31 July, Action-Man, Shanghai

On the streets in Shanghai, as the proverb says, "The rich and the poor meet together." Beneath the glitzy lights and designer malls on Nanjing Road, the beggars still beg and the homeless pick through garbage. Rich families with fresh department store treasures stroll casually by the trash pickers. As always, the poor seek more money and better status in a thousand different ways. Hawkers sell trinkets and DVDs and rollerskate shoes. Shoeless kids stick their hands in your face and say, "Hello, money," as if it were your first name.

But others force me to pause. A man in the square has no arms. He sits with a coin cup between his feet and his head down. A lady on the subway stairs cradles a baby whose head is twice the size of mine. It stare coldly into space. An old hag, her face and hair torn apart by skin disease, waits in the alley shadows for someone to pass by and take notice. Why does God choose such lives for these people?

All of their faces are burned into my head. Even in Shanghai, this pinnacle city of modern civilization, not everyone is comfortable. Day by day, the destitute play out their game for one more meal. What sort of game are we playing?

Drew