Eric's Beijing Diary

New Years Eve. Sitting here contemplating the year that is slipping away. What kind of a year has it been? A lot has happened in the past year. I think I can say that I have made a little progress in coming to terms with the language. It would be nice if I could study language full time for a period, but that has never been possible. So I content myself with the piecemeal effort I am stuck with. Actually, though, it's not all bad. In fact, if you're not in a hurry, slow learning is better than fast learning, because you are less likely to learn stuff that has to be completely unlearned later. The point is that after several years of this piecemeal stuff, I think I am finally coming up with a modus operandi that is facilitating steady progress toward the goal. This is the part that is more important than anything.

Work. Hard to believe I have almost completed three years here at the University. I flew into Beijing from Los Angeles on January 10th, 2004. I have spent the three years since then developing the Oracle program here at the Software College, interrupted by the need to travel to remote sites to facilitate the expansion of the program. Some of these remote locations were a good idea. Others I am not so sure about. The most important of these, of course, is Beihai College.

Travel. I have ridden some twenty to twenty-five trains back and forth across China during the past three years, trying to build my understanding of this country and its culture. Fortunately, travel is reasonably inexpensive at the moment, otherwise I wouldn't be able to do this. And it's important. There are some things you just can't learn by reading books.

Life. Still seems that there is something new everyday. I guess maybe that is because I live and work in such a fluid field. Technology is always changing. Last summer, the Software College announced that the undergraduate program was going to be eliminated, and the undergraduate students would all be merged in with the Computer Science Department. Naturally, I wondered where that left me. But a group of students complained, and the president of the university reversed course. But that is only one area. If you live in China, you will see change happening all around you all the time. Nevertheless, even with all the change, Beijing is a pretty easy place or a foreigner to live.

Mission. What am I here for? What is my mission? This is by far the most important question I have to answer. Three years ago, I was in the process of preparing to come here. I first heard about Beihang University after I had contacted the Asia Pacific office for Oracle in Singapore in the summer of 2003. When they first contacted me, I didn't even answer their email, because I had planned to go to the western part of China. But they sent me another email, and I decided that courtesy demanded at least a cursory response, and the rest is history. In retrospect, it is probably a good thing I came here instead of going to the countryside right away, because I really wouldn't have been prepared for it. Now, however, I am beginning to wonder if the time may soon come when I will need o reassess my position here. Beijing has been good for me, because the Upper West Side provides so many opportunities for language learning, etc. But every time I go to the western part of China, I am reminded how much different it is from prosperous eastern cities like Beijing and Shanghai. Am I ready to pick up and move to the West? I don't know.

It's a dismal world. The execution of Saddam Hussein yesterday underscores the sense of despair and anguish in a world that just can't seem to come to peace. Yet, the very bleakness of the landscape once more brings to mind the words of Thomas Hardy, in his poem, The Darkling Thrush. If you remember your English Literature, perhaps you are protesting that Hardy was a novelist. I know, I ploughed through The Return of the Native myself during my undergraduate years. But Thomas Hardy turned to poetry in his later days. As you read this poem, remember that it was written by a man whose novels betray a very dismal view of life, and of the futility of the struggle against fate and the mercilessness of nature.

The Darkling Thrush

by Thomas Hardy

31 December 1900

I leant upon a coppice gate
When Frost was spectre-grey,
And Winter's dregs made desolate
The weakening eye of day.
The tangled bine-stems scored the sky
Like strings of broken lyres,
And all mankind that haunted nigh
Had sought their household fires.

The land's sharp features seemed to be
The Century's corpse outleant,
His crypt the cloudy canopy,
The wind his death-lament.
The ancient pulse of germ and birth
Was shrunken hard and dry,
And every spirit upon earth
Seemed fervourless as I.

At once a voice arose among
The bleak twigs overhead
In a full-hearted evensong
Of joy illimited;
And aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small,
In blast-beruffled plume,
Had chosen thus to fling his soul
Upon the growing gloom.

So little cause for carolings
Of such ecstatic sound
Was written on terrestrial things
Afar or nigh around,
That I could think there trembled through
His happy good-night air
Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew
And I was unaware.

A little snow never hurt anybody. We don't get it very often here in Beijing. Usually once or twice a year. It's just too dry for much more than that. I took this picture as I was heading south of Wudaokou toward the North Gate of my university, alongside the train tracks where the train from Inner Mongolia has just passed the Wudaokou railroad junction (Wudaokou means "Junction Number Five."). This old country road is one of the last remnants of a community that is being filled up with development. It's really a place out of its time, because I am actually south of both Qinghua and Beida. There is quite a bit of urban area north of here, now, and I live on the northwest side of the city. It is a bit amazing to me that this area has survived as long as it has, because the universities I mentioned have been around since the beginning of the 20th Century. Wudaokou has changed so much, though, just in the three years that I have been here. Perhaps it will slow down a little this year, but it's hard to say. Maybe the slowdown will come right after the Olympics. I can't see it going too long at the current rate, because a fair amount of the building going on is speculation built ahead of the market. This is sure to create a glut, which will drop prices, at least for rental property. Still, the Wudaokou area is destined to become more and more urban in the years ahead. Sad to see it go, but that is the way of things in this world. "For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come."

