Loading
Aug 10

Watching the NBC broadcast of the Opening Ceremony of the Olympic Games in Beijing gave me a sleepless night. Something about the ceremony and the games bothered me. I had to think it trough.

What do you make of the following features of the Opening Ceremony? Continue reading »

Aug 07

I couldn’t help but think of Gresham’s law while reading the twin news of the banner carrying pole climbing protesters in Beijing and the last minute cancellation of Joey Cheek’s visa to go to China.

Continue reading »

Aug 06

Four members of the activist group, Students for a Free Tibet, have staged a lamppost protest in Beijing, unfurling a banner that read, ‘One World, One Dream – Free Tibet’, as the Olympic torch relay entered its final stage in the host city on Wednesday 6 August. All four – two British and two American nationals, holding tourist visas – have been arrested and are currently in police custody. In their interviews with the BBC, parents of the two British protesters spoke of their pride and explained that they were otherwise not unduly concerned about their children’s safety. They added that following the arrests the British students had made direct contact with their respective families, confirming that they had been treated well in custody. It is believed that they will now be entered into the deportation process within the coming days, whilst human rights campaign groups, including Students for a Free Tibet, have claimed further protests will follow in the weeks ahead. Continue reading »

Aug 05

August 15th is drawing close. It is a good time to think about China’s relation with Japan.

Besides, a new survey on this topic was discussed in Yomiuri Shimbun, August 4, 2008.

“Only about one-third of Japanese think the relationship between Japan and China is good in contrast to nearly 70 percent of Chinese who view the relationship positively, according to a survey conducted jointly by The Yomiuri Shimbun and a weekly magazine published by Xinhua News Agency.” Continue reading »

Aug 05

In 2002, the GDP of China was 10.2 trillion yuan, and the GDP of the US was 10.6 trillion US dollar. At the year-end exchange rate, China’s GDP was 11.7% of the US’. In 2007, the GDP of China was 24.7 trillion yuan, and the GDP of the US was 14.0 trillion US dollar. At the end-end exchange rate, China’s GDP was 24.0% of the US’.

If we assume the relative paces of the underlining economic numbers remain the same, China will catch up the US in 2019. That’s scenario #1. The key underlining economic numbers are: nominal GDP growth and currency exchange rate. Continue reading »

Aug 03

Thanks for all the thoughtful feedback to my previous post.

Your suggestions of overcoming East-West misunderstanding with multiculturalism (Alice Poon), attention to individual choices, within-group differences (Wu Di) and between-group commonality (Daniel) remind me of the Foreword written by former Japanese ambassador to the United Nations Hatano Yoshio for Nitobe Inazo’s well-known book “Bushido: The Soul of Japan” (Kodansha, 1998 edition). Continue reading »

Aug 02

Note: This post is a translation of an article written by Deng Wangjing 邓王景 and published on China Youth Online 中青在线 on July 31, 2008. It is a response to an essay “public opinion is not always correct” written by Chen Jibing 陈季冰 on the same site two days earlier. In turn, Chen’s essay, which is already translated by ESWN, seems to be a response to some even earlier articles. Some examples are:

Hopefully, such translations would give readers a stronger sense of (often quite lively and sometimes idealistic) discussions of politics, democracy, etc. in the Chinese media.
Continue reading »

Aug 02

After lamenting Western misunderstandings of the Chinese, their political arrangements and culture, it behooves to examine some Chinese misunderstandings of the West with regard to the attention their country has received from human rights activists and advocate journalists, especially in the run-up to the Olympics.

Why are the Chinese viscerally sickened by the following scenes from the Western media? Continue reading »

Jul 30

China presses hush money on grieving parents,” according to New York Times

Parents of children killed in collapsed school buildings in the Sichuan earthquake have been offered cash settlements, relaxing of the birth quota and pensions by the local government. In exchange, they are pressured to sign a contract to give up demand for investigations into official negligence and corruption associated with the collapsed schools. Some parents have relented and signed the contract, while others have refused.

A while ago at the collective funeral for the victims at one of the schools with a large casualty, the grieving parents’ pain was so profound that some bite on their fingers and wrote their children’s names with a wish of a “good journey” in their blood on a piece of white cloth. The pain of losing a child can never be compensated with money. My discussion will focus on a cross-cultural understanding on the money in question. Is it correct to label the Chinese authorities’ offer to the grieving parents “hush money”, or even “compensation”? Continue reading »

Jul 28

Several blogs have summarized two of the key findings from the 2008 Pew Global Attitude Survey in China . 1. The Chinese are overwhelmingly satisfied with the direction of their nation, its economy and its government’s handling of issues critical to their lives (often with consensus in the upper 80 percents). The Chinese satisfaction with the state of the nation has improved significantly since the last time they were surveyed a year ago. 2. Compared to their sanguine and optimistic view of the nation, the Chinese are far less satisfied with at least two critical aspects of their personal/individual lives, i.e., their career/financial situations and family lives. Their perception of their personal lives has not improved since the last time they were surveyed.

