Home » Feature » Art and Culture
Deng’s legacy: The Cinderella story of Pudong
Print Edition
HUANG Yan got married in the summer of 1991 and moved into her husband’s home on Yuanshen Road in Pudong. Her parents were happy about the marriage but also concerned about her moving to the “countryside.”
“Our apartment block was the only building in the area higher than six floors,” recalls Huang, who’s in her 40s. “There was little, if not nothing at all, in the area. No shops. No department stores.”
Getting to Pudong on the east side of the Huangpu River from Puxi on the west bank meant taking ferries. There were no bridges, no tunnels. The ferries transported more than 1 million people a day on the crossing. To most Shanghainese, Pudong was just a rural suburb.
The breathtaking transformation of Pudong from paddy fields to glinting skyscrapers began under the policies of Deng Xiaoping, earning him a reputation as an economic miracle-maker.
Shirley Xu watched the miracle unfold. During her high school years between 1991 and 1994, she took the ferry from Pudong to Puxi and then the No. 55 bus along the Bund.
“That first year, there was absolutely nothing to see looking over at the east side of the river,” says Xu, now managing director of Osterhout Communications. “It was just flat land. In my last year in high school, the Oriental Pearl TV Tower suddenly appeared, along with other tall buildings. The skyline was changing.”
In early 1990, Deng visited Shanghai with his family to celebrate the Chinese New Year. In meetings with local officials, including then Shanghai Mayor Zhu Rongji, Deng urged them to come up with something new to advance Shanghai’s development and make it China’s flagship international city.
At the time, Shanghai, the former financial heart of China, was lagging the development of the southern province of Guangdong, which was flourishing thanks to special economic zones like Shenzhen that were set up in the 1980s.
“The development of Shanghai and Pudong is not a regional issue, but a national one,” Deng told central government officials after his visit. “To develop Pudong is to develop the Yangtze River Delta region.”
Two months later, Pudong was on the drawing boards.
Deng’s firm support for economic reforms also inspired those around him.
“I still remember his voice, sonorous and firm,” says Ma Lin, Deng’s former guard who accompanied him in Shanghai. “He was concerned with and visited many factories and companies.
“I also fell in love with the city from those Shanghai trips. Inspired by his determination on reforms, I went into business after retiring from the army.”
In those early years of Pudong’s development, Yang Xiaoming, then 37, was working for a municipal cultural fund. He received a phone call one day, notifying him of his transfer to the newly established office for the development of Pudong.
“I was both nervous and excited,” said Yang, now general manager of Shanghai Lujiazui Finance & Trade Zone Development Co, in a recent interview with local media. “It was a time when people all said they would rather have a bed in Puxi than a room in Pudong.
“But I also believed it would be a stage for my ambition and talent. At the time, my monthly salary was less than 200 yuan (US$32.50), and I remember telling my friends that I would be happy to retire someday if I had a salary of more than 1,000 yuan and a 3-bedroom apartment,” he added. “Looking back, not only my personal ambitions were realized, but we also created a miracle.”
Deng’s economic reforms and policy of opening up to the outside world didn’t always flow smoothly. There were critics within the Party who thought the policies were too bold. As the naysayers gained ascendancy, economic development in many cities stalled.
“The entire country was in a depressed and confused state, both politically and economically,” said then Guangdong Deputy Secretary-General Chen Kaizhi in an earlier TV interview.
It was Chen who accompanied Deng in his 11-day visit in Guangdong in 1992 as part of an inspection tour of South China. The trip turned out to be a landmark in China’s economic development.
The South China tour started in Wuchang in Hubei Province and ended in Shanghai, where Deng told city officials, “You must be more courageous in reform and opening up. Have courage and be quick.”
(Zheng Xin contributed to the article.)
- About Us
- |
- Terms of Use
- |
-
RSS - |
- Privacy Policy
- |
- Contact Us
- |
- Shanghai Call Center: 962288
- |
- Tip-off hotline: 52920043
- 沪ICP证：沪ICP备05050403号-1
- |
- 互联网新闻信息服务许可证：31120180004
- |
- 网络视听许可证：0909346
- |
- 广播电视节目制作许可证：沪字第354号
- |
- 增值电信业务经营许可证：沪B2-20120012
Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.
