Topic: About China

[ren]

I've been here for a bit over three months now and I'm moving out soon and all I've learned is that all my preconceptions about China were totally wrong.

Fun Facts:

The Chinese media is actually fairly critical of the government and  doesn't censor as much as I thought except for issues regarding Tibet. I met a reporter for the China Daily (a government run newspaper) at a bar and asked him about how much control the government has. He said they rarely intervened and for the most part reporters knew what they could write and what would be pushing the line. Sometimes when you read the paper it's really obvious that there's been some government influence though.

Lots of PA systems in the street and in stores have music playing in the background while a voice speaks overtop. The background music is The Sound of Silence by Simon and Garfunkel. I don't understand how this happened and why it's so widespread.

The Chinese love Christmas but they don't understand it. Lots of places still have Christmas decorations up.

During the Spring festival (Chinese New Year), fireworks are everywhere for two weeks straight. And by everywhere I mean almost twenty-four hours a day on every road at every street corner. It felt like the city was under siege.

Bullet trains are the most amazing things. They start up so gently that you don't even notice. The speedometer at the front said we were already at 150km/h before I had even noticed we left.

Getting into a Chinese university is ridiculously hard. Staying in University is easy. Plagiarism is everywhere from both the professors and the students. For most of my exams they've practically told us the questions before hand. You can do really well without understanding a single thing.

I've heard lots of people say that back in the day you couldn't walk down the street without being offered a job. China is like that. I teach English at a high school here and I have no teaching qualifications. I've also been offered two jobs as a pilot in a tv show and I've never acted in my life.

The Great Firewall of China is useless. Every foreigner here uses a proxy or a vpn to get around it, at least the english ones. Most non-english foreign sites aren't blocked so it's not as big of a deal for them. The use of proxies isn't as big among Chinese people since they use mostly websites in Chinese but a significant amount of them still do. The only blocked sites I've come across are facebook, youtube, dropbox, some image hosting sites and foreignpolicy.com.

The subject of the Tiananmen square protests came up among students born in the late 80s. They know all about it and don't really see it as a big deal. It kind of makes sense. We think of it as a protest that was going to bring democracy to China, they just think of it as a bunch of teenagers protesting. Kind of like the Kent state Shootings. Nobody in America thinks those protesters were going to take over the government but it could easily have been perceived that way considering they were shot by the National Guard.

They love beer here but bars and clubs are dominated by foreigners. Chinese people tend to drink in restaurants. I think I like that better.

Cigarettes are cheap and everybody smokes. A pack is less than a dollar. You can smoke indoors here so your clothes will always reek of cigarettes.

All these movies that are supposedly banned in China are widely available here. Avatar was recently banned but it was absolutely huge here. Banned just means that the government decided that it got popular enough for a foreign film and they want some local content. It doesn't seem much different in practice than the Canadian content laws I'm used to. All the banned stuff can still be bought in stores and on the street.

That's all I can think of for now but I'm sure much more will pop into my head which I can post if anybody's interested. Anyone have any questions or want to know anything?

[Pugnate]

OK, I do have a question. Do bra stores exist in China? You know... because there they are useless.

All joking aside, that was a fun read. I feel like visiting China now.

I am glad someone from OW traveled. Sometimes with local media only highlighting the negative, it is easy to develop a skewed view of a place. To be fair, I didn't realize that the papers in China could be critical of the country.

In Saudi Arabia for example, you just will never ever see any criticism of the government from the papers.

As for the proxy stuff, that's what people do in most countries with those internet blocks.

edit:

Why the hell was Avatar banned?

edit:

hahah this simply can not be true:

http://www.haaretz.com/news/report-china-bans-avatar-from-1-600-cinemas-due-to-fear-of-popular-revolt-1.265734

The report said the government feared the revolt by the indigenous Na'vi population shown in the film would ignite the Chinese people's imagination to instigate a similar popular revolt.

[ren]

They aren't super critical of the government. You won't find articles calling for massive upheaval and bringing down the people in power. But you will find articles where they point out problems that China suffers from and imply that the government could do more to fix it. I think that sometimes these articles are just planted by the government so that they can fix the problem after making everybody aware of the problem but other times it seems legitimate. It's hard to tell.

That's why Avatar was banned? I heard it was a foreign content thing. Haha, they're so arbitrary about what's allowed and what isn't. And banning isn't really banning since you can still by them everywhere on the street.

One thing I've learned from being here is to take the same critical eye I've always had to foreign governments and point it towards my own. For example, China banning Avatar seems completely arbitrary, pointless and unjust. But that doesn't sound so different from the arbitrary measures the MPAA uses to give out movie ratings. All both systems do is limit revenue.


As for bra size, there's a Hooters here. I haven't gone but I want to just to see how well equipped the staff is.

