Pollution solution, Beijing style

During the Olympics, 400,000 Beijingers went online to vote for keeping the Olympic car restrictions that took nearly half of all cars off the road for two months, clearing the streets and the skies.

The verdict is in: all private cars will be banned from the roads one day a week and license plate restrictions will again take about 30 percent of cars off the roads each day. 

Within two hours of publishing the news, 2,400 Beijing citizens complained on China Daily's Web site. Some said it is unfair to require private cars to be taken off the roads one day a week. Some said the restrictions force law abiding citizens to buy more cars. Most said city officials won't follow the law anyway, making it a restriction only obeyed by people it hurts.

Read more at China Daily.

"Honey, where'd we park the bike?"

The car isn't quite king in China yet and with a looming global recession, car sales are slowing, while bicycle retention and electric bike sales are sky-high.

The photo here is the "parking lot" outside a downtown Carrefour in Heping District, Tianjin. There is a parking lot attendant here who tells people where to put their bike for the small fee of two Mao, or about three cents.

Car sales are high by Western standards; sales rose 19 percent in the first half of this year as car makers sold 5.18 million vehicles, according to this Bloomberg article. But that's down from last year's 23 percent growth.

From my micro view here in Tianjin, bicycles are widely used and more convenient for students because streets are congested with public buses and taxis. Old fashioned pedal bikes are by far the most common, but electric bikes are gaining popularity. One source predicts every household in China will have an electric bike by 2009.

I just wanted to touch on this very interesting, deep and fluctuating issue. Here's a few links to read more: Two Wheels or Four Wheels? Humble bicycle still rules Chinese roads-hearts Kick-starting the ebike

The Tianjin Variety Show!

When it comes to the fantasy world of television and movie production, it's reassuring to find out China is the same as Hollyweird.

I attended the filming of the Tianjin version of American Idol Thursday, except this is a misnomer because any Western concept introduced in China quickly loses its recognizable traits. Instead of the sexually ambiguous Clay Aiken singing sensitive pop music, it was a sexually ambiguous man dressed in traditional Peking opera costume with full face paint singing the cherry blossom love song of a young woman in Springtime. The winner wasn't an American girl singing music from the heartland, she was a Chinese girl (age 7) singing Peking opera from the dynastic court. 

The show also featured a co-ed dance troupe of 50 to 52-year-olds and a young man singing the typical Chinese pop cheese. I'd love to tell the story, but the photos and video really do it for me. Visit www.AmericanFair.shutterfly.com to see more photos of the show.

Teacher's Day in Tianjin

I teach on the fourth floor of a four-story building. After my classes ended on a regular Wednesday, I was walked down the main staircase toward a large group of students. 

I didn’t think anything of the packed first floor lobby, until the 40-some students burst into applause. 

I was bum rushed by someone with a bouquet of lilies. A wall of teenage girls were flashing cameras and yelling “Chieza!” (the Chinese version of “say cheese”). Confused, flustered and clueless on how to gracefully behave, I finally got an answer to my internal question of ‘What the hell is going on?’

“Happy Teacher’s Day!” the students all yelled.

Teacher’s Day in China, celebrated every Sept. 10, is an official working-holiday to show appreciation and respect for educators. This year, the 24th anniversary of Teacher’s Day, President Hu Jintao traveled to a school for deaf students in Henan Province. Premiere Wen Jiabao dined with eight teachers in Zhongnanhai and told them, “Teaching is the most splendid profession under the sun.” Both stories made front page news (click on links for stories).

The reason for all the pomp and flattery is out of historical respect for teachers. Confucius, the father of all teachers, taught more than 3,000 students in spite of the turbulent Spring and Autumn period. During these times, Confucius traveled the warring states promoting peace by teaching the merits of a moral life and rewriting the ancient texts. 

These rewritten texts form the foundation of Chinese civilization. 

There’s definitely an air of reverence in my students’ rapt attention. They stand to answer in-class questions. When I speak rapid-fire American English, my students apologize for not being smart enough to keep up.