This evening, the Office of Foreign Experts Affairs took us to a presentation of the French opera Carmen by the National Ballet of China. I think I like Russian ballet better, but that is probably because the music appeals to me more. These guys were pretty good dancers. Nothing wrong with their talent.

China is experiencing a remarkcable revival of the arts. This stuff isn't really new for China. Western art forms have been around for quite awhile, at least in Beijing and Shanghai. But there seems to be much more interest now. The debate about the influence of foreign culture is certainly not over, as witnessed by the current ruckass stirred up by the confucian scholars over Christmas. But most reasonable people believe that these things are here to stay, and development of the arts is not likely to see the knd of intermittant resistance such as that which was generated by the Cultural Revolution.

Guaibude. No wonder. I couldn't figure it out yesterday. For some reason, I could not access the web site that houses my online exams. I am used to this happening in the lab from time to time, because the systems inside the school firewall have very limited access to foreign sites. But I couldn't access it from my apartment connection, either. Very strange. I am not used to this. China has the best Internet access in the world, but yesterday it was really bad. I was beginning to think I was back in the States. Actually, that's too general a statement, because broadband access in the States is actually pretty good, and the utilities debate that has held back the development of broadband is pretty much over, I think. AOL doesn't have to like it, but I think they are more or less resigned. Broadband is taking over. But the dialup connections I had in the States were not very reliable. Very different here. Dialup was all I used in my apartment for two years, and I very rarely had any issues. There was never a time that I couldn't get on, except when the Software College forgot to pay my phone bill. Now I have broadband, but I still use dialup as a backup. But yesterday it just wasn't working. I actually had to cancel the online test.

This morning I connected to the BBC to hear Newshour from 20 hours GMT (which is about 5 am here). The program isn't live, but the audio feed is. It crashed. Very strange. I never have trouble getting the BBC, except when I go to the BBC web site. But I never do. I went the first time, then saved a .ram file to my desktop, which I use to take me directly to the audio feed for Newshour without going through the browser. It always works. Not this morning.

When I left my apartment, I stopped to pick up a paper, and that is when I saw the headline. I read the headline in the China Daily. Turns out several Internet trunk lines were severed by the earthquake off the coast of Taiwan. This has to be the worst break in five years. They say it will take several weeks to fix it. I hope it doesn't become several months. Can you imagine? They have to take a ship and follow the line out from the shore, find the break, and repair it. I bet this will heighten the interest in using satellite relay for Internet communications.

This kind of thing is very frustrating, of course, but alleviated considerably by the fact that much of my online listening has switched to podcasting. Of course, I can't download podcasts right now, either--iTunes has not been able to bring down a single file since the break. But the point is that because I have been doing this for some time, I have lots of files that I have not listened to. Not everything is time sensitive. The daily news is, of course, but much of the documentary type stuff has a longer relevance window. For example, I am listening to a BBC documentary right now that is a group of interviews with people who were personal acquaintances of Saddam Hussein. iTunes downloaded it back in November, but it is still quite relevant, especially given the news of the past couple days. These BBC documentaries are not long. Each one is anywhere from 20 to 30 minutes. But I have about 50 of them that I have not had a chance to listen to. And that is just one podcast subscription. I am subscribed to 12 different podcasts, and most of them have dozens of files I have not heard. Way more than I will ever be able to listen to. I do watch one American TV program a week over the Internet. It's a PBS program called, "McLaughlin Group." But they encapsulate all their programs as 65 MB Quick Time videos and put them on their website. I have one sitting on my hard drive right now that I haven't seen. Furthermore, I use a download manager (NetAnts) to download the files. This means that even with a very poor connection, I can start the download, and if it breaks up, I can start it again later, and it will pick up where it left off. So I have more than enough information to keep me busy for a few weeks.

Still, access to daily news is really going to be a struggle, because I get my news from English language sites, and most of them are foreign.

