1000 Years Of Joys And Sorrows - Ai Weiwei/ Japan Invades China 1937

As Russia moves into Ukraine, it seems that Ai Weiwei's description of the Japanese invasion of China in 1937 seems an appropriate reading.  Not just for the people of Ukraine, but for the people
of the world.  If Putin is able to 'take' Ukraine, what's next?  And what does this foretell about future relations between Europe, Russia, and the US, not to mention China, and the rest of the world?  

In July 1937.  Ai Weiwei's father Ai Qing was a young poet who had started getting noticed.  Three months earlier, the wife had their first baby on the day the Japanese began their invasion of China.  They are trying to keep ahead of the Japanese army and have arrived at Hangzhou.  Hangzhou is a little west of Shanghai and is known for its beautiful West Lake which is now a World Heritage Site.

Ai Weiwei writes:  

"The West Lake was unchanged, hazy and indistinct.  It seemed to him that the locals were drifting through life, still clinging to an illusory notion of leisure.  The onset of war had failed to shock Hangzhou;  while the fate of the nation hung in the balance, people simply continue with their routines. 'I cannot pretend to love Hangzhou," Father would soon confess.  'Like so many cities in China, it is crammed with narrow-minded, selfish residents,  with complacent and vulgar office workers, low-level officials accustomed to currying favor, and cultural types who make a hobby of hyping things up. They commonly think of themselves as living in unparalleled happiness, as though lounging in their mother's lap.'  He would write these words at the end of the year, when news came to him that Hangzhou had fallen, after he and his family had escaped to Wuhan." (p. 51)

Sound familiar?  

Ai Qing, who had moved his family further west, was once again faced with an advancing army.  This is surely happening right now in parts of Ukraine.

"When they arrived at Jinhua Railway Station at eight o'clock in the morning, wounded soldiers, freshly evacuated from battlefield, lay strewn along the platform.  One of the soldiers, a faint gray light shining in his eyes, told Father that hospitals in the area were no longer taking in casualties.  Some had covered themselves with straw for warmth, while others threw straw in a heap and set fire to it to warm up inside dirty bedrolls.  The fight had disrupted the normal train schedule, and in the confusion it was unclear whether rail service would even continue.  Ticket sales had been halted, and if a train came in everyone simply piled in,whether they had tickets or not."(pp 51-52)

Later, he writes about poetry and democracy.  Ideas to contemplate as those in power aim to abolish truth with mistruths.  

"'Poetry today ought to be a bold experiment in the democratic spirit,' he declared, ' and the future of poetry is inseparable from the future of democratic politics.  A constitution matters even more to poets than to others, because only when the right to expression guaranteed can one give voice to the hopes of people at large, and only then is progress possible.  To suppress the voices of the people is the cruelest form of violence.'  Eighty years later, his faith in poetry's freedom's ambassador has yet to find vindication in China."

For those of you unfamiliar with Ai Weiwei, he's probably modern China's best known artist, though he's living in exile now.  Here's a short bio.

I haven't seen much of Ai Weiwei's art in person.  But I did see this tree at an exhibition of modern Chinese artists at the Louis Vuitton museum in Paris five or six years ago. The link describes it somewhat.  

The Trevor Noah interview below doesn't tell you much about his art or life, but it's worth watching as we deal with an increasingly oppressive takeover of the Republican party.   

I have to add, reading a good book is so much more satisfying that scanning Twitter or other online collections of alarmism and distraction.  

Good Time To Visit Anchorage Botanical Garden

 There's a great display of rhododendrons right now at the garden.  The early ones have big seed pods.  It's just past the fire station off Campbell Airstrip Road.  Same parking lot as the Save High School.

And then there are the ones that are in full bloom.   

Someone had a camera set up to take time-lapse photos these.  

Rhododendrons play a huge role in traditional Chinese art.  Next time you see a Chinese scroll look at the flowers carefully.  

And, of course, there are plenty of other things blooming as well.  I try to stop by at least once a week on one of my bike rides so I can check out the every changing selection of plants to buy.  

I think this is a globe flower, not quite in bloom yet.

And below are Martagon Lilies.

A June 4 Repost: What's An Iconic Photograph? Thinking About Tank Man

 I posted this five years ago.  Since then, the most iconic 'photo' was actually the video of George Floyd,  And probably some photos of the January 6 insurrection.  (Yes, that's the term that I think best describes what happened even if the majority of Republicans think (or say, even if they don't believe it) it was just a boisterous demonstration.)

 A lone student protestor blocks Chinese army tanks near Tiananmen Square. 

In 1989, when this photo was taken, most people still believed in the power of a photograph to tell the truth.  With digital photography and Photoshop people are still taken in by the apparent 'truth' of a photograph, but many people are also much more skeptical.

PetaPixel writes about this photo:

"AP photographer Jeff Widener’s “Tank Man” photo, shown above, is widely considered to be one of the most iconic photos of the 20th century."

 Though Business Insider says that Stuart Franklin's image is the iconic image,

". . . Franklin's image is arguably the most iconic, having appeared in Time and Life magazines, and winning him a World Press Award."

There were actually four photographers who managed to smuggle their film out of Beijing that day, all shooting from balconies or rooms at the Beijing Hotel about half a mile away:  Widener, Charlie Cole, Franklin, and Arthur Tsang Hin Wah. A fifth photographer, Terril Jones, got shots from ground level, but did not publish them until the 20th anniversary in 2009.  He wasn't aware of what he had until the film was developed several weeks after the events.  There were also two videos made of the event that got out.

My questions today, 27 years later, are about what makes a picture 'iconic,' what story does it tell, and  how close is the story to what really happened (assuming anyone can even know that)?   I'm afraid I'm only going to make some quick stabs at answers, and perhaps raise more questions about how we interpret what we see.   

1.  What makes a picture iconic? 

Wikipedia's definition is similar to many others I found:

An icon (from Greek εἰκών eikōn "image") is typically a painting depicting Christ, Mary, saints and/or angels, which is venerated among Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and in certain Catholic Churches. Icons may also be cast in metal, carved in stone, embroidered on cloth, painted on wood, done in mosaic or fresco work, printed on paper or metal, etc. Icons are often illuminated with a candle or jar of oil with a wick.

The term has evolved to have a more generic meaning which is appropriate to the idea of an 'iconic photo'  (from Oxford online):

"A person or thing regarded as a representative symbol of something: 'this iron-jawed icon of American manhood.'"

So, what exactly is the tank man photo a symbol of? 

