kaspar könig

Welcome (back) to the “fresh impress of the peoples republic”

Dear Familiy and FRIENDS,

this time:
the cabdriver who calls a friend,
the hidden three georges damm,
Shanghai’s (only?) solarpowered infopanel,
and pechakucha in beijing.

Arriving in chongqing, confusion was immediately on board of the bus. Some people exiting others stayed put..
where we at the right bus-station? 17 h o’clock.. we heard the boat was leaving at maybe 18h so we didn’t have much transfer time.
O.k. a woman kind of persuaded us to get out because, yes the boat is leaving and she can arrange it. Aha . we got out and no harbour in sight. So, yes the wrong station. Since we figured that out, we might aswell just have a look what other boot agencies were around. nothing in first sight. Only busses to the next distinations. Then we just catch a cab to bring us to the right station. No cabdriver understood our intention even not with the best intentions. to many cabdrivers wanted the job. then a mobile phone is passed to me by one of the drivers. On both sides of the line, two enormous loud urban soundscapes clashed and basicly no conversation was actually possible. I managed to yell railway station and was able to make me understood. Then the confused voice of a man was changed by the voice of a woman and she repeated: where? where?. Another time we said it was to loud to understand eachother, at least that’s what I understood. It was just the feeling, get us out of here please! The cabdriver said he had understood and so we agreed on 8 Yuan for the drive. Well we just passed the corner and the phone rang again.
the same voices told me that we should wait for them. they would arrive in 2 minutes. And indeed.

A white car stopped just in front of us on the very crowded roundabout.Then the driver told me to pay the cabdriver the fee and be his guest to find out where we were really going to. O.k. I hesitated for a moment. But at the same time I was wishing for it so we got a bit better impression and got in the car where we could talk. So this was the way we met David and his friend.
In the car we made new plans. the boat was gone by now so maybe a hotel and a new try tomorrow? We got acquainted and the dinner we spent together. also we found out that this city had boats coming and going at all times. Information is gold in a place you’ve never been, just after arrival.

in the end we decided to take another bus and drive a bit further around the 600 KM lake with its many gorges and get a boat in Wanxian.. now, it is time for some figures. chinese style:
worlds longest dam will float 140 towns 326 villages and will 672 squar kilometer of water. so no wonder that the impressive romantic gorges are now under 100 meters of water then the dam is nearly finish and will open in 2008 officially. Is it an olimpic dam i wonder? well if 1,2 million people have to move for it you might start to believe that. Also Chongqing becomes the first city on a lake which used to be a river. if you want to see more, visit

http://www.irn.org/img/threeg/3g_map_graphic.jpg

the trip on the boat was still worth it! The 8 people in our 6 bedroom 3rd class were getting allong well and the one child among us was a delight. The boat is photographed and attached as jpeg. Finally arriving to this dam, nothing was visible. An extra entrance-ticket needed to be bought to see this obvious doubtfull dam-migration project to generate it’s backland powersupply. Though most of the vertile farmland is flooted and the power will go to new industries. The indicators of the final waterlevel where still way up. Where some flats regardless transformed in shipping-docs? judge yourself see the photo.
deboarding and just traveling to yichang was the destination after 1 day and night on this yangtse-lake!

Shanghai is amazing as you might of heard already. If you’ve never been there just like me before this arrival, I couldn’t imagine that real shine of reflection in the skyscrapers changing all day and ending into an mass-energy consumptive lighthouse even before the beginning of the night. Help! If these shiny houses would be christmastrees, shanghai would be a densed healthy forrest!
A skyscraper functioned as a full size screen with colours The biggest screen I ever saw. A flower dia slideshow was on. The whole skin of the building was illuminated. I would love to have the remote control and switch around like a tv from the other side of this same yangtse that’s entering the yellow sea in shanghai! As a good energy example and awareness tool I could only discover solarpowered decibel city sound measurement infopanel! (see image)
Awareness in accoustic polution is a good thing! Though with so much soundpolution it is tough to start making actions for the ears of the citizens.
The first thing I would do (although I’m the forefighter of bicycle sound!), is stopping the polution of the electric bike! The high frequencies that emerge during braking are really mean! And definitly unpleasant for my ears. Would like to now your reactions if you know that sound! (if not. come and have a listen to one of my recordings when you’re around!) Never seen this contradictions between wealth for the rich and the reality of the poor! Strange disgusting and curious blend of communistic capitalism in its extreme extension. Don’t now how to explain, but it impressed me a lot.

When we arrived in beijing early in the morning, the softsleeper promised what it said. We slept sofly and crossed the eastcoast by night towards the north. Very nice to wake up with a kind of militairy discipline. A trainsteward opens softly the door and starts almost yelling at us. 7 sentences in mandarin where translated in : >arrive soon< ! aha.pechakucha in beijing

Sunday, we participated in something unique! The first pechakucha night in BEIJING was helt yesterday at KoKoMo. This is a creative ideas exchange platform, worldwide, that gives artist and related people and matters opportunitty to talk together in a presentationformat with 20 slides of 20 seconds showtime each. A popular thing cause on the first occasion there where already 150 peoples gathering and the place was crowded. The starting guest speaker was, you can guess, ME! Showing my works in beijing to the interested people was super, especially the Xiloseum Instrumentwork was admired! We finished this beautiful initiative from the good guys (florian, salome, andre and sebastian) with the movie 2PS from Maja G. and I think it was very succesful! On tuesday I’ll find my way once more back to the 2 kolegas, where i’ll struggle again with the computer and the new instruments to give a new sound to beijing! Hope to see you there! That’ll be the goodbye party too. because wednesday we’re leaving back west!

This was the last fresh impress for now. Thanks a lot for your reactions. I’ll publish the complete fresh impress (1 till 6 ) on the website soon. Also I’ll put you on the list for my next impressions mail I still don’t know when that’ll be! If you want to get off the list please write a small message! if not I assume that you agree!

best regards and the best wishes for 07 if I won’t be able to speak to you before!