Last night I decided to have Christmas dinner, so I headed down to Brown's Pub in Dongsishitiao, because it had advertised a Christmas dinner that was within the range of affordability, and because it is quite near the Bookworm, so I figured I could find it without too much trouble. When I finally got there, they had jacked the price up to 150 RMB from the price they had quoted in their advertisement (100), and the place was dead, not surprisingly. I stopped by the Bookworm and found a very interesting book on the Great Game period in Central Asia during the 19th Century. The Bookworm has a little coffee bar area, too, but it isn't really the kind of place I would recommend for Christmas dinner, so I headed down to Jianguomen to see what Grandma's Kitchen had cooking. I didn't have any reservations, and I didn't know if they were doing Christmas, but I couldn't think of anything else. A shot in the dark, if you will.

Those guys should advertise more. They had a really nice Christmas dinner set menu. It started with an appetizer. You had to choose between bacon wrapped shrimp and crab stuffed mushrooms. I really like mushrooms, so I chose that one. Next was the salad. I chose the Waldorf salad even though I didn't have any idea what a Waldorf salad was, because the other choice was cole slaw, which seemed kinda plain to me. The soup I chose was cream of mushroom. I do like minestrone too, but mushroom definitely wins when it is a choice between the two. For the main course, you had to choose between turkey and gravy and grilled ham with pineapple. I chose the grilled ham because it was cheaper, and I had turkey for Thanksgiving. I definitely made the right choice. That ham was very good. Best ham I have had since I came to China. In fact, the ones who chose turkey were looking enviously at me wishing they had chosen what I had. I'm serious.

I needed help deciding on the desert. The choices were rum cake or cranberry-orange cheese cake. I don't know...which would you choose? I wasn't sure, so I asked the waitress. She said she really liked the cheesecake. Usually if a waitress responds definitely, I will take her advice. But if she wavers, then I tend to think that maybe she either doesn't know, or she is just trying to be vague and noncommittal. I have had many different reactions from waitresses over the years. Sometimes they will just say, "They're both good." There's usually not much you can do when they respond like that. But this time, the waitress was quite definite. I took her advice, and it was the right thing to do, trust me. That cheesecake was one of the best I ever had. The whole thing came to 138 RMB including the dinner wine. I had to pay extra for coffee. That is pretty expensive by Chinese standards, but it's really not a bad price compared to what you pay at the big luxury hotels. You have to be very careful in Beijing. You can go to a luxury hotel and end up spending hundreds of dollars. I saw one or two advertised for 2000-3000 RMB. And the thing is, the meal you get is often not that great. When it comes to Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner in Beijing, more money does not necessarily mean better quality. Not at all. Grandma's Kitchen is not a luxury hotel, but it is certainly a lot nicer than Brown's Pub, and 138 kuai comes to about 15 US dollars. That, I think, is a livable price for a once-a-year event.

Christmas. I'm sitting here at the coffee bar listening to Christmas sermons I am downloading from the Internet. The wireless connection here is pretty fast, so an average sermon only takes a few minutes to bring down (if you're using NetAnts). I'm listening to John Stott now, preaching from Matthew Chapter Two, telling how the magi were astrologers from Mesopotamia who had become convinced that a great king had been born. Here's his outline:

1. No trouble is too great to seek Him.
2. No people is to alien to find Him.
3. No offering is too precious to give him.

Christmas Memories. In China, it's not always easy to have discussions like, "What was your favorite Christmas?" or "What was your favorite Christmas present?" You could quite easily get Chinese young people to reminisce about Spring Festival (Chinese New Year), because that festival is so deeply ingrained in Chinese culture. But many, many Chinese young people don't have such memories of Christmas. So I turn inward. What do I remember about Christmas? I can't say much about my first Christmas, because I don't really remember it, but I have seen the picture lots of times. I am sitting between John and Mary in some kind of a walker. That's about what I can come up with. I remember a Christmas in Williston when I was about four or five and got a sled. And I remember one year Mel and I got stuffed dolls. Mine was Quick-Draw McGraw, and hers was Jinx the cat. Another time we got some puppets. Mom let us open them early if we behaved ourselves at the TV station, so we opened them one evening when we got back from doing the "Family Bible Hour" program. I don't remember all of them, but I know we got Popeye and Olive Oyl. Somehow those puppets managed to survive for a number of years, even through our house fire in Honjo. Anne Marie always used to call the Olive Oyl puppet "Matsuda-san." Back to Williston, though, one of the main memories I have is going to Grandma and Grandpa's house at Seven Seventeen West Broadway ("It's too much you do for us old people!"). Or "Well if it isn't you!" I always liked Grandma Langager because when we dropped them off after church, she would look at Melody and I and say, "Now don't get a spanking," Saved my hide more than once. I remember one year Uncle Si bought us our first TV, but I can't remember if that happened at Christmas or not.