2.  What does the picture tell us? 

Here's how the New York Times interpreted the photo in 2009:

"The moment instantly became a symbol of the protests as well as a symbol against oppression worldwide — an anonymous act of defiance seared into our collective consciousnesses."

Charlie Cole, one of the photographers on a balcony at the Beijing Hotel, says it this way (from the same NY Times article, in which  he also gives a detailed account of what happened and how he got his film past the Chinese Public Security Bureau):

"I think his action captured peoples’ hearts everywhere, and when the moment came, his character defined the moment, rather than the moment defining him. He made the image. I was just one of the photographers." 

For people outside of China, this is probably the story we give to and take from this photo. [Yes, 'give to' because all interpretation is based on how our brains relate the meaning based on what we already know and expect.] 

For Chinese officials, I suspect it represents the restraint of the Chinese government which patiently bore months of demonstrations.  It also showed the compassion of the tank drivers who didn't run over this man.  We get a hint of this in a 1990 interview Barbara Walters conducted with then Chinese Communist Party Secretary Jiang Zemin.

"Walters : Yes. Do you have any idea what happened to him ?
Jiang : I think the picture you mentioned just now shows exactly that the
person stood in front of a tank and the tank stopped. Why did the
tank stopped ? Did the child stop the tank ? It's because the tanks--
the people in the tanks -- didn't want to run over the people
standing in the way. But I think this picture just proved that."  (Emphasis added)
(Transcript of the interview are from a Google Group forum.)

I'd add one more interpretation.  I arrived in Hong Kong for my Fulbright at Chinese University of Hong Kong in July 1989, barely a month after Tiananmen.  I met a number of people who had been in Beijing during those times, and ended up taking a group of students to Beijing the following May.  It was a trip we had to schedule well before the first anniversary of Tiananmen, because the parents of my students didn't want them in Beijing during the anniversary.  One student wasn't allowed to come at all because his father thought it was potentially too dangerous.

But I'd like to highlight here just one story.  I had a student who was diagnosed with obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD).  He'd spent time in a mental hospital and had either thought about or actually tried to commit suicide (I don't recall exactly.)  He told me his interpretation of this picture, which went something like this:

"I wanted to be Tank Man.  I could end my life as a hero."

I'd say this was a version of what in the US is called suicide by cop.  When he told me this, he had a wistful smile on his face.  He considered this the perfect way to go.  This was his reaction to this photo.  [As I write this, 27 years later, I realize that I don't know if he had a wistful smile.  I've seen him with a wistful smile, but did he really have it when he told me that?  Maybe.  Maybe not.  I'm just writing this to remind folks not to trust people's old memories.]

We could spend days studying what this image means to different people and whether it has any meaning to people in China at all?  The photo was suppressed in China.  Given the scope of the internet today, I'm not sure how many people have since had access to this picture.  But as I was working on this post, I came across a  Japan Times story on a photoshopped version of this picture from 2013 with Tank Man standing in front of a line of giant, yellow rubber duckies.  The article said

"Internet searches for 'big yellow duck' were blocked by Chinese censors, but the image went viral on social media overseas."

But let's move on to the more concrete aspects of the picture.  What does it factually tell us?

3.   How close is our understanding of the content of the picture to what actually happened?

Here's how Wikipedia describes the photo:

"Tank Man (also Unknown Protester or Unknown Rebel) is the nickname of an unidentified man who stood in front of a column of tanks on June 5, 1989, the morning after the Chinese military had suppressed the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 by force. As the lead tank maneuvered to pass by the man, he repeatedly shifted his position in order to obstruct the tank's attempted path around him. The incident was filmed and seen worldwide."

Did you catch that?  June 5.  June 4 is the date of the so called Tiananmen Massacre.  The photo was taken the day after.  I didn't realize that until I was working on this post.  If you google Tank Man Tiananmen, you'll see a number of pictures.  This one is very closely cropped.  Others show a long line of tanks.  And here's one from the shots taken by Stuart Franklin (you can see it and more of the original slides and about Franklin's story here.)

Image from Business Insider

This is an image of one of the original slides that Stuart Franklin took that day from a balcony of the Beijing Hotel. 
The green arrow was on the image I copied.  It points to Tank Man walking into the road.  I've added the yellow circle.  It shows Tiananmen Square, which continues to the left of the circle beyond the photo.  The tanks are headed away from Tiananmen Square.  In the bigger scheme of things, I don't think that means all that much, except for the way we in the West, most of whom have never been to Tiananmen Square, associate this with atrocities in Tiananmen Square itself.  Knowledge gained since June 3, 4, and 5, 1989, seems to show that most of the people who died did not die at Tiananmen Square, but at other locations in Beijing.  And most of the deaths were workers, not students.  Again, I think those are details that don't change the meaning of all this, but I am simply trying to discuss the difference between people's perception of the facts and the facts of the photo.  And how cropping
a photo can take away the context of the image. 

Again, the images (since multiple images of this event  shot from the same location were published and now we can see many more that weren't originally published) have a meaning that goes beyond what happened that day. 

And now that we've discussed the photo and questions about what it means, here's some video footage of the event that also gives more context (though it doesn't show the people walking Tank Man away.)



 


And, here's another take on the image.  Stuart Franklin talks about another image he took during the demonstrations at Tiananmen Square in spring 1989, that he would prefer symbolized Tiananmen demonstrations. 

From Business Insider

"This is an image that changed everything because, for me, it crystallized the spirit of revolt. The uprising in Tiananmen Square was one of the most moving events I’ve witnessed. It was a tragedy to see unarmed young people shot down in cold blood. It was a movement for freedom of expression, for basic rights, and against the outrage of official corruption. It ended badly, a stain on the reputation of a great country. The facts should not be denied, but discussed, so that people can move on. A lot of things were misreported on both sides. A lot of outside actors were involved that may have worsened the situation for the students and their protest. I want this photograph to be available to people for whom this is an important memory. It symbolizes the courage of the time. What it doesn’t show is the bloodshed. I am best known for the image of the tank man. That is called an ‘iconic’ image, but what such images sometimes obscure, with the passing of time, is all the other pictures that lend explanatory power to the story. I’m interested in history, and this landmark event changed my life.” — Stuart Franklin

An ironic twist I can't help but mention, TechDirt reports that a Chinese firm now owns the rights to the Tank Man photo.

And finally, I'd note that Tiananmen 天 (tian) , 安 (an) , 门 (men)  means, literally, Heaven+Peaceful+Gate (Door)

Video About China's Contribution To Saving Wetlands Along International Flyways Of Migratory Birds [Updated]

[UPDATE:  Here's a link to a great site about birding and other wildlife in Beijing and beyond:  https://birdingbeijing.com.]

