Senior Citizen Homes In China
The New York Times discusses the growth of retirement facilities in China (link via TPD's Facebook feed), though notes with a caveat that these remain viable options only for the upper class living in or near major cities.
Over the years I've had several conversations with Chinese friends in which the subject of retirement homes comes up. Often, my friends find the idea of putting grandma or grandpa in a home to be an abhorrent violation of filial duty. One told me that her parents wouldn't allow her to date a foreigner because they were worried that the foreigner would, if married to the girl, refuse to look after her dear old parents.
It usually surprises these friends to hear that my grandparents lived with me, at least part of the year, for much of my childhood. In fact, the experience of living with grandparents and other relatives isn't all that alien to a lot of Americans, particularly in generations past.
Placing elderly relatives in retirement homes derives not from a ruthless cultural norm, but more from a value that the Chinese well recognize: pragmatism. A lot of senior citizens have medical issues that require more attention than a working adult may be able to provide. Being in a home with full-time professional care, surrounded by peers, is often a more appealing lifestyle for a senior, particularly a widow or widower.
As Chinese people grow wealthier, I would guess that more of them will reach similar conclusions to their American- or Western- counterparts.
As a corollary issue, I find it interesting how matters assumed to be largely or entirely cultural are often mostly socio-economic in nature. I do believe that the Chinese have a stronger cultural norm of involving extended family members in day-to-day affairs than do Westerners, though not to the extent typically assumed. Plus, urbanization and affluence cause lifestyle changes that override cultural considerations.
What we often believe is cultural, and thus impenetrable, is actually far more fluid and malleable that we realize.
Human Rights, Continued
This article- about increased acceptance for homosexuality in Beijing- says far more about the state of "human rights" in China than this editorial by the Washington Post.
Smoked Out
So I guess those non-smoking signs on the Beijing-Tianjin high speed trains are more than just decoration:
A man was given three days in detention for breaking a non-smoking rule on a new high-speed rail line, Chinese state media said, an unusually severe punishment in a country where smoking bans are routinely ignored.
He was caught smoking in the toilet just after the train had left Tianjin for Beijing, triggering an alarm and causing the train to stop, the official Xinhua news agency said on its website (www.xinhuanet.com).
The high-tech line connects the capital with neighboring Tianjinin. It opened in time for this year's Beijing Olympics and features carriages more luxurious than usual in China, including swivel chairs and spacious, plush interiors.
No-smoking signs and rules are generally given short shrift in China and about half of all Chinese men smoke.
"It is strictly forbidden to smoke on the Beijing-Tianjin Express, and they hope everyone respects the rules, travels in a civilized manner and ensures the train's safety and punctuality," Xinhua said.
What I find so funny about this is that the Beijing-Tianjin journey takes less than a half-hour. It's one thing to be caught smoking on a ten-hour journey, but surely the poor guy couldn't wait a half-hour?
The Maddening Chinese Holidays
In his latest Sinosplice post, John wonders whether the dread 7-day workweek will become a thing of the past as China adjusts its holiday schedule.
I arrived in Lianyungang on a Friday evening right before the October holiday. When my colleagues greeted me at the door, they said that while I didn't have to take over my classes until after the break, I should still come and observe their lessons over the weekend.
"But, isn't tomorrow Saturday?" I asked.
They murmured to one another and informed me that, while the next day was indeed Saturday, Chinese schools "make up" days lost to the holiday on the preceding (and occasionally succeeding) weekends. This means that your five-day holiday is bookended by seven-day workweeks, resulting in an odd wish that the holiday hadn't occurred at all.
Of all the little Chinese scheduling intricacies foreigners learn to deal with, the seven-day workweek is easily the worst. A colleague of mine in Fuzhou once directed a spirited tirade against our Chinese 外办, as if a tiny office in Fuzhou Senior Middle School were responsible for the national calendar. Typically, I scheduled two relaxed days over the weekend before a holiday, including a classic teacher's cop-out of screening a DVD.
Last year, those who make these decisions in China decided to phase out the two weekly holidays in May and October and scatter days off throughout the year, perhaps in an effort to avoid tourist crunches that occur when a billion people hit the road at the same time. This year, our May holiday was reduced to three days. According to John, this will be the last week-long October holiday. He's for it. So am I.
Five-day holidays are fine, but the infuriating seven-day workweeks make them almost worth not having at all. Plus, there's something wonderful about four-day workweeks, particularly when Mondays are off....long weekends followed by short weeks are great.
