The long ladder steps of the Bangbang

Locals in Chongqing call these steep stairways “long ladder steps.” This recording captures one such corridor, still tread by “bangbang” porters. It’s morning school rush: vendors hawk, footsteps echo, delivery station chatter booms, and schoolkids’ jabber rings from afar—all swirling in a hundred-step passage. Cities with Z-axis terrain stack buildings vertically, weaving complex, layered echoes with distinct character.

(“Bangbang” refers to porters who use a metre-long, wrist-thick bamboo stick to carry goods, climbing hundreds of steps to haul cargo from riverboats to upland warehouses. Only a few dozen remain today.)

Recorded in Chongqing, China by Digimonk.