When I taught a masters of public administration class in Beijing in 2004, I paid close attention to the birds I saw.  We had a fifth floor walk up apartment in the faculty housing on campus and so we had a treetop view from our apartment.  The most prominent bird at the time was an azure magpie.  

But I was surprised to learn that most of my students were unaware of the birds on campus.  They simply didn't see them on campus.  They were surprised that there were birds and that their American professor was interested in them.  

I searched bookstores for birding guides.  I identified birds by taking pictures and sending them to a birder friend in Anchorage who sent them to her birder friend in Japan who would identify the birds and then I could google them to confirm.  

Eventually a student took me to the biggest bookstore in Beijing - about five stories - and we found a birding book published by, I think, the World Wildlife Association.  I'd even look straight up and sometimes see flocks of birds way, way up high above Beijing.  

So when Emily retweeted this video, I was excited.  The Chinese government has stopped reclamation projects along the Yellow Sea where migratory birds stop on their migration path.  

This post is for my students in Beijing. Ben (Frank), I hope you'll pass the video along to your old classmates.  

There is a variety of people speaking here - from China, from Cornell University, from New Zealand, and from Anchorage.  

Thanks to all these folks for making this happen.  (This video is dated May 23, 2021)

Want A Break From The US Election? Why Not Brush Up On China's President Xi?

 This LA Times article offers a Cliff Notes review of President Xi Jinping and China's role in the world.  Since Trump has sucked all the oxygen out of the media, we haven't paid enough attention.  This article shouldn't take more than ten minutes.  

Unlike reading more tweets about Tuesday, you'll finish this feeling like you've learned something important to know.

In China's Shadow:  The Rise of Emperor Xi, Prosperity, power and political devotion merge.

There's biography:

"When Xi speaks about his coming of age, he points to Liangjiahe. “Northern Shaanxi gave me a belief. You could say it set the path for the rest of my life,” Xi said in a 2004 interview with the People’s Daily.

He started out lazy and weak in the village, but by the end of seven years, he had experienced hard labor and developed a taste for the pickled vegetables of peasants. It is a folklore reminiscent of Mao’s claims of seeking liberation for the oppressed underclass. But whereas Mao incited grass-roots movements and armed struggle, Xi’s approach to power eschews mass mobilization.

Policy: 

“ Xi’s ambitions abroad have been just as grand. He has expanded China’s global power through multibillion-dollar development projects such as the Belt and Road Initiative and by gaining more influence in institutions like the United Nations. He has capitalized on a United States that has turned isolationist under President Trump, dispatching China’s corporations, diplomats and spies everywhere from Nairobi, Kenya, to Brussels in what is becoming a new world order.

Xi often says that this era is one of “great change unseen in a hundred years,” namely that the world’s top superpower is in decline, and that this is China’s moment to rise. “Systemic advantages are a nation’s greatest advantages, and systemic competition is the most fundamental competition between nations,” Xi was recently quoted saying in the People’s Daily.

That determination to prove the Chinese system superior has driven impressive moves toward combating poverty and pollution, making this nation of 1.4 billion people a dominant force in high-tech industries and allowing it to contain the coronavirus outbreak — even as much of the world blames China for allowing the disease to spread.”

And criticism:

"Xi’s militant nationalism has also provoked backlash. The Chinese military has carried out aggressive maneuvers in the South China Sea and rattled Taiwan by sending fighter planes into its airspace. Chinese troops have had deadly clashes in recent months with Indian soldiers along a disputed border. Xi’s reorganized security forces have increased arbitrary detention of foreigners including citizens of the U.S., Canada, Australia, Taiwan, Japan, Hong Kong, Belize, Turkey and Kazakhstan.

A recent Pew Research Center survey found that unfavorable views of China have reached historical highs in 14 advanced world economies, with a median of 78% of respondents saying they have “no confidence” in Xi’s handling of world affairs — though the ratings on Trump are even worse.

Ironically, a popular nickname for Xi on the Chinese internet is the “ accelerator in chief ,” meaning that his aggressive approach to “stability” has caused more domestic and international conflict and is speeding his government toward self-demise. Criticism has risen even from fellow princelings: Cai Xia, the granddaughter of a revolutionary leader who taught at the central party school for four decades, was recorded calling Xi a “mafia boss” this year.

“He has turned 90 million party members into slaves, tools to be used for his personal advantage,” Cai said."

Chinese And Blacks And Asian Americans

Some Chinese Americans I know passed this article on to me.  They were angry about anti-black racism by fellow Chinese in the US - particularly those from Mainland China.  From China-Gate:

"警察杀人应受谴责。但是，如果有华人因此同情黑人，那将是东郭先生和狼。
来源: 鲁迅九 于 2020-06-02 09:17:36 [档案] [博客] [旧帖] [给我悄悄话] 本文已被阅读： 4339 次 (1450 bytes)
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被示威者点燃的中餐馆
　　甚至有一名担任外卖送货员的中国留学生也成为了示威者的攻击对象，头部严重受伤，脑内积水，双眼框骨折，一度生命垂危。
　　黑人是最愿意攻击华人或者中国留学生的，他们一旦愤怒、不开心，需要发泄时，华人往往就成为他们攻击的对象。在之前的疫情期间，很多华人及中国留学生都受到了黑人的攻击：
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因为华人佩戴口罩，一名黑人在车厢内连续击打他头部40多拳
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一名黑人将硫酸倒入一名出来倒垃圾的华人女性头部，导致伤势严重
　黑人面对白人时，显得非常的可怜，懦弱，但当他们面对华人或者中国留学生时，就是另外的嘴脸了。

　　
I asked them to translate and then compared their translation of this to Google's and they agreed that the Google Translate version was good.

"The police should be condemned for killing. However, if there are Chinese who sympathize with black people, it will be Mr. Dong Guo* and the wolf.

　　Even a Chinese student who was a takeaway deliveryman became the target of the demonstrators' attack. He was seriously injured in the head, hydrocephalus in his brain, fracture of both eye frames, and his life was in danger.
　　 Black people are the most willing to attack Chinese or Chinese students. Once they are angry, unhappy, and need to vent, Chinese often become the target of their attack. During the previous epidemic, many Chinese and Chinese students were attacked by black people:
Because the Chinese were wearing masks, a black man hit him with more than 40 punches in the head
A black man poured sulfuric acid into the head of a Chinese woman who came out and dumped garbage, causing serious injuries
　 Black people look very pitiful and cowardly when facing white people, but when they face Chinese or Chinese students, they are different."

