The Richest Village in China

Yesterday I went to the richest village in China and the best place to live in the world. HuaXi - that’s how it’s billed. You can see it on Youtube if you don’t believe me. 

The experience  started out with a long drawn out process at the front desk where they couldn’t grasp the fact that I wanted to take a bus and not be driven by a private driver who would sit around and wait for me for a few hours and charge $60. Not that that’s so much for 4 hours, but the bus was 60 cents. Eventually a different person behind the counter wrote out these directions- Number 12 bus 10 stops. then walk 526 meters - find bus 205 and get off in 23 stops. Now that’s service. He said I’m afraid of some confusion getting from bus 12 to bus 205 (Yes, me too 528 meters in what direction?) But I said, I’ll give it a try. Now the first concierge says. “Probably no one speaks English at the bus station” can you tell he’s not my favorite person? I said, Not to worry - I’ll figure it out  and off I went thinking, I don’t care if I have to walk around the Jiangsin bus station for 3 hours, I’m not coming back saying I couldn’t get to HuaXi!

But of course I got the HuaXi - and back  thanks in part to the kindness of helpful strangers. During the the "526 meter walk" I was looking hopelessly lost and a kind woman got me on the right track without speaking a word of English. Those days of playing Charades paid off.

OK that was a lot of talk without even mentioning the greatest place to live on earth. People who live there get to live in their own house, get a car and cooking oil. The houses are nice, at least what I could see from outside the gates, because it s definitely a gated community. There was a lovely park with a big grandstand and seated statues of famous people, the only one I recognized was Mao. The only thing missing from all this loveliness was people. Yes it was the middle of the day, but someone, somewhere? the caveat for living here is that you have to work seven days a week, which in my opinion is cruel and unusual punishment. And where are the kids?

The jewel in the crown of this “village” is an opulent and gorgeous hotel/museum. The lobby has huge pieces of jade, great marble floors, it is really really posh and in the middle a statue of Mao with 2 carts and water buffalo. Incongruous, I thought. I do wonder what Mao would have thought about all this. 

We tourist could take the elevator to the top floor (72nd) for 150 yuan (about $22.50) Initially I thought this was a huge rip off because when you get to the top, although the design was great, the view was very much impeded by the smog. This was surprising since it didn’t seem too smoggy from the ground.  And guess what, - you could buy stuff up there. I’ve heard the term “red capitalism” since I’ve been here and I guess this is it. 

However the rip off was greatly lessened by the fact that every 12 floors on the way down, there were beautiful element themed exhibits. Floor 60 was metal (what's your favorite metal, gold of course.) Not surprisingly,this was the most beautiful. There’s a solid gold cow in the foyer (again, what would Mao say?) But I thought it was impressive. The building was a tower, so on these exhibit floors you went around a circular route. The floors, walls and ceilings here were all painted gold to emulate the Summer Palace of the last dynasty. (I happen to be reading Imperial Woman right now, which has a great deal to do with the Summer Palace, so I was really enjoying the vibe) Gold is good!

The other floors were wood, (some beautiful artwork ) water,(aquariums) fire, and earth (a four season's walk through a garden). They got less impressive as you went down, although on the fire floor there was a movie running that began with the volcanic beginning of the earth, man's discovery of fire and a quick fast forward to the building of HuaXi, presumably man's greatest accomplishment.

I'm not sure why the bovine theme, but each floor had an impressive cow, bull or buffalo in its foyer.

The story of HuaXi is very interesting and is the product of one person Wu Renbau. It is a farming commune that has branched out to manufacturing, and other stuff that's getting boring. The final decision is it's cool and interesting, but I would rather have a couple days off every week. 
Back to the Sheraton pool please. Full disclosure - it cost 60 cents to get back too.