I read that Teacher’s Day originally fell on Confucius’ birthday, but was moved later to fit the government’s holiday schedule. In America, this would be the death of a holiday. Within four years, even the flower shops would forget to advertise for it.

But in China, gratitude for and pride in teaching is obvious. When I was struggling to open my apartment door that day because of the two cases of mooncakes and carnations my students gave me, I didn’t mind that I feeling like I’m Anna in "The King and I." 

'Halfpats, the new expats'

I recently had a talk with one of my few American friends who actually got a job in America after we graduated. It was only three weeks into the new job, a copy editing position at a decent big-city magazine, but already the honeymoon was over.

"It's going OK, I guess. I don't know, I have an appointment at the Peace Corps office tomorrow."

It's just that simple. If work doesn't work out, maybe it's not the job you need to change. Maybe it's the country.

At least that's what a growing number of recent American graduates think. There are more than 6 million American expats living abroad now and according to a recent Wall Street Journal article, the most entrepreneurial among them are young, unattached travelers willing to wander until the right career track finds them.

We're "halfpats," according to this article, or local for-hire expatriates that are younger, cheaper and more willing to take risks, thus the meandering that lead us so far from home. Not only am I surprised to find myself among this workforce, I had no idea I chose one of the best destinations for halfpat hiring. (My halfpat friends and I are pictured above. The smaller photo is another halfpat friend, Kelsey, embracing the Malaysian therapy of being lit on fire.)

The Beijing area and China have been boom territories for these marketable expats, according to the WSJ article. In lieu of the previous economic slowdown and now crisis, people see strength in China; 44 percent of Americans already think China is the world's leading economic power, according to a February Gallup poll.

We kids are marketable because we don't come with the costs of transportation, family relocation or housing. In most cases, halfpats have a cultural understanding and better language skills because they often come during college or right after, Richard Brubaker, blogger and manager of China Strategic Development Partners, said.

"Halfpats, with prior work experience of 3-4 years, and prior in-country experience of 3+ years, have already proven their ability, desire and commitment to operate in China," Brubaker wrote in an article for China Success Stories, a business Web site. Brubaker sees this "widely available talent pool" as a great resource for business management in China.

I've seen evidence of the "halfpat" phenomenon in my own microcosm of under experienced, over educated and thus unemployed friends. I know four History majors moving to Spain, one political science major already in Turkey, a marketing major maybe in Paris and myself, a wannabe journalist and English teacher in China. But in three weeks, I've gotten job offers over the phone, taken up tutoring and looked at opportunities hosting a radio show, writing bar reviews and acting. (Yes, acting. Foreigners with little or no acting experience in China are often sources for movie or TV show extras, when a role calls for that Western face. Read more here)

My friends are having trouble just getting apartments in the also slow economies of the European Union, let alone extra tutoring jobs to supplement a meager 700 Euro/month income.

It seems the gap year halfpats can actually make money, and forgo the calls home for cash typical for the last 20 years. That is, as long as you're in China.

Collections of Conversations #1

I've taken notes on comments that sounded pithy, profound or insightful even though they were in common conversation. I've included names for comments taken from conversations with friends, acquaintances and other adults. I have not included names in cases where I took quotes from my class or my friends' classes. Here's a few: 

-"What is your opinion of Christ?" -Benjamin, the American name of a Shanghainese man who asked me this question within the first hour of our flight from Chicago to Shanghai.

-This comment was made during a conversation about Bjork's outspoken support for Tibet at a music concert in Shanghai during the National Holiday in October 2007, and the government's subsequent wariness to permit foreign musicians to perform in China.

"She came on stage and said, 'Tibet! Tibet! with her (fist pumping) in the air like that and now some people don't like her simply because of that. I think music is music. But I think there are so many people, maybe the government needs to be strict." -Viola, who chose her name because it was the name of a strong-willed, unmindful woman, and the name of Shakespeare's lover.

