(Warning for the reader: these are some snapshots in the memory of the trips made in China. They do not pretend to draw a complex reality like the Chinese one of the 80s. These are small personal experiences that have a value only for the writer).
The 1980s were those of China's awakening, thanks to Deng Xiaoping, the "little helmsman" who had denounced the mistakes of his predecessor and planned the reform of the socialist system.
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I worked in the Societa' Metallurgica Italiana leader of non-ferrous metals in Europe. SMI sold kilometers of Lega 10 to the Chinese (a copper-clad steel cable for telephone lines to replace the very expensive copper one).
The Chinese were excellent payers and were opening up to the Western world by soliciting numerous economic missions to their country.
The president of my company, Luigi Orlando, was vice president for years of Confindustria (the main association representing manufacturing and service companies in Italy) and your editor had become his assistant after moving from Florence to Rome to manage the Group's registered company.
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Confindustria delegation with numerous journalists in tow.
Arrival in Canton.
A nice colleague of the Mattino di Napoli who was a heavy smoker rushes out of the airport, starts smoking like a madman and throws his butts on the ground.
Two policemen, a man and a woman, jump on him, handcuff him and take him away. We had to call the Italian embassy in Beijing to be able to free our travel companion.
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Jogging in Canton.
As soon as I arrived at the hotel after so many hours on the plane, it was not a good idea to go to bed. A run of a few kilometers would surely have reconciled me with the different time zone and made me dispose of the toxins.
I wear a pair of shorts and a brightly colored jersey shirt, tennis shoes with reinforced and sprung soles.
I go out through the central door of the hotel and take a left. I am convinced that I will be able to go around the block back to the origin.
Among my many talents I also have that of not having the slightest sense of direction.
In fact, I no longer know how to return to the hotel. Panic grows and I decide to ask for information.
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I found myself in a miserable neighborhood with streets dotted with quilts from beds set to dry. People look at me curious and surprised. They are all dressed in black, blue, dark gray.
A woman comes towards me holding an open box with something to sell. "Hotel, hotel ..." I mumble the name of the hotel in my own way.
The woman looks at me in fear and begins to scream. Better to resume the race hoping to recover some indication to return to the hotel.
The street ends in a large square where other streets converge. In the middle of the square there is a pedestal with a policeman on it who operates the traffic light.
In the square and in the adjacent streets an incredible mass of people on bicycles, trucks, buses, tractors. Cyclists ring the bell all the time, truck drivers are attached to the horn, the general noise is frightening.
The pizzardone (policeman) somehow tries in the midst of all that din to regulate the traffic from the streets to the square and vice versa.
I just have to keep running and head towards the podium on which the policeman is glued. I arrive under the ladder and as soon as the soldier realizes the Martian who is asking him with strange gestures something, he thinks rightly to block the red light.
The din of bells and horns suddenly fell silent. People wave out of the bus windows, cyclists observe the scene with extreme interest as I persistently try to break through the pizzardone's mind to get some indication.
At a certain moment I see a hint of intelligence in the eyes of the policeman. He pronounces the name of the hotel correctly in his own way and I nod yes that it is exactly where I would like to return.
In the midst of the unnatural silence of the paralyzed traffic, the pizzardone descends the ladder and approaches me.
"What are you doing now?" I ask myself alarmed, "You won't want to handcuff me ?!"
He takes me by the hand and leads me in front of one of the great streets that converge in the square, indicates that I must go in that direction and then, manifestation of the highest indulgence towards a stupid western foreigner, knocks on my hand three times indicating the turn in the third street on the left.
My run starts again according to his instructions, the policeman has taken up its place on the pedestal, reactivating the traffic light and starting again the traffic currents and the general noise.
Oscar
(keep it going)
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