In any case, I shouldn't be complaining. Because my boss is English, not Chinese, I get nine days off for the holidays. Next week, I'll be off on a five-day bicycling trip around southern Yunnan, from which photos and text will follow. Life is good.
On Nomenclature
Recently I took a job as an intern with a company called the China Intel Organization. We mainly specialize in providing information and analysis on logistics and infrastructure within China, often for larger corporations or for trade publications and journals.
One of our recent tasks was compiling country profiles for various east and south Asian countries, focusing on their economy, transport infrastructure, and logistics markets. I was responsible for about six countries, including Hong Kong and Taiwan.
For these entities, finding information wasn't particularly difficult (even if the Taiwanese government website is firewalled here on the mainland). What did trip me up a bit, though, was nomenclature. What's the proper name for each place?
Hong Kong is the easier of the two to distinguish, as its status is far clearer. For all intents and purposes, Hong Kong is a separate country from China. It has its own currency, customs operation, laws, and political structure. Beijing controls the territory's defense and foreign affairs and has significant sway in who actually governs. Otherwise, Hong Kong is independent, as anyone who goes there for Visa runs will attest.
Hong Kong is officially a Special Administrative Region (SAR) of China, along with Macao. In writing my profile, I used the acronym SAR, despite its unfortunate implication of the "SARS" respiratory illness that struck south China earlier this decade. I couldn't use "island", because much of Hong Kong sits on a peninsula. "Country", "Colony", or "Territory" all seemed inappropriate. "Region" also didn't fit, because the term "region" indicates a far larger geographical area, such as "Southeast Asia". So I was stuck with SAR.
Taiwan was even trickier. Its status, as we know, is a subject of great controversy in East Asia. Taiwan is a de facto independent state, but it is only recognized as such by a handful of mainly insignificant countries. For roughly thirty years, the Western world regarded Taiwan as the legitimate government of China. This changed in the late 1970s as countries such as the US sought rapproachment with the mainland. Now, Taiwan is sort of in limbo.
Taiwan's official name is the Republic of China. The ROC has existed in one shape or another for roughly 100 years, after it toppled the Qing Dynasty in 1911. From then until 1949, it was the official government of all of China, excluding Taiwan only because the island was under Japanese occupation until 1945. When the ROC leader Chiang Kai-Shek fled to Taiwan, he took the name with him. It has stuck.
Within the People's Republic of China, of course, the Republic of China is a meaningless designation. The mainland refers to Taiwan as "Taiwan Province", even though Beijing holds no power on the island.
In international competition, Taiwan and China (and Hong Kong) compete as separate entities. To overcome mainland objections, Taiwan is referred to as "Chinese Taipei". I recently read an economic report from the Asia Development Bank in which Taiwan was called "Taipei, China". This strikes me as odd; why identify a territory by its capital city?
I suspect that this bit of confusion will exist until the China/Taiwan situation is resolved, though this intern would be happy if someone came up with a name I could automatically reproduce in my reports.
Of course, odd country-names are not the exclusive provenance of China. Here are some others off the top of my head:
-The break-up of Yugoslavia has been a nightmare for mapmakers. What was once a unified state has become several different countries. First, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, and Macedonia split from Belgrade's control. The territory comprising Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo, and Vojvodina formed the rump state of Yugoslavia. Of these, Macedonia was the most controversial. Greece objected to the use of the name (identical to their northernmost province) and so the newly independent state became known as the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, or FYROM for short.
Then, the rump state of Yugoslavia became known as Serbia & Montenegro. When the latter declared its independence, the situation appeared to simplify. Then, of course, Kosovo became an independent state as well, so now Belgrade's dominion has shrunk even further.
- I once read an article in The Economist about nomenclature difficulties with The Czech Republic. I believe the country even held a vote to determine a new name, but no acceptable alternatives emerged. One I like is Czechia, but as of yet it doesn't exist.
-Belgian Congo became Zaire but then changed again to The Democratic Republic of Congo, so as not to be confused with Congo-Brazzaville, formerly French Congo.
-For some reason when I was in high school, the Ivory Coast became Cote D'Ivoire, which is of course French for The Ivory Coast. Why did this happen? Also, East Timor became "Timor-Leste", which is just Portoguese for, wait for it, East Timor.
-Some of these are controversial. Burma changed its name to Myanmar after a military coup in 1988, but due to the odious nature of the Burmese regime some news agencies stubbornly refuse to recognize the new name.