*"The term Mr. Dongguo (Dōngguō Xiānshēng) has now become a Chinese idiom for a naive person who gets into trouble through being softhearted to evil" people.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wolf_of_Zhongshan

The friend who sent this to me was very upset and wanted to report to someone about this racism being spread via one of the most popular American Chinese language online newspapers.

I really wasn't sure what to do with this.  What was my role as a white American to make this point?  My experiences in China showed me the one seemingly universal national prejudice of Chinese was against Japanese.  One can understand the rationale behind that - the resentment of how viciously Japanese soldiers slaughtered Chinese during WW II.  One can say that was 70 years ago, but Chinese will report that the Japanese have never apologized and still honor their WW II soldiers without acknowledging their barbarity towards Chinese.  I only met a few African students in China and they felt they were not treated well.

Then today I saw this article:   Asian-American Anti-Black racism - My fellow Asian Americans, we must address the anti-Blackness rampant in our community which raised this issue for me again.  With this second article, I decided to post on this topic.  But it's a slightly different topic.  It reminds me that there are layers and layers here.  The top article - I was told - is aimed at Chinese born Chinese living in the US.  This second article is more broadly aimed at Asian-Americans, presumably, many if not most whom, were been born in the United States.

And a further layer in all this are people like the University of Alaska Anchorage's Dr. EJR David, a Filipino-American who came to discover (and then eventually to write about) his own mental colonization as a Filipino, while living among Alaska Natives in what was then called Barrow, Alaska.  He frequently points out that brown Asians tend to be forgotten when people talk about Asian-Americans, a term, he argues, generally means East Asian Americans.

So consider this post a heads-up.  I'm just calling attention to something going on that probably is not on the radar of most white Americans and only understood from specific view points by many Asian-Americans as the second article suggests.  And I really can only guess that only those African-Americans who have contact with Asian-Americans think much about these issues.  I don't recall the issue coming up in the Netflix series Dear White People, though Wikipedia says there was an 'Asian' character - Ikumi - in Season 1 Episode 5.

And that's not even mentioning African born blacks living in the US and their own views on American whites and blacks.  (See for instance, Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.)

My experiences living in Germany, Thailand, and China is that there are many forms of racism or other prejudices based on skin color, religion, nationality all around the world.  One of the key differences between other places and the US, is that the US is one of the few places which has ideals about equality for everyone that are regularly taught in schools, and which are recited and have been believed to generally prevail by the white majority.   Even if those ideals aren't practiced.  And now we have a president who is demonstrating for the world the hypocrisy we've been living.

And ironically, it's led to a higher level of awareness and  discussion than this nation has ever had.

Seth Abramson Outlines How Trump's Coronavirus Response Is Related to His Company's Business In China, Huge Loans He Owes China, And The Trade Deal

(THREAD) This thread summarizes the major-media investigative reporting on the TRUMP-CHINA SCANDAL, a bribery scandal involving Trump's hunt for dirt on Joe Biden in China, his debts to the Chinese government, and his decision to ignore life-saving COVID-19 intel. Please RETWEET. pic.twitter.com/lAe1oxRenV

— Seth Abramson (@🏠) (@SethAbramson) April 24, 2020

It's a long thread, but well worth reading.  Abramson has written two books on Trump - Proof of Collusion and Proof of Conspiracy.  He wrote both by stitching together thousands of news reports, pulling together details into a coherent story about Trump's corruption.

What's A Twitter Thread?
It's a group of Tweets linked together that allow the writer to present a longer story than a single tweet allows

The intro of this Twitter Thread goes over some of those stories to put Trump's current actions with China and the Coronavirus into context.

I guess Trump is trying to demonstrate the maxim that if you commit big enough crimes you don't get caught.




Basically, Abramson outlines when Trump learned of the Coronavirus (in November while working on a trade deal with China), that Trump (or his companies) owes China tens of millions in loans that are coming due tsoon, and how all of this adds up to a conflict of interest and using the office of the presidency for personal gain of such a magnitude that it boggles the mind.

And all his antics at the so-called press conferences are simply diversions to not only shore up his base, but also to divert attention from the most serious, but more complicated abuse of office that's going on.

Abramson's background is in law and journalism.  The story is so stupefyingly huge that Trump might just get away with it, because people aren't ready to take the time to put the pieces together.  That's why we need people like Abramson.  Like everything else he does, it's so outrageous that it seems like has to be made up.

I'll give you some of the tweets in this long thread - here's where you can just read it straight through yourself.   

16/ You can read all about Trump's conflicts of interest in China here—mind you, just a *few* of the ones we know about, as most are hidden within Trump's tax returns. The most obvious piece is scores of valuable trademarks timed to Trump policy decisions. https://t.co/LksWGDDTjb

— Seth Abramson (@🏠) (@SethAbramson) April 24, 2020

36/ But here's the rub: Trump receives intelligence on the novel coronavirus *as he's in the middle of trade negotiations* with the Chinese. And weeks after Trump learns of the virus, he makes the most stunning decision imaginable with respect to those negotiations—and the virus.

— Seth Abramson (@🏠) (@SethAbramson) April 24, 2020

38/ So at a time the Trump administration had received *and rejected* urgent U.S. intelligence on the coronavirus, it received from *China* a request for an exceptional, entirely unexplained "out" clause that would cover a pandemic. And what did Trump do? Nothing—he permitted it.

— Seth Abramson (@🏠) (@SethAbramson) April 24, 2020

42/ But it's more than this: Trump was being told by a cadre of Americans at the World Health Organization in December that there was a virus in China that could come to the U.S. and be devastating—further confirming the intel reports from 2 U.S. agencies. https://t.co/c2pupquEmM

— Seth Abramson (@🏠) (@SethAbramson) April 24, 2020

Chinese Disciplined Doctor For Emailing About Corona Virus - What Will Happen Here?

A close Chinese-American friend showed me this document recently.  He explained it was the 'confession' letter of Li Wenjiang, the doctor who first notified his colleagues about the new virus.  He was 'confessing' to this act and promising to obey the laws.   I asked for an English translation which my friend has now provided.  (See below)

This has been on the internet a while, but I think it's important considering our president's assurances that (from the Hill)

"Trump said he was “not at all” concerned about the possibility of a pandemic.
“We have it totally under control,” Trump told CNBC. “It’s one person coming in from China, and we have it under control.”
“It’s going to be fine,” the president continued.
“We do have a plan, and we think it’s going to be handled very well,” the president told reporters. 'I think China’s in very good shape also.'”