How would you explain the disparity between the Chinese attitudes toward their country on the one hand and their individual lives on the other? What do you make of it?

The data suggest that the Chinese personal/individual lives have been decoupled from China ‘s national life to a significant degree. Continue reading »

Jul 27

Mainlanders often feel exasperated by constant Western criticism, as if no matter what China does and no matter how much China accomplishes, it’s never good enough in the eyes of Western nations. The poem “Chinese Grievances” (aka “What do you want from us?”) expresses this feeling well. I think what’s shared below will help us better understand this problem.
Continue reading »

Jul 26

I have enjoyed my few days so far in Beijing, all the feeling of a hexie society.  However, that is only the superficial view of one man.  According to this Tianya post (连接) from a mainland Chinese also overseas, the under-currents are not always so smooth.  Many of those on TIanya, feeling their own discontent with society, applaud this post as being critical but balanced.   For part 1, see hereNOTE: This is the translation of a Chinese BBS post, and does not necessarily represent my experience, nor my opinions. 

The turbulence in China’s larger social environment, at root, has been caused by imbalanced development in Chinese society.

On the one hand, the laobaixing in China remain the most hard-working and good-natured anywhere.  Just as I described before, waiters making 800 RMB can peacefully coexist with senior white-collar workers making tens of thousands of RMB per month.  I’ve carefully watched their every action, and you can tell that they truly treasure this work despite its poor pay, and you can imagine how much less they must’ve made in their home villages. 

Continue reading »

Jul 26

I have enjoyed my few days so far in Beijing, all the feeling of a hexie society.  However, that is only the superficial view of one man.  According to this Tianya post (连接) from a mainland Chinese also overseas, the under-currents are not always so smooth.  Many of those on TIanya, feeling their own discontent with society, applaud this post as being critical but balanced. 

Last year, I ran into my ex-girlfriend on MSN Messenger.  She was pregnant, and without much meaning I reminded her to be careful with her baby’s health.  Just ordinary topics, like a reminder that she should try to breast-feed after birth.  I don’t know why, but she suddenly responded sharply: “Don’t think that our life in China is worse than yours.  Our classmates are all doing great; if we wanted to go overseas and play, we could.  You should just stay in America; there are so many people going overseas these days, even if you came back, you wouldn’t have an advantage.”  She continued, in great detail and color, to brag her happy life with her husband.  I calmly told her, I never felt I had any sort of advantage over you, and China’s future has plenty of hope.

Continue reading »

Jul 20

Chinese Exceptionalism -义理和人情

Written by: bianxiangbianqiao | Filed under:Analysis, culture | Tags:, , ,
227 Comments » newest

Before switching from posting immature opinions on things I know unprofessionally to the work I do for a living for a few weeks, there are some thoughts I really want to get out of my chest. I hope these thoughts will help non-Chinese understand some puzzling phenomena in the Chinese social and political life.

Notes:
1. My English translation of the key terms (义理, 人情, 隐忍) might be a bit off. Suggestions are welcome.
2. If you disagree, please trash, ridicule, tear it apart or ignore. Don’t worry about me committing suicide out of shame. Continue reading »

Jul 19

I was having an online discussion with a business associate about U.S. export controls. She made the following statement:

“China is such a threat to the U.S…we must be extremely careful of what they get their hands on…China and other non U.S. friendly countries will do practically anything to steal our knowledge for our weapons and military equipment.”

Notwithstanding that she has certain valid points I was still offended. I responded:

“I must admit that I take offense at the prejudiced statement because not only is my family Chinese, Chinese foreign policy for 5,000 years has been one of nonintervention & nonaggression (with a few exceptions). I realize that China does not take a Western style proactive approach to certain “hot” international issues, yet China on the other hand doesn’t directly interfere with other countries through military intimidation & conflict. China, like many other countries, has its own way of doing things and just because it is not the American way does not make them a threat.

China definitely does pose a serious geopolitical challenge, but calling China a ‘non U.S. friendly country’ is cold war thinking and detrimental to building a harmonious international community. Just because an individual is an American doesn’t give that person the right to demonize other strong countries which do not cower before America’s violent foreign policy. The world would be a much better place if countries spent more time mutually controlling and sharing technology through recognized international bodies, rather than demonizing each other and creating a world of fear and hate.”