-Bombay became Mumbai, who (I'm told) is apparently a Hindu goddess that represents the city. Bom is Portoguese for "good", while bay is English for, uh, "bay".
-China changed quite a bit of its place names when pinyin became the standard on the mainland. Thus, Peking is now Beijing, Chungking now Chongqing, and Nanking now "Nanjing". The old names still exist in certain ways; most people say "Peking duck" to describe the city's signature dish, and the "Nanking massacre" is heard more than "Nanjing massacre". "Chungking Mansions" is the name of a legendary guesthouse complex in Hong Kong.
If pinyin were used for place names in Hong Kong and Taiwan, then the former would be called Xianggang, while the latter's capital city would be Taibei.
-And finally, here's a little story. When I was a kid, our local football team (the San Francisco 49ers) were a dynasty, always good and regularly winning Super Bowls. Our quarterback was Joe Montana, generally regarded as one of the three or four best in football history. When the 49ers traded Montana to the Kansas City Chiefs toward the end of his career, the San Francisco Chronicle actually dug up some people who planned to move to Kansas City just to follow Joe. That's how popular he was.
Anyway, during the height of Montana-mania a small town in the state of Montana renamed itself "Joe". At around the same time, the Dallas Cowboys (our rival) had a great quarterback named Troy Aikman. A city in Texas, conversely, renamed itself "Troy", not realizing (apparently) that Troy, Texas doesn't have the same ring to it as Joe, Montana. Oh- those Texans.
Kunming Fashion
Last weekend, Max & Co, a boutique line under Italian fashion giant MaxMara, held its third annual fashion show in Kunming to promote its fall and winter collection. Knowing little about fashion (but more than a little Italian) I interviewed Max & Cos PR director the day before the show, and the interview turned out to be a lot of fun and very interesting. Here's a snippet:
GoKunming: The concept of high-end fashion is relatively new in China. What characteristics of the Chinese market have you most noticed since you began working for Max & Co?
*
Adele Lobasso: Although consumers from around the world like purchasing brand-name clothing, the Chinese wealthier classes showed an even more pronounced preference toward wearing well-known designer items. For example, in the early 90s, I saw quite a few Chinese women leaving the sticker on a new pair of sunglasses in an attempt to flaunt their purchase.As far as taste is concerned, the majority of Chinese women dress more modestly than their European or North American counterparts, so we de-emphasize particularly revealing clothing when appealing to the Chinese market. Regional variations matter, however. It is difficult to compare fashion trends in cities such as Beijing and Shanghai with cities in the country's interior.
Read the rest.
The 8 Conversational Don’ts
Passport has an amusing post detailing government efforts to improve Chinese conversational manners. In particular, there are eight topics that Chinese people have been asked to avoid when talking to foreigners:
1.
Don't ask about income or expenses.
2.
Don't ask about age.
3.
Don't ask about love life or marriage.
4.
Don't ask about health.
5.
Don't ask about someone's home or address.
6.
Don't ask about personal experience.
7.
Don't ask about religious beliefs or political views.
8.
Don't ask what someone does.
Perhaps I've been here too long, but to me one of the charms of Chinese people is their willingness to ask questions that Westerners (particularly Americans) find taboo. People are generally polite and won't press if you don't want to discuss a particular topic, and after awhile most foreigners get used to the curiosity of their Chinese hosts.
My concern is, I suppose, that with these regulations in place conversations between Chinese and foreigners will be reduced to English-corner fare, such as "Can you use chopsticks?" and "What is your favorite Chinese city?". But even those innocent queries violate the stipulation against asking about personal experience.
In truth, the vast majority of people will simply ignore these rules, and that's a good thing. I do hope that when legions of Westerners arrive in Beijing, they'll find the Chinese people open, expressive, curious, and interested rather than silent automatons terrified of foreigners.
Tang Wei Blacklisted
Ang Lee's "Lust, Caution", which I wrote about here, was censored in China due to its explicit sexual content. Many Chinese (and foreigners) nonetheless managed to watch the complete version thanks to the ubiquity of pirated DVD copies. Such is life in China (and everywhere else)- where direct government control ends, the free (black?) market takes over.
Despite its graphic sex scenes, "Lust, Caution" seemed to present a more-or-less politically acceptable viewpoint on recent Chinese history, and as such was widely shown (though censored) throughout the nation's cinemas. An effective compromise appeared to be reached.
