About China blogosphere, travel, and entrepreneurship

An interesting conversation unfolded on Meg’s blog post about China Visa problems. Commenter CnInDC offered a well-argued explanation of the root cause of work visa limitations in both countries.

But one thing he (or she) shared helped me understand the feelings that some Chinese people must have:

I agree that the current visa “crackdown” was caused by security concerns about the Olympics. If you watch news in China you’ve probably already noticed that the China’s domestic Olympic propaganda has been dramatically toned down from wanting a most successful Olympic to a merely safe one. The reality is there, that a most successful Olympic is already beyond our reach. The people they wanted to impress the most, the western media and the general public from the western countries, are impossible to please. So they go for the next best one, that at least it’s safe, no ugly scenes (or at least not a major one), and the Chinese can enjoy the party all by themselves. I’ve heard this before from the Chinese people around me and think it may have a point: “大不了办成全运会”, or, “At least we can turn this into a national sports event”.

Photos from my visit to see the Good Luck Games in May:

It reminded me of this poem entitled “My Friends, What Do You Want From Us” I saw earlier in April on China Digital Times (also on China Herald) from cbc forums via C’est la vie blog:

What do you want from us?

When we were called “sick man of Asia”, we were called peril.
When we billed to be the next superpower, we’re called the threat

When we closed our doors, you smuggled drugs to open markets.
when we embrace free trade, you blame us for taking away your jobs.

when we’re falling apart, you marched in your troops and wanted your fair share.
when we’re putting the broken pieces together, “Free Tibet” you screamed! “it was invasion.”

So we tried communism, you hated us for being communist.
So we embraced capitalism, you hate us for being capitalist,

Then we have a billion people, you said we’re destroying the planet.
Then we limit our numbers, you said it was human rights abuses.

When we were poor, you think we’re dogs,
When we loan you cash, you blamed us for your debts.

When we build our industries, you called us polluters.
When we sell you goods, you blamed us for global warming,
When we buy oil, you called that exploitation and genocide.

When we were lost in chaos and rampage, you wanted rule s of laws for us.
When we uphold law and order against violence, you called that violation of human rights.

When we were silent, you said you want us to have free speech.
When we were silent no more, you say we were brainwashed.

Why do you hate us so much? We asked. “No”. You answered, “we don’t hate you”.
We don’t hate you either Bud, do you understand us?? “of course we do”, you said, “We have CNN, BBC, and CBC”.

But why, we still feel, your western people are not happy with us.

What do you really want from us??

My friend, What do you really want from us??

There is plenty of angry rhetoric from people who take extremist political positions on China on the China Digital Times post. There is also some extremely thoughtful points there too. Please read that comment thread first before posting some extreme rant (either highly critical of China or highly defensive against perceived criticism of China) that has already been said over there.

I propose we just take the time to try to understand the feeling expressed in the poem above and figure out how we can all take this feeling into account in our behavior with each other.

(Why am I posting this? I figured this poem would be hard to find in the future and wanted to just capture it on the blog where I know I could find it)

China Net (中国网) reported that there will be 50,200 registered guests visiting Beijing during Olympic Games weeks. They are athletes, officers, medias, sponsors and special guests. The estimated oversea visitors are 600,000 and domestic visitors are 2,600,000. Beijing Tourism Bureau said that there will be sufficient accommodations for all the visitors. The key is that you, as a visitor, must prepare more budget for your stay! Here are some numbers:

• Vacation home: 1 bed room/2 bed rooms : 800 RMB - 1500 RMB/day (120 -220 USD/day)
• Budget hotel (e.g. HomeInn): 1,000 RMB - 2,000 RMB/day ( 150 USD - 300 USD/day)

Wow. Can you believe that people are actually going to rent apartments at this price?

Tips to SAVE money:

1. Stay at your friends’ or relatives’.
2. Stay in neighborhood city, e.g. Tianjin. The commute between Tianjin and Beijing is about 1 hour, ticket at 70 RMB single trip. Not a great deal if you are traveling with a family.
3. Stay away from the Bird’s Nest. The closer to the Bird’s Nest, the more expensive it is.