-"China and America are friends." -Sui, or the man on the bus to Cuandixia

-After being asked to describe the ideal place to live: "Do you mean anywhere in China? or anywhere outside of China?"

-"If she could change one thing about herself it would be the color of her skin."

-A comment made after I fielded the omnipresent question, who do you support in the U.S. election? "I must see you again, because you are one American who believes in change." -Prince, a Frenchman who's soul was born in Congo.

-"You'd be surprised how far a kiss can go." -Kiley, an Australian expat coaching my friend on how to utilize her foreign appeal.

-"So American women aren't like in 'Sex and the City'?"-Viola

Sense of Self in Cuandixia

Do a quick google search for “trying to find myself.” The search will return Web sites about Thai students traveling abroad, husbands in danger of losing wives and families and, yes, English as Second Language teachers lost in mind and self on every continent. 

I did this search because the overwhelming feeling that I am lost 8,000 miles across the planet drove me to a remote tourist village five hours, two trains, two taxis and a bus away from “home,” or Tianjin. Instead of “finding myself,” I found peace in good company and new friends in Chinese courtyard houses.

The village of Cuandixia has the best preserved collection of courtyard houses from the Ming and Qing dynaties. The town is one of the China's historical heritage sites, but is not heavily visited by tourists and on the day I went, I was the only American in town. The centuries-old village has moved into the 21st century, with adequate hot and cold running water, electricity and karaoke set-ups in some houses where visitors can rent overnight beds. But it is still an old-fashioned small village in that there's not much to do.

After climbing the mountain staircases to every viewing platform in the mountain valley, I started to feel a little bored and actually lonely on what I'd romantically thought would be my first solo adventure. It was my first Mid-Autumn Fest and my 23rd birthday comes shortly after and this was my present for both.

Re-entering the village, I passed more friendly townsfolk and ended more conversations in embarrassed muttering and looking at the ground. I finally chose a courtyard house because there was music coming out of it and I wanted, needed to be around people. As soon as I entered, a young Chinese woman handed me a microphone and asked (in English!), "Do you want to sing?" Viola, and her friends Jiang Nan, Yuan Bo and Deng Rui Teng (pictured here), saved my trip and taught me the first lesson of traveling alone: be an extrovert.

I stayed in the extra bed in my new friends' room, ate new dishes while laughing over Chinglish, sang a terrible rendition of "Dizzy Miss Lizzy" at their and the other guests' express desire to hear me sing a Western song, and shared mooncakes. We played "games" that seemed more like theater, and at midnight they sang me Happy Birthday. Viola gave me birthday presents of face wash samples (very handy) and a lime. My mechanical hanzi was critiqued by a man who opened Tsingtao beers with chopsticks, but he, with Viola translating, taught me the meaning of single happiness. 

The name of the courtyard house we stayed in was named for the character that means single happiness. The character describes the happiness of a woman when she gets married. When the woman and her husband have a baby, the character is written twice, to convey double happiness.

Forget finding yourself, it's better in the company of others. The night I spent in Cuandixia was one of single happiness, but the memories will give me double happiness to come. 

China smells

Petter Hessler wrote in River Town that, at first, China was just sounds to him. He described the sounds of freighter ships passing through the Yantgze River channel locks at Fuling, the sound of the 24-7 Peking Opera station inevitably blaring out of some cabbie's stick-shift, King Long jalopy and the sound of sandaled feet padding up the mountains of stairs in the river town.  

If Peter Hessler's river town was sounds, mine just smells.

The Haihe River,  called the "Mother River of Tianjin" by locals, dissects the city and surrounds my campus. Walking over the bridge that leads out to a six-lane thoroughfare, I pass through clouds of algae plume/seaweed vapor, the sulfur smell of underground sewers and exhaust from the perpetually congested Weijin Lu. 

During the afternoon, the river attracts grandfathers who fish while their grandchildren are in school. The old men smell like mold; it is a warm climate with some sweaty days and older men seem to wear a uniform of dress slacks pulled up to the naval and stretched out white, tank-top undershirts. Washing clothes is not done as frequently here because almost all clothes are line dried (dryers are considered selfish wastes of electricity). Chinese people also don't use deodorant because, as a Chinese friend told me in Shanghai, "Only white people sweat."

