For those of you who’ve never been, China is a big country.
Like, really big.
And even though this might come as news to most tourists, the country has more cities than just Beijing and Shanghai. A lot more. I mean, it should seem almost logical that in a country of 1.4 billion folks, all those people would have to live somewhere. But at the same time, most 外国人 would be hard pressed to name any of China’s provinces or its second-tier cities.
For those of you in this category, allow me to introduce the city of Shenyang. While this “tiny” metropolis has a population of just 8 million people, the city is a major commercial hub and the capital of Liaoning Province, which means that it qualifies for China’s prestigious ‘Tier 1’ status.
This one time, just a few months before the COVID-19 pandemic broke out and the whole world lost their collective minds, I actually got the chance to spend a few days in Shenyang. It was only the middle of September, but this far north, the winter chill had already begun blowing in. The sun would start setting by late afternoon, so I took to wandering about the city during my lunch hour, thankful that I’d had the foresight to pack a fleece jacket.
At every intersection, delivery drivers on electric mopeds would whiz past my ankles, a constant reminder that no matter how far I’d traveled, I was definitely still in China. But even though I’d been living in the mainland for some time, and I’d gotten a keen sense for the Chinese people’s sense of nationalism, I wasn’t quite prepared for how the people of Shenyang took vigilance to the next level. No matter where I went, the locals always seemed to be giving me the hairy eyeball, quickly marking me as a light-skinned outsider. Who knows why? Maybe they thought I could’ve been an advance scout from the North Korean Army or something, since that border was only a few hundred miles distant.
And while I always did my best to avoid talking politics in China, those folks that I did engage with, they all seemed to hold a fierce grudge towards Japan. While in Shenyang, September 18 marked the midpoint of my visit, and traffic ground to a complete halt at precisely 9:18 AM, when the government sounded a long, piercing alert siren. Although this initially seemed like cause for concern, after the moment passed and I crawled out from beneath my desk, a quick search on Baidu informed me that the siren was apparently an annual tradition. Every year, the city of Shenyang sounds this alert to kick off a day of remembrance, marking, the outbreak of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression.
By that point, I’d had just enough of Chinese nationalism, and opted out of a planned day trip to the infamous Unit 731— a former concentration camp where Japanese captors carried out horrific medical experiments against Chinese prisoners of war. I chose to stay local instead, my attention captured by what appeared to be a glitch on my phone’s Google Maps application. At first glance, it seemed as if China’s Great Firewall was making the Internet act up again.
Because surely, there couldn’t possibly be a second place called the Forbidden City?
Just a short taxi ride later, I was amazed to learn that I’d been misinformed for my entire life. Yes, there really are two Forbidden Cities— or as the locals call them, 故宫(Gu Gong, Ancient Palace). These are separate and unique landmarks, because apparently, the ancient Emperors had this thing where the royal court migrated north each summer to escape Beijing’s sweltering heat. And while Shenyang’s Forbidden City might be a smaller version of the world-famous palace, it’s also a UNESCO world heritage site, and a destination in its own right.
For me, though, the main draw was the lack of crowds. This far off the beaten path, there were no coach buses full of holiday makers, those package tour groups which always descended on the major sites back “home” in Beijing. It was almost shocking for me to just stroll up to the box office, plunk down my cash, grab a ticket, and make my way inside. At Beijing’s Forbidden City, standing in a queue for two hours is considered to be an essential part of the experience.
Once inside, far from the maddening crowds of a Chinese megacity, this Forbidden City was surprisingly quiet. Peaceful, almost. Left on my own to wander about the palace, it was easy to appreciate the fact that I was literally walking in the footsteps of royalty— or more likely, following the well-trod paths of the thousands of staff and government bureaucrats who were essential to running the daily affairs of state.
Several hours later, I’d managed to check out every square inch of the palace, including a couple small museums of royal furniture and ancient weapons. I was finally ready to head back out to the real world— but even as I stepped into the hustle of modern-day Shenyang, the city seemed different somehow. Just standing there, watching all those people rush through traffic, I couldn’t help wondering how these same busy streets would have looked a few hundred years ago.
I guess it wasn’t the city that had changed; just my perspective. Because even with all the electric scooters, the honking car horns, and the fact that every last person was holding a mobile phone in their hand— for a few moments, at least, I was still capable of appreciating these glimpses into people’s daily lives, there in the furthest reaches of the Middle Kingdom.