From a poem to a pouch to an outdoor cafe courtyard, Shanghai's Wukang Road takes on smoking

In nudging smokers toward proper cigar etiquette in public places, nothing may be too small to matter. Even a poem or a pouch can help.

That's what I found out through my recent observation and interviews in Shanghai's historic Wukang Road area. The area has been selected as one of the city's eight pilot zones, including the Bund and Yuyuan Garden, where nuanced efforts have been made since mid-March to nudge smokers away from puffing randomly in outdoor spaces.

And it's not just about curbing outdoor passive smoking. My nearly four-hour "field trip" on Monday of the 1,183-meter-long Wukang Road and its adjacent area, which took me both around such landmark buildings as the Wukang Mansion (formerly known as International Savings Society Normandie Apartments) and into roadside design cafes, gave me an impression that proper smoking etiquette was mostly observed both indoors and outdoors, thanks to the collective efforts of many people, including space designers and tobacco control volunteers.

A cafe with a poem

I'm not a big fan of coffee, but a cozy cafe on Wukang Road caught my eye for its special design: It has a storefront glass wall that opens to Wukang Road, and the glass doors forming the wall can be folded to the two sides, enabling customers to sit in the middle, an open space that can be called indoors and outdoors at once. I lingered around this "open wall" and saw no one smoking. A couple of young customers were either talking over coffee or taking photos.

What a nice picture, I said to myself.

I entered the cafe through its main entrance near the glass wall, and a young lady greeted me with a smile. As she took my order, I noticed a conspicuous no-smoking sign on a wall.

"Is this no-smoking sign all you have to remind customers to observe cigarette etiquette?" I asked her.

"Not just this sign," she replied, pointing to another wall. "We've also posted a poem persuading people not to smoke. Our cafe's designer presented the poem in calligraphy.

"And if you want to smoke, we have a designated outdoor smoking area in our backyard," she added.

I had never been inside such a smoking area, so I ventured to sit by a line of tall trees in the backyard, hoping to observe at close distance what it would feel like to be surrounded by smokers.

It turned out, to my surprise, that not a single wisp of smoke wafted my way. Five customers smoked in a far corner of the backyard, shaded by trees. We were about 10 to 15 meters apart, and there were no seats between us. A young man about 5 meters in front of me puffed at an e-cigarette while chatting with his girlfriend. Another two men, seated near another corner of the backyard, were either working on a computer or simply relaxing. Like me, they didn't smoke at all.

This backyard smoking area is so structured that a few tables, benches and chairs are scattered away from each other, so that even non-smokers don't easily fall victim to passive smoking.

So I stayed in the outdoor smoking area for quite some time, enjoying my light roast coffee among smokers without smelling their smoke at all.

And while I lay back in the spacious backyard, I indulged myself in the poem, having discovered that it was written by a scholar-official in the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) to dissuade people from tobacco smoking. In fact, as I found in my later research, China's anti-smoking movement was first recorded in 1639 during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644).

Having finished my coffee, I returned to the cafe's counter and discussed the ancient poem with the young clerk. She said the poem might be a bit too difficult for some customers to understand, but it serves as a special reminder against smoking indoors. And when we talked about the origin and the meaning of the poem copied by the cafe's designer in calligraphy, a couple of customers turned around to listen attentively.

Shanghai has implemented a sweeping ban on indoor smoking, so anyone in breach of it is liable for punishment. Still, cases have been reported about smokers breaking the rule.

Mencius (372-289 BC) said that laws alone cannot carry themselves into practice. In other words, law doesn't work by itself. A proper nudge in the form of a moral poem also helps, or at least is what the cafe's designer apparently appreciates.

A persuasion pouch

A pouch nudges just as well as a poem. Both are likely to awaken popular interest in a healthy way of life by respectfully reminding people of their innate will to do good.

Toward the end of my nearly four-hour observation and interviews, I happily ran into a group of volunteers who each held a small pouch specially designed to extinguish cigarette butts.

"Whenever and wherever we see a smoker puffing outside designated outdoor smoking areas, we suggest he or she nip the cigarette in such a pouch, or a cigarette snuffer," said a senior volunteer from the Hunan Road neighborhood committee, who was coordinating a regular inspection tour along the Wukang Road area with two other volunteers when I met them.

I joined their inspection tour as an observer, and together we patrolled the Wukang Road area. We found very few people smoking randomly outdoors.

It was in front of a shop across the street of Wukang Mansion where we spotted a young man smoking on the sidewalk. Two volunteers immediately confronted him with a polite request that he better refrain from puffing outdoors, while telling him he could extinguish his cigarette in a pouch. Embarrassed but not offended, the young man quickly returned to his own shop, walking all the way toward its open backyard to smoke.

Although he didn't extinguish his cigarette in a volunteer's snuffer, he did stop random outdoor smoking anyway.

"Sometimes smokers would nip their cigar butts in our pouches, sometimes they would go and throw their cigar butts in nearby ashtrays," said the senior volunteer. "It works both ways."

Indeed, a pouch is especially useful in that it comes in handy, obviating the need for a smoker to look for an ashtray if there happens to be none close by.

A reporter from eastday.com, a leading news portal based in Shanghai, has also joined local volunteers in a patrol along the Wukang Road. Unlike me, she put on a volunteer's suit and held a cigarette pouch in her hand on a recent patrol.

She said in a report published on Tuesday that she and her colleagues had altogether dissuaded 10 smokers, eight of whom extinguished cigarettes in their pouches. The other two smokers moved to nearby dustbins, respectively, puffed a short while, and eventually nipped their cigarette butts in ashtrays.

My own experience echoes what the reporter has seen. Both of us realize that most smokers are amenable to reasoned and respectful nudges, as many of them may not know that outdoor smoking in the area is discouraged.

On my part, I have learned a lot from local volunteers, especially their devotion to tobacco control. The senior volunteer I walked with for a considerable time proved to be much more sharp-eyed and devoted than I was in detecting and dissuading any outdoor smoker who puffed while walking.

As I enjoyed our patrol on sidewalks, she suddenly said: "A lady is smoking across the street."

She immediately darted across the street, a pouch in hand, and told the young lady in a soft but firm tone: "Please kindly take note that smoking here on the sidewalk is not encouraged."

"Not even an e-cigarette?" the young lady asked politely in return.

"No, not even an e-cigarette," replied the senior volunteer.

"Ok, I see," the young lady conceded with an understanding smile.

In the end, I thanked the senior volunteer for showing me all the way how best to nudge smokers toward proper smoking etiquette. And before we parted, I invited her to have a look at the ancient poem written in ink on a wall in Gathering, the cafe that tries to nudge its customers to follow smoking etiquette "to the letter."

"Very nice," said the volunteer, who took a picture of the poem.

While we enjoyed the poem, the young clerk at the cafe's counter gave us a heartfelt smile.

A few thoughts

From a tobacco-control advocate to a designer and a clerk of a cafe, everyone can do something, however seemingly trivial, to help create a neighborhood culture in which mutual respect prevails.

About 15 years ago, I lived in a rented apartment near the Wukang Road area. At that time, Wukang Mansion was not yet a wildly popular site as it is today, and there were not so many tourists who crowded the area just to pose for a photo with the mansion and other nearby landmark buildings.

As I encountered huge crowds in my revisitation trip after a lapse of more than a decade, I feared at first I might be enveloped in a sea of smoke, as I often was in many other crowded places.

But my fear soon proved to be misplaced. When a whole neighborhood acts in tandem for collective good, it becomes amicable in almost every detail, from a poem to a pouch to a well-arranged outdoor smoking courtyard.