Anyway- the building is known in polite circles as the "Oriental Crown," but us commoners call it the "Upside-Down Devo Hat." Who knew Chinese people loved Devo so much? The design looks slightly reminiscent of an Emperors Crown in over all shape. It also is based off of a special type of clay vessel (which is where the four legs comes from.) The last piece of inspiration came from wooden brackets often seen in Chinese architecture. The outside has 7 different shades of red used to emphasize a theme of "different but working in harmony." It was overcast that day and it is hard to see the different shades of red.
You enter into the building through one of the legs. At the bottom they show you the construction of the pavilion. Then you take a high speed elevator up to the top floor- although it is themed as if you are riding a train. Then you enter in the to first area: The Footprints. The footprint area had all these long cubes hanging from the ceiling at different hates and terminated in a television screen. It showed news clips from the past 30 years of everyday Chinese life. Many of them seemed familiar to me- as some of these are things that I experience on daily bases. Here you cued up to watch a movie. The movie was projected on 3 GIANT screens that spanned 180 degrees of this round room. The projections even continued on to the ceiling which added a really cool element. There are two movies but we saw one that based around this family. It showed them beginning in a peasant village, and then the next generation moved to the cities to become migrant workers. Then the next generation grew up in the city and was witness to some national tragedy and triumphs. While it definitely was a propaganda filled film showing the progress that China has made in the last 30 years: it totally suckered me in. When they showed clips of the horrible earthquake that wrecked parts of China I got choked up. It really is amazing to see what progress China has made since the "Great Leap Forward" failed and left so many Chinese people starving, uneducated and many dead.
After the film you want into this crazy room that had a laser projected river that looked real. Then it had a traditional chinese scroll painting on the wall that stretched maybe 75 yards. At first glance it was just a traditional painting. BUT- watch for a moment and you realized the scroll was ALIVE. The people, trees, rivers, all were alive and moving. It was a very dramatic effect.
This led into the crazy BAMBOO forest that was GORGEOUS! THey were these long bamboo tubes that stretch from floor to ceiling and were filled with LED elements and they changed colors, glimmered, and sparkled depending on the mood of the music/film in the background. This section was talking about how IMPORTANT natural resources are and we must respect nature.
Then you entered the 'Children's Hope' area that had pictures created by "children" across China showing what they hope for the future of the country. I say "children" because China must have 1,000,000 budding savant artists because some of these drawing were too good. Like 8 years olds who drew perfectly shaded figures. Or a 7 year old who is a master at a linoleum block print….as an art teacher I felt MORE then a little dubious about these "children." Then every so often they threw in a real child's piece of art to keep it sort of in reality.
Then it was on to an Epcot-esque ride that made absolutely no fricken sense. It was 10 minutes of riding around in what I think may have been a Surrealist Nightmare…. there were these large abstract color changing trees, then an ice world filled with pagodas, then this awful tunnel that showed city progress and made you wanna barf. As soon as I get blogger to post my video's all of you will see what I mean. Seriously…this ride made no sense- what so ever.
Then it was on to the section about China going green….it was a bit laughable. As the world's #1 Polluter you felt like saying to the Chinese Expo designer, "seriously?" It did offer tips about going green. So many tips in fact they contradicted themselves. ("Save gasoline by having business teleconferences rather then traveling!" "Save electricity by turning off your cellphone and talking in person!") It just seemed so hypocritical to talk about how China's going green- when 3 months ago they said they didn't need to because they were a developing power and all the other countries had time to develop before they went green. It's a very Chinese thing to talk about it and not do it.
Outside was a creepy Dr. Suess-esque creature and I have included a picture. Again- I was not sure the significance….maybe to show all of god's living creatures united and working together? I don't know.
After reading a little more on the subject I learned that Shanghai had in fact forced their people to go see the expo to create the feeling that it was busy. If they did not attend they might lose their jobs or their wages. It really sucks that they felt the need to distort the results on what I'm sure was an amazing Expo.
It was our last stop on what was an awesome trip to Shanghai. Our next day was Chinese New Years Eve…..and boy are you guys in for some awesome pictures!!!!!
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