Weekly Review: Here are six interesting blog posts from the past week that will help you travel back in time, see what “they” don’t want you to see, know when to flee, put yourself in context to Tiananmen, hate both Americans and Chinese at the same time, and understand China.
The Day The Communists Took Over Shanghai
From Urbanatomy/That’s Shanghai, comes an interesting collection of English language newspaper clippings and articles from 60 years ago chronicling the fall/capture of Shanghai by Chinese Communist forces. Soon after, Hong Kong ascended to glory.
The occupation has so far taken place under unexpected conditions of order and correctness. Above all, Shanghai had feared that the intermediate period might give rise to riots and pillaging by mobs of the licentious soldiery and by refugees. The speed of the advance, however, dispelled these fears. One of the rare skirmishes in the city centre broke out at the Park Hotel: the previous night, a handful of Nationalist soldiers, whose conduct at the front had earned them the title of national heroes, had been guests of honour at a Propaganda Committee banquet with Chinese wine and dancers. Surprised at dawn while still in the ladies’ company, they decided to die a hero’s death, which they accomplished quite properly, despite being improperly dressed.
Why This Should Matter To You:
- You like the History Channel.
- After 60 years, Shanghai is largely as big and bad as it used to be…before the Communists. We win!
Chinese And Americans Are “Both Brash, Arrogant People From Empire Countries”
Japan Probe is annoyed by Newsweek Editor Rana Foroohar’s post, “Japan: The World’s Worst Economy“, declaring her unfavorable view of Japan to be tied to her favorable view of China.
I must say that while I love the Japanese aesthetic, as well as the country’s art and music, I wasn’t sorry to leave last week. This probably says more about me than the Japanese, but I had a constant, subtle feeling of being an awkward gaijin always on the verge of making some etiquette error. I find that culturally, I’m much more comfortable in China. I’m now in the Pearl River Delta area, aka The World’s Factory. Yesterday, I interviewed a bunch of students at Sun-Yat Sen University in Guangzhou, and when I asked one of the students her impressions of the Japanese, she said that she felt they had a lot of rules, and that she didn’t know how to follow them. It put me in mind once again of the similarities in character between Americans and Chinese. Despite our obvious political differences, we are both generally brash, arrogant people from big empire countries, and on the upside, have fewer barriers to movement within our societies than either Japan or Europe.
Why This Should Matter To You:
- You’re a brash, arrogant American who resents being likened to the Chinese.
- You’re a brash, arrogant Chinese who resents being likened to the Americans.
All The Stuff The Chinese Censors Don’t Want Their Own To Know
Danwei shares with us a neat little trick you can use on Google (or Baidu, if support evil) to find BBS discussion forum topics that have been closed, thereby preventing more people from replying to them with comments and ensuring that they soon get “buried” by other topics. Of the tools forum moderators can use, this is slightly less definitive than an outright deletion of the topic, but still considerably devious. Of course, some topics might deserve being closed down but what we’re looking for to aggravate ourselves are those that were squelched purely for political reasons.
The search is for the string “Comments have been closed” on the Netease news portal, and the results returned are all controversial issues that are the subject of heated discussion in other venues.
The news stories in the above screen shot are:
- Sichuan calculates 5,335 students dead or missing from the Wenchuan Earthquake
- Corruption Prevention Bureau: Some officials are unclear about the problem of taking overseas holidays using public funds
- Foreign Ministry responds to US president’s China-related remarks concerning “World Press Freedom Day”
- Deng Yujiao’s mother suddenly dismisses her lawyer
Why This Should Matter To You:
- You’re curious about what subjects the mods at various mainland Chinese BBS forums find unacceptable enough to close down…and you can read Chinese.
When Foreigners Get Wrongly Blamed In China…Skip Town…Immediately
If you’re doing business in China and you haven’t yet discovered, read, or subscribed to China Law Blog (but somehow us), what the hell are you doing? This week, Dan shared a most harrowing story of them advising the foreign half of a Joint Venture to immediately skip town when it became apparent that they’d possibly get sued by some local Chinese. There’s a lot more to the story, of course, but you’ll just have to read it for yourself. It’s a nail-biter.