Our friend Eric is just relocated from Beijing to Shanghai, and he wants to rent out his apartment as an Olympic Home. If you are visiting Beijing for Olympic Games and haven’t found a place to stay, this is a pretty good deal:

• Address: Rm xxxx, Building 10, Xinkang Garden, Xisanqi Est. Rd, Haidian, Beijing
• 地址: 北京市海淀区西三旗东路新康园10号楼xxxx

• 10 minutes’ walk to Huoying (霍营) Subway Station on Line 13. Taxi 20 RMB to National Stadium.
• 3 bedrooms, 2 bath rooms; all rooms are equipped with air conditioning.
• Unlimited broadband Wireless/cable Internet
• Solar energy power warm water system.
• 40 sqm living room, 25+sqm patio, total indoor area 137.15 sqm (not include the patio).
• Full electronic furnished kitchen

More information from Eric via Q&A:

Q: How much are you charging? For what period of time?

A: For August 1 - 31, I charge 100 USD/day for the entire apartment (3 bedrooms).

Q: What is the rental market like? What are you seeing people charging? You must know the market to be able to price your own property.

A: Beijing government have collected lots of Olympic Homes to provide such service. They charge 60-80 USD/ room/day.The hotels charge for olympic guest for about 200$/room/day. Here are some Olympic Houses that charge 5,000 USD / month.

Q: What is the market for Olympic rental housing at this time? What other websites have rental housing listings? (whether or not you posted on it?) Anyone who is seriously looking around will look at other listings as well so helping people get educated will make them more confident about your listing.

A: The market for Olympic rental include the oversea visitors and China domestic visitors. Lots of local people hope to make money from oversea guest. Beijing Craigslist has lots of houses for Olympic visitors. Most of them charge about 1000RMB/room/day or 8000 USD -20000 USD per month for a 3-bed room apartment. I only posted once on Beijing Craigslist, but didn’t get any contact so far.

Q: You show a floor plan. Are all the numbers square meters? Is it 137 m2 inside and 168 m2 including the outside patio?

A: Yes, you are right, it is 137.15 m2 inside, and 168m2 including the outside patio. It is on the top floor of the building, have a very good view.

If you are interested in finding more information about the apartment, contact Eric directly: mobile: 0086-135-6458-628eight, Email: yundong.sun#gmail.com.

By now we all know that a visa extension is no longer a matter of bringing the right identity photos to the Public Security Bureau. What used to be a routine process is now a dangerous lottery, made all the more confusing because different PSBs seem to be following completely different application procedures and demanding different requirements, and the rules may change again next week.

My boyfriend, Chris, is one of the unlucky ones unable to stay in China. He is not a protester or an agitator. He’s teaching second grade, not selling drugs. He was working for a school who has sponsored his visa extensions in the past. He has never overstayed a visa or worked on a tourist visa, but he was not able to extend his visa. I can’t think of anything he’s done that would make him a bad candidate for continued employment and residence in China.

I’m told that visa changes, like everything else in Beijing, is “because of the Olympics”. This connection has not been made clear. Some say expats are security risks, likely to turn the harmonious games into a PR disaster. Others say booting the ESL crowd will free up foreigner-friendly housing, to be rented to Olympic guests at a Western price.

I’m not going to stay in China without Chris, so I’m going back too, as sad as I am to leave Beijing. I feel stupid about leaving, too. Over the last few years, friends and family members have asked me why I want to live in China, and I try to explain the wild excitement of my adopted home. Living in China lets me move between two completely different cultures, and see the perceptions Americans and Chinese have about each other. I don’t like everything in China, of course. I’m not crazy about the subway stampede, and I don’t know why it takes 10 receipts, 20 counters and 30 red stamps to make a purchase. But I’ve tried to be a bridge blogger, even if only in my small circle. For several months, I’ve been blogging Olympics changes and Fuwa sightings for Beijing Olympics Fan! I was invited to be on a few episodes of the BBC’s radio program World: Have Your Say to talk about the amazing progress being made in preparation for the Olympics (I’ve even come close to using that cliche about “China’s coming out party”).

After telling everyone what a long way China has come since they’ve opened their borders, I feel stupid having to explain that I’m coming home because, uh, foreigners have to leave for unexplained reasons. This change in rules is shady, arbitrary and frightening, and after trying to change the perception of China away from this stereotype, I feel like an idiot.

