China Odyssey

Some years ago, I wrote an op-ed piece encouraging people to be more aware of just who and what they were supporting with their purchases — a practice that I called "conscious consumption." It's always fun to tell people how they can be better, and I even glibly acknowledged that uncovering the life story of a product could prove a formidable task.

I now confess that, at least with the time and effort I was willing to invest, it was, in fact, an impossible task.

Joe Bennett, though, was willing to give it more.
A routine trip to the store inspired this New Zealand journalist to go in search of the whole story residing in a five-pack of underwear. "Where Underpants Come From: From Checkout to Cotton Field — Travels Through the New China and Into the New Global Economy" is the result.

Bennett takes it back one step at a time, from the distributors shipping out of Shanghai through the assembly line factories to the cotton fields in western China. He doesn't speak the language and admits to having thought very little about either China or the global economy before embarking on this journey. The story of his education in global commerce is 101 material with predictable mishaps and some downright silliness. On the other hand, he is a sharp observer and an entertaining writer and 101 is where you start.

"Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China" by Leslie T. Chang takes a deeper look at one aspect of this new global economy. China has more than 130 million migrant workers, a rural-to-urban migration of a magnitude never seen before. Young women are the dominant players in this movement that Chang explores in-depth through the lives of two factory girls in the industrial city of Dongguan.

It takes 200 pairs of hands to make a running shoe; the largest shoe factory in Dongguan employs 70,000 people. The workers live in factory dorms, eat in factory cafeterias and drink factory-bottled water. Chang, a former correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, followed two young women at this factory for three years. Min and Chunming were both able to escape the assembly line into positions of higher pay and status. A belief in this possibility sustains the migration. A willingness to work hard and "eat bitterness" is key.

"In Country Driving: A Journey Through China From Farm to Factory," Peter Hessler goes in search of the villages left behind. This is Hessler's third book on China (after "River Town" and "Oracle Bones"); he speaks fluent Mandarin and has an easy, unassuming manner that encourages people to talk to him. He obtained his Chinese driver's license in 2001 and spent the next seven years driving through China.

He first set out on a 7,000-mile journey across northern China, following the Great Wall from east to west. The roads here are rough, often essentially non-existent, and Hessler found villages crumbling away like the loess formations that surround them. Children and grandparents wait for the return visits of the migrants, but the rules of return are crumbling as well — all opportunity lies elsewhere.

Hessler also spent several years exploring the farming villages in the mountains north of Beijing. His focus was on the village of Sancha, where he observed the economic transformation of China in action through his friendship with one particular family.

When Hessler first drove out of Beijing, he found himself largely alone on the road. But with growing urban prosperity, more and more Chinese are buying automobiles, and with that comes the desire to go somewhere. A paved road transformed the traditional farming village of Sancha into a destination; tourism is the latest entrepreneurial opportunity.

In Lishui, a small southeastern city, Hessler witnessed the birth of a factory town. Lishui is in an agricultural region known for its tangerines. In 2003, the government built an expressway and declared Lishui an economic development zone. Hessler met two men, outsiders, in the midst of building a factory. They believed they had found their niche: the tiny 0 and 8-shaped rings on bras for adjusting the straps. They had a machine and soon they would have a building. The migrant workers would come, money would be made.

A few years later, another entrepreneur built a better bra ring machine; others found new niches in other economic development zones supplying the myriad unnoticed products of modern life. Tangerines were forgotten.

Hessler is a marvelous writer — entertaining but never mocking. Reviewers always describe him as insightful, and I will, too. I think, though, that his special talent is in simply telling the story.

Before leaving China, Hess-ler returned to Lishui and the now-silent bra-ring factory. The building had not been cleaned: tiny rings littered the floor and the workers' self-help slogans still covered the walls. At the entrance, the owner's gold calligraphy greeted him:

"The tremors of the future/Are happening right before your eyes."