There it is - the coast of China. The big one.
Probably the most important and significant of all the countries of the Pacific Rim,
and yet the one that's least understood.
But we've got to try and understand it because if forecasts are right,
within the next 25 years, China is going to have the most powerful economy in the world.
Yet I still have that feeling - partly because of its recent history -
of apprehension about travelling in China, a vague whiff of difficulty.
But I'm also deeply fascinated and looking forward to getting there.
Slipping into China through Qingdao is like coming in through the back door.
If you've taken the overnight ferry from Korea, this is where you will first set foot
in a country that is home to one quarter of the world's population.
The first surprise is how big the place is.
Qingdao has grown from a seaside resort to a city the size of London in just 20 years.
And there are no signs of it stopping there.
The second surprise is the Welcome Guest House, which turns out to be a Bavarian castle.
It was built for the governor 90 years ago when Qingdao was a German colony.
The spirit of Wagner lingers in the woodwork and the Chinese seem to rather like it.
Communist leaders were especially keen, if the wall plaques are anything to go by.
When Mao Tse-tung went to the seaside, this is where he came,
and this is the room he stayed in.
It's just this, is it? Thank you very much. Xie xie. Xie xie.
A little anteroom for drinking tea and planning revolutions.
And through here another little room leading to another...
huge room! The state bathroom.
This is wonderful.
A mixture of simple socialist taste and German baroque
results in a very small loo.
The old colonial town has survived remarkably unscathed.
Maybe because the party leaders liked it so much.
Modern China has been grafted onto Germany without anybody really noticing.
As soon as I've unpacked, I take a walk to get my first feel of life on Chinese streets.
Looks interesting. Blood donors, organ donors.
The sign doesn't help much,
but the sign language tells me that "mass massage" is on offer.
(SPEAKS CHINESE)
Every single masseur turns out to be blind.
Yeah? Shall I take my coat off?
Do you speak any English?
Well, communication isn't really necessary. Does it through the fingers.
It's getting slightly stronger all the time. Pressure's like...
having a wall collapse on you.
That's nice. That's better.
(VOICE WARBLES)
He'll turn me out on the street in a minute.
Public massage is clearly not unusual in China and I come away converted.
Walking on air. Walking on air. Really... It's a tough massage.
A few bones broken, but I feel wonderful.
The Chinese seaside seems just like the British seaside -
lots of people in thick coats walking round very cold water.
There are the same school parties and the same loonies... sorry, health freaks.
There are the same keep-fit fanatics and the same sun-worshippers.
Being photographed seems to be a passion
and one that an old ham like myself can hardly resist.
It gives me a sense of belonging,
as if I've become an honorary Chinese on my first day.
That's good. You like those? They're good? Yeah. Very nice.
Back at the guest house, there is only one possible book at bedtime.
"Quotations From Chairman Mao Tse-tung."
Suitable reading for the man who once slept here.
"The socialist system will eventually replace the capitalist system.
"This is an objective law, independent of man's will.
"However much the reactionaries try to hold back history,
"sooner or later revolution will take place and will inevitably triumph."
It's a dream, really.
0utside the city is something never envisaged in Mao's little red book -
a vineyard producing Chinese Chardonnay.
It was started 12 years ago by a pioneering Englishman
who went bust and died at the age of 43.
Parry's grave overlooks slopes where supply can now barely keep pace with demand.
- Do the Chinese like wine now? - Oh, yes. Very much.
Wu Lizhu is the chief winemaker at the Hua Dong vineyard.
Because production is getting bigger and bigger.
Michael Parry's unfulfilled dream has been realised as a joint-venture project
between the Chinese and a British company.
Hua Dong is being modernised, but the labels still go on by hand
and some of the departments remain defiantly labour-intensive.
In the end, it's all a matter of taste.
- The magic moment. - Let's start with Riesling.
0n an afternoon when we didn't need to chill the wines,
Wu Lizhu poured me some of his favourites.
It's a nice colour. Yup.
Pale and... Chinese Riesling here we go.
Yup. Kind of appley.
Yeah. Appley. Like green apple.
- Shall we break the ice? - Taste it.
Mmm.
That's smashing. Nice, isn't it?
- Well, that's good. - Shall we change to Chardonnay?
I could do with a few more glasses, but China awaits.
There's a lot of the country still to go.
We've come inland now from Qingdao on the coast to Taishan,
China's most sacred mountain.
It's considered to your spiritual advantage to climb it, which I intend to do.