I’m heartbroken that Chris had to leave China, but the visa issues are bigger than my personal story. Many of the foreigners who’ve been unable to get or renew a visa have a lot to offer China. International students are having trouble staying over the summer, and I think foreigners studying Mandarin can contribute so much to international relations, business, everything. Real Chinese fluency is so important for cross-cultural conversation, and it breaks my heart that students who are devoting their time and talent to this language can still be asked to leave. Freelancers, musicians, possible investors, and employees for smaller businesses are also having trouble, or simply coming in on tourist visas, which defeats the whole idea of legitimizing a vague visa system. We all know ESL was due for a bit of a cleanup, but many talented and inspired teachers have been affected, as well as the unqualified drifters. I can’t understand how expelling the foreigners who’ve invested their energy and effort into China helps anyone at all.

When I first saw the Olympics countdown commercials, on CCTV9 in my old Yantai apartment, it was over 800 days to the Beijing Olympics. I’ve eagerly watched it count down, two years, one year, 100 days, and now that there’s less than a month to go, I’m leaving China. The Olympics will be on TV at home, but I don’t know if I’ll remember the Beijing games as more than the reason we had to leave China.

I was crying as Chris and I drove to the brand new Terminal 3 airport, past the new Beijing 2008 banners proclaiming the Olympic slogans Beijing Welcomes You! and One World, One Dream.

Beijing is welcoming someone, I guess. But it’s not us.

Photos courtesy of Meg Stivison at Simpson’s Paradox.

So we’ve shown you where the big places in Beijing’s underground maze are located. Now it’s time to show you how to get around from A to B. Thing is — you need to go underground — and the only way in is with — a ticket. (Which, for too many of us, makes sense.)

Your Weapons: Play Your Cards Right

Beijing has officially stuffed its 38-year old paper ticket system in the paper bin. Beginning June 9, 2008, no amount of hollering to get into the station with an old, paper-based ticket will do the trick: the machines do only cards, which come in two forms: Single Journey Tickets (单程票) or the Beijing Super Pass (Yikatong, 一卡通).

If your trip in the underground maze is a once-in-a-lifetime experience — as in, if it’s a sole trip in your whole life — go for the Single Journey Ticket . Otherwise, though, go for the Beijing Super Pass. The thing is a lot easier on you — for one thing, you get spared the agony of waiting in line to get a ticket or being confronted with an automatic ticket machine that demands exact change only.

Getting A Single Journey Ticket or a Super Pass

“Oh, the agony of choice.”

Don’t get us wrong: Not only is choice extremely difficult for Blackadder (from whom we stole the previous quote with our sincere apologies), but with the Beijing Subway, card-wise, it’s a real pain-in-the-neck OR gate, not an AND gate, so to speak. You can’t exactly wave two cards over the faregate reader at the same time — nope, that trick won’t work. So you’ll have to settle for just one of the two: Single Journey Ticket or Beijing Super Pass.

• Single Journey Ticket (单程票, Dancheng piao): These are easy to get at a Subway station. You can get these either from an actual, living, breathing human being, or you can get them from a working but dead, lifeless machine. Human beings will hand you a Single Journey Ticket upon payment of the universal RMB 2 fee (Airport Express excepted); the machine spits the ticket out after you’ve paid.

• Beijing Super Pass (一卡通, Yikatong): You’ll have to find someone who can breathe (not something that only throws electronic messages at you) to get this baby. Then again, with the Super Pass, you’re not eternally condemned to getting them at your Subway station. Bus recharge spots (the famous “blue houses”) and a few banks, in fact (we know China CITIC Bank does Super Passes) will be pleased to hand you over a Super Pass. Here’s the thing: they require a RMB 20 deposit plus an initial top-up of RMB 20. You can throw a pink RMB 100 note (CNY 20 deposit, CNY 80 initial charge), and say this:

“Chong bashi kuai qian (充八十块钱)”

Man Meets Machine: Getting A Single Journey Ticket

OK, so you’ve decided that you want to abandon the world of touch-and-go Subway rides and settle for a once-in-a-lifetime (maybe!) Single Journey Ticket. And you want to get this thing from a ticket machine.

