In Shanghai, another boring Expo is taking place

At the cultural olympiad of nations, there is the greatest interest in Czech dishes like dark Budvar, potato soup, Kaplická cmunda, and pancakes. In the store, about five hundred toys featuring the character Krtek by Zdeněk Miler were sold, and the most popular Czech glass is the so-called tall enamel.

Shanghai - Organizers lit up the sky above the Huangpu River on the night from Friday to Saturday when they set off 100,000 fireworks to kick off the World Expo 2010. It was a stunning display, wrote the Canadian newspaper The Montreal Gazette. Despite the warm night and the fact that the holiday extends across Shanghai until Wednesday, ordinary Shanghai residents were rather bluntly urged to stay home and watch the multimedia extravaganza on television.
    The streets and bridges around the Expo that could offer a good view of the fireworks were either part of the program or closed off. Even some typical supertall buildings in Pudong, which could have provided advantageous observation points, played the role of extras in this costly production and were therefore out of reach. All these measures were taken in the name of safety.
    The Chinese rarely express what they really think about their leaders' obsession with "big events," like the Olympics or now the Expo, which can completely upend their lives. Thus, it was interesting when the Beijing newspaper Global Times quoted a man named Siung Jianjun, who commented on all the security measures surrounding the Expo.
    "Safety is essential for big events, but the effort we have put into it is too great," he said. "It would be better to invest less effort into this and take more care to ensure that ordinary people could live better lives," he added.
    Shanghai reportedly spent 58 billion US dollars (about 1.15 trillion crowns) to create the Expo, improve and expand urban airports, the metro system, and roads, as well as to generally polish up the Chinese financial center for a grand party. Many feel that the reported amount is understated by some 20 to 30 billion dollars.
    The twenty-million-strong city has gone a long way to convince the world that it is a real cosmopolitan center. For months, residents have been sharply reprimanded not to hang laundry in the streets, not to go out in pajamas, and to learn not to jump queues. This has been a significant intrusion into the daily lives of ordinary citizens, but so far it seems that hardly anyone has noticed.
    During the six-month duration of the exhibition, it is expected to attract 70 to 100 million visitors; 95 percent of them will be Chinese. They will be able to admire magnificent pavilions, from the British structure Seed Cathedral, resembling a dandelion, to the Spanish funky wicker creation and the Dutch exuberantly overflowing Happy Street. The architecture will undoubtedly amaze visitors, but anyone who participated in tours prior to the opening of the exhibition will confirm the sad fact that the exhibits inside these magnificent buildings do not meet expectations.
    In practically every pavilion, including the most popular ones where people wait in line for two to three hours to enter, visitors are offered various versions of a national propaganda film. Each one has some special features, such as a slanted projection screen or astonishing sound, but in the end, it is still just a film.
    World Expos used to be about innovations and inventions. Today, they are about brands and business. Each of the 189 countries exhibiting in Shanghai now hopes to close more and better deals with the Chinese. Whether they aim to attract more investments, more students, or more tourists, nations from around the world will strive hard over the next six months to enhance their profile in this city, which itself is profiling as the engine driving China's endeavor to become an economic superpower.