On a different note...

A friend wrote me an email and said that she never thought I could be so serious until after she saw my blog! So this is to lighten up the entries a lil' bit.

I had a dream the other night....

We went to Wudaokou to eat at a Korean restaurant and so the drinking began VERY early, perhaps 7pm. Then we went to meet five others (two Yankies, two Chinese, and a Korean) at a Korean bar/pub. In fact, Liu Chengfu was there! We invited him to come and it was good to see him again. Problem is, neither Igor or I remember much of seeing him! We were drinking heavily at the Korean restaurant, then went to the pub and even drank more, a lot more. Don't ask me how but I knew it was november 11 (11/11), singles day in China! And everyone except Liu Chengfu was single, so we drowned our sorrows in alcohol. I had no idea how much i drank until suddenly I realized it was WAY too much and immediately told Igor "I'm going". I had to get home. It was only 10:30. Well, long dream short, the taxi driver's retched perfume induced incessant puking the entire way home and the poor female taxi driver had to stop for me to take a dump on the street! I crawled back into the taxi with my pants down to my ankles!!!! Poor woman! Thank god it was JUST a dream. Anyhow, barely made it home. Gave the taxi 100 kuai. Got in my house and passed out on the floor immediately. Igor wasn't too familiar with where I lived, so when he left wudaokou later, he simply told the taxi: Go to the hutongs!!!! funny! Anyhow, he miraculously made it back to my house but couldn't get in because you have to have a security card (which is strange--who woulda thought a security card for a siheyuan!?). So he threw small stones at my window. Of course, I was passed out, didn't hear a thing and while he was picking up rocks, he found my wallet on the ground!!!! Well, next thing he did was break my fucking window! I still didn't hear it! And so he went to a hotel and we met the next morning, both laughing. Then I woke up. Never thought a dream could be so vivid and...well, inane.

Outsourcing WHAT?!

I don't know what the hell it is with outsourcing today because it came up during lunch with a friend and then again in an article I just read. Apparently big pharma is beginning to outsource jobs to China that entail testing products on dogs. Who would have guessed! What a surprise! Less activists to worry about I guess. And even if there were say more than a few, I don't know if it would make any difference. After all, I saw on TV a few months ago doctors testing violent and addictive drugs on rats! Yep, right there on TV--and it wasn't channel 452 on the satellite dish. Injecting different amounts into different rats to see the effect. Some died, some just wobbled. Yeah, great fun to watch.

Speaking real quickly (I just finished and actually, this may not be so quickly) of outsourcing. Bad thing or good? To be honest, I don't know enough about the issue. What i do know is that outsourcing isn't always such a bad thing. Of course, if it were my father's job that was outsourced I'd probably say otherwise, but it's not. And what I see here in China is that there are not only more qualified Chinese to take the more technologically advanced jobs but the are willing to work harder and more for less. At the same time they get paid better, derive more benefits, and have a reliable and steady income. In fact, they are happy to have this job because it's not boring, there are opportunities for advancement, and the experience is great. Plus, it keeps prices low worldwide to some extent. For example, I know a semiconductor engineer that who makes about 7,500 RMB ($1000) per month (25,000 RMB/yr. is the threshold for being a serious consumer in China), which is not bad at all for a country whose average income is $300 per month. She works at least 50 hours per week and is happy with her job (she's been given a raise once and is up for review annually to receive others). And why not mention that western companies generally bring better standards abroad (very generally, that is). More and more Chinese, at least in second and third-tier cities, prefer to do business with foreign investment companies because they know they will abide by the contractual terms; they don't have to be suspicious about that truly rampant Chinese phenomenon of going behind the other party's back to make a bigger gain but hurting the overall deal.

Of course, there are the negative aspects too. China's greatest problem in my opinion is pollution. If anything will bring China down in the next twenty years or so it will be a series of severe environmental catastrophes. Unless China cleans up its act, literally, there's no way nature can bear the environmental burden. Foreign investment also takes advantage of the lax environmental standards in China and this is a true shame. In my opinion, China is the toxic dump of many international companies taking advantage of rarely enforced environmental laws and highly corrupt provincial officials. Of course, one also cannot exclude Chinese-owned and operated companies either. In fact, chances are they are worse. But billions of dollars have been invested by foreign companies to produce chemicals and materials whose waste is dumped raw and untreated, whose viscous fumes are bellowed brazenly without contrition, and one day the Chinese are going to wake up to this. In fact, I am sure many of you have heard that there were 74,000 protests in 2004 (this year it is down to like 50,000 I believe--their clamping down). Well, most of those are land confiscation and environmental protests. Most, if not all of the people are innocent farmers who are powerless against a system that pays no heed, that doesn't give a shit because development and a "harmonious society" are more important, guanxi is more important than people's lives.

