Chapter 373: Fifty steps to laugh a hundred steps

It didn't take long to reach Soga via the First Railway, and Ernst and his party arrived at Soga before dark. Suojia is still under construction, the southern urban area has been completed, and the National Library is being built south of the center of Suojia.

The Soga National Library is larger than the Habsburg Royal Library in Austria, the largest in Germany. It is also mainly in the Baroque style. It covers an area of ​​5 hectares and has a total construction area of ​​39,500 square meters. Ernst The 30,000 sets of books brought this time are not even enough to fill the gaps between teeth.

Ernst attaches great importance to Soga's plan. Currently, there are three cities in the Central Province, First Town, Dar es Salaam and Bagamoyo. However, Dar es Salaam The city is geographically relatively south of Bagamoyo and First Town, so when you look at Dar es Salaam on a map, you always feel that its direct west side is empty.

The First Town is the political and cultural center of East Africa, Dar es Salaam is the economic center of the Central Province, and Bagamoyo is the shipbuilding center of East Africa. Each has its own strengths. Therefore, Ernst felt that Central Province still lacked a scientific research center, which was the fundamental reason for the construction of Soga City.

Although Soga City is not needed now, it should be built first so that East Africa will not be in a hurry to recruit talents in the future. Although the education in East Africa has not kept up, the economic crisis is just around the corner. Ernst believes that during the economic crisis, East Africa can recruit some talents. East Africa to develop.

And Suojia plays the role of arranging talents. Science and technology, Ernst believes, can only play a greater role if they are concentrated. Scientists and inventors live in a city and can communicate with each other at any time to inspire ideas and correct mistakes.

Therefore, the construction of Soga is based on the highest standards, which is no less than the first town in the capital, so that future talents living in East Africa can feel at home.

The first is the living environment. Suojia can be called a garden city, with large and small parks scattered throughout the city. And because it is located in the tropics, Suojia will be full of flowers and green trees all year round.

There is nothing special about the climate. The advantage is that it is relatively stable. There is no winter and it hovers between spring and summer. During the rainy season, you have to deal with heavy rains that may occur at any time. However, the drainage facilities are quite complete and the sea is close, so there is no need to worry too much.

Road construction adopts the highest standards. Nowadays, brick roads are mainly used, but the width has reached the standards of later generations, and green belts have also been used, making the project volume huge and convenient for replacing with asphalt roads in the future. This is the main road, and There are specially designed pedestrian paths, and Ernst even reserved a motorcycle lane, but the construction staff did not know the role of designing an extra lane. The pedestrian path can also explain that the motorcycle lane is no different from most urban roads in Europe.

The current road design in Europe is very rough. It is just one road. Pedestrians, carriages, and livestock are all crowded together. The divisions are not detailed, and the roads are not wide. Even Paris and London do not have such exaggerated urban road construction in East Africa. In the eyes of the designers, it was completely extravagant and wasteful, which is why Soga City was called Ernst’s Big Toy.

Secondly, Soga City is very convenient for the concentration of talents. After the opening of the railway, it is less than half an hour away from Dar es Salaam, which will facilitate their travel between Europe and East Africa.

This is very important. If the talents are not trained in East Africa, then there is a huge demand for them to travel around the world, including visiting relatives back home, academic exchanges with foreign countries, business trips, and even leaving East Africa after finding their next home. Enns It is extremely impossible to tie them up in East Africa with a rope.

Taking advantage of the economic crisis and the unsatisfactory employment environment for talents recruited, their first choice is definitely not East Africa, but they have to go to East Africa for development due to the pressure of life.

Whether East Africa can keep their hearts depends on East Africa's sincerity. After all, Africa is synonymous with backwardness, and talents have always flowed into economically developed regions.

Here Ernst believes that Hefei did very well in his previous life, and it is a very important decision to try to retain the University of Science and Technology in Hefei. According to the layout of education in the Far East in the previous life, Anhui has no advantages. After all, it is next to Jinling. The role of Jinling is to concentrate educational resources in the region, which is the same as Xi'an and Wuhan.

Ernst was very satisfied with the urban construction of Soga, which was a very important step, so he asked his subordinates: "If you choose to live in Soga, would you consider it?"

"Your Highness, if we only consider the environment and transportation, then I think there is no city in Europe and the whole world that is far better than Soga. However, whether Soga can attract people to settle in, we must first consider the issue of employment. Without jobs, there will be no income. source, no one will stay here, and the second is the hardware facilities of a city. Suojia has done a good job in this aspect, even a little excessively wasteful, but wider roads are not a bad thing, and then there is the climate. Suojia is not bad either. The last thing you need to consider when living in a place is the city’s business environment, safety, entertainment facilities, overall civic atmosphere, and urban culture, etc.”

Ernst was very satisfied with this answer. He then asked: "Then do you think Suojia has any shortcomings?"

"As for the shortcomings, I can't see anything now. After all, this city is still an empty city. What it is like needs people to come in and live there for a period of time. But Your Highness, what is the purpose of building this city? I don't understand this matter. I still can’t figure it out.”

Ernst: "You will know this problem in two years. I can only say that Soga City will be of great use to East Africa. And in your evaluation of the construction of Soga City, I noticed the problem of excessive waste. What I want to say is Urban development is changing with each passing day. Now it seems that Soga is a bit ahead of its time, but the future may not be certain. Think about Paris. This was the case in the past. At that time, many Parisians believed that Napoleon III built a lot of construction projects just for the sake of face. Indeed, there are also reasons for this. But now Paris is an example of transformation around the world, and I think Paris may be replaced by some cities in North America in another twenty or thirty years. It doesn’t matter if the starting point for the construction of Soga City is higher.”

"What your Highness said is true. Anyway, we can't use all the native people in Africa. It doesn't matter if we build more big projects. Moreover, this is not Europe. European cities have been built long ago. Any changes require more consideration than in East Africa. And East Africa is a blank slate, allowing us to realize our imagination more freely.”

The indigenous people have made great efforts in the construction of Soga City. This city was built in a very short period of time, but it is much more difficult to transform than the urban reconstruction of Dar es Salaam. Dar es Salaam still retains many of its former buildings. The buildings include the Zanzibar Palace which was converted into a luxury hotel, while Soga is a new town built entirely from the ground up.

When he thought of this, Ernst suddenly felt a little pain in his conscience. Before, he was out of sight and out of mind in Europe, but when he arrived in Africa, he became hypocritical and tried hard to suppress the "sympathetic" thoughts in his heart.

Ernst said: "The construction of East Africa is inseparable from the indigenous people. The rational use of the indigenous people is very important for East Africa. There is no need to exterminate the Indians like the United States does. When some indigenous people reach the age of life, we have to find good homes for them. After all, I have worked in East Africa for so many years, whether it is farming, working on construction sites, digging canals, or building roads. It has taught them some means of survival in modern society. In the future, they can find some workers to survive when they leave East Africa. "

"Your Highness, you are still too kind, but this is also the difference between our German nation and the North American beasts." He said with a rather proud expression.

What are you proud of! Fifty steps to laugh at a hundred steps, at least East Africa is fifty steps short! However, Ernst did not say much. The times are like this. Even if East Africa is only fifty steps short, it is still much better than the Americans. The good ones cannot be compared to the United States, but the United States still wins in this regard.