I have been back to China for about four weeks now and I haven’t written anything other than my trip experience, not because that I am lazy or have no time, rather that I received too much striking information to be able to put anything solid down! Any good writing relies on mature thoughts and my mind has been turning around crazily for answers! …China is getting crazy, in good and bad ways, and in ways that make me wonder…
The very first impression is that China is becoming a commercial country. There are shops everywhere, one after another, following people to where ever there is new development. They are all brand-new, bright, well decorated with expensive materials such as marble stones, selling painfully expensive stuff! The pictures attached in the article of New York times: In China, Cultivating the Urge to Splurge best show what I am talking about. It seems that China is turning EVERYONE into merchants, a country where, traditionally, merchants had been looked down upon as the Jewish merchant in Shakespeare’s “Merchant of Venice” ! Yet the more expensive the stuff is, the more lonely the shop becomes.
The places where you find most crowded are the whole sale markets where a bra costs 12RMB while 500RMB is the price in the shining stores! The price difference is all the more appalling with different brands! Strangely, with the whole-nation-run commerce, China is regarded as a non-consuming country for the reason that ordinary Chinese families save 20-40% of their income instead of being like Americans saving almost zero( nowadays, many of them would be greatly releaved if they can keep up with their mortgage payments! ). This NYT article thinks that China and US will help each other out of the economic crisis in turning China into a consuming country, in another word, getting Chinese people’s “big” pennies out from their pockets by speeding up the consumation. What do you think? Shouldn’t we think about how we got into this crisis before we try to find the solution? We might be out this time, but what are we going into once we are out?
Second jaw- dropping image is that China is a paint-fresh country with weird illogical phenomena! On one hand, everything is new and fresh: skyscrapers, new real estate developments with wonderfully planned stereo-typed gardens, falls, wooden bridges and pavilions, even granite stone walk ways! On the other, we see buildings of only 10 years old looking not far from slums, having dirty water streaks, broken balconies, weathered wooden bridges, pavilions, bamboo chairs with three legs, water ponds of unprosperous stale water…No wonder that overseas Chinese only buy houses of less than 10 years old…As a condo owner in China myself, I have never seen any legal document such as ” The Declaration of Co-Ownership” in the condo management and there is NO condo Management Committee. This means that no owner knows how their condo is managed and where their condo fee is spent. Equally, owners, by building the solariums on tops of the buildings, have no idea that the roofs do not exclusively belong to them…It was a true story that one developer even attenpted to “take” back the already planted and sold expensive trees in the big day time…
“Splurge” is an exact word to describe many parts of Chinese cities. It is also a precise word by which we get a sense of what present Chinese culture seems like: extraordinarily beautiful outside, like the drop-dead opening ceremony of Beijing Olympic Games in the extremely modern architecture, the splendid fireworks of the 13th Asian Games, the Shanghai World Expo. But they were built with billions of RMB contributed by the sweating workers and with confiscation of land and properties which people have no right in saying no to(I believe that they were properly arranged some where else far away). The Water Cube concert hall stage glittering with gold and platinum speaks loud for the crave and craze for splurge in Chinese culture !!
Another thing I saw on TV that I can describe as weirdly “splurge” is that a billionaire mister gives tons of gold to poor people with a loud voice, aiming at summoning other rich Chinese enterprises to follow the “splurge” of his action. Yes, it is great what he is doing, but how come we have people rich as him and people poor as billions of others? He does have brought many rich enterprises in joining his action of giving and I am all for great deeds, but I am sure that many eyes might be blinded by the heroic “splurge” of this story. As a wise nation, each of its individual should have the right and dignity to be well-off by having fair opportunities and I hope that this Mister shall keep in mind that the glory of his generosiy only belongs to God ( to Heaven as the Chinese expression)!
If you have been a Chinese and lived overseas for many years, you could be happy for these great changes. Yet, you can feel that behind these changes, something has not changed. Quite many Chinese in Montreal complain that the Canadian Medical system is slow, the French popultion discriminates allophones by requesting them and their kids to learn French, while at the same time, most of their country men could not even afford medical care, with many dying outside the hospitals. Poor people have to bend their knees and grey their souls for their kids’ normal 9-year education…We see million-condos all pre-sold, and handicapped people bleakly sing for pennies just beside sales display windows…Something has not changed under the marvelous granite paved walkways and behind the gilded concert halls …
One morning, when I was exercising in the park of the living quarter, I over heard an interesting conversation between two old ladies. Both were over sixty-five years old and retired, I assume. The talkative one’s husband died six years ago. She was waning that she had been very lonely after her husband passed away…that she could not bother her kids to look after her all the time and that she was deeply worried that she could die alone without any one knowing… They complained about the Retirement Homes’s bad service, but was also horrified at the same time by the idea that they could end up dead alone at home. I hope you can understand the desperate state of mind of elderly Chinese and the pressure of this issue on their Children. Do you know that Chinese kids are their parents’ insurance companies? Especially for the real needy peasants who have no stable income and no insurance of any kind, Kids are not only the sole measure to insure their old age, but also to secure their emotional and spiritual dependence, for the cruel and unbelievable sad fact that Chinese people in general have no belief to hold them through their old age. They have only their children or grand children, nonetheless those who would very well be driven into spiritual numbness by deliberate avoidance of spirituality or chase blindly the development for development’s sake …
We would wonder how men’s bones have been soft with their muscles and brain stiffened and how the spirit of innovation of our people has been killed! How can an eagle fly when it is chained to the ground, let alone the fact that most are trained to be cows to pull the heavy cart of history and to bear responsibilities for the life and happiness of their parents…I absolutely agree that China will step onto another level only when she changes into an innovative country. Nevertheless, to the contrary of the wish of Chinese parents and the country, 60% of the university graduates each year could not find any jobs, not including the billions of “failed” kids! As a mockingly brutal result, instead of helping their elderly parents with their old age problems, they are “eating off” their poor parents year after year!
