It's easy to time-travel in China! (Patreon)

That may be a funny thing to say, but every time I travel out of the big cities in China I feel as if I've travelled back in time 20 years. I recently visited Shaoguan with my wife, it's a  prefecture-level city in northern Guangdong Province and it is literally like time-travel so let's look at the good and the bad of China 20 years ago but actually today! 

I'm going to start with the good and unlike the big cities, smaller cities are more family and community oriented. 

Often times parents will go to work in the big cities and leave their children behind in their hometowns in the care of the grandparents and so you get to see a lot more of the traditional family unit the smaller cities also the 1 child policy was a little more ignored by the locals so you'll sometimes even see brothers and sisters. 

The communities are also more tight knit, unlike the big rat race cash grab of the bigger cities, street sellers are more of a permanent fixture in the smaller towns and so people get to know each other and develop trust and community bonds, the lack of law enforcement also leads to a more relaxed atmosphere... You'll never see a health inspector closing down a restaurant here...

I've always had fantastic interactions with the locals as most of them have either never seen or had the opportunity to talk to a foreigner before, here for instance the boss of this shop making a local specialty insisted on showing me the whole process and gave me one to try (I liked them so much I bought a massive bag full).

Here his wife and a family member prepare the raw ingredients

Then prep them before the boss deep-fries them in a wok that looks like it has never once been cleaned...

The markets are also far more relaxed and although absolutely filthy, they have a special charm and a very long history (even a few hundred years in some places). 

When I say filthy though, I'm not joking, you do get numb to it and I don't even see it anymore but people used to living in the west often seem very shocked when they see the fact that there are mangy animals walking over the food and random food stuffs on the ground drying in the sun with the occasional rat or something scurrying by...

And of course the live animals that are for sale add to the symphony of smells ;)

Let's move onto what I consider to be the not so good parts of the old China, and it starts with propaganda..

This slogan on the wall is basically saying "you're dumb if you don't know that you're only allowed to have one child" .... I think you're dumb if you stand there to read the sign because parts of the building will fall on your head

Of course our favourite dictator who single handedly destroyed China's beautiful history and culture is still worshipped and praised which is something that always boggles the mind (yes I understand why, but let's be real... he was not a good man).

Such a welcoming face!

You'll even see old men walking around in their old Mao uniforms which is a little sad as they probably feel really let down with the fact that a foreigner is allowed to walk in their neighbourhood when they fought so hard in the past against us foreign invaders (at least that's what I think they're thinking).

There is however a rather quirky outcome due to the communist past and that is the lack of maintenance... hear me out for a minute here. Since no one was allowed to own property or shops or anything really, there was never any incentive to maintain or look after anything outside of your home, the result is that the exterior of most buildings look atrocious, adverts from decades ago still line the streets and no one paints or maintains anything... The interior of houses however are immaculate as those are actually within the control of individual families. 

I would be embarrassed if my apartment looked like Chernobyl on the outside, but most people don't pay it any mind as it's "out of their control" 

Yeah, quite honestly this has always been a pet peeve of mine, Chinese people are very industrious and capable yet many of them do very little to improve their living conditions..

Dryers are also not a thing in China and everyone dries their clothes in the sun, according to Chinese local beliefs, the sun is a far better way to dry clothes than a dryer, in fact I had to have an argument with my wife about how I'd prefer she didn't hang my underwear on the balcony for all my neighbours to see lol (that's just a cultural difference, compromises must be made!). 

Before I get onto another positive, we can't forget that no matter how run down or badly maintained things are, there's always one thing that works perfectly, and that's the ever watchful eye of state surveillance...

This camera even has some panties to keep it company!

So onto some more good stuff, and that is nightlife!

The dark is your ally! It hides the filth and degradation and allows the cities to shine at night, what once looked fairly shabby, now looks like a diamond and the night-life is fantastic, street food and atmosphere is second to none!

I absolutely love China at night!

I hope you've all enjoyed this little look into the smaller cities of China (they never get any love and they represent the majority China).

I'll see you in the next video and as always:

- Stay Awesome!

SerpentZA