First of all, stay away from machines that have the words OUT OF SERVICE or MAINTENANCE on them (it’s too bad that was the only pic we could find). No amount of banging on the screen (or the machine, neither of which are recommended) will get you your ticket. Your odds increase at alarming rates if you find a machine that reads CHANGE, NO PAPER (insert coins only), NO CHANGE (does what it says on the lid), or, best of all, IN SERVICE. (RECHARGE ONLY is of no interest to you. )The machine accepts only RMB 1 coins and RMB 5 or RMB10 banknotes in good condition — if your dog ate it, the machine won’t eat it. (We know, we know: electronic indigestion sounds horrible.)Warning:

• Don’t buy return tickets at this machine. Tickets are only good for this very station — on this very day. (Yes, those are some seriously picky machines.)
• You need to hit confirm within 60 seconds, or your attempt at tricking tickets out of the machine (even legally) gets automatically nixed. (Some people miss this and end up causing massive queues in front of these machines.)
• Dead or disabled machines (ie those that give you no change, accept no paper, or are plain dead) are common currency on Line 5 stations in the evening, according to detailled research by your Beijingologist. You’ll need human-to-human interaction to get your Single Journey Ticket there.

Grab your change (if any), and your ticket. Head out!

Man Meets Machine: Topping Up Your Super Pass

First, the bad news: if you’re anywhere between Pingguoyuan and Fuxingmen stations on Line 1, as well as a few Line 2 stations, this trick simply won’t work. Automatic Super Pass Add Value machines (充值机) are on a permanent disappearing act at these stations. Seek human assistance instead.

Now, having said that, if you’re at any other station, you’re going to find at least one machine that does Super Pass top-ups. It’s often a machine that’s just slightly smaller thanAuto Ticket Machine. And it doesn’t have a coin slot.

Insert your card, choose English, choose Recharge, and feed the machine with RMB 50 or RMB 100 notes. Then choose if you want to recharge with a receipt (orange button) or without a receipt (green button). Life sure is great if you’re on at a Line 13 station, where just about all machines double as rechargers. And life is ninth heaven-ish in Line 5 stations, where you’re allowed to top up in increments of RMB 10 — not just RMB 50.

The Only Way In (And Out): The Ubiquitous Faregates

Probably the most important thing to remember about these faregates is how you use your cards — wait, play your cards right. This next bit is all you’ll need to know:

• Single Journey Ticket people, touch in and insert out. (There’s a card insertion slot — either integrated with the “touch zone” or as a separate part of the machine.)

• Beijing Super Pass people, touch in and touch out.

The other thing that’s of note: Stand outside the white line. (This is especially true for faregates on Lines 1, 2 and Batong.) There have been countless horror stories of people dipping cards while inside the faregate, only for the machine to beep in protest and the passenger getting just about no mileage at all. (We won’t even get into the mass crowds behind the guy.)

We Hope You’ll Never Need To Use This: Fare AdjustmentWe hope you’ll never have to use these guys, but just in case you lose your Single Journey Ticket or Beijing Super Pass, you’ll need to go through the Fare Adjustment counter. The fare will be RMB 3 (which is CNY 1 more than the standard charge, “to cover costs for the lost card”).If you lose your Super Pass — all hell breaks loose. Because Beijing’s Super Pass is not a registered card. If you lose a card with any charge on it, the extra charge, leaves you forever.And you’ll need to pay the CNY 3 to get out of the system.(Sniff.)

(Want to keep one of those cheap Single Journey Tickets? Faking a loss will set you back an extra CNY 1. Be smart and buy an extra Single Journey Ticket before you head into the system. It’s up to you to make sure you keep your “souvenir” ticket away from your “in-use” ticket, unless you want to be confused at the exit faregates!

Don’t Try This At All: Fare Evasion

It’s not like the Beijing Subway wants you to ride without paying. Heck, they’ve gone to massive attempts trying to stop this.

• Subway staff police the faregates like mad. If they catch two people (not a kid and an adult, by the way) slipping in together, these guys yell and chaos breaks out. (Or nearly.)