I remember our first Christmas back in Japan. We had a Christmas program at the church in Sakata and I was Joseph. But the service dragged on and on and I fell asleep. When it came our turn to go on, I somehow stumbled on to the stage, but my bathrobe had caught on an old piece of furniture in the off stage area, and I dragged it up with me. We also had a Christmas programs at the boarding school. One year Miss Osmundson had given me a part where I had to pull my pockets out of my pants to show that I was broke. After our Christmas program, the grownups put on a skit for us about two people driving in a car. The car was an old table with a table cloth over it, and four of the grownups were crouched under it as tires. Dad was the driver, and Auntie Myrt was the passenger. At one point, Karen Werdahl, who was the cop, rode up on Bobbi's tricycle and pulled the car over. Dad had grabbed a duffle bag from the boy's dorm to use a prop, and when Karen asked him for his license, he opened the duffle bag and pulled out Thanny's long underwear. We all got a kick out of that.

I remember when I was in third grade I got a watch. It was the first watch I had ever owned and I was quite proud of it. The next year I had decided that I wanted to get a shortwave radio for Christmas. I prayed and prayed for that shortwave radio. It's funny how things look different with the passing of time--at the time, I almost felt guilty, because I knew I was asking for a luxury. But looking back now at a kid trying to keep from going stir crazy at that little boarding school, it was definitely a necessity. Somehow, I knew that I needed it. But I was taken aback on Christmas Eve when John and Mary also got shortwave radios. I hadn't thought they were even interested in such a thing. It hadn't occurred to me that Dad and Mom couldn't very well give me a shortwave radio, and then give John and Mary coloring books. Mel got a camera, which was good, because she actually got to be a pretty good photographer.

For me, Honjo was my favorite place for Christmas. We always had lots of snow, and we could go to the sand hills and go skiing. We probably did more sledding in Akita though. At Kinshojiyama. On the way back, we would stop and buy those little bean filled pancakes from a street vendor. We didn't do that much skiing in Sakata, although in Sakata we could buy those little bamboo skis for 15 yen. I never did master them, but I saw Japanese kids who were pretty good at it.

I was having coffee this afternoon with my law tutor, when we got kicked out of the coffee bar. Christmas, you know. I had been planning to leave anyway, to go to the Christmas service, but we were in a middle of a discussion about a clause in the criminal procedure book that says, "In conducting criminal proceedings, the People's Courts, the People's Procuratorates and the public security organs must rely on the masses...," so I wanted another 45 minutes or so. The coffee bar had a Christmas "special" (if you can call a 20 kuai cover charge a special). In China, and also in Japan, I think, Christmas for most people is just another version of Valentine's Day. In my case, it turned out to be a blessing in disguise, because the line at the Haidian Church was much longer than I had expected.

Click for larger image.
There is a growing interest in Christmas among Chinese people. Christmas is known to be a very important Christian festival, and most assume that the place to go to find out about it is to a church. In addition, church Christmas programs are free, and open to non Christians, so Christmas programs usually draw a crowd. But the growing interest has exceeded the ability to accommodate it. I got there at quarter to seven, because I wanted to be sure to get a seat for the 7:30 service. No such luck. Jesson had gotten their a bit earlier, but even he was too far back in the line to get in at 7:30. We had to wait for the 9 o'clock service. Fortunately, there were lots of police and security guards there to herd the crowd and keep them back. It would have been a stampede otherwise. The Haidian Church is renting an old building that only holds 700 people. The new building is coming along, but the inside still needs to be finished before it can be used for services.

China as a culture is struggling with the question of Christmas. The Danwei Blog has an interesting piece about some young Confucian Scholars who are trying to wipe out Christmas. Good luck. Once Christmas invades a culture, there is no turning back. I read a book one time by a guy who spent a whole bunch of years in Castro's prison. One Christmas he built a Christmas tree using an old broom. It's been awhile since I read it, but I think he used hangers or something for the branches with empty pill bottles for decorations. Imagine this now, a Christmas tree made out of accumulated junk, in a country where Christmas had been outlawed for many years. A land with no Christmas trees. This prisoner, who later left Cuba, described the reaction of one of the prison nurses when she saw his Christmas tree. Tears were streaming down her face as she gazed at his creation, "It's so beautiful!" What was beautiful? The broomstick? The pill bottles? No. The beauty was Christmas. This nurse had not seen a Christmas tree for many years, but she had not forgotten. You see, Christmas has an inherent beauty that awakens in every human heart a hope that maybe, just maybe there is a refuge for the tiny craft that is our lost soul, bobbing helplessly on the stormy sea of life's uncertainties. Even Castro had to give it up. Cuba has been celebrating Christmas for three years now. Don't get me wrong, Confucius is pretty pervasive, too. This is China, after all. But even Confucius is no match for Christmas.