It just bothers me that people always demonize China as a rouge state without ethics or values. I fully understand that the CCP has its share of corruption and violation of human/civil rights. I understand that China is building up its military and engages in constant espionage. I also understand that China does not share many American values. For example, the American values of…

Foreign policy: forcing poor countries to accept democracy and capitalism through military invasion.
Politics: politicians waste their time fighting amongst each other and waste the people’s money. Chinese politicians do the same but without the media coverage.
Military: China’s military personnel are usually only deployed for disaster relief
Diet/Food: gradual obesity through over consumption of over processed unnatural foods.

I am having a hard time deciding where my exact values stand because I share both American and Chinese values. Am I wrong by taking such a stand? Due to the fact that my ancestors were on the Mayflower should I take a more patriotic stand? How do you draw the line between where your values/ideology stands with statements like above?

Jul 18

A report titled China’s Economic Rise—Fact and Fiction published earlier this month takes an optimistic view of China’s future prospects: “Beijing now seems likely to overcome potential stumbling blocks such as economic instability, pollution, inequality, corruption, and a slow pace of political reform.”

Continue reading »

Jul 18

This is a follow up to DJ’s post on the Official Chinese Olympic Fashion, but from a different angle. Instead of mutual respect between the host and guests, I have some introspective and soul-searching thoughts about the Chinese identity fantasy in the context of a global culture.
Continue reading »

Jul 18

There is a heated debate going on regarding the lack of Chinese characters on China’s official Olympics uniforms in contrast with those on German’s sportswear.

Personally, I see no point in not printing Chinese text on China’s official uniforms. But for this post, I will purposely play the role of a “CCP apologist” and try to put these things in positive terms. 😉 Besides, I will explain two frequently used Chinese phrases and hopefully cast some light on a particular aspect of the Chinese culture.

Continue reading »

Jul 15

The Chinese Olympic Journey

Written by: bianxiangbianqiao | Filed under:Analysis | Tags:
45 Comments » newest

“We went out to swim in the big pond, but ended up finding ourselves. The ocean did not drawn us, just made us wiser and better”. This was a bit of sentimentality I shared with an undergraduate classmate who also came to the United States for graduate school and spent years trying to “make it” out here. The same sentiment parallels the Chinese experience with the Olympics in particular and their transactions with the world in general, since Deng Xiaoping opened the window on the world (allowing the flies to come in, along with some good stuff).

Two recent Western comments on the Chinese preparation for the Beijing Olympics caught my eye. 1. According to James Fallows, the Chinese authorities’ tightening of control over the situation was defeating their own purpose of impressing their audience – the West, especially its media. 2. Meanwhile, Richard Spencer at the Daily Times started to wonder aloud over his fish pond in his Hutong residence who the games’ intended audience really was. Could it be that the Olympics were designed as a reward for the hardworking Chinese, instead of a “coming out party” to entertain foreigners? My first reaction was Spencer had a more astute grasp on the Chinese psyche. Then I realized both comments could be right, but apply to different stages of the Chinese experience with the Olympics.
Continue reading »

Jul 14

Reacting to reactions to a campaign that went too far, Amnesty International put the following disclaimer on its home page:

Amnesty International would like to make clear that it was not involved in the dissemination of a series of images that have been circulating on the web in relation to the Beijing Olympics. Amnesty International’s global website address is www.amnesty.org

The statement is not untrue per se. But some details were conveniently left out:

  • Amnesty International commissioned TBWA\Paris to produce those photos
  • It further granted permission to TBWA\Paris to run the ads once and enter them in the Cannes
  • The visuals were not final versions, and Amnesty International knew the wrong web address was a minor error
Jul 12

In response to Marc (who wrote in #189 “What Does It Mean to Chinese”)

“However, the reason that I brought up house church vs. Three-Self church initially has a lot to do with nationalism. You see, Three-Self church was started by some nationalistic Chinese Christians in the early 1900’s (way before communist took over power in China). Hence they called themselves Three-Self (meaning self-governing, self teaching, self supporting). They hated Western Christians in China then. They teamed up with communist government later in the 1950’s to start persecuting other Chinese Christians who didn’t see things their way. That’s when house church Christians started to emerge. Anyway, the whole conflict started out with nationalism.”

I am glad that you put Christianity in China in historical perspectives, but your interpretion of important, complicated historical events is a bit oversimplified and biased. Still, you are right, the Three-Self Patriotic Movement was initiated by patriotic Chinese Christians and endorsed by the government, not “created” by the government as the PBS article claims to be (http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/china_705/history/china.html, a companion piece to Frontline/World Jesus in China).

Continue reading »