Restaurant kitchen

Wuhan has changed a lot since I first visited, six years ago: it's definitely wealthier, less blatantly polluted, more Westernized. The once-ubiquitous little motorcycle/taxis are all gone now ("Not beautiful enough", Grandma explained), milk and coffee are widely available where they were once almost unobtainable, and there's a MacDonald's even in the blue-collar section where Grandma lives.

But Wuhan still isn't downtown Boise. Bustling little markets still pop up on the sidewalks every morning, with peasants trudging in from the countryside carrying baskets of vegetables on yokes over their shoulders; the markets dismantle themselves and disappear by 10:00 AM. Restaurants appear wherever there's an appetite, whether there's a roof or just an old oil barrel with some charcoal.