We decided to have our Christmas party today instead of Sunday, because Christmas Sunday is always so busy. The ones who are in the choir are not able to come because they have to practice. Another thing is that the old Wudaokou market has been torn down, In the past, I would go with the cooks and buy whatever they needed. But since that is no longer possible, we decided to have a potluck. The sisters said it was a bit awkward to bring something to church first and then here, so Saturday seemed to be a better choice. After they started cooking, Joy sent me to the store to get some green vegetables. The small market near the north gate doesn't have a produce section inside, but there is some stuff being sold out in front of the store. I saw some leafy vegetables that I could not recognize, but it looked interesting. I was looking at it when one of my neighbors happened by. She is a librarian here at the University. She was telling me how to prepare the stuff, and she said it was pretty healthy, which I had already surmised. I bought some and took it home. As has happened to me several times before, no one could tell me what this new vegetable was, but they all liked it. Chinese cooking is like that. I find myself eating something I have never had before, but when I ask the others eating with me, none of them has eaten it before either.

I read the Christmas story from the Gospel of Luke, and we had a little discussion about it. Helen, the student I met when I was riding the "cattle car" from Suzhou to Beijing in October, brought a bunch of her friends from Gily University. Most students in China do not come from a Christian background, so there are always lots of questions and also some interesting comments ("What does Christmas have to do with sin?"). After our discussion, we sang some Christmas carols--some in Chinese and some in English.

Cabbage anyone? Interesting story here about a market that is giving away free cabbage heads once a day to seniors (and anyone else, actually) who line up and wait for hours. If you didn't know anything about Beijing and saw that line, you might be inclined to think that people are really desperate. The truth is that cabbage is not really that expensive. But there are lots and lots of senior citizens in this country. Most of them remember the days when cabbage was dumped in the streets of Beijing to keep people from starving. Young people don't relate to this, but the older ones know from deep experience that if you have a head of cabbage in the house, you are not going to starve to death.

But there is another issue. There are so many, many people who have lots and lots of time and nothing else to do with it. Standing in line once a day is a social activity for these people. China is a diverse society, so it is dangerous to generalize--some have been known to work into their seventies. But many government workers are forced to retire at the age of 50. This can be quite a blow, because they are still active, and able to work, and because the amount of their monthly stipend is a tiny fraction of the salary they have to give up. I know at least one very bright young lady who gave up her plans for graduate school because her mother was forced into retirement. Young people (especially if they are the only child) feel a real obligation to provide the financial support for their aging parents.

I was talking with a few Chinese Americans the other day, and one of them asked me what I thought about Hilary's chances for being elected president of the United States in the next election. I said that I thought she has a good chance to be nominated by the Democratic party, but I think she would have lots of trouble in a national election. The reason for this is that, while the US government imposes strict spending limits on candidates who accept matching funds, there are no spending limits imposed on nonprofit organizations who create attack adds designed to keep a given candidate from being elected (such as the add in 1988 showing Dukakis riding around in a tank). Hilary is likely to generate these kinds of adds, because she holds views that are scary to people who espouse family values. Both in China and in the United States, many families have to deal with the issue of child care, because both parents work. In China, most children whose parents work are cared for by their grandparents. In America, they more often end up at some kind of day care. Hilary believes that children should be cared for by large government day care centers. She elucidates this view in her book, It Takes a Village to Raise a Child. I am quoting loosely now, because it has been a long time since I read it, or I should say had it read to me (it was a book on tape), Imagine a country where children are playing happily in large government day care centers. This may seem too good to be true, but I have seen this kind of thing in France." I, for one, do not think such a thing is too good to be true. I think it is too horrible to imagine. But Hillary believes that children should be raised by the community proper, rather than the family. This and other such views make her a prime candidate for attack adds paid for by organizations who identify her as the person they love to hate.

The other issue that will give Hilary trouble in 2008, though is Iraq. She voted for it, so she won’t be able to say that she opposed it, and she will have a hard time presenting herself as someone who can get in there and solve the problem. Iraq is becoming more and more depressing all the time. I have been concerned about Iraq from the beginning, because I believe that America’s reasons for getting involved were not valid, and history has never been kind to an emperor who makes war without an honest justification. But once you get involved in something, you have to finish it. There is only one thing more frustrating than the way the US got involved, and that is the way the Americans are fighting it. Several times I have heard Bush say, "I will send more troops to Iraq as soon as the generals ask for them." With all due respect to Bush (and I do respect him in many ways), this kind of talk is disconcerting. Since when do generals know anything about how to win a war? Read history. Generals tend to be defeatist by nature. General Douglas MacArthur always used to say, "Councils of War breed defeatism." He was quoting his father, who made his name as a 19 year-old lieutenant planting the Union flag on Missionary Ridge as part of an impulsive charge by a group of courageous soldiers.

