Expatrialogues

Voices and Images from around the world.

Today is Thursday, December 04th, 2008

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About the Author

Steve Peer once braved the frozen tundra of northern Canada as a reporter and photographer. He now calls southern China home and enjoys the humid clime more than the bone-numbing cold of his native land. He misses little of North America: Riding in the back of a Canadian air force transport plane and crossing a Chinese street both hold the same level of danger and excitement. After traveling extensively in south-west China he has plans to see and photograph more of Asia. When not shooting photographs or writing he works as an ESL educator and administrator at a private school.

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Chinese Gridlock

April 8th, 2008 • Related • Filed Under

I spent an hour and a half sitting in the back of a taxi on a recent Saturday afternoon. It wasn’t by choice. The entire trip should have taken 30 minutes. I found myself mired a mile from home, watching the meter click over every three minutes, adding more jiao to my fare. Why? Three lanes of traffic had been reduced to one. There were no warning signs for motorists, just a traffic snarl akin to the gridlocks found in one of Dante’s circles of hell (if a modern version was written).

I did what any photographer would do: Pulled out my electo-image-recordin’-device and tried to amuse myself. What did I see?