The concern also arises from the message that Dr. Fauci at the CDC and an infections diseases expert sent to colleagues that he was told that all communications he makes about the virus go through the White House for approval.  I would note that Fauci and Trump have both denied that Fauci is being muzzled.



(If it's not clear, those red smudges are fingerprints.)

Translation:

Wuhan City Police Bureau, XXX Branch, Zhongnan Road StationLetter of Coaching and WarningName of the person whom is coached and warned: Li, WenliangSex: Male DOB. XXXIdentity card category and number: XXX Address (Location of the Official Household Registration): Wuhan City XXXXEmployer: Wuhan City Central HospitalIllegal behavior (time, location, participants, number of participants, issues on hand and consequence): On December 30, 2019, in the Wechat Group named “XXX”, announced the fabricated fact about 7 confirmed, diagnosed cases on Coronavirus from Huangnan Fruit and Seafood Market. Now, we follow the law to give you coaching and warning on your making false/fabricated statements on the internet. Your behavior seriously disturbed social order. Your behavior overstepped what the law permits, violating the regulation stipulated in the “People’s Republic of China Penalty Provisions on Security Management.” Your behavior is illegal!XXX [this is a name] hope you to cooperate and obey XXX’s coaching and advice. Can you stop your illegal behavior from now on?Answer: Yes, I can. We hope you will calm down and deeply reflect, and seriously warn you: if you stubbornly insist your opinion, do not show remorse, but continue to conduct illegal activities, then you will be sanctioned by the law! Do you understand?Answer: Yes, I understand. Name of the person whom is coached and warned: Li, Wenliang (signed). January 3, 2020.Name of the coach: XXX [this is a name]   Employer: Wuhan (Public Security) Bureau, XXX District, XXX Branch (Official Stamp). January 3, 2019 [2019 should be a typo]

I had some questions about the authenticity of the original document, even though I trust my source completely.  But this document is out there for many to see.  Here's a Business Insider article that includes the document.  

Today's LA Times has a long article about how the delay in dealing with the virus helped increase the death toll and how the lack of preparation led to medical workers dying - from the virus or from exhaustion caused heart attacks.  

It also mentions the doctor in this document - Li Wenjiang.  

Medical workers’ love for the motherland, Communist Party membership and self-sacrifice have become major propaganda themes after the death of a whistleblower, Dr. Li Wenliang , prompted unprecedented calls for transparency and freedom of speech in China.  (emphasis added)

 And how the government's praising of 'martyred' health care workers has met with a backlash on the internet.

"But some Chinese feel state media have turned medical workers into props.
One article by the Wuhan Evening News praised a 28-year-old nurse who went back to front-line work 10 days after a miscarriage, calling her a “warrior.” Many online commenters objected.
“Stop this type of propaganda! Stop putting unprotected medical workers on the front line,” one user wrote.
State channel CCTV also aired a report about a pregnant nurse only 20 days from her delivery date but still working in an Wuhan emergency ward, calling her a “great mother and angel in a white gown.”
Internet users, feminists and academics were furious.
“Hospitals should not be allowing a nurse who is nine months pregnant — or the one who’d had a miscarriage — to work. Their immune systems are weakened, and it’s highly possible that they will be infected with the virus,” feminist writer Hou Hongbin told the South China Morning Post.
Both nurse stories were deleted after the public backlash."

With all the intentional misinformation production in the US and elsewhere these days, it becomes harder for anyone to know what is

• True
• Speculation
• Misleading
• Intentionally misleading 

This sort of suppression of bad news behavior is very typical of authorities.  It certainly happened with Chernobyl, but it isn't limited to authoritarian governments.  The movie Jaws is a good illustration here.  As was Lyndon Johnson's hiding of US provocation that gave him the excuse to go to war against North Vietnam.  

This is an era where critical thinking skills are, well, critical.  

Some Impeachment Cleansing - Old Post On Confucius And Thomas Jefferson

Serendipity plays a big role intros blog.  I got an email from someone who claims to be an English teacher praising an old post of mine and linking to her blog.  It has the normal SEO (Search Engine Optimization) fingerprints, but I did look at the link to my blog in the email.  I didn't see any naturally connections to her theme, but the page did include this four year old post about a movie on Confucius and also Thomas Jefferson useful for Trump induced brain damage. 

Think of this as an attempt to reset our national political/moral thermostat to normal and away from the crazy settings the Trump administration has reset it to.  Or think of it as a lozenge for the political sore throat Trump has given us all.  

Saturday, May 23, 2015

Something For Alaska And US Majority Leaders To Think About

 This comes from the movie Confucius. (孔子 (Kong Zi) Director: Mei Hu).

Confucius consents to an audience with the royal consort of Wei against the wishes of his disciples.  She has a reputation as a beautiful woman with a sketchy past and she clearly is intent on seducing the great scholar.

She starts off by asking about the Book of Odes, and the love poetry in it.

Screen shot from Confucius. (孔子 (Kong Zi) Director: Mei Hu)

He politely rejects her request to become his student and to meet again.  She then asks about his theories of government. 

Screen shots from Confucius. (孔子 (Kong Zi) Director: Mei Hu)

Screen shots from Confucius. (孔子 (Kong Zi) Director: Mei Hu)

Screen shots from Confucius. (孔子 (Kong Zi) Director: Mei Hu)

While there is much about Confucian teaching that is problematic today - particularly his rigid hierarchical power structure and his low regard for women - there is also much of use to our political leaders today.

I'd note that Thomas Jefferson, one of the inspirations of the Tea Party,  was something of a China scholar.  From a scholarly paper "Thomas Jefferson's Incorporating Positive Elements From Chinese Civilization" by Dave Wan. 
(Note that the poem Jefferson clips out in the passage below, is the one referred to by the Royal Consort of Wei in the film - "The Book of Odes."  The poem is a tribute to the Prince of Wei - several hundred years prior to Confucius.)

"Founding Inspiration from the Confucius’ Classics

       In the nineteenth century intellectuals in the United States often enjoyed creating personal scrapbooks, in which they would cut out their “favorite newspaper articles and poems” and past “them onto the backs of old letters to create a sort of personal literary anthology.”  None of us will feel surprised to know that Thomas Jefferson, “an Enlightenment intellectual,” created a scrapbook in his own way. Some time from 1801-1809 Jefferson included in the section of his scrapbook titled Poems of the Nations an ancient Chinese poem from The Book of Odes. His love of the poem provides us with a window through which we can look into his efforts to learn from Chinese culture. What he wanted to learn from the poem?