• Line 13 faregates are super-smart. To save energy, faregates on Line 13 close only after 8 seconds of inactivity. Just you try to storm in to an open faregate, however; this thing called “infrared” instantly gets wind of your (unpaid) presence, and before you know it, the doors slam shut as you’re just about to head for your train.

• Even if you’ve gotten in without paying, you’re still liable for a penalty. The punishment for riding without paying: ten times the standard fare. Owch. Not cheap.

Olympics Special: Security Checks

Safety first: The Beijing authorities have made security that bit more pronounced. With effect from June 29, 2008 — all the way through to September 20, 2008 — if you’re doing the Subway, you’re also going to be doing Security Check.

A few pointers:

• Baggage of any kind is liable for an X-raying. If your bag is huge or massive in numbers, it goes in for the obligatory check-up.
• You’ve got to have a sip of any water you’re taking in. (Just to be sure the stuff is not — “terrorist”.)
• If you’re caught bringing in explosives, you could be in for — on-the-spot arrests. They actually have people from the police at the Security Check!

We suggest that you travel light to avoid the hassles an impromptu Security Check could bring you.

Please Get Ready For Your Arrival

Good stuff. You’ve picked your destination. You’ve gotten your ticket, touched in, touched out (or inserted out), and are at your destination.

That’s just about it — pick your exit from the platform (this is crucial, as some stations use those sinister side halls where a wrong exit will cost you another CNY 2 just to get back into the system — or a long walk), and — be on your way.

Beijing Airport Express (机场快轨; jichang kuaigui) opens up to the public today at 14:00. CNReviews reported on the Beijing Airport Express back on 6/27, when the inservice date was originally 7/1, but the launch date has been in flux ever since.

Photo courtesy of Beijingology

This news was first reported to the Anglophone world on Twitter by our fearless correspondent David Feng:

News on the opening is also on China Daily, and Sohu (zh). According to David on Beijing A to B, the fare will be RMB25. According to David on Beijingology:

The line will have only four stops along the entire line. There will be two stops in central Beijing — Dongzhimen and Sanyuanqiao — with the two remaining stops at Beijing Capital International Airport. The Airport Express reaches Terminal 3 before reaching Terminal 2; passengers for Terminal 1 need to use the transfer passageway at Terminal 2.

Service intervals are expected to be 5 minutes at the start, with the entire trip taking around 18 minutes (Terminal 3) or 25 minutes (Terminal 2).

The new subway line will be a driverless system.

The Airport Express will feed into the overall Beijing Subway system at Dongzhimen (interchange with Subway Line 2 and 13) and Sanyuanqiao (interchange with Subway Line 10). The Line 10 interchange is especially exciting because it provides one-transfer access to Beijing’s CBD and to Beijing’s Haidian high-tech district. For a high-tech entrepreneur traveling to Beijing, this is transit nirvana!

Here’s a video of an earlier test run I found on YouTube:

More on this live from David Feng once he recovers from staying up all night waiting for the Beijing Apple Store Sanlitun to open up!

David Feng chimes in with the following first-day travel experience:

I think it’s been like this for — let me think — the best part of 58 years since Beijing Airport entered the real world. The old brown terminal, Terminal 1, Terminal 2, and now Terminal 3. For too long, Beijing Airport was just a road-and-air biz. No trains. No way.

Enter the airport on and after 14:00 on July 19, 2008.

When the guys that built Terminal 2 got their hands dirty with the construction work, they left virtually zero space for a Subway connection — hence making the Terminal 2 something like an add-on. The thing’s not big, by the way: only one side platform. (To make it up, though, it has probably one of the widest side platforms ever.)

When the guys that built Terminal 3 got into action, however, they left the new T3 (as we call it in shorthand) with a glitzy new Airport Express terminal connection, with platform screen doors, faregates (later installed), and just about everything that plain shouts at you METRO STATION. Except for one thing.

The train.

Oh yes — the train. Flashback forward to July 19th — and to the new Airport Express service.