The reason America is losing this war, is because the commander in chief is following the generals instead of leading them. For the past 14 years (since 1992), America has been led by draft-dodgers (Clinton and Bush) who managed to avoid combat. It was Vietnam; I don’t blame them for not wanting to get involved. But they can’t have it both ways.

Consider the American Civil War. The North did not defeat the South because they had better generals. The crème de la crème of the West Point officers were from Virginia. They went South. I can’t say this without giving credit to Winfield Scott, the commanding general of the Army, who was from Virginia, but fiercely loyal to the Union. Technically, Scott is not an exception though, because he was not from West Point, but I mention him because it was his loyalty and dependability that enabled Lincoln to take command at such a dark and perilous period in American history. But my point is that North did not win because if it’s superior officers. The North won because the North had a commander in chief who was second to none. Lincoln had the opposite problem to Bush. The first commander of the Army of the Potomac was the pompous McClellan, who kept asking Lincoln for more and more troops, but was afraid to use them. Lincoln at one point said, "Sending troops to McClellan is like shoveling flies across a barnyard." He was forced to remove McClellan. It took almost the entire Civil War for a general to emerge who would take on Lee without becoming overawed by his greatness. And Grant only survived because Lincoln refused to listen to the voices of his detractors in the Army and out. Grant was railed as an incompetent drunkard, and Lincoln was told that he had to "do something." Lincoln decided that he had to act. His order was terse and straightforward, "Find out what brand of whiskey he’s drinking, and give it to my other officers."

Or consider the grave situation facing America during World War II. F.D.R. was not exactly a military man, although he had been in the navy, but he was blessed with commanders both in the Pacific and Atlantic who were men of extraordinary capability, and he had the good sense to let them do their jobs. In the Pacific it was MacArthur, who defeated the Japanese, and called for 10,000 missionaries. Can you imagine what would happen today if Bush called for 10,000 missionaries in Iraq? We don’t do that anymore. We have decided that democracy is the new savior of mankind. The key commander in the European theater was Winston Churchill. This may surprise some people, who are not accustomed to thinking of Churchill as a military man. But he was. He made his living as a battlefield correspondent, not as a soldier, but he was a military man by training. Churchill did not go to Cambridge or Oxford. He went to Sandhurst, the British equivalent of West Point. Churchill’s decision to go to Sandhurst was made by his father, and the story is told that he made this decision after watching his son playing with toy soldiers in the nursery. But the story as usually told is a bit simplified. This is not the case of a kid playing with a few soldiers. Little Winston had arranged fifteen hundred toy soldiers in perfect battle formation. It was Churchill who talked of the exhilaration of being shot at without result. If I start telling stories about Churchill, this will become a book rather quickly, so I will stop. But I mention him to point out that World War II was won not just by generals, but by leaders who had a clear perspective, and the will to fight it out. The common thread that tied these three men together was a tough old Massachusetts pioneer woman by the name of Sarah Barney. She was MacArthur’s great-great grandmother, and she was the great aunt of both Churchill and F.D.R. So MacArthur was Churchill’s eighth cousin, and F.D.R.’s sixth cousin once removed.

After World War II, troop strength both in occupied Europe and occupied Japan was overwhelming. The allies weren’t taking any chances. Does anyone dare to imagine what might have happened if they had put in a minimal force such as the Americans are doing today in Iraq? It’s a frightening thought. MacArthur ruled Japan like a dictator for five years. Aoyama-san told me one time that his monthly salary before World War II was 1 yen. One yen was a fair amount of money in those days. The common currency was called "sen." One yen was one thousand sen. Post war hyperinflation moved the value of the yen down to the point where the sen was irrelevant. When I was a kid, the exchange rate was 360 yen to the dollar. So 1 yen was worth less than a third of a penny, and the sen was out of circulation. You just never saw them. But you could buy them at the pawn shop. And you could also buy the old one yen notes. Every one of those old one yen notes had the following statement in English: "The Government of Japan agrees to pay the bearer on demand one yen in silver." It was signed by General Douglas MacArthur. MacArthur ruled Japan as a dictator for five years after World War II. The Americans went in with an overwhelming military force and pacified the country. The generals in Iraq keep talking about how if we do that in Iraq, it will be harder for the Iraqis to take over. So this half-hearted effort is somehow better? It’s depressing. But there is one person in Washington who has consistently called for more troops. There is one man who bemoans the half-hearted effort and insists that the Americans need to put enough soldiers in Iraq to do the job properly. His name is John McCain. Interesting. Stay tuned.

China is sometimes referred to as a culture of shame. But it appears that the police in Guanzhou have done one now that is too much for even the most traaditional Chinese. This time the outrage is not coming from human rights fanatics in the West. The outrage is coming from people all over China. The country is in an uproar over a public shaming of prostitutes in Guangzhou.

