Up the Yangtze

The Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River in China - the largest hydroelectric dam project ever constructed at the time - would ultimately displace over one million people as cities, towns and villages and thus homes would be submerged underwater at the dam's completion, all in an effort to satisfy the growing and seemingly insatiable quest for energy. In many respects, the dam would change the face of China for good and bad, the bad including the loss of tradition and culture. During one of the dam's mid-phase construction stages, one family, the impoverished Yus, are followed, they a microcosm of the overall effects of the dam on the Chinese way of life. Despite the central government providing citizens relocation funds, most of those funds would be siphoned off by corrupt government officials at every level by the time they would trickle down to people like the Yus, forcing the Yus to figure out where they would move on their own, they who just want a plot of arable land near the river on which to farm. At the same time, the Yus' sixteen year old daughter, Shui Yu, who ultimately wants to attend high school (the Yus who do not have the money yet for her to be able to do so), is sent to work on one of the river cruise ships catering to western tourists, most who arguably will have the impression that what they will be witnessing is their traditional view of China. Like many of Shui Yu's colleagues aboard the ship, she is unwise to the ways of the outside world, she and they who are taught to put forward the best face of China, which in such a service industry means being forced to learn the global language of English.