lisa1709's journal

Quaint Tudor houses, cobbled streets and red telephone boxes. You would be forgiven for believing this was a description of a typical British town. However, just 25 miles southwest of Shanghai lies China’s “Thames Town”, an eerie replica of an English market town. It was originally completed in 2006, not as a British theme park, but to provide living space for a projected 10,000 people. The town is virtually empty. During an extended visit to Shanghai myself and a friend, fuelled by curiosity and intrigue, decided to take the trip to the Songjiang District to see this mysterious mock-up for ourselves.

Entering Thames Town felt like we were arriving at some kind of elaborate film set. This wasn’t just a couple of copycat streets, this was an entire town. Everything from the lampposts to rubbish bins were designed to look as authentically British as possible. The architecture was varied, in fact a little too jumbled. We walked past everything from black and white Tudor style buildings to red brick Victorian terraced houses. Still not a soul in sight.

In true British tradition it began to rain as we made our way to the waterfront. Amidst the pattering we heard voices. As if we had been cut off from civilisation for weeks my friend and I turned to each other in disbelief. There are people here? Really? A group of Chinese tourists had approached us for pictures. They were also here to visit this bizarre representation of a British town and we, as westerners, had become part of the attraction.

We wandered through the disturbingly quiet streets past boarded up shops and deserted pubs encountering a few people along the way. In various parts of the town we came across guards, dressed almost as the Queen’s Guards minus the bearskin hats. I stopped for a photo with one of them who seemed more than happy to pose in his badly fitting uniform. This quite possibly could have been he pinnacle of his human interaction on this particular day in Thames Town.

I couldn’t help but wonder how I had ended up here. On a trip 7500 miles away from my home country I found myself walking through strangely familiar streets. Of course the lack of human life deterred from any real authenticity, but I still felt an odd confusion of my own whereabouts. I wondered whether Thames Town would ever be fully inhabited or whether it would remain as a silent, eerie ghost town, serving it’s purpose only as a tourist attraction for curious travellers like me.