China At Night In The Hutongs

China at night in the hutongs is a dystopia. Everywhere it is dark, both in mood and physical attribute. Only neon signs pierce the darkness, some light pollution trickles in from a neighboring busy road, but the hutongs are eery. Old ladies with weathered faces sweep their stoops, men on creeky bicycles pass by, there eyes never leaving yours. Tiny shops sparse themselves along the crumbling brick walls, but the sense that most lends itself to dystopia is smell. Every thirty paces down every winding hutong encounters a new odor. Sometimes it's garbage, sometimes is sewage, sometimes it's fruit, all the time it is very strong.
Watch Blade Runner, the noodle house scene at the beginning, that is what it's like.