solved peacefully and people can get back to their daily routines. 

Riot police

 Complete lock-down, hundreads of polices were positioned here to guard the road

Dong Ying as a city

Dong Ying is on of the newest cities in China and founded as late as 1983! The population here is 1.6 million and it's China second largest oil city. But it's incredible to think that 30 years ago there was nothing here except grass and mud...Weather was perfect here for the whole time and it's rather clean place being next to the sea. 

View from hotel, new buildings being build all the time

When we went to do some sightseeing I saw this grass truck

Swan lake...Or thats's what it's called because there are suppos to be white and black swans. We didn't see any swans. Nor were there any people, this place was totally deserted.

The Swan Lake

Lookout tower

Cave toilet

There was also a massive temple next to the lake. Not a single person inside but the bells on the roofs kept ringing. It was like the place would have been full of ghosts, I felt much like "Spirited Away" when coming here.

The shrine was decorated but not a sign of a person who would have done that. The had also put fruits to the gods which is a custom here. Although no sign of who would have done that. Maybe it is a magical place? :)

The Bell tower

Only us 2 here, was spooky but really cool!

Traditional Chinese bridge, they are not straight so that the ghosts could not walk on them

Just next to downtown they build a tower in the middle of a hill

The "Europe" street

International beer city was completely empty, there were however 8 waiters playing cards, efficient labour!

Dong Ying - Petrochemical Expo

Dong Ying is the second largest city in China producing oil and petrochemical equipments. We went there for an expo to meet manufacturers and other people in the line of oil business. The expo was opened with a huge dinner followed the next day with some opening speeches and then the actual expo. It lasted for 2 days and after it was done they organized a big banquet and acrobatic performance. The Chinese are probably the best in the world when it comes to acrobatic performances, saw some really talented people who bend more than a rope. 

Amazing fireworks for the opening

Food was plenty

Showoff, my bag cost 100 euros! Wow...

Drone for small places where they use explosives

Oil fields

Howo, or Volvo copy?

Helicopter without passengers....New 9/11? 

The hotel had a huge stone carved dragon boat, so full of details

Plate spinning

This girl was max 12 years old but did show was impressive

The "small hats" show

The even had some foreigners singing in Chinese. They said they were from Canada and Sweden but I's pretty sure it was Africa and Russia