Things I Saw

Things I saw

I was in the K family car, waiting at the intersection to make a right turn.

When the light turned green, I saw there were a few oncoming vehicles trying to make a right turns. Two were at the front of the line of cars waiting at the green light. The car behind had a very impatient driver and I saw it try to pass the car that was in front. I first thought it was an impatient driver trying to go around the right turning drive so it could go straight through the intersection. I thought wrong.

In BC when I saw people carrying signs I could assume they were on strike; In China when I see people carrying signs I see that a company is doing a promotion. Recently, I saw a group of sign carrying workers as I was walking around the Hui Shan Wanda Plaza. Nothing unusual except how the workers were carrying their signs. They weren't so much carrying them as wearing them on their backs. They had these vests with flag stands on the back. I wanted to take a picture of them with my phone but I couldn't make myself inconspicuous. It was different I thought and I wondered if the strikers or picketers in BC now have similar vests to wear.

The boulevards in China breakup when near intersections. Why I mean is the boulevard there will have a gap in it to leave space for pedestrians to walk through without having to walk over the boulevard. The gap leaves an island like boulevard by the end that is at the intersection. Twice, I have seen vehicles collide into the island. For whatever reason when turning, the drivers see the pedestrian path without noticing the island. I passed such an accident scene first a few years ago. I just saw the second such accident at an intersection that was under construction. The island was new and the driver making a turn out of habit didn't see the island. And the vehicle went so fast that it was lodged on top of the island.

I saw a very long lineup of cars trying to get into the Maternity Hospital which is not far from the school I am currently working at. Wondering what it was, I thought it was people trying to get their second vaccine shot. I wasn't far off. I learned from a foreigner group on WeChat, that people were panicking over reports of covid cases in Guangzhou.

I won't get the vaccine because I am not going travelling for at least a year.