Thoughtfully they've put some steps up the mountain - 6,293 of them.
So I'd better get started.
The Chinese believe that if you can climb the Exalted Mountain, you'll live to be 100.
Pension-fund managers would be impressed by the turnout.
Good for you, though, isn't it? It's a good thing to climb.
Once you get to the top...
the gods will look after you for a few years...
...till you come again.
The stamina of the pilgrims is impressive.
Taishan Mountain is 5,000 feet high.
Well before the top, we're amongst snow.
I've lost count now but I think it's about 200...
About one...
"Is this travel or work?" I was asked.
To travel and work. To see the country.
- To see the country. - As much of the country as possible.
Today Taishan, tomorrow the world. Race you to the top?
The only people who take it in their stride are porters carrying the heaviest weights.
Taishan Mountain has great meaning for all Chinese.
Taoists believe life begins where the sun rises,
so this - the most easterly mountain in China - is the most sacred.
Even Chairman Mao struggled up here.
At last, after two and a half hours, I reach the Southern Gate of Heaven.
0nce through the august portals, relief is short-lived.
Not only is the temperature well below zero,
but the real heaven is another half-mile away up another hundred steps.
Then there's Immortalisation Archway to pass through and you're there.
Time to pay respects to the greatest deity on the mountain -
the Princess of the Temple of the Azure Cloud.
Thank you very much. Very nice mountain.
From the sacred mountains of Taishan to the fleshpots of Shanghai
is a journey of 550 miles.
For a Communist country, China's trains have always been class-conscious.
Now the difference between hard and soft class seems to be widening.
Hello. Taking pictures of Chinese eating breakfast?
In today's China, wealth, it seems, can be flaunted without risk.
As Deng Xiaoping himself said, "To be rich is glorious."
- Rice? - No, it's not rice.
I'm invited to eat with a businessman who honed his skills in Canada
and is now one of Shanghai's many new entrepreneurs.
I was here eight years ago and it seems to be changing a lot. Do you find it's changed?
For the last ten years, it's changed a lot, mostly in the major cities
and especially around the coast and on the Hong Kong border.
Shenzhen is the city changed the most. Shanghai has been changing a lot.
Are there problems running a business in China that you wouldn't have elsewhere?
Over here there are problems. People are not used to the way we're running things.
They've been working in the Communist kind of way for the last 40 years.
But they're learning.
(CHINESE SONG ON RADIO)
It's eight years since I was last on a Chinese train and they have changed.
The in-train entertainment system now carries adverts.
There was one for liquor and one for insurance.
The buffet I had for breakfast this morning.
Very international. The uniforms. The look of the train.
It's all much more up to date. It's almost more Western.
I just remember it used to be a bit livelier, a bit less predictable.
I wonder if this is just one face of modern China.
See? More advertising. In exactly the right place.
We're sucked into Shanghai by mile after mile of new apartment blocks.
They're being built for the millions of Chinese
who Chairman Mao once exhorted to work the countryside.
They're now urged by his successors to seek their fortune in the city.
0utside the station, I step into a great stew of cars, crowds and commerce.
0verwhelming but exciting.
Next morning I'm out on the streets
because the authorities won't let us interview people in their houses.
So not everything has changed.
The number of bicycles in Shanghai provides a collective security -
it's the cyclist who's boss, not the car - but I wonder for how long.
I'm told that beside these old alleys where Chinese Communism was born,
there is now a branch of Harvey Nichols.
And it's true. London, New York and Paris are all represented here.
Even Savile Row has come to Shanghai.
- Hello. - Hello.
It's quite a surprise to find Gieves & Hawkes here. It's a long way from home.
Let's have a look. Ah, there's a sale.
- Can I try this on? - You can try it, sir, yeah.
I never get the chance to go to Gieves & Hawkes in London.
- Mirror. - Thank you.
Not quite. I don't think it's quite me.
It should be longer and wider and I could have it as a dressing gown.
- How much is that? - 440.
440? For only 440 quid you can look like a complete prat.
Let's have a look at the blazers. They're not in the sale. How much is it?
- That's £750. - £750. Yes.
Is it really only 20 years since the whole country wore Chairman Mao jackets?
Better? That's better, isn't it? That's more like it.
Lovely. Oh... Sorry, I've just noticed.
- But you can look only... - Exactly.
Just shoot me from up here, Nigel. Do you sell bicycle clips?
That's what I really need - some monogrammed bicycle clips.