Earlier this evening, I had a tea party with some of my friends. We talked about where happiness come from. All of them said Chinese are not happy because there is dictatorship, there is unfairness, there are people starving or dying outside the hospitals, all reasons for not being happy! One of them said that I become so naive and simple living years in Canada…Who says that their comment is not true? I am happy that I am still naive and simple, and mostly, I hope they can see and feel the reason why I am a joyous person. I am happy that Canada provide me with a well secured society, the important SPACE for me to think and grow DIFFERENTLY and I managed to have time for myself to be able to learn and feel more about life and its essence: genuine and grateful attitude towards life, curiosity, stereo-typed way of thinking and joy for even the smallest action in life, such as smiling to an unknown person…
I have been reading Zhuang-Zi, Lao Zi since long time ago. Chinese is such a great nation with such an old and marvelous Han culture! It is impossibly surprising that we let it disappeared for so many centuries since the last Qing Dynasty and we fooled ourselves so long ! It is very regretful that I had to leave China hunting for what I could have obtained right here in China and it is shameful that I had to re-discover my own culture by millions of miles of traveling back and forth…Yet, “traveling tens of thousands of miles should follow reading tens of thousands of books” serves as an excellent excuse for leaving China…Staying in Canada so many years, I have already fallen in love with my new country while having my home country in heart wishing its people true happiness…
Changing China into a country with consuming economy will not change China profoundly, and it will not help US to save their economy by selling their technologies to China or providing services for Chinese if China does not change from the root. If we criticize China for its fake GDP, then I truly doubt about the author’s point. “A consuming economy” for what, for a dog in the cage chasing its own tail? I’d rather see that ordinary people have insurance of life and medical care so that they can stop killing their daughters or continue having too many kids to have food and education for them,; I would want them to enjoy free education rather than seeing the schools chase profit introducing unfairness from the cradle or rather than seeing them chasing the fames of universities; I’d rather see the joyous light in everyone’s eyes, the smile on everyone’s face, respectful and careful attitude from everyone’s heart!
We forget that we do not need much to be healthy, joyous and happy. We can have it any time and any where. I do not believe that we should be defined by the reality, rather that the reality be defined by how we think. It will be a shame that we do not inherit our culture and improve our mind , change our way of thinking or perspective. We will be damned if we are only defined by our reality which may not necessarily be wise at all! ” Consuming” should never be the solution to any problem. Changing our fake and superficial life style to a modest, balanced and genuine one should be the answer. I do not want to see Chinese get over weight like many Americans after years of eating fast foods. I hate to accept the fact that Macdonald or many other commerces get rich by misleading people into a wrong and unhealthy life style for which many other commerces try to sell their diet plans after to correct…
What the on earth we are doing when we need only three small decent meals but instead we over kill our fine senses by stuffing our stomachs and with dozens of spices at the same time ? ” A Consuming Economy” might serve very well for misleading people into this unhealthy and wasteful life style and leading the globe into destruction. Can you imagine 16 billion people wasting resources like the Americans with two people having three or four big cars!?
Life style or how we can healthily and happily live our lives should be the solution to our present global problems. To Americans, to Chinese or Europeans, the solution should be the same. We do have enough wealth for everyone to live well, if we do believe the concept of having equal right to the share of natural resources and use the wealth wisely. Most importantly, we will have to adjust our way of thinking about life itself and find a way to live our lives joyously with modest consuming speed, of course, we will not be like North Korea starving and denying our natural needs. I believe this is the true solution instead of turning the rest of the world into ‘Consuming Economy” without conscious, vision, priority and truly knowing how we can keep balance and how to be happy.
The world economy is just like a giant devil. Who has this wisdom, strength and power to hold it back for a moment for us to re-think and re-design where we are going? Isn’t the economic crisis the right moment?
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