The new Airport Express links Beijing with the airport — and by that, we mean really quickly. This is a four-stops-only biz: two stations in central Beijing, two on at the airport. I got onto the train at Sanyuanqiao, which is the second stop; I hailed from the Line 10 interchange. (The transfer passage, by the way, was so short that it seemed nonexistent.) I tapped in with my Beijing Super Pass (I think I was the only one; other got Single Journey Tickets for the line), and waited for the train, sure not to miss it. (If you miss your train, by the way, you’re treated to an excruciating wait of 15 more minutes before a 4-car Airport Express heads your way. 2017 plans call for gaps of 4 minutes only between trains. We sure hope they start shortening the gaps — soon.)

The train wasn’t exactly smooth — even with semi-autopilot on, the train behaved at best like a boat going through sorta-rough waters. (The “vomit-inducing”, as I later noted, weather outside — the heavens threatening to open up — made the trip that bit more miserable.)

However, the trip was pleasant for one thing: you got a seat. Imagine standing (like you do on main line Subway lines) for 15-odd minutes. (A repeat trip today saw me getting productive on the road — I pulled out the MacBook and got online while mobile. By the way, I cheated — a la GPRS. No wifi on the Airport Express — yet.)

Also, one of the best things about the Airport Express is that they run to an invisible schedule — 15 minutes as we have it. The gaps are uniform from the first train to the very last one. Little wonder, then, that when I finished my bit of Yoshinoya at T3, I was able to head back to central Beijing — in good time.

The Airport Express is a “good thing”, but here’s what they could’ve done (or, indeed, could do — remember, there’s plenty of room for improvement coming down the road) to make the thing better:

• Shorten the gaps between one train and the other.
• Add a station near Dashanzi/Wangjing East. (It won’t kill you, by the way; Line 14 is expected to snake its way across the region.)
• Add wifi to the thing and either make it free or affordable. (Wifi on the Heathrow Express is about GPB 5 — OK in the UK, but bloody murder in Renminbi Yuan.)
• Make the thing smoother. Make the thing more quiet.
• Finally, make all faregates super-wide. (About 30% - 40% of the faregates are — a massive improvement over what they have on downtown Subway lines.)

For Day One, though, good stuff!

Tangsos Chan is the blogger behind China Web 2.0 Review (in English), VP of VP of China Growth Capital. CN Reviews coverage of Tangos can be found here and here.

CNReviews was invited to attend the media preview event of the Apple Store Sanlitun today. David Feng of CNReviews (who is also from TechHub86 - techblog86 and BeiMac) was able to attend. In these pictures exclusive to CN Reviews and TechHub86, we can see the opening of the first-ever Apple Store for all of Greater China.

Other sites:

Apple4.us (h/t Flypig on twitter) has some great photos from the event:

More photos at Apple4.us.

Also on Twitter, Stephen Schwankert aka @chinabuzz (who’s day job is China Correspondent for IDG News Service) remarked on Twitter that “our new best friend: John Ford, Sanlitun Apple Store manager“.

UPDATE: Stephen (aka @chinabuzz) posted more details at PCWorld:

This is the first of many stores we will open in China,” said Ron Johnson, Apple’s senior vice president of retail, in remarks at the store. He later added that Apple will open stores “in Beijing, in Shanghai and beyond,” and confirmed that another store will open in Beijing’s Qianmen area, a shopping street south of Tiananmen Square that has been renovated ahead of the Olympic Games, which begin next month.

UPDATE: More great photos from Apple4.us on a new post:

Thanks again to Amy Barney of Apple Computer for the invite.

The store will opening on July 19, 2008 at 10:00 (reported by David Feng at TechBlog86).

invite courtesy of TechBlog86.

We learn from @shizhao (one of CnbloggerCon committee members) that Chinese Blogger Conference 2008 is calling for theme suggestion now. The conference is going to held in Guangzhou on Nov. 15-16 this year. The poll is in Chinese and here is the quick translation:

• A 网志创建和谐社会 - Blogs Creat Harmonious Society
• B 多志兴邦 - More Blogs (Wills), More Flourishing the Country
• C 和谐网志 - Harmonious Blogs
• D 和而不同- Harmonious but Diverse
• E 和而不同，多志兴邦- Harmonious but Diverse, More Blogs (Wills), More Flourishing the Country
• F 网志的个性与社会性 - The Personality and Sociality of Blogs
• G Other- ____________________

You can go here and pick or suggest the theme you like together with your blog URL. I (not stand for CN Reviews) picked B. I think Chinese blogosphere want more diverse voices, but they are not necessary to be harmonious.

