Don't Start the Revolution Without Me! - Jesse Ventura [48]
The people live very meagerly, but construction is happening at an unbelievable rate. I was informed that, in the late 1990s, 20 percent of the world’s T-cranes, the big ones that build skyscrapers, were in Shanghai. In Shanghai, you could put three or four New York Cities in the downtown skyline. I’ve never seen anything like it. I’m still trying to figure out where all the revenue comes from, I guess maybe in large part from us—because China now holds a large part of America’s debt.
I found the two cities to be completely different. Beijing was as attractive, and seemed very businesslike. Of course, that’s where the Forbidden City is, the center of government. I found Shanghai much more of a fun city beneath all the commerce going on. You walk the streets after dark, and it’s every bit as vibrant as New York. Young people and lights, a rollicking night life.
In a country that’s supposed to be communist, that may sound kind of amazing, but I think it’s by design. Even though China now has Hong Kong back, that city is still a product of the Brits. The Chinese look at Hong Kong as something of a bastard child that they want to crack on the head every now and then for misbehaving. But they can hold up Shanghai as moving into the twenty first century the Chinese way.
The food I ate in China was unbelievably good. Unfortunately, as I would also come to find out in Mexico, we’re being cheated somewhat in the United States—because the native culture’s foods are far better than the so-called Mexican and Chinese that we get here. For some reason, we believe everything needs to be deep-fried. Rarely is any food served that way in China. I’m trying to figure out what gets lost in translation once it crosses our border. Like their mandarin duck—oh, incredible!
You do a lot of “stick eating” over there—food cooked on sticks like shish kabobs. It seems that’s a popular way of cooking food in Asia. When I served in Southeast Asia for seventeen months, there was nothing better than barbecue on a stick! Somehow I think a stick holds flavor better than metal does. But you’ve got to be smarter with your barbecuing, because it’s easier to burn the stick and lose the food. We Americans are in too much of a hurry, that’s why we go with metal.
While I was there, Minnesota’s 3M company signed a contract to produce all of China’s license plates. The deal had been in the offing for a while—I really had no bearing on it—but it was signed, sealed, and delivered that week. The other thing that’s going great guns in China is Hormel Meats. Minnesota has a Hormel plant that’s now producing all the sausage for their pizza. And the Chinese have started to go crazy over pizza.
I hate to say this, but the McDonald’s in China are packed, too. Apparently they haven’t seen the movie Supersize Me. Did you know that McDonald’s brought a lawsuit to try to keep that documentary off the air in America? I haven’t eaten fast food since I saw it, and I feel guilty that I ever took my kids there. Think about it: They put warning labels on cigarettes, but ordinarily you wouldn’t die from smoking in less than twenty years. With McDonald’s, it’s been proven that if you eat there for forty-five days straight, you’re dead. There should be a warning label on the wrapper telling people to beware of eating only at McDonald’s. Something like, “You need to supplement your diet with foods other than what this place serves.”
Anyway, I enjoyed visiting the Hormel factory. Although it’s overseen by the U.S., the upper management are all Chinese. I know it sounds like a cliché, but you could literally eat off the floor. The plant is out in the suburbs, where farming is still going on. Right up the street, you’ll see the family with the one-acre farm and the big-horned cow.
I came away from China fully realizing that they will be the economic power of the world, and a lot quicker than anyone imagines. Within the next decade,