But hey, the same thing was happening in the US between at least 1890 and 1950. But China, as someone recently said, has forced what took the west 200 years into 20. The law has not had any mentionable developments. So we'll see what happens...Anyhow, here are some stats, all from reliable sources:

· The Xinhua report (gov't funded newspaper=low estimate) cited Pan as saying that China has over 20,000 chemical factories located along major rivers, including 10,000 along the Yangtze River and 4,000 along the Yellow River. It did not say how many were on the Songhua River.

· RE: Yangtze River: The report said 30 billion tons of polluted water were released into the river in 2005, a 50-percent increase over the number in 1998.

• China is paying a huge price for its economic growth...The cost of environmental pollution and ecological damage is thought reach as much as 8 to 12 per cent of China's annual output - or about as high as the country's annual growth.

• Around half the population, or 600m people, have water supplies that are contaminated by animal and human waste.
• According to the World Bank, China has 16 of the world's 20 most polluted cities. Estimates suggest that 300,000 people a year die prematurely from respiratory diseases.
• The main reason is that around 70% of China's mushrooming energy needs are supplied by coal-fired power stations, compared with 50% in America. Combined with the still widespread use of coal burners to heat homes, China has the world's highest emissions of sulphur dioxide and a quarter of the country endures acid rain. In 2002, SEPA found that the air quality in almost two-thirds of 300 cities it tested failed World Health Organisation standards
• It is no rarity, therefore, to find a bureau imposing a fine on a dirty local enterprise (thus fulfilling its duty), but then passing the money on to the local administration, which refunds it to the company via a tax break.

The list goes on and on...

Guilt v Shame

Went out with a German friend the other night who was here in Beijing for five years or so working for the European Commission and is now a consultant vetting NGO proposals to receive education assistance. Funny, the conversation turned on the topic of Western guilt versus Chinese shame and when they surface--the chronology of the feelings and how they influence, or what they mean to, the individual,--a topic that has come up before with another friend. Here it is:

In the West, the feeling of guilt is very personal, very individualistic and happens psychologically immediately after the deed or even just after the thought of the deed. For some the feeling is psychologically stultifying, for others it's just a small voice that says "you are bad" or "that is wrong" and acts as preemptive force to dissuade one from committing the act (again). This happens in the mind of the individual, whether or not somebody else knows about it. So, if I cheat or steal or lie, perhaps I will feel guilty, or even the thought beforehand may prevent me from doing it (barring other factors like I am starving and need to steal a loaf of bread). And shame, for the most part, only comes after guilt, though it can certainly intensify it too.

On the other hand, we tentatively reasoned, in China guilt is something that comes after shame. That is, if somebody, namely a Chinese, does something that is a social foux pas, they don't feel guilty until after somebody or the community finds out. This is interesting because one wonders then what prevents the Chinese, in this case, from committing an unethical act they feel they can do it unnoticed?

And even more interesting, the feelings of shame and then guilt in China only surface based on the communities prescriptive and proscriptive values. For example, if flogging a small helpless and chained-up dog is not considered a bad thing by the community or society, not something to lose face over, then no feelings of guilt or regret will surface in the flogger. So it is interesting how it is society's values, or put in a different way, your face in society, that keeps the individual in check, that draws the ethical parameters (and explains why chit-chat is so goddam prevalent here). Interesting too how with a change in societal values comes a change in when one can be shamed. For example, not too long ago in China it was accepted that a man have a concubine or another lover. In fact, it was expected. "Hey Chen, how's the paramour doing today? Well, tell her I say hello! And bring her and your wife over to eat sometime..." However, this changed substantially after the cultural revolution, though not entirely, and today is considered much more shameful (the Taiwanese, interestingly, who were not influenced by the cultural revolution, are infamous for having paramours).