What’s your choice of the theme?

Much to the detriment of my productivity, I spend an unwholesome amount of time online verbally sparring with individuals who take extremist political positions on China, whether for or against. Most regular readers of websites and blogs focusing on China-centric topics are familiar with the never-ending commentary that plays out, usually involving arrogant Westerners condemning all that is Chinese on one side, the rabid Chinese nationalists running defense with the best English they can muster on the other, and the nauseating hypocrisy in the middle that seemingly no side can ever get away from.

I sometimes step back and look at this depressing fiasco as a whole, and wonder if we’re not all utter idiots, clutching to the vain hope that our criticisms, insults, explanations, persuasions, or emphatic exhortations will somehow change someone’s mind for what we consider to be the more balanced and the better. It is demoralizing, to say the least, to realize that, yes…we’re all utter idiots.

Take, for instance, the politicization of the 2008 Beijing Olympics. How incredibly aggravating it is to see the Chinese and the Chinese government demand that the rest of the world not politicize their cherished coming-out party, only to see that they themselves have politicized it to the hilt. It may be wholly understandable that they want that control. Yet, it is that precise double-standard coupled with bumbling–or just poorly translated–rhetoric that consistently overshadows the sheer cultural ignorance and insensitivity we see from holier-than-thou activists for whatever movement du jour that has a gripe with China, its government, or all 1.3 billion of its people.

Those on the polarized ends will never see eye-to-eye, nor do they care to. The battle has always been and will always be for those in the middle. I’d like to think I’m in the middle but unlike those on the ends, I think that’s exactly where I and the majority of people should remain. Yes, straddling the fence involves the fence being uncomfortably entrenched up my nether regions but I’ll deal. Why? Because the truth is–according to me, of course–that both sides are right and both sides are wrong. This has been the case and will unfortunately always be the case, and I’d very much prefer to associate myself with the “right” on both sides.

Perhaps,then, the reason I continue to be drawn into these debates is my idealistic–but childish–faith in the marketplace of ideas. I mean, if I know something and I don’t share it, who knows how many countless souls will be swayed into the abyss of ignorance, bias, prejudice, and greater idiocy? Ah, yes, how narcissistic of me but isn’t cherishing dissent in the presence of consent precisely the difference between Western ideals of democracy, freedom, and human rights, and the authoritarian “social harmony” of China?

But in addition to the wonderful ideal of passionate but reasoned discourse leading us all to enlightened decision-making and declared positions is the very practical notion of being practical. Trying to convince your mortal enemy that he or she is an idiot is like China trying to convince the Dalai Lama that he’s the incarnation of evil; it is a waste of time and there could be more productive things to be done like racking up notches or, In China’s case, making sure your truths, lies, and spins are believed by the only people that really matter, your domestic population.

With all of that in mind, I offer you this excerpt of a July 14th article from the New York Times, whom many Chinese largely regard as a biased, Western, anti-China publication simply because it dares to print anything critical of China:

The call he will never forget came for Peter Ueberroth in the middle of the night on May 12, 1984, over a crackling phone line from Beijing. It carried the news he believed would determine the fate of the Olympics, not just the Games he was working to organize in Los Angeles that summer but all the ones beyond.

At the other end of the line was Charles Lee, the man he had sent to persuade the Chinese to send their team to the Olympics for the first time. Ueberroth, the leader of the Los Angeles organizing committee, was asking China to defy a Soviet Union-led boycott that was announced four days earlier. The Soviets said the boycott would keep 100 countries away from the ‘84 Games. If the Soviets succeeded, Ueberroth said flatly, “we were done.”

Salvation came when Lee called and told Ueberroth, “They’re coming.”

As the world prepares for the Beijing Games in August, that moment is all but lost in the history of the Olympics, when the winds shifted and carried the Games away from a political bludgeon in the cold war to the combination of athletic and commercial success they have become since.

Ueberroth, now 70 and the chairman of the United States Olympic Committee, will lead the American team into China with a deep sense of gratitude. He believes China saved the Olympics.

So maybe the United States and George W. Bush, the fantastic man that he is, attending the 2008 Beijing Games isn’t really about