Yet according to the Hollywood Reporter, actress Tang Wei (who played the lead female part, Wong Chia Chi) has been blacklisted in the Chinese media due to her participation in the film. Her star turn had led to endorsement deals from advertisers, but now these will be revoked. She and others involved in the production of "Lust, Caution" will also be shut out of any film awards ceremonies. It is unclear what prompted authorities to wait until now (months after the film's international release) to implement such a crack-down.
For Tang Wei, this news must be most unfortunate. Unlike several of her co-stars, she was not an internationally known actor prior to the film's release. In fact, for the 28-year old, "Lust, Caution" was her first major role. The blacklist reeks of sexism, too. Her counterpart, Tony Leung, arguably revealed just as much of his body but has thus far avoided any heavy-handed response from Chinese authorities. He apparently is lucky enough to be a major star as well as a Hong Kong native (rather than Wei who hails from the mainland).
The Chinese government has long been sensitive to artistic expressions viewed as insufficiently patriotic. Yet "Lust, Caution" was written by a Chinese, directed by a Chinese, and acted in by Chinese. This was no hit job by vindictive foreigners, and in fact the "heroic" characters of the film were Chinese patriots resisting the Japanese occupation and its Chinese Quislings. That the film attracted political controversy at all remains somewhat mystifying.
But what's odder yet is the timing. Why did China wait until now, when anyone who wanted to see the film already has? Furthermore, the prevalence of DVDs and internet downloads means that no one really can be stopped from having a look- if anything, blacklisting Tang Wei will only increase "Lust, Caution"s publicity.
It's hard to see what the government hoped to achieve from this hubbub. The end result, sadly, will be destroying the career of an exceptionally talented and brave young actress.
(Hollywood Reporter link via ESWN. More coverage from Danwei)
798- Factory Chic in Beijing
Upon the advice of a friend, I visited the large 798 art complex on my first full day in Beijing. Located in the northeast of the city, 798 was formerly an industrial neighborhood full of factories and gray silos that has since been converted into art galleries, cafes, and quirky little bookshops that would not look out of place in Berkeley, California.
Our guide for the day was Ting Ting, a Kunming native who works as an assistant curator at an exhibit called The Long March Project. The exhibit's name refers to the massive year-long retreat undertaken by Communist leaders during the 1930s, culminating in the coronation of Mao Zedong as the Party's supreme leader. The exhibition, by contrast, merely aims to introduce performance art to parts of rural China that lack access to the cultural life in China's cities. Of particular interest to me was a display of paper cutting art, all hand-made by peasants living near Yan'an in central China's Shaanxi Province. These farmers- all of whom were illiterate- have passed down paper cutting skills through the generations and the result is a remarkable collection of intricate and complex designs depicting scenes of rural life.
Ting Ting then led us to an interesting Italian-funded exhibition of an Indian artist who specializes in large, avant-garde sculpture pieces. On the gallery's ground floor we walked into a dark tunnel that curved around before dead-ending at a back wall, a somewhat claustrophobic and frightening experience. Other galleries showed photos of a Chinese prostitute posing nude with groups of men and amazing photographs of Beijing street life by a French photographer. The breadth of the art available on display at 798 matched that at any of the world's leading museums, and I found myself continually amazed at how ingenuously former factory space was converted into hip art spaces.
In one gallery we visited, Maoist slogans were still visible on the wall, serving as a haunting reminder of China's totalitarian past. Judging by how vibrant 798 appeared it was difficult to remember that less than forty years ago the entire of China was completely devoid of any artistic life whatsoever. It seems quite appropriate that in the "new China" Maoist trappings have become artistic kitsch.
I asked Ting Ting whether 798 had endured any political pressure. She responded that it had, but its rapidly gentrifying residential spaces have made it far too valuable to be torn down. The Chinese government, ever pragmatic, would like to convert 798 into glitzy new apartment complexes but for now, the art complex will apparently survive.
China's burgeoning arts scene is an overlooked aspect of the country's growth, as journalists (and government officials) prefer to emphasize more tangible changes such as fancy cars and shopping malls. A visit to 798 though offers travelers and residents alike an opportunity to see a more bohemian side of a country often dismissed as grim and utilitarian.
UPDATE:
I see James Fallows noticed something very similar during his recent trip to Shenzhen- go have a look. My favorite has to be his last photograph, that of a smiling George and Laura Bush juxtaposed to more grim images of Mao, Deng, Hu, Ho Chi Minh, and Stalin.