How often do I catch myself walking in the city with my eyes down watching the pavement and the flow of faceless people passing by. The city can do that to us, it can make us reduce humanity to a flow of bodies passing by, forgetting that each one of them has a story, a life and a face.
So many have walked, are walking and will walk this earth. How indelible of a shadow are we going to leave behind? Is our life going to be forgotten or will there be anything in the universe that would have been positively impacted by our lives and how we lived them?
“You work that you may keep pace with the earth and the soul of the earth.” Gibran Khalil Gibran
You see them every day, at all times of the day, weekdays, weekends, working, toiling, sweating, carrying loads, in construction sites, cleaning streets, selling goods, resting on sides of roads, falling asleep in the shade to catch their breath. They are very important elements in the canvas that is Shanghai, a city rushing towards the future and using every resource it has to get there fast. It is one of the few cities in the world using the German designed Maglev train (magnetic levitation) that can get you into the city from the airport in 7 minutes, a trip that would take close to an hour by car… China has these good people to thank!