To Screw in a Light Bulb

Fuz Maio is the site of Nanjing's ancient Confucian Temple and the home of the Kongzi Academy, with whom we are collaborating. This historic area is the Chinese equivalent of a national park or national landmark, and a great deal of attention goes into its maintenance. China is rich in people, and labor costs are low. Therefore, they use more people than we to accomplish an equivalent task.
They are meticulous in their attention to historic detail. In the above scene, they were painting a trash receptacle to look like a pair of ancient urns. Actually, they were repainting it-- someone told me they had decorated the same trash can six months earlier. Apparently, they want everything to look freshly painted. Three (very talented and artistic ) government employess addressed a task that might have been accomplished by one. A supervisor kept a watchful eye on the artists, and of course there were observers like me.
The problem is not unique to China. In the US as well, tasks grow in complexity depending on the number of participants.