In case of fire, run like hell

While showing Jonathan and Soyan a nearby open-air market (a positively enormous one that runs about a mile from end to end and is punctuated by clusters of warehouses chock full of stalls selling goods), we happened to glance off to the side of the main thoroughfare and caught sight of the market's fire control system: a couple buckets and some short-handled shovels. Not to say that a single fire extinguisher would be adequate, either, but this system faces two distinct challenges: first, there are no water taps nearby from which one might draw water into the buckets; second, without a jackhammer there is no way those shovels are going to be able to collect enough dirt to throw on a fire. This set of shovels and bucket (complete with rack) is something of a standard, as we have seen identical sets elsewhere in Beijing.

The moral of this story? If it looks like a building has caught fire, cut your losses and get out of Dodge.