Wuhan in my eyes-武汉吾见

Wuhan in my eyes Every time the word Wuhan comes into my eyes, I can’t think of the friendly Wuhanese. Having traveled throughout China, Wuhanese is among the very few who are friendly to persons from elsewhere. This is quite different from that in Beijing and Shanghai where if you are not a local, you are sure to be discriminated. On the mind of the Beijingese and Shanghaiese, they are the masters of China. Anyone, whor he is, Cantonese, Sichuanese, or Hunanese, he is a peasant in the eyes of the Beijingese and Shanghaiese. So people from all over China visit Beijing and Shanghai only to find themselves lower classes than they once think. But this doesn’t happen in Wuhan. I once studied the reason why the Wuhanese is tolerant to outlanders and the results come as follows.

a.Wuhan has always been a center in China, where people come and go very often. This can be traced back to the 1st century when it was the time of Three Kingdoms. Anyone who read the novel Three Kingdoms can remember at that time, Wuhan was an economic and communication center of China. It was once a fortress which all the three kingdoms, Kingdom Wei, Shu and Wu expected to occupy. So many wars happened there. The well-known Chibi War happened very close to Wuhan, about 100 kilometers away, southwest. And because of the well-dloped agriculture there, the Jianghan Plain was praised to be a barn. People all over the country went there, buying and selling. Business was done day and night, which attracted people there for profit. This ed the communication between people of different places and Wuhan. When this communication is established, the acceptance of outlanders was fixed in the heart of the locals. Wuhanese in most part don’t take outlanders as outlanders. They accept them as part of the locals. So despite that Wuhan in many eyes is a southern city in China, the people there speak with northern accent and Hubei dialect belongs to the northern dialects of China. Of course, this derives from the communication of people from the north. It is also a proof that Wuhan is a place which once had a lot of northerners.

b.Wuhan was once an economical center of China, but in the past century, it was an industrial center in China. Since the second half of the 19th century, in the years of 60s, the governor of Hubei was the well-known reformer Zhang Zhidong, who was one of the aocators of the reformers in the late Qing Dynasty. Under his initiation, Wuhan became an industrial centre of China. The well-known Hanyang Steel and Iron works was established there. It is one of the first modern industry works in China. A well-known product of it is the Hanyang rifle which adopted Deutch technology. In the coming decades, the Hanyang rifle was the best rifle made in China. Later, Governor Zhang introduced investments from abroad and set up modern factories in Wuhan. This also attracted a lot of people from around China to Wuhan, where they did business. But this is not the biggest effect. The biggest is that in Wuhan appeared the first batch of modern industrial workers in China. Before this, China nr had modern industrial workers. The workers in then China were most handycraft industry workers who were different from modern industrial workers. A difference between the two kinds of workers is that the modern ones had fewer local ideas for they came from different parts of China. A skilled modern industrial worker might work in this factory today, but it's very possible that he works in another factory tommorrow for there he is better paid. So the fluidity of workers is often than the handycraft workers who don't change their jobs much. This fluidity brought tolerance to the outlanders. As this tolerance is inherited, and passed down from generation to generation, it became part of the character of the Wuhanese.

c.The last reason is that Wuhan has always been an educational center in China. Governor Zhang Zhidong established the first modern college in Hubei, which later dloped into the well-known Wuhan University. Since then a lot of youth from Hubei, Hunan, Henan, Anhui and other parts of China enrolled themselves in this university. And after that universities were established there. In the first 50 years of 20th century, Wuhan became one of the education centers following Beijing, Shanghai, and Nanjing in China. It is now enjoying the same educational status as it did 50 years ago. Universities brought many students from all corners of China to Wuhan, and it s the communication between the Wuhanese and the outlanders.

In one word, Wuhan is the most tolerant city to outlanders. And most Wuhanese are generous, and easy-going. If you hope to dlop your business, Wuhan is a good place.

武汉吾见

武汉提不得，一提起来我的话就多了。就光几个“center"我就可以垮一半天（先垮哈子别的，center留到等哈子说）。每回一看到武汉这两个字啊，我心就飞了。莫说我见的世面少，九州江湖哪一块冒得我冒客的，朋友也交的不少，顶够朋友顶讲味口除了武冒得别个。不呛北京上海，总把别个外地人不当人，总摆江湖大哥大的味。“歧视”你懂不懂？不懂？好！我乐样说吧，管你是广广也好川娃也好，就算是湘妹，北京人上海人都把他们一视同仁，看成么事列？说来你不信，---农--民（声音小碟嘎，莫浪他们听到了）！你说气不气能！搞到江湖上的英雄豪杰不敢客北京上海，怕被伤害了，自己都觉得低人一等不呛他们想的样，你说是不是呛任贤齐唱的“我现在一定~~~很~~~很”。我劝你还是客武汉，我留了个心眼，武够朋友不是一天两天。勒一说话又长了，又要讲到我不想讲的"center",真是冒得办法，算了，明天再讲。