WITH less than a year until the launch of Expo 2010, Mark Thomas reports from Shanghai on Liverpool’s preparations to take part:
A first glimpse of the Shanghai skyline can be an intimidating experience for a stranger.
A futuristic, dizzying city of 20m people, its endless forest of skyscrapers includes some of the tallest and frankly weirdest- looking buildings on the planet. Factor in the insane traffic, jamming the bird’s nest tangle of four and five lane highways and overpasses at all hours, and you have an urban landscape out of some dark science fiction fantasy.
Once you get over the initial culture shock, however, it is a city you can warm to quickly, as you discover the little pockets of charm, elegance and tradition tucked away amid the Gotham City pandemonium.
A glance across the river to the buildings of the Bund, in Shanghai’s historic heartland, and for a moment you could be home, looking across the Mersey at the Three Graces. Suddenly you understand why we are soon to celebrate 10 years as twin city to Shanghai.
At present, Shanghai is if anything more chaotic than usual, as the city goes through its own version of the "big dig", feverishly preparing for the day, on May 1 next year, when the first of 70m anticipated visitors descend on the city for the six- month extravaganza that will be World Expo 2010.
Liverpool, as the only UK city outside London to have a stand at the Expo, has an enormous opportunity to take full advantage of an event that has been described as the Olympic Games of business.
The Expo site covers a staggering 5.28 square kilometres, on both sides of the Huangpu River which winds its way through the centre of Shanghai. More than 200 nations and international organisations will be represented.
The buildings are well advanced now, although the contents of most of their interiors remain closely guarded secrets. China’s national pavilion, a spectacular hat-shaped structure over 60 metres high, and the 18,000-seat performance centre at which many of the world’s top artists are expected to perform during Expo, look close to completion.