       Below is Jefferson’s clipping of the poem:

                                           A Very Ancient Chinese Ode
Translated by John Collegins seq
Quoted in the To Hio of Confuciues
(….from a manuscript presented in the Bodlein Library )

SEE! how the silvery river glides,
And leaves' the fields bespangled sides !
Hear how the whispering breeze proceeds!
Harmonious through the verdant reeds!
Observe our prince thus lovely shine!
In him the meek-ey'd virtues join!
Just as a patient carver will, Hard ivory model by his skill,
So his example has impress'd Benevolence in every b[re]ast;
Nice hands to the rich gems, behold,
Impart the gloss of burnish'd gold:
Thus he, in manners, goodly great,
Refines the people of his state. True lenity,
how heavenly fair !
We see it while it threatens,—spare!
What beauties in its open face!
In its deportment—what a grace!
Observe our prince thus lovely shine!
In him the meek-ey'd virtues join!
His mern'ry of eternal prime,
Like truth, defies the power of time!

       The poem pays tribute to Prince Wei from the State of Wei, who was loved, respected and remembered by the people of his state. Confucius (551-479 BC) highly praised Prince Wei, described in the poem, when he quoted this poem in his famous book, The Great Learning, to provide a standard to inspire other princes and leaders of various states to follow. Confucius said,

In the Book of Ode, ‘Ah! The former kings are not forgotten’ Future princes deem worthy what they deemed worthy, and love what they loved. The common people delighted in what they delighted them, and are benefited by their beneficial arrangements. It is on this account that the former kings, after they have quitted the world, are not forgotten."

Important themes that we should remember from Confucius is his emphasis on ethics, on education, on harmony and treating people with respect and taking care of the poor and less fortunate. 

Just something to think about on a cloudy Saturday.


____________________________
I don't particularly recommend this film as a film.  But as an easy (and visually beautiful) overview of the life of Confucius it will do.   It tends to give us a series of vignettes of his life,  with very little character development.   The two actors in these screenshots are (from Wikipedia):

• Chow Yun-fat as Confucius or Kong Qui, also known by the honorary title Zhong Ni.
• Zhou Xun as Nanzi, the royal consort of Wei.

Zhou Xun was in Dai Sijie's Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress (2002) a film very much worth seeing.  She was also in Cloud Atlas.  

Thoughts On Hong Kong [Updated]

I'd been to Hong Kong various times for short visits, but in July 1989 I arrived for a year long stay. As a Fulbright Scholar, I would be teaching public administration at Chinese University of Hong Kong.  July 1989 was barely a month after Tiananmen Square crackdown ended the student and worker demonstrations for democracy in Beijing.

The Chinese government has done its best to erase that event from Chinese consciousness.  The median age in China is 37.3 years.  That means half the population today was seven years old or younger, or not yet born.  And of those who were around, never knew much about what actually happened.  And prosperity has meant that many people would rather spend their time pursuing consumer goods than dwelling on Tiananmen.

1989 was eight years before the British lease on Hong Kong was about to end and Tiananmen really shook up the residents of the British colony.  Another disturbing thing that happened around that time was people's discovery that the words "right to abode" were not in their renewed British passports.  That meant that although Hong Kong residents were technically British subjects the right to move to Britain had evaporated.

A giant liberty statue had been created and was featured in demonstrations at that time.

The truth of the matter was that Hong Kong was not really much of a democracy.  My university students knew very little about how the Hong Kong government worked or what their rights were. When I asked them to contact government agencies, you'd have thought I'd asked them to jump from the tenth floor.  There was no democracy, not even the semblance until after Tiananmen.  From a 2010 article called "Hong Kong's Elite Structure, Legislature and the Bleak Future of Democracy under Chinese Sovereignty"  (this will get you to an abstract, you need access through a library to get the article free.)

Since Hong Kong was ruled by Britain's designated governor during the colonial period (1841‐1997), the government has been commonly described as executive-led. This means that the colonial governor had all the power and authority to exercise policies and legislations in the territory. Appointed by the governor, the Executive Council (ExCo) merely gave advice to the governor. Established in 1843 under British rule, the LegCo had contained no democratic seats until 1991 when 18 out of 57 members were directly elected. Before that, the LegCo was, to quote Sing (2003 Sing, Ming. 2003 29), “a place for mild politics and perceived simply as a ‘rubber stamp’.”. 

There were dozens of periodicals on sale whose key purpose was to help people find ways to emigrate from Hong Kong.  Botswana had full page ads in the South China Morning Post enticing people with $250,000 I believe, to get citizenship in Africa.  There were any number of scandals revolving around diplomats from different countries selling citizenships.  Vancouver was known as Hongcouver.

Here to give you a sense of how opaque the bureaucracy was, is a sample of questioning about such emigration hustlers in the Legislative Council about the time I got there in July 1989:

"Oral answers to questions     -   Consumer protection against emigration counsellors
1. MR. PETER WONG asked: Sir, will Government inform this Council what consumer protection measures, if any, are taken to protect Hong Kong people who wish to seek assistance from emigration specialists who hawk their skills and wares for reward in Hong Kong?
SECRETARY FOR ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES AND INFORMATION: Sir, this is an area of consumer affairs where the guiding principle must be Caveat Emptor, that is, buyers beware.
The Hong Kong Government neither encourages nor discourages emigration consultants setting up business in Hong Kong, nor does it encourage or discourage Hong Kong people from using their services. The services available vary from filling forms outside consulates to mapping out an investment strategy to qualify as an investor. The decision on whether to consult, on what to consult, and how much it is reasonable to pay for the services provided, must be one for the individual to make.
    Sir, I can only suggest that the best advice can probably be provided by the
consulate of the country concerned.
Of course, if there is any evidence of a criminal act such as fraud or deception, then a report should be made to the police.
MR. PETER WONG: Sir, the "caveat emptor" answer given by the Secretary suggests that the Government does nothing to protect Hong Kong people in this hour of their need. Does this mean that the Securities and Futures Commission, the Registrar General's Department, amongst others, allow the flood of advertisements in the newspapers to go completely unchecked?
SECRETARY FOR ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES AND INFORMATION: Sir, in the famous words of one of our illustrious former Financial Secretaries, "the Hong Kong Government believes that if something is not broken, do not try to fix it"; and this is an area falling into that classification. From 1 January 1987 to date, the Consumer Council has only received 11 complaints and this shows the size of the problem.
MRS. LAM:  Do consulates in Hong Kong accept responsibility for the actions of
immigration specialists from the countries they represent?
SECRETARY FOR ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES AND INFORMATION: Sir, I have no knowledge of what the consulates do with respect to particular immigration consultants.
MR. DAVID CHEUNG: Sir, many of these immigration specialists are lawyers specializing in the immigration laws of their own countries. What measure of supervision, if any, does the Law Society or the Government of Hong Kong exercise over their activities?
SECRETARY FOR ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES AND INFORMATION: Sir, I believe we are now wading in the area of foreign lawyers. I wonder whether I should not defer to the Attorney General?

