Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
chapter four
It's a Green World After All?
Marketing Nature and Nation in Suburban Shanghai
h ere is just one moon and one golden sun.
And a smile means friendship to everyone.
h ough the mountains divide,
And the oceans are wide,
It's a small world after all.
Richard Sherman and Robert Sherman, “It's a Small World,” theme
song of the Disney attraction of the same name, 1964
Whether or not signifi cant development takes place at Dongtan, we will
always have h ames Town to visit. h ames Town is a literal recreation of
“authentic British-ness” located on Shanghai's outskirts. Built in 2001,
h ames Town is an already decaying “English” village complete with Tudor-
style pubs, corner shops, Edwardian houses, Canary Wharf, and Victoria
redbrick warehouses—an amalgamation of hundreds of years of British
architecture. h e decay here is not mere metaphor but literal, in the “walk
carefully or that panel of faux-wood that is already half off will fall on you”
sense. h e majority of visitors are young newlyweds who have come to take
their wedding photos on a giant lawn in front of a huge Gothic-style church
(based on an actual church in Bristol). Decked out in (white, red, and pink)
wedding dresses and fancy tuxedos, pairs of young lovers patiently wait
their turn to pose romantically in front of what is, in eff ect, a giant concrete
