"The man led us through a courtyard, around the back of the school buildings, and suddenly there it was: the yard opened up into a wide, grassy playing field, flanked on one side by raised seating.
On the edge of the grass pitch – regularly mowed, yet never used – we were pointed towards a series of bronze statues. The figures showed children in traditional Chinese dress, frozen in play as the pink silk scarves tied about their necks flapped noisily in the wind.
'Fifty thousand Quai!' the man giggled, ecstatic, before explaining to us that the silk scarves were washed and replaced on a weekly basis."
Apparently thousands of buildings are being maintained, cleaned, even silk scarves on statues getting washed -- for nobody to see.
Who is paying the maintenance workers' wages? The local government?