After Tiananmen, with less than ten years to go before Hong Kong would officially be given back to China, things got really tense.  Negotiations between England and China to establish an agreement about the handover was a major concern for Hong Kong residents.  The Joint Declaration came out in 1984, but then the Chinese came up with "The Basic Law" in 1990, a pretty touchy time.  Hong Kong might not have had much democracy under the British, but China's legal protections, punctuated by Tiananmen,  augured even worse under the Chinese.  

From a Hong Kong government site in 2008:

"The Sino-British Joint Declaration on the Question of Hong Kong (The Joint Declaration) was signed between the Chinese and British Governments on 19 December 1984. The Joint Declaration sets out, among other things, the basic policies of the People's Republic of China (PRC) regarding Hong Kong. Under the principle of "One Country, Two Systems", the socialist system and policies shall not be practised in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) and Hong Kong's previous capitalist system and life-style shall remain unchanged for 50 years. The Joint Declaration provides that these basic policies shall be stipulated in a Basic Law of the HKSAR.
The Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (The Basic Law) was adopted on 4 April 1990 by the Seventh National People's Congress (NPC) of the PRC. It came into effect on 1 July 1997.

The Document
The Basic Law is the constitutional document for the HKSAR. It enshrines within a legal document the important concepts of "One Country, Two Systems", "a high degree of autonomy" and "Hong Kong People administering Hong Kong". It also prescribes the various systems to be practised in the HKSAR.
The Basic Law consists of the following sections -
a. The full text of the Basic Law which comprises a total of nine chapters with 160 articles;
b. Annex I, which sets out the method for the selection of the Chief Executive of the HKSAR;
c. Annex II, which sets out the method for the formation of the Legislative Council of the HKSAR and its voting procedures; and
d. Annex III, which sets out the national laws to be applied in the HKSAR."

The current demonstrations were sparked by a new law that allows extradition to China for trial for Hong Kong residents.  Just imagine Trump allowing extradition for trial in Russia in the United States.  When the extradition law was withdrawn temporarily, the demonstrators were not satisfied.  The people of Hong Kong have come a long way since my students' shyness.  (But also consider that to get into Chinese University of Hong Kong, my students had had to toe the line and not ever cause any trouble.  They were not representative of their peers in Hong Kong.)

China does, of course, hold most of the cards.  When the British left, the removal of 'the right to abode' from people's passports was an indicator that Britain had no real concern for the people of Hong Kong.  They were principally concerned about British held property, 'real' British citizens, and appearances.  Fighting China over Hong Kong was never an option.  While they won that fight a century earlier with in part by addicting the country to opium, China now had the upper hand.  

And there is no way the US is going to fight to protect the rights of Hong Kong residents.  Even if Clinton were now president, the US simply has no way to got to war against China over 400 square miles in the south of China.  And Trump doesn't seem to even want to use it as a bargaining chip in this trade discussions.  

So I don't see this ending well.    The only danger to China is that its own population might see Hong Kong demonstrations as a model for more freedoms in China.  China appears to be doing a massive propaganda campaign to its own mainland population,  making the demonstrators appear to be criminals and thugs and American backed haters of China.  I suspect they'll succeed.  I know when I was teaching in Beijing in 2004, there were three things that my students believed religiously - Tibet was better off under China, that it's population had been slaves to the monks before China took over;  the Japanese were evil; and Taiwan was part of China.  But that said, they were great students, and once the trusted me not to punish their active participation in class, they had lots to say and were very curious and creative.

I suspect the government is working hard now to make sure their views on Hong Kong are similarly loyal and unmovable. But the size of Hong Kong's demonstrations should give China reason to pause and reconsider how much it changes the Basic Law.  China has blindspots when it comes to challenges to its control.  China's way of handling this in Tibet has been to simply ship enough Han Chinese there that the native Tibetan population becomes a minority.  They could try something similar in Hong Kong.  In fact there already are a lot of mainland Chinese in Hong Kong.  

But with that said, let's remember that the US has serious ideological blinders when it comes to China too.  And that China has 1.4 billion people.  

That means that the smartest 10% is 140 million people.  The same is true for the richest 10%.  And the most athletic 10%.  And while those groups will overlap somewhat, they make up more than 50% of the US population.  Ten percent of the US population is 3 million.  

If China unleashes the potential of its top 10% there's no way anyone else can beat them.  Especially now with Trump destroying the potential of the US through ethnic and cultural war.  

I'm not a China expert.  My serious interest in China is about 25 years old now, and even then it was limited to a very narrow focus.  So consider these musings based on experience and some serious research once upon a time.  

[UPDATED August 21, 2019 - Here's an opinion piece in the LATimes today by a Chinese researcher at Human Rights Watch, using his own experience as a student in the US to  explain why overseas Chinese students are anti-Hong Kong protesters.  It's consistent with what I wrote yesterday, but adds more detail.  It also causes me to see Americans in the same pattern - unable to give up their ingrained beliefs, even in the face of the obvious.  One's identity is caught up in these beliefs.]

Six Four - Tiananmen 30th Anniversary

Tiananmen May 1990

June 4, 1989 is just called by the date in Chinese.  Like 9/11.  It's 六四  liù sì.  It's the date the Chinese army cracked down on the Tiananmen Square (and much more of Beijing) protests.

Here's a new article by the then LATimes Beijing bureau chief.

I watched the 1989 Tiananmen uprising. China has never been the same

"From the windows of a deserted coffee shop at the Beijing Hotel, a few hundred yards east of Tiananmen, I could look toward the square and see several hundred soldiers forming lines across the capital’s broad main street. In front of the hotel was an angry and brave crowd of a couple thousand Beijing residents. These protesters were furious at the army for shooting its way into the city center, tanks and armored personnel carriers smashing obstacles, soldiers spraying bullets at crowds blocking its advance. Now I watched as the soldiers periodically fired into this crowd.
For me, what the Chinese call simply “June 4” — a date that fundamentally shaped today’s China — had begun the previous evening.
I was the Los Angeles Times Beijing bureau chief then, and had overseen the newspaper’s coverage of the pro-democracy protests since they began in mid-April. The Times’ team had been taking turns staking out the square, and my shift was to begin at midnight. Before leaving home late on June 3, I learned that the army had begun smashing its way through crowds several miles west of Tiananmen."