Alongside luxury tailors, luxury cars are beginning to appear.
At this speed of change, I wonder how long Shanghai's bicycle-repair men will survive.
(MICHAEL) Good. That's fine. Thank you.
That enough?
Really? You don't want that? Bargain. Xie xie.
Nice to do business with you.
Just as you start thinking you understand China, you come across something like this.
(GENTLE WALTZ PLAYS)
Something you can't imagine happening on 0xford Street or Fifth Avenue.
The Chinese love ballroom dancing and they'll do it anywhere.
And anyone can join in. You don't have to be Fred Astaire.
It's all coming back to me now.
I gave all this up for rock and roll. I only had two lessons.
You don't need to speak the same language. You just have to be dressed properly.
It's all right. Yes. Thank you.
Thank you.
Good morning! You are all from London or Cambridge or Oxford?
- Well, he's from Bristol, Ealing... - (CAMERAMAN) All those places.
If I want to get to the Bund, which direction do I go?
- Go eastward, then you can get to the Bund. - Where did you learn to speak English?
I'm a St John's graduate. St John's was sponsored by the Americans.
This was before the Liberation War.
(MICHAEL) During the time we call the Cultural Revolution, what were you doing here?
I'm very sorry. I am graduate from St John's and that would be very troublesome.
- To talk about it? - Yes.
So 20 years ago, you would not have been allowed to talk to me?
Sure. If I talk to you, I am something wrong. I must be a rebel...
What is it called? Yes. Something would be wrong.
Yes. OK. But it's different now, is it?
There's a couple of chaps in police uniforms looking a bit uncertain.
But nowadays that don't matter. They can't interfere. We can talk freely.
I feel my new friend is someone I still shouldn't be talking to.
I make a quick exit and follow his directions to the Huangpu river.
This area behind me is the Bund,
which is the old 1920s and '30s financial and economic heart of Shanghai.
Even eight years ago, this was still the centre.
But in the last five years, a truly staggering construction project has changed all that,
and the new face of Shanghai is going to be here on what was...
(SHIP'S HORN)
- Thank you. - (SHIP'S HORN)
Shouldn't have had the prunes!
I was trying to say that this is the new economic zone of Pudong.
It's awesome evidence of China's open-door policy.
Tower blocks, built at the rate of one floor every three days,
will house a stock exchange, banks - all the heavy artillery of capitalism.
It may be capitalism without democracy,
but there is surely no going back to the stern certainties of old-style Communism.
This is the gaudy face of a country that has seen 10% growth
every year for the last ten years, and wants more.
Later that night, I catch the midnight express out of Shanghai.
- Is it always full? - Yes, it is. It's always like this.
- People have to book ahead for these? - Oh, yeah.
How many people? Thousands on these trains, I suppose?
Yeah. You've never seen the hard seats. If you see that... fully packed.
That's further down. They sleep on the hard seats for days?
How long would a train like this take to get down south to Beijing, say?
It would take probably three days.
Hard class haven't got beds. But we have.
0ur destination is Vietnam, but we're taking an inland route -
travelling due west and following the Yangtze River into the heart of China.
It's the third longest river in the world -
a fraction shorter than the Amazon and the Nile.
Upstream from the city of Yichang,
it enters a series of gorges which cut through mountains so impassable
that the river is still the only way through.
The Yangtze is a dangerous river.
Attempts have been made to control its mighty, unpredictable flow.
The lock at Gezhou is one of them.
Before it was built, boats battled through rapids, whirlpools and fierce currents.
This massive lock we're ascending actually raises the water level about 100 feet.
And it's here because the Yangtze's already been dammed at this point.
If the Three Gorges Project goes through -
this massive damming project which the government insists will go through by 2009 -
then there'll be many more locks for people to navigate as they go up the Yangtze.
This is pretty spectacular.
0nce through the lock, we enter Xiling - the first of the three great Yangtze gorges.
This was once the most treacherous stretch of the river.
Massive rocks claimed dozens of ships and thousands of lives.
The busy river sweeps by between limestone formations
to which the Chinese have given names like Yellow Cat Gorge,
Lantern Shadow Gorge and 0x Liver and Horse Lungs Gorge.
Then suddenly the landscape changes.
Changes utterly.
From the middle of the countryside rises the biggest construction site in the world.
0ver the next 15 years, a gigantic wall - 600 feet high and one and a quarter miles long -
will rise from these foundations.
It will cost $20 billion.
