Guangzhou's recent 7 year urbanization method consisted of several Billion Yuan spent on infrastructure and "beautifying" the city for its East Asian Games hosted this earlier this year. Similar to Beijing's Olympic games in 2008 and Shanghai's Expo earlier this summer, Guanzhou has also reached a higher level of urbanization with an international event. With more than 14,000 athletes and officials from 45 countries attending this event, the magnitude of its "incredibility" shocks most migrants. A bigger, but unknown number, 30 million, is coupled with the number of migrants who came into the city looking for jobs once this event was hailed. With this monstrous event comes the underlying negative aspects, doled out to migrants, who are forced to work long and tiring hours for little pay and families tossed out of their homes in order to demolish houses that are deemed "eyesores".
Hailed as an "breakthrough" for Guangzhou's international image, the public are forced to accommodate more laws and regulations through this time. Though roads and structures have been rebuilt and foliage planted in order to resonate the "quintessential perfection" Guangzhou has achieved, workers have been inconvenienced by the law that requires drivers alternate days on the road in order to create less traffic, shutting down construction sites and factories, banned interior decoration, as well as evicting more than 600 beggars from the city. Migrants have been calling this event a "show" for Communist party officials rather than the people; bosses have been given tickets to see the games, while mere employees are stuck working, but if they had wanted to see the games, the likelihood that they would be able to afford it seems minimal.
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