Young Chinese Child falls from a window in a room in which an American employee of our client is one of the few adults. Child is very badly hurt. Very badly. It now appears his injuries will probably not be permanent, but he also may be in recovery for a year. His medical expenses by US standards were fairly low, but they are astronomical by Chinese standards, particularly for this less than large city. A day later, the parents of the child come with a lawyer to tell this employee that they want six figures (in US dollars, not RMB) from him and from his employer for the injuries that have befallen their child. They also go to the police and make the same request of this employee and his American employer.
Why This Should Matter To You:
- The children of your local Chinese staff regularly play in your workplace.
- Your workplace is several floors up.
- Your workplace has open windows.
- Children fall out of your open windows.
- You’re a foreigner.
We Remember Tiananmen 1989 Because We Like Chinese People More Than Venezuelans
Rob from the Black and White Cat blog that gets updated every once in a blue moon reminds the world (or those passing by his little corner of it…which should include you now) of a massacre that took place 20 years ago, not of students and workers in China, but of the protesting poor in Venezuela. So why is this massacre, which seemingly claimed as many lives as Tiananmen did, not so well-known and well-remembered in popular consciousness?
The hopes and fears of spring, 1989, and their bloody end in June will remain forever seared into the memories of those who saw the events first hand, or watched with horror from a distance on our television screens.
But there was another massacre in 1989; one that few in the English-speaking world have even heard of. In February that year, Venezuelans rose up against a massive rise in fuel prices, part of a package of neoliberal reforms that were the straw that broke the camel’s back. The poor protested, rioted and looted, seizing the food and goods that had been denied them and the complacent middle classes and rich took for granted. The uprising became known as the Caracazo and it would turn out to be one of the most significant events of the late 20th Century.
Why This Should Matter To You:
- You can’t get enough Tiananmen!
- You’ve had enough of Tiananmen!
- “Which movements, rebellions and massacres we choose to remember, and which to forget, say more about ourselves than about reality itself.”
Bonus! Chinese Are Not Westernizing, They’re South Koreanizing
If you haven’t read it yet (which is incredible given how many times it was linked to this week), go read John Pomfret’s recent post explaining “Why China Won’t Do More With North Korea.” In it, he offers six things that could happen and weigh on China’s mind were North Korea to collapse. They range from very real to slightly (slightly) paranoid.
First, there’s a silly assumption in Washington that our interests (no nukes in North Korea) are the same as China’s. But they’re not. China’s first interest in North Korea is making sure the Kim regime doesn’t collapse. China’s second interest? Making sure the Kim regime doesn’t collapse. From Beijing’s perspective, nukes in North Korea rank somewhere around 10th.
The comments are also a hoot.
Why This Should Matter To You:
- A nuclear North Korea frightens you and you’re pissed that China isn’t exactly on your side.
- What? The Chinese aren’t westernizing? Wait a minute…
That’s it for this week. Have a link to a blog post that shouldn’t be missed? Be sure to share it with everyone in the comments, and don’t forget to tell us why you recommend it!
Great post Kai, thanks for the low down.
Regarding the Rana Foroohar paragraph…
I read some of the comments left at the Japan Probe site, and most people appear to have been deeply offended by her suggestion that Americans and Chinese are more similar than we would like to admit.
Before I lived in Japan I felt the same way. This is not to say that I now believe Americans and Chinese to be alike in every respect. That would be stupid. But she has a good point that Japan’s social strictures are so tight that it is nearly impossible for any non-Japanese not to offend the Japanese with their mere presence.
That said, I loved living in Japan just as much as I loved living in China — but for a very different reason. The politeness of society in Japan is refreshing, even though I understood very well that the politeness was only on the surface — or tatamae, as the Japanese call it. (I also loved the food, the general Japanese aesthetic, and a few very close Japanese friends who were willing to overlook my frequent cultural faux pas.)
What the Chinese may lack in “politeness” (as compared to Japan), they more than make up for with genuine friendliness, hard work, perseverance and entrepreneurialism. These are qualities that, despite all our other differences, should make any American feel comfortable.
I always considered that Chinese and Americans have some similiar characteristics. Eat your heart out :)