This is currently the most important
and probably the most controversial point on the Yangtze River.
You can see the workings for the Three Gorges Dam
which will extend to the other side of the river here.
So everything from here on that we're going to see
will in 16 or 17 years' time be totally underwater.
The homes of over a million people will disappear beneath a lake 370 miles long.
The project promises safe navigation, cheap electricity
and an end to devastating floods.
The cost will be the loss of all this.
The man-made scenery of the Yangtze is spectacularly grim.
Ancient power stations belch fumes.
A permanent smell of sulphur hangs in the air.
These towns look doomed.
Why change anything when, in a few years, all this will be engulfed?
Coal is flung down the mountainside - some of it sliding into barges,
the rest settling over the city like a great black shroud.
We pass through Witch's Gorge and into Szechuan province.
There could hardly be a greater contrast with the world we've left behind -
the glittering promise of Shanghai and the Three Gorges Dam.
This is old China, where machines are few and human effort plentiful and cheap.
Men and women form a conveyor belt to the coal barges.
We decide to stop here and look at the town.
It's called Wushan. A small hard-working place of few luxuries.
Life on main street reflects basic needs - food and warmth for the coming winter.
For some reason, Wushan is full of hairdressers. I decide to treat myself.
Can you do one of those like you were doing to him?
And a wash and... No haircut because I think that's OK.
How do you do? Thank you.
This is a monk's hair wash. They just do the bit in the middle.
Thank you.
They obviously work in relays here.
One lady lathers the hair very thoroughly
and now this girl here applies the massage, which is very nice.
I'm not sure what's going to happen next! I'll leave them to it.
I don't think this happens often in Wushan, judging by the audience!
They don't really see any Westerners at all.
The other sad thing...
is that in seven years, this high street will be completely dead. It'll be evacuated.
And a couple of years after that - about ten years from now - it'll be underwater.
Every porter in town has turned out to help us leave.
It's a fixed fee - the fewer the porters, the more money they share.
So each man fights to carry more.
Believe it or not, these are the lucky ones.
I try to be helpful but all I'm doing is depriving someone of a job.
Separated from the rest of China by mountains,
Szechuan is home to one hundred million people.
For many, the Yangtze is not only the lifeblood, but the great highway.
The hard-worked river boats sustain a whole range of ancillary services.
As departure draws closer, the pace in the kitchen rises
from merely manic to hysterical.
Chinese takeaway is given a whole new meaning.
Those of us not enjoying a Chinese throwaway
eat in the more sophisticated surroundings of the first-class dining room.
We're deep inside China now and I'm aware, not uncomfortably,
that we're the only non-Chinese on the boat.
After three days and two nights on board ship, we've...
- (SHIP'S HORN) - Thank you!
We've negotiated... Shut up! We've negotiated our way down the Yangtze gorges
to the town of Chongqing here.
It's about 1,500 miles from the mouth of the Yangtze in Shanghai
and here the Yangtze River meanders off for another 2,500 miles to the Tibetan border.
We have to try and head south towards the Vietnamese border
and try and get a train across to Hanoi.
The last we heard was that there wasn't a train across the border to Hanoi
and also that there was, so we'll just have to see for ourselves.
This might have been the easy bit.
At first sight, Chongqing looks as romantic as all the other cities of the Yangtze.
The difference is its size.
Chongqing is the biggest city in China.
It may soon be the biggest city in the world.
16 million people live in and around this mini Manhattan.
It's famous for its fog.
In the morning, I set out for a lunch date.
Steps climb steeply from the river.
50 years ago, the entire water supply for the city
was carried up here by an army of 20,000 porters.
So if you choose a local speciality?
Waiting for me at the meat market is Miss Liu -
a 23-year-old graduate from Chongqing University.
She's one of a new generation of Chinese
who can barely remember hard-line Communism and the Cultural Revolution.
So the meat that's hanging up here, that is the menu?
- That's where the food comes from? - Yeah.
- What's this we're starting with? - I think this is the steamed meat.
- Steamed meat? - Pork.
- Pork meat. - Have a try.
Try a bit of steamed pork.
- How about it? - I knew it was good before I ate it.
We've come into China through Korea and we spent some time in Shanghai.
Does it worry you that as people get richer, they get more selfish?
Less community-minded?
Mao's idea was that China should be built on the peasantry who shared everything.
Now everyone's getting rich. They have their mobile phones. Is it a change for the worse?
I think so, to some extent. Because...
