Far from the Maddening Crowds

There are 56 seperately defined ethnic groups in China. The Han nationality is the largest group making up 95% of the population. Other notable minority groups include, but aren't limited to, the Tibetans, the Monguls, the Uighurs, and the Dai.
I know this because I've read it about 7000 times before. It's also in TV ads, on billboards, and if you ask any Chinese person they'll be happy to recite that information to you.
The current population of China is a little unclear. My students say 1.6 billion, official texts say 1.3 billion, but irregardless, if 1 million Chinese were to drop dead every day for the next year, it would still be the most populated country in the world. In fact it would probably take about a week and a half before anyone realized something was going on. For a land mass roughly the same size as the continental USA it has over four times as many people.

Here is an example of what it feels like to be on the streets of China. If you live in San Francisco, New York, Sydney, London, or anywhere else with an established Chinatown, you already kind of know the feeling:

Gather together the following CD's:
Christmas hits (The Musak version), The Best of Yoddeling, any heavy hip-hop or rap, The 1812 Overture.
Go to the middle of the New York Stock Exchange right before close, put on all 4 cd's and crank them up to as high as they possibly can go.
Now get 20 of your friends to read out the following, starting at different areas in the paragraph:

HELLLLLOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! LAO WAI HELLOMISTER WAIGUOREN MA NI SHI BU YAO HELLO HELLO HAHAHAHAHAHAHA WEI LAO WAI HELLOMADAM LOOKALOOKA HELLO HAHAHAHA LAOWAI CD DVD WAIGUOREN KAN TA HELLLLOOOOOOOOOO HAHAHAHAHAHAHA WO TA SHIBUSHI LAO WAI HAHAHAHAHA NI HUI SHUO ZHONGWENHUA HELLOOOOOO

Try to get a bunch of diesel engine cars and motorcycles to drive through the stock exchange constantly pounding on their horns. Also, if there is the constant noise of construction in the background, including jack hammers, this helps. And if you get at least 10 people to hawk a loagie and spit it at your feet randomly, that's also good.

Now multiply this level of noise by 10, and your almost at the Chinese level.

But that's just the noise.

So think back to the most crowded public transportation you've ever been on. Add 10 times as many people. Now have them all staring, with mouths open, gawking, and pointing at you. Now although you were pretty sure you were unable to move in this crowded subway or bus, have it so you're some how simulateously being pulled and pushed, pinched, groped. Have small children and dogs run around your feet. And make sure some random person is petting your hair.

Now, take all the smog in Manhattan and put it into this little subway car or bus. Have a bunch of men constantly blow cigarette smoke in your face. And just have a fire going somewhere for no reason.

Now the smell. The worst BO you've ever come across, pollution, cigarettes, raw sewage, wet dog, cooked dog, decay, burning rubber, and Chinese food. All mixed together.

This is what it feels like on every street in China. Which was why Starbucks was so nice. But see, none of this matters, because in about a week you learn to block out all external stimuli. So the only way for someone to get your attention is to grab you, shake you back and forth, while holding your chin and waving their hand in front of your eyes, yelling your name. Only then will you emerge from the happy land inside your mind of beaches and isolation.

For the next year, 1,000,000 people a day could die and it would still be this way. Only probably with a much worse smell.