There are sporadic clouds of cigarette smoke, but not as many as Western media encouraged me to expect. Women rarely smoke because, like drinking, smoking is improper for ladies. Most men, like the one in this picture, smoke a pack a day.

With far fewer street vendors than Shanghai, Weijin Lu mostly smells warm, like sweet tofu, cooked in cylindrical, steel drums and sold underneath the overpass. It's here that young Chinese teenagers roll out blankets of faux jade and amber jewelry.  The smell here is more a feeling of dinginess because these hard-working people live in a city where the dirty air leaves dust behind.

Peter Hessler may have had a romantic depiction of pleasant sounds, but I enjoy every one of the unpleasant smells in Tianjin. Tianjin is often called a real Chinese city, a working city, and the smells are comforting in their Earthiness.

"What happens now?"

Sitting in a restaurant with a friend on the opening day of the Paralympics, my friend asked me, “What happens after the Olympics?” 

It was my first visit to Beijing and we were having lunch in a kaiten-zushi-style restaurant, where you sit at a bar with a rotating conveyor belt of sushi from which you grab what you want. The restaurant was linked to the Beijing Friendship store, a chain of stores created to sell Chinese fabricated antiques to foreigners. 

Two things struck me as unique in this situation: I was in the heart of Beijing eating in a restaurant apparently owned and operated by some Japanese, which Chinese historically hate more than the Russians, Koreans and 50-some ethnic Chinese minority groups combined. Secondly, the 14-story landmark that I specifically met my friend at because “every cabbie in CHina knows it”, according to Renata, was a Western example of capitalism in China.

What I’m getting at is that though the Olympics are over, the goal of more than 7 years of renovation, re-education and coordination is accomplished, China changes constantly and that’s surely not about to stop.

Just outside of Tianjin in the Tianjin Economic-Technology Development Area (TEDA), business is continuing to boom and in today's China Business Weekly the cover story was about a company with Tianjin-Chicago ties. Wanxiang Group, China's largest auto parts manufacturer, already has a base in Chicago and is being courted by other U.S. cities. This is common; in the past, China was courting companies, now U.S. cities are courting Chinese companies. Read more

Beijingers want clean-air to stay

The South China Morning Post and the China Daily reported Monday that most Beijingers want the strict driving restrictions which took more than 1 million cars off the road to clear the air for the Olympics to continue after the gold is gone. 

"We want to hear more public opinion on whether, or how, to keep the rule," Wang Li, deputy director of Beijing's traffic bureau, was quoted by state media as saying. --taken from an article in the South China Morning Post. http://olympics.scmp.com/Article.aspx?id=2904&section=latestnews

Here's a China Daily article saying one environmental official is trying to keep the restrictions, though this article came out before Monday's article saying no decision has been made. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2008-08/24/content_6965609.htm

Pollution: Before and after a summer rain

Take a look at the first photo here: It's not raining in this photo. That’s no fog of some impending storm. This is Weijin Lu, four days after the closing of the Olympics. During the Olympics, air conditions were good enough to host preliminary football matches on this major street in Tianjin at the "Water Droplet" stadium. http://en.beijing2008.cn/cptvenues/venues/tjs/headlines/n214132329.shtml

The second photo is an image of Weijin Lu one day after a rainstorm cleared the air from Beijing to Harbin to Qingdao, leaving two days of blue skies in Tianjin. The last picture was taken from the observation deck of the Tianjin TV Tower on one of those remarkably clear days.

Beijing's pollution control measures meant to cut smog during the Olympics and Paralympics should still be in effect, until the Paralympics end on Sept. 17. In the face of last week's hazy smog, I have to ask if these regulations have measurably improved the air quality or if the region has simply been blessed with good weather. Read more at BBC: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2.hi/asia-pacific/7569876.stm