User Comments - Tal

Posted on: Restaurants with Entertainment

Not that I've noticed, but I think 'We Will Rock You' was covered widely in Asia, you could probably find it at most KTVs I'd guess. It could be said that in general Chinese youth don't go in for gender-benders. Several boys of my acquaintance were deeply shocked by David Bowie's appearance in the video for 'Ashes to Ashes'. It's funny how they'll react to stuff, I guess it's more of that ole east-west dichotomy. Later dude.

Posted on: Restaurants with Entertainment

Mine is to be able to buy a Beijing Duck Wrap To Go in KFC, and use the carton to decorate my office wall. Hotel California is a fine song, unfairly despised due to over-hearing. It's cute and surreal that it's one of the handful of English songs that Chinese people have taken to their hearts. 'We're all just prisoners here... of our own device.' *chuckle*

The sound of silence. That's another one.

Posted on: Classical Chinese vs. Modern Chinese

"Wu Zetian was a power hungry, bloodthirsty tyrant...".

Yeah, but dude, in China they are the heroes. Every schoolchild and student here believes that Genghis Khan was a great Chinese hero. I always thought that one legend that would always be retold in any culture would be the story of Popeye. Maybe we're all just too western in this thing.

Posted on: Listen Up, Foreigners!

呵呵, the funny thing is that the taxi-driver in question probably thought he was being friendly, (since I assume iaing is neither black nor Japanese.) Yeah, if you can't learn to get used to xenophobia, China really isn't somewhere you'd want to stay long-term.

Posted on: Party Dues

Hi Mike, nice to see you still around on these boards, gives me a little feeling of CPod's old glory days.

First let me stress (as I think I have done before) that I am not denying that Chinese people can be virtuous and/or inherently good. Certainly there are many hard-working, intelligent, worthy Chinese people, and I admire them. In speaking of 'China' or 'the Chinese', one can only generalize. I actually prefer to know Chinese people as individuals, and to judge them as individuals. Of course it is always a challenge to get over the culture gap(s), because many of them will view you as a foreigner first, foremost and always, and perhaps this in turn makes it harder to establish a personal relationship based on the principle that 2 humans can get to know each other as individuals, and communicate dispassionately on any given topic.

My post above was not essentially intended as criticism of Chinese people. Mainly it was a denial that China is still (in any sense) a Communist country, and a personal response to the kind of voracious, unfettered capitalism that now exists in China. Even a casual observer of China these days surely cannot be unaware of the vast gulf that has opened up between the 'haves' and the 'have nots', the suffering of the poor and the disadvantaged, the environmental degradation which is all a result of the abandonment of socialist principles.

I myself grew up reading the works of George Orwell and Howard Zinn, and considered myself a socialist until my early to mid twenties. (I am aware that in the US especially, socialism/communism is demonized, is basically regarded as a dirty word, but I make no apology for continuing to consider it one of mankind's nobler aspirations, even if it is unattainable. It is to my mind simply part of our tragic human nature that such an ideal is forever associated with monsters like Mao and Stalin.) I no longer consider myself a socialist by the way, (nor even a political animal. Was it Churchill who said something like: 'If you're not a communist at age 20, there's something wrong with your heart. If you're still one at age 30, there's something wrong with your head.'

In response to Kaj I say much the same. There are countless Chinese people who are patient, hard-working, and entirely admirable. Are these individuals well-served by the current runaway capitalism and greed which apparently I am (as a westerner) supposed to rejoice at, given that it represents some kind of idealogical victory for the west? What kind of communism am I talking about? Well I'm applying the word in its most basic sense, as defined by any dictionary: shared ownership of the means of production and exchange, social justice and welfare for all, the concept that a human society is a collective effort. These were the ideas that saved China back in the day, but have now been thrown away to be replaced by brittle nationalism and consumerism.

Posted on: Party Dues

哈哈, thanks for the reminder.

Posted on: Party Dues

Gah! What happened to the edit function? Oh wait, this is Chinesepod. Yep, the more it changes the more it's the same.

Posted on: Party Dues

Oh yeah? Then it's a cold day in hell and the Emporer has a fine new set of clothes!

[IMG]http://i39.tinypic.com/2dheoia.jpg[/IMG]

Seems to me China turned its back on Communism when Deng Xiao Ping announced that 'to get rich is glorious'. As the saying goes, history repeats itself, the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce. To get rich (quick) isn't glorious, it's vulgar, tawdry, and I suspect ultimately hollow. China now seems partly like a land of the dispossessed, except for the nouveau riche of course, who show us clearly how it is possible to have great wealth and no class. It is also a country that truly knows the price of everything and the value of nothing. An inspiring sideshow before the curtain comes down on the petro-chemical age.

Posted on: I Said COLD Cola

Isn't it? ;-)

Posted on: The Trouble with Marrying a Foreigner

呵呵，you're tempting me down the generalizing road again. On the whole I would agree, but then I'm looking from a western perspective too. I'm pretty sure the many Chinese ladies who have married western men would disagree. Quite likely the (very) few Chinese men who form close relationships with western women would too.