In the West, admittedly, not all people feel guilt and of course many heinous acts are committed even by seemingly normal people. So guilt doesn't always work, but those things that do create guilt in the Judeo-Christian sense have been put into laws that have more or less been enforced, and it is the law (and infrastructure put in place to enforce the law, as demented as it sometimes can be) that also keeps us in check. So, you beat your kid and the neighbor calls child services, you never see your kid again and are locked up for ten years with a $100,000 fine. Meanwhile the kid is convinced he/she is scarred for life, feels guilty or shamed that he/she is different, goes on meds, and later tries to commit suicide (or something like that). In China, on the other hand, one, the law is the last thing people resort to (though this is slowly changing) and two, it is okay to hit one's kid (to a certain extent) and the kid even expects it!! In fact, there is even an expression that goes something like "to hit is to love, to scold is to care" in Chinese. Maybe the law in the West is the society in the East, and vice versa???

Well, this entry turned out to be way longer and more complicated with more tangents than I intended but I hope the crux is intelligible. Any opinions??? I am especially interested to hear about where Mongolians might fall on this guilt/shame spectrum, or if they even do...!

Law School Apps About Over!!!

Well, five down and one to go. Finished Boalt, Loyola, Southwestern, USC, and USF. Now just UCLA. This is it, just have to finish this last application and then begins the dreadful penumbra of waiting till as long as April until I find out who accepts, rejects, or waitlists me. I definitely got a little obsessive-compulsive on these since the deadlines for law schools are between February and April, depending on the school. What's great though is that submitting applications electronically (the first time I've used this service) through LSAC is incredibly convenient. Once one has submitted all of the necessary documents, such as the LORs, resume, personal statements, which are stored in files on the website, it takes not more than 15 minutes to finish each application and have it sent off. No downloading of forms, no sending in checks, nothing. All computerized and converted to PDF, then automatically forwarded to the law schools. Saves a hell of a lot of time and postage fees, and saves myself from my embarrassing and atrocious penmanship! Though the LSAC $12 fee per law school is bearable, the law school app fees themselves are killers. Between $50 and $75 per application. Terrible. I guess that's just a precursor to law school, which just tuition alone will run about $30,000 per year unless I go to UCLA or Boalt, which, being state schools, will discount it a bit.

Life in a siheyuan (四合院)

Well, here are the pics of my place, as promised (courtesy of Flora, thanks!)

Rooftops

Inside

Entrance (my place is on the right, top and bottom windows)

I didn't know this when I moved in but in the middle of the maze of hutongs and siheyuans I live in is the solemn and serene Pudusi temple. Perfect place to go for a walk, read a book, etc. Here it is:

Pops and Paige in Beijing

My father and stepmother were here for two weeks and came just in time to stay at my new place. In fact, I only slept in it for one night before they came! And the location was perfect for them. Not only that but they adapted to Beijing extremely well, my father becoming the most diehard of bargainers I've ever seen in such a short time, even outdoing me, and I can speak Chinese! Go pops! That was hillarious! They were able to see most of Beijing and even became familiar with some of the sidestreets and shortcuts. I was worried about my stepmother's extreme allergy to MSG, but I guess the line "If she eats it, she will die. And if she dies, YOU are responsible" pretty much convinced them not to put any in. And from the look on the their faces and the time they were gone after we ordered, I wouldn't be surprised if they were in the kitchen watching the chefs!



The traffic and endless crowds sometimes got to them but they were troopers and I was happy they enjoyed their stay. My father even wants to try to come again and I hope he does. If so, then we go to the countryside since on this trip they only saw the big cities (we went to Shanghai for a long weekend too). And I don't know why but they had some sort of fetish for paintings of Qing dynasty maidens and managed to bring home something around the order of twelve! I told my dad he's subconsciously fulfilling his fantasy of having a harem! "No, they are gifts (smile)." Sure pop, ah huh.

While in Shanghai we got to meet a very good friend of mine, William, who I met at UCLA. We hadn't seen each other in at least four years and it was great seeing him again. He took us out to lunch with his girlfriend and we had a blast. He and my father really connected and I think by all of our laughing and demands from the servers, we drove out some of the customers and drove some servers insane! Very memorable time. But Shanghai is not a place for traveling unless you like shopping. Nothing else really to see there except people and skyscrapers (if the air is somehow clear that is), and madness. Made me realize how happy I am to be in Beijing.
Willy!