You can compare Steven Holley's account with others on the scene at the time in this post I did three years ago about the meaning of the term 'iconic photo' that examines the context of the Tank Man photo, which Holley discusses in this article.   Holley's account seems pretty consistent with what I found out doing that post.

I'd note that I arrived in Hong Kong for a year's sabbatical about one month after Tiananmen and was able to talk to several people who had been in Beijing at the time.  I didn't get to Tiananmen until May 1990 when I took a group of Hong Kong students for a study tour.  We had to go in May because people were worried that something might happen on the first anniversary.

Here's a very different recent China story I found the other day and put into a draft post until I could find some related posts.

China reassigns 60,000 soldiers to plant trees in bid to fight pollution

"China has reportedly reassigned over 60,000 soldiers to plant trees in a bid to combat pollution by increasing the country's forest coverage.
A large regiment from the People's Liberation Army, along with some of the nation's armed police force, have been withdrawn from their posts on the northern border to work on non-military tasks inland.
The majority will be dispatched to Hebei province, which encircles Beijing, according to the Asia Times which originally reported the story. The area is known to be a major culprit for producing the notorious smog which blankets the capital city."

Welcoming The Year Of The Pig

Twelve animals represent the astrological signs in the Chinese Zodiac.  And the Chinese New Year is one of the most important holiday for Chinese. This year is the Year of the Pig.

The Pig occupies the last (12th) position in the Chinese Zodiac. You are a “Pig Chinese Zodiac native” if you are born in one of these years: 1935, 1947, 1959, 1971, 1983, 1995, 2007, 2019 . 

How to make 🐷 🥟 to greet the year of 🐷 Happy New Years! pic.twitter.com/ffwq5sLPfF

— Carl Zha (@CarlZha) February 3, 2019

Click here to see a list of people born in the year of the pig.  

Genesis 2.0 - Mammoth Hunters Of Siberia

We just got back from a strange documentary film about Siberian native men who go searching for ancient  mammoth tusks in islands in the arctic and sell them to Chinese.  They find a whole mammoth - it bleeds when they accidentally hit the flesh with an ax -  and eventually parts of it go to the South Korean genetics lab of Woo Suk Hwang that clones dogs for $100,000 a pup for those who can't bear their dogs' death.  Woo Suk Hwang hopes to find a living cell in the ancient mammoth flesh so he can clone it.

At the end we watch  interspersed shots of the native men trudging across the tundra on ancient - and very smoky - off road vehicles  and shots of visits to super new genetics labs in Korea and China.

My gut reaction to what was going on - raking the mostly untouched tundra for ancient bones, then the Korean cloning factory - seemed at odds with the film's apparent support for the activities it was portraying, but eventually the film seemed to twist in my moral direction.  There was an early hint as traditional poems were read that warned the local people not to dig in the earth and not to be seduced by the spirits that tempt them there. There was mention of native taboos for touching the bones and flesh of the buried mammoths.  Later, after seeing the Korean cloning king showing off his prowess, even watching a Caesarean birth of cloned puppies, the film briefly mentions that Woo Suk Hwang had been shown to have committed fraud in past scientific journal articles,  Then, during the visit to BGI, a giant Chinese genome sequencing lab, a Swedish scientist in the party raises ethical questions after the guide talks about using sequencing to prevent Downs Syndrome babies (our cash cow she says).  Toward the end we once again hear the traditional warnings against digging into the earth and tempting sprites and spirits who live there.  Finally the men get their tusks back to the Siberian mainland where a Chinese buyer inspects them - not very good quality - and we're told that 20-30,000 tons of mammoth tusks are undug every year!  The film ends when the camera man is told to stop filming while the native men are selling their tusks.   It was called Genesis-2.0.  

Global warming is unearthing artifacts frozen in the perma-frost for tens of thousands of years.  This film offers us a glimpse of what that actually means. The people involved, and the stark contrast between the rough wilderness conditions where the bones are found, and the super-modern genome factories.  Lots to digest.  (Yes, one of the native men who found the ancient flesh mentioned that eating raw meat was part of his culture, as he tasted the flesh.)

The Road to Sleeping Dragon

I mentioned Michael Meyer's book The Road To Sleeping Dragon in the last post.

Meyer went to  a rural Sichuan province as a Peace Corps English teacher in the 1995.  I'd gone to rural Thailand as a Peace Corps English teacher in 1967.   I'd first gone to Beijing from a year teaching in Hong Kong, twice in spring 1990, with a followup month of research in 1991, and a again a couple of years later when I taught a class on Chinese Civil Service Reform, which included taking the class for ten days to Hong Kong and Beijing.  In 2004 I taught three months in Beijing, which gave me some opportunities to visit Xian and Shandong provinces as well.

So there are lots of reasons for me to enjoy this book, which modestly (and reasonably) states early on that it's not even a

 "book of reportage but rather of mostly chronological impressions, of lessons learned over time.  Although my understanding of China has deepened over twenty years, I can't pretend to be a "foreign expert," as my work permit alleged."

My first choice as a Peace Corps volunteer was China - but there were no Peace Corps volunteers there until much, much later.  Americans were not even allowed to travel there back then.  Thailand was a much easier place to serve.   Meyer falls in love with a Chinese woman which helped his Chinese greatly, I'm sure, and gave him continuing ties to China.

I've enjoyed comparing his insights to my own impressions.  (We both despaired at the decisions to tear down whole neighborhoods completely and replace them with high rise apartments.  Particularly the hutongs.)  He filled in details about other things.  (That the son of Hitler's architect Albert Speer Jr. played a role in the designing of the new Beijing.  The author's role in lobbying for the World Wildlife Foundation for a more natural Panda preservation area. And I enjoyed the short description of his meeting with artist Ai Wei Wei.)

Much of the book feels like it was taken from articles he's written over the years about China.  While following a basic chronological path through his life in China, it does jump around a bit.  But it does hang together.

And I'm also reminded of the wonders of traveling to places unknown, facing daily situations where you have to try new things, take chances.  You have no choice.  And as you do, you discover inner strengths you didn't know you had.  And you expand your known world.