[ren]

Hey Pug are you still going to Thailand in August? I'm unsure given the current political situation. I've heard it's ok if you stay out of Bangkok but I'm not sure if it's worth it.

[Cobra951]

We're not as free as we think we are here either.  For example, political correctness is a doctrine as totalitarian as anything in China.  Try to publish an article in the USA that runs significantly afoul of that, and see what happens.

I'm not surprised you get job offers just walking down the street there.  They have all their jobs to offer, and ours too.

Neither am I surprised that the "Great Firewall" is easily circumvented.  But the open cheating in universities I did not expect.

[idolminds]

Everything sounded fun until the cigarettes part. I don't think I could stand that.

[Pugnate]

So as I was working, I thought I'd glance at OW again, and was surprised to see a reply from you (ren)... people don't normally post at this time. Then I realized you were in a closer time zone to me.

Anyway, I still hope to visit Thailand, though it is a touch worrisome. My uncle's business is rooted in that country, and he said things were dicey.

Things seem to be better now, though you never know I guess. I'd still visit. I'd just stay indoors for the most part if things got bad. I am used to it a bit after living in Pakihellhole. On a side note, the whole situation is so unexpected in Bangkok. This sorta thing hasn't ever happened there, and I understand so many tourists end up living there... though I guess we know why...

As for China, I guess nothing would surprise me about their media manipulation.

The whole people going mental and killing school children has been crazy to read about though. Have you noticed any impact of that on the media and your daily life there? Do you hear people talking about it?

One thing about the Chinese is that they are very closely knit people. I remember the Chinese students in Canada used to just stick together and not hang out with anyone else.

I guess most races do that in a foreign country though.

edit:

Please visit Chinese hooters and post pics.

Also, would love to teach English in China for a year, though I bet it pays little. I mean I am sure it is good if you are doing it part time while studying, but I guess it isn't worth it on its own?

edit:

haha you know what would be weird... if Ren got a job in China as a WoW gold farmer.

hahahah I actually have a better idea... what if Ren went to India and got a job as a customer support representative.

No Sir, I actually am Canadian. This accent is not fake!

[ren]

The school killings was big news here. Chinese news was saying the same thing as Western news and blamed the socioeconomic pressures of rapid development and rising income gaps. I didn't notice any change personally but they put up guards at a lot of schools. Guards are used here to show prestige so pretty much any institution already has guards so seeing them at a school wouldn't seem out of the ordinary at all. I didn't hear anybody talking about it though but that may just be because of my rudimentary chinese skills.

I think the grouping together is mostly the foreign country part. Here, a lot of the locals are really curious about me and where I come from. They also seem really surprised when they see me walking down the street with a white person, a black person and a chinese person. Four races at the same time is probably far more multiculturalism than they're used to seeing.

We're not as free as we think we are here either.  For example, political correctness is a doctrine as totalitarian as anything in China.  Try to publish an article in the USA that runs significantly afoul of that, and see what happens.

I'm learning that now. In a lot of ways, people here seem much freer than in North America. Political Correctness doesn't exist here, you can say anything, you can do anything and you don't have to worry about offending anyone.

Everything sounded fun until the cigarettes part. I don't think I could stand that.

You get used to it. I had trouble with it at first but I don't notice anymore. same thing with the smog. As soon as I landed, it was awful. I had trouble with it for a few weeks and even dreaded going outside. Now the air seems clean to me. I'm sure when I go back to Canada I'll be amazed at how fresh the air is.

Oh, another cool thing. Squat toilets > Western toilets.

[ren]

Also, would love to teach English in China for a year, though I bet it pays little. I mean I am sure it is good if you are doing it part time while studying, but I guess it isn't worth it on its own?

I teach for four hours a week which is enough to pay rent and some food. Rent is cheap for me because I live in a dormitory though. Most people who just teach english work around 20-25 hours a week and end up breaking even after living costs, entertainment and travel.

[idolminds]

You get used to it. I had trouble with it at first but I don't notice anymore. same thing with the smog. As soon as I landed, it was awful. I had trouble with it for a few weeks and even dreaded going outside. Now the air seems clean to me. I'm sure when I go back to Canada I'll be amazed at how fresh the air is.

Thing is, thats not something I want to get used to.

[ren]

Thing is, thats not something I want to get used to.

Yeah, I feel pretty disgusted that I'm used to something which made me feel sick just a few months ago. That can't be healthy.

Another fun fact: China is only one time zone and that makes life on the east strange. It gets light out around 4 or 5 and gets dark around 7 or 8pm. It feels wrong.

