Close up of the climbers.
Being that construction is happening, 24/7, in Beijing, there is a lot of cleaning to be done.
There is also a lot of climbing to be done since someone has to put up all these buildings, clean them, tear them down, and rebuild them again.
I’ve mentioned before how often buildings are torn down and how quickly new ones go up.
Jill and I are often surprised, when we leave for a trip abroad, how new buildings seem to pop up, or the ones we knew, are gone.
It is what happens when you have 25,000,000 people living in a single city and the population keeps growing day by day.
Honestly, there is no way I’d want to do these jobs and, when I see these workers, dangling by these ropes, it reminds me of how lucky I am to have come from a middle class family that expected me to go to college. More than that, my family also expected me to travel, continue to educate myself, and not lead a life of manual labor.
Now, in no way am I disdainful or demeaning of manual labor. I work as a Marriage and Family Therapist and it is hard work. But it is not nearly as hard as manual labor.
I am just stating I was born into a family that valued both but was given an opportunity to do something other than manual labor and I choose that path.
Therefore, I’m always amazed, and somewhat terrified, when I see these guys hanging from ropes, cleaning or building, and start to think about the safety conditions and how things are built here and how quickly they fall apart.
I hope they are all okay and got home safely from their jobs.