I've heard that before the Cultural Revolution in China,
people lived more closely to each other.
They talked to each other very friendly, but nowadays I don't think so.
Do you have an image of life in Great Britain? Like London, where I come from.
Someone said they were very preserved.
- Reserved, yes. - Reserved.
Preserved is perhaps more true than you think!
Is it true? And also the...
Especially for the men, they are gentlemanlike. They have good manners.
I think if I had the chance I would go to Britain
to see what's the difference in the real Britain and the Britain in my mind.
You be careful of the men. They're not all preserved.
(BELLS AND CYMBALS)
Not the local football supporters, but retired people exercising in the socialist manner.
Red sashes are sported to remind Miss Liu's generation of their revolutionary heritage.
Time to leave Chongqing.
- (PATRIOTIC MUSIC PLAYS) - The Chinese take their railways seriously.
Complete with its own martial music, the 9.30 for Guiyang pulls out dead on time.
South of Chongqing now. Still running beside the Yangtze.
For about another half-hour or so it's still the main artery of China.
An hour out of Chongqing, as we part company with the Yangtze,
I asked the driver what he thinks of the Spice Girls.
We're travelling south, away from the mists of the gorges
into a world of green paddy fields and a rich, reviving, subtropical sunshine.
The railway slices across a high limestone plateau and into Guizhou province.
Its construction 30 years ago was vital in opening up this remote region.
But even so, Guizhou remained closed to foreigners until the 1980s.
Guizhou is far from big cities and centres of control.
These mountains have provided a refuge for some of the oldest tribes in China.
My guide, Sheng Wan - or Priscilla as she prefers me to call her -
is taking me to a market deep in the mountains.
This is where the Miao people live.
The Miao form an ethnic minority of some five million.
They've more in common with the mountain people of Laos, Vietnam and Burma
than they do with the Chinese.
During the Cultural Revolution, they had to conform.
Now they're free to live the way they want, but they remain very poor.
(MICHAEL) Would you buy things from this market? Would you buy food here? Is it safe?
Yes, it's safe.
Yeah? It just looks kind of basic. Meat laid out on the open tables.
- Do you want to try some? - I've suddenly lost my...
I love these. Do the women wear this all the time, this national dress?
Yes.
And they wear even more beautiful on holiday, on festival days.
- This is what they normally wear? - Yes. Normally wearing.
These days the Miao are encouraged to celebrate their own culture.
The Chinese have set up a Minorities Ministry to make sure they do.
The Miao love festivals. They were originally for the young to find partners.
A get-together could lead to a knees-up which could lead to a get-together
and a whole new generation of musicians.
Driven out of the rich plains by the Chinese,
the Miao have had to make a living from a magnificent landscape but very poor soil.
The methods haven't changed in hundreds of years.
Machinery is almost unknown.
Their tractors are water buffalo and their seed drills are women and children.
There are no roads. To get to the village we have to walk through the paddy fields.
There are few places in the world as untouched.
We're probably the first foreigners they've ever seen.
Hello.
- Do they speak Chinese or Miao? - Only Miao.
(SPEAKS CHINESE)
Only can understand some Mandarin.
Unlike many others in China, the Miao are open, friendly and curious.
I asked Priscilla if we can see in the house.
- (PRISCILLA) Yes. - We can have a look in.
(MICHAEL) Let's go in, shall we?
Barging in while you're having your lunch.
Is this?
Do they have a big meal in the middle of the day and go back to work?
(SPEAKS CHINESE)
Yes, yes.
Can you ask them have they ever seen foreigners before? People from the West?
- (PRISCILLA) No. - What do we look like to them?
- Quite different. Quite strange. - How? Why?
- Oh. With big nose, they say. - Big noses?
- Westerners have a big nose. - That's just me, not everybody!
Two weeks after entering the Yangtze gorges, we're out of the mountains
and rushing across the plains towards the Vietnam border.
Well, almost to the border. It turns out there is no rail connection to Hanoi.
We must leave our train and carry on by bus.
We're set down hours later at a grand, strangely deserted frontier.
This is Friendship Gate in Pinxiang and it marks the end of China
and the frontier with Vietnam, which I hope to cross soon.
This is not an orthodox way of leaving China.
In 1979, the Chinese and the Vietnamese went to war and the border was sealed.
It's now open again but there aren't many people here.
I hope there's someone to see my passport.
Sadly, it's goodbye to China and "Hello, Vietnam."