[Pugnate]

Four races at the same time is probably far more multiculturalism than they're used to seeing.

hahaha

You get used to it. I had trouble with it at first but I don't notice anymore. same thing with the smog. As soon as I landed, it was awful. I had trouble with it for a few weeks and even dreaded going outside. Now the air seems clean to me. I'm sure when I go back to Canada I'll be amazed at how fresh the air is.

The strangest thing for me going to Canada was how so many people there smoked so much. In the Middle East, smoking isn't nearly as popular as it is in Canada. It was a bit shocking at first, so I can't imagine how bad it is in China.

Regarding the teaching thing, if I could find work there, I wouldn't mind spending a year of my life doing that in China even if it means only breaking even. I'd be there to soak in another culture...

[ren]

But the open cheating in universities I did not expect.

I thought this was a well-known fact but perhaps not. Whenever we get exchange students in Canada nobody wants to work with them in group projects. The main reason is that they use the open internet for research and tend to plagiarize. Even the ones with good intentions sometimes do it inadvertently since they're not used to our stricter rules. The consequences are pretty severe. I doubt you'd get kicked out of school for another member in a group plagiarizing but you'd have to go through a painful amount of meetings and possibly get put on probation. If you do get kicked out, the university sends your name to other universities in Canada so you can't attend them in the future.

But in China, for group presentations, most groups have found powerpoints online and just presented those. Lots of assignments can be found online by a quick google search since the professor just stole it from another university. You can use pretty much any source for papers, nobody seems to care about how reputable it is.

The strangest thing for me going to Canada was how so many people there smoked so much. In the Middle East, smoking isn't nearly as popular as it is in Canada. It was a bit shocking at first, so I can't imagine how bad it is in China.

Regarding the teaching thing, if I could find work there, I wouldn't mind spending a year of my life doing that in China even if it means only breaking even. I'd be there to soak in another culture...

I've heard the opposite. Whenever people from Europe or Asia come to Canada, they're surprised by how little smoking we do. The Middle East is probably an exception to that rule though.

[Xessive]

HAha Pug and I share that disdain for abundant smoking in Canada! haha Man, I still remember after a night of LAN gaming when I stepped out everything on me smelled like cigarette smoke, my clothes, my hair, my skin, everything! It was the first time I was thoroughly disgusted by smoking. When I took a shower the water running off my hair was murky! That's how much smoke residue was lodged in my hair! AAARRGH!!

Pug, when I hung out with Pete and Tarra last week, same thing happened again, man! I feel bad that I can't hang out with certain people just because I can't stand the smoking anymore.

Oh Ren, if you ever wrote a book about your exploits call it "About China" that'll sell in the US wildly! hehe

[Cools!]

Regarding smoking in Canada. Don't know how it's now, but Europe is like being stuck in a gas chamber in comparison. When I lived in Belgium, a lot of people smoked, everywhere. It didn't help that the cities are labyrinths. I used to joke how you could probably find my high school by the smoke outside the gates. So when I came to Canada, it was like a breath of fresh air.

A lot of the stuff I've heard about China reminds me of all the things my folks have told me about what it was like in Soviet Russia. People were just used to being oppressed and content with what they had, after all, they had no choice. Only when you showed them what life could be for them somewhere else did they realize how little freedom they had in the first place.

My dad for example told me what it was like to own a club and how he had to be careful about what kind of music they played at it. You had to go through all sorts of hoops to play Western music and you had to be careful about how many times you played. There was a quota that required you to play a certain number of Russian songs during each night. The problem was that there weren't many Russian dance songs (since it would have been influenced by Western music, which was band) so if you stuck to that rule, nobody would actually show up at your club. Oh and you had to send the playlist to the gov for approval.

Anyway, my dad still played mostly Western music, but he had friends in the bureau that would tip him off when a representative would come in to check on him so that's when he would actually play the Russian content. There was a lot of stuff like that going on and anyone who pushed the limits was playing with fire big time. My dad was accused of being pro West on a number of occasions and only his reputation and previous contributions (and friends on the inside) saved his ass from being sent to Siberia.

So sure, when someone came to visit from the West it would've appeared that people were generally "happy". After all, like China now, Russia had plenty of newspapers and such. Of course they all stayed within the "limits" of what was allowed, because otherwise people had a strange habit of going to jail for stupid reasons or simply disappearing.

Heck you had to apply and go through a whole testing process just to go on vacation to another part of the country.

Anywho...

[ren]

This is true. While China (at least where I am) doesn't seem as strict there's a lot of similar bullshit that people are forced to work around. Everybody deals with it because the benefits outweigh the costs in the low likelihood they get caught. But I wouldn't doubt for a second that they'd rather just be rid of all the crap.

My main point before was that I was expecting a much larger and stricter government presence and much more oppressed people. I was surprised by how free things relatively were but by they're still far from ideal.