I was impressed that the Wall Street Journal piece on the subject this weekend mentioned the effect of a whole generation of people growing up in a society where they have been told that there is no God, and therefore no one to whom they are accountable (as long as they don't get caught).

I for one, really do want to see the government crack down on prostitution. But the people who really irritate me are the pinps. I certainly don't justify what the prostitutes are doing. But they have never been pushy with me. They have always been very polite, and when I say "no," they back off. Again, that doesn't justify their low sense of morality. I don't view prostitution as a victimless crime, nor do I see the prostitutes as a the primary victims. Society is the victim. And as polite as they may be, prostitution is predatory behaviour. Granted, many of the "victims" are quite willing victims. Still, they should not be encouraged down the wrong raod.

But again, my real irritation here in China is with the scum who are using women to make money for themselves. If there were a parade of pimps, I wouldn't complain. They are the ones who ought to be shamed.

Weird. My favorite Japanese restaurant has apparently bitten the dust. Strange--I was just there a couple days ago, and the proprietor didn't say a thing about it. 'Course, I really didn't get a chance to talk to him. I recall, now, that he was sitting sleeping in his chair when I went up to pay my bill. Hmmm...very strange. I wonder when he knew, because he was very friendly last week when I talked with him, and didn't give a hint of anything unusual on the horizon.

You can't really be surprised when a business goes belly-up in Wudaokou, because store-front rent prices are high close to the junction. There are 12,000 international students in the surrounding universities. BLCU to the East, Qinghua straight north, Beida to the West, and, of course, Beihang just to the south. Add to that half a million Chinese students, and you end up with a sizeable potential clientele. I know, Chinese aren't known for eating Japanese food, but there are 600 Japanese students at BLCU alone, and while the Chinese don't eat Japanese food so much, other foreigners (including Americans) do.

Wudaokou really doesn't look like much. It's basically an old railroad junction. But it is an old railroad junction that happens to be in exactly the right place for the kinds of businesses that attract lots and lots of students. In fact there's a guy from Hong Kong who put together a web site for the "night life" in Wudaokou. I met him outside the coffee bar one night.

I am really going to miss that place. Tonight I ate at another Japanese restaurant just downstairs from my favorite one, and I met a couple Japanese ladies. They told me about another couple restaurants that are pretty good. I think I will be alright. Still, I'm going to miss that guy's hamburger curry. Best I ever had anywhere. And if you happen to have a miserable cold in the winter time, you can't beat hot sake. I am really sorry to see the place go. But although it is tragic, it is not the same as the destruction of the restaurants on the West side of Beihang. Those were torn down not because they were not profitable, but to make room for a new world that is sure to be much more sterile and boring then the lively community that preceded it. This time, the change is apparently forced by economic realities. Doesn't make it any easier, though, to say goodbye to a place that won't be forgotten. Sure wish I knew what happened.

The other day, I noticed an oblique reference in the Wall Street Journal to the case I have referred to previously in this blog (see Tuesday, September 19, 2006 and Tuesday, November 7, 2006), so I did some searching and came up with what I believe is the latest disposition in this case.

It may sound strange to say this, but I am not as concerned about the verdict as I am about the manner in which it was obtained. I should say first that four years is probably a severe sentence even in the case of guilt, because it just doesn't sound like what happened could really be called a riot. But there was a public disturbance, and one should be fair enough to allow that the government does have an interest in investigating to determine to what extent, if any, Mr. Chen contributed to the developments. The problem is, that in the process, they trampled all over the rights of the accused. I do not mean the rights of the accused as seen by outside foreign "human rights" nuts who don't know what is going on. I mean the rights of the accused as set out in Chinese law. This is perhaps my primary concern regarding the justice system in China at present. Over and over again, I hear of defendants being deprived of the right to defend themselves according to lawful criminal procedure. The gangsterism that seems to be standard fare in the countryside is a blight on China's reputation at a time when China should have a sincere interest in showing the world that this country cares about human rights. It is easy to have rights spelled out on paper. But we must go beyond that. We must beware the temptation to circumvent those rights when it is not convenient to honor them.

The Americans like to lecture the world about human rights. But the Americans have set up an off-shore prison at Guantanamo, Cuba that is far more worthy of Castro than the land of the free and the home of the brave. The Americans set up this prison not to circumvent Chinese standards of justice, or Afghan standards of justice, but to circumvent their own standards of justice. The American excuse is that these are war criminals who are not entitled to POW status. They do have a point. POWs and war criminals are not the same. A soldier in uniform who is obeying the orders of his commanding officer and fighting for his country is not a war criminal. He is not violating the law, he is obeying the law (of his country, and international law, assuming compliance with the Geneva conventions). Someone who just grabs a gun and starts shooting people is not entitled to the same level of respect as a soldier in uniform. That is a fair point. But the problem is that the Americans have used this distinction as an excuse to round up dozens of people, some of whom were not shooting anybody, and warehousing them indefinitely. There is no excuse for this. Many of these "war criminals" are guilty of something. But the process employed in bringing them to justice is horrendous, and has damaged America's reputation irreparably. The United States of America will never again be seen as the legitimate guardian of human rights.

Two young ladies at the English corner tonight wanted their picture taken with Santa Claus. It's that time of the year again. There is nothing in America that really correlates to an "English Corner." This is perhaps because Americans tend to be monolingual. But in fact, the English corner is about more than just language. It is also about cultural interaction, and "seeing the world through another person's eyes." People who come to the English Corner are not just interested in language. They are interested in culture, philosophy, politics, and a whole host of other issues. The media is controlled in China, so opinions are certainly affected by the fact that access to certain kinds of information is restricted. For example, when talking about the Japanese, and their apparent military buildup, most people in China are not aware that China sent a nuclear attack submarine into Japanese waters. Their argument changes hue pretty quickly when I tell them that. Generally, though, conversations at the English corner are quite amiable. Perhaps this is true for me in part because although I am an American citizen, I did not grow up in the United States, and don't seem to feel the same knee-jerk reaction I sometimes see exhibited by Americans who are super-sensitive to any criticism of their country.

It is supposed to be the anniversary of Pearl Harbor. Went with a group of students again to the Hunan restaurant on the West Side, which has still managed to survive the bull dozers. Over a meal of pig's head, bamboo, and mushrooms, we somehow got into a discussion of China's ancient history. I told the students that I had a lot of trouble trying to understand the ancient history of China, because there isn't as much stuff available in English.

A little later, I was at the coffee bar, and somehow got into a discussion with some students from Post and Telecoms about Mao. One of them had seen the book I was reading, and wanted to know how Americans view Mao. Quite a number of people have asked me this question since I have been in China. I usually tell them that Mao is viewed as a dark figure by Americans. Deng Xiao-ping is different. He visited America, was very friendly, and managed to enhance Chinese--American friendship considerably. But Mao is still viewed very negatively, mainly because of how he treated his own people. Opinions about Mao in China itself are much more dynamic. I have heard every possible variety of opinion. Generally undergraduate students are more adoring of Mao as a "great leader" than graduate students. Still, it never ceases to amaze me how many professional people will try to argue that the progress seen in China today is really a modification of Mao's principles.

Well, Ed Joyclyn had this day this evening at the Bookworm. He has just completed the second long march, following the route of the second and sixth regiments in 1935, who followed the first long march of 1934 using a slightly more westward route. Evaluating the significance of the Long March is difficult, because China at that time (as always) was such an enormously complicated situation. When Ed posed this question, I said that the Long March had inherent significance, because the Chinese Communist Party would not exist without it. The KMT would surely have overwhelmed them. Ed countered that the thing that really defeated the KMT was the Japanese. That's actually a good point. The Long March enabled the Communists to escape the grasp of the KMT, but they still would have been wiped out sooner or later if it had not been for the Japanese. This is why Mao responded to a Japanese apology with an expression of gratitude. Still, the Japanese invasion of Chna could not have accrued to the benefit of the Communists if they had not managed to survive long enough to benefit from it. It was the Long March that enabled them to do that. Ed and Andy (his partner on the first Long March retrace in 2003) benefitted immensely from the fact that there are still a few old timers along the routes who remember the old days. In this sense, the retracing of the Long March was completed just in time. I am still reading Ed and Andy's first book, and it is certain that this latest march will produce a lot more interesting history, enhancing understanding of these incredible retreats, and just how they influenced the events that followed.

Sister Rose got married today, and she had asked me to bring a greeting, so Shannon picked me up, because she had agreed to interpret for me. It was a very nice low-key house church ceremony, not a big fancy wedding. There are basically three types of weddings in China. There is the public office wedding, where couples go to register with the government. For some people, this is the only wedding they have. Then there is the family wedding. Depends on the family, but in many villages in China, this is the wedding that counts. In fact, in some villages, people don't even bother with the official registration. They don't think it's important. Finally, there is the church wedding. For Christians, this is the important one.

Rose's wedding was held in a hotel, mainly, I suppose because her church does not have a building. The style and arrangement pretty much followed the pattern of a western Christian wedding, except that there were people in the audience letting off streamers when she was walking down the aisle. I have never seen anything like that at an American Christian wedding, but it would be very common at a Chinese family wedding. Oh, and her fiance, a preacher from the countryside, didn't quite have the nerve to kiss her. He just gave her a big hug.