Revising History Belongs to the Victor

September 8, 2010

The Economist has a Blog called Asia view that reported the Chinese Communist Party is planning to celebrate the 90th anniversary of its founding in 2011.

It seems that John Woo, the director of Mission Impossible II will be involved in shooting a film called The Great Exploit of Building the Party.

I am sure that surviving Chiang Kai-shek’s purges will be there along with The Long March and Deng Xiaoping’s Getting Rich is Glorious.

However, China’s Sexual Revolution will be absent.


American Revisionism – Who will win?

The Economist mentions that thousands are working on a book, the publication of the second volume of A History of The Chinese Communist Party. Since the victor always writes history, I wonder if China’s George Washington chopped down a fictional cherry tree too.

What’s interesting is that Communist officials say they will propagandize the valuable experiences the party has accumulated through a long struggle, etc. etc. 

Asia view says, “Nothing new there,” but doesn’t bother to explain that it isn’t very Chinese to act like an American and share the dirt while going to therapy so he or she may learn to forgive his or her parents for being human.

I’ve written before that most Chinese do not like to share embarrassing news with strangers.  This has nothing to do with Communists and everything to do with being Chinese. When history is revised in China, it is Saving Face.

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. 

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China’s Stand-Up Comedy

September 5, 2010

People laugh in China. There’s even humor, jokes and comedy. However, I often don’t see the humor in a Chinese joke while a Chinese audience roars with laughter.

Part of the joy of humor in America is when you discover the shocking meaning behind the punch line.

John Pasden, who has lived in China for more than 10 years, writes Sinosplice. John has been interested in Chinese humor for a while.

He points out that Chinese stand-up comedians follow the punch line with an explanation of why the joke is funny.

  • Zhou LiBo’s Chinese stand-up comedy “war story” with English subtitles

A popular stand-up comic in Shanghai, Zhou Libo, provides an example.  He jokes about China’s massive purchases of U.S. Treasury bonds, “I am really confused about why a poor guy lends money to the rich. We should just divide the money amongst ourselves,” he says. “But on a second thought, each of us would only get a couple of dollars!”

Then Zhou LiBo adds the explanation, “Because the population is so big.”

Although Zhou LiBo is a stand-up comedian in China, his reputation reached the Los Angeles Times, which reported that the government in Beijing can’t understand him while his fan base continues to grow.

The Times says, “Zhou is Shanghai’s homegrown rock star. Born and raised there, he began his career with a local comedy troupe before taking the stage on his own. His routines are filled with local humor and performed mainly in ‘Shanghainese’ — a local dialect with only a passing resemblance to Mandarin.”

In fact, China has more than 56 spoken languages and a flock of dialects while having one written language.

See Four Equals One China—Minority China – Part 5 and Part 6

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. 

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Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

The Sky is Falling but only in China

September 4, 2010

The Los Angeles Times published a piece that says, “Airline crash shows China safety standards have fallen, critics say.”

In the lead paragraph, the Times mentioned that China’s overall air safety record has been one of the best in the world for six years.

In China, “State media said Wednesday that the plane carrying 96 people overshot the runway on a fog-shrouded night…”

Let’s put this crash in perspective by looking at a list Wikipedia provides of accidents and incidents involving commercial aircraft around the globe.  

Remember US Airways flight 1549 on January 15, 2009, which ditched in the Hudson River with no fatalities, or Cogan Air flight 3407 on February 12 that hit a house in Clarence, New York killing all 49 passengers on board.

Then there is Southwest Airlines Flight 2294 on July 13, 2009, that made an emergency landing in Charleston, West Virginia with no injuries.

How about October 21, 2009, when the pilot of Northwest Airlines flight 188 was distracted by his personal laptop computer and missed his destination in San Diego by 150 miles.

On December 22, American Airlines flight 331 overruns the runway in Kingston, Jamaica and there are 40 injuries and no fatalities.

If you visit the List of accidents and incidents involving commercial aircraft, scroll from 2004 to 2010 to see how long that global list is.  Then there is the list of accidents and incidents involving military aircraft.

Yet a crash in China, with a great safety record for six years, has Sinophobes leaping out of their swamps shouting in morbid joy as if they are celebrating.

An excellent post on Telos does a good job explaining why so many hate China. “China-bashing is the new anti-capitalism.”

See Dragon Air

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. 

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Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

China’s Fighting Singing Crickets

September 4, 2010

The first time I read about China’s singing crickets was in “Empress Orchid” by Anchee Min.  Retired concubines spent time carving gourds where these crickets lived to entertain empresses, emperors and princes.

I learned about China’s fighting critics from a comment on this Blog and there was a link included.  

While writing this post, I Googled the subject. In Gardening4us.com, Catherine Dougherty tells us, “cricket culture in China dates back to the Tang Dynasty (618 – 906 AD).” 

She says, “It was during this time the crickets first became respected for their powerful ability to ‘sing’ and a cult formed to capture and cage them. And in the Sung Dynasty (960 – 1276 AD)… cricket fighting became popular.”

In TrueUp.net, Kim says, “The Chinese consider the cricket to be a metaphor for summer and courage…”

We learn from Pacific Pest Inc. that, “Crickets are popular pets and are considered good luck in some countries; in China, crickets are sometimes kept in cages, and various species of crickets are a part of people’s diets … and are considered delicacies of high cuisine in places like Mexico and China.”

From Home Made in China, we learn in a comment from Gogovivi, who is based in Qingdao, North China that, “Summer used to mean picking berries in the yard and making jam, canning green beans, going to the farmer’s market, BBQs, lawn mowing, hiking, swimming. Now my whole family looks forward to the arrival of singing crickets.”

See A Stylish Assault Against Pornography

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. 

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2 Comments | China, Chinese Culture, Chinese history, cultural differences, history | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

The Distribution of Wealth

September 3, 2010

Howard Steven Friedman writes in the Huffington Post about the incredible economic growth in China and the high degree of income inequality between the haves and have nots—a growing problem in America too (but Friedman doesn’t mention that).

Friedman concludes by saying, “For China to continue its growth rate, it will need to address inequality systematically and aggressively.” He mentioned large numbers of men with limited social mobility and few job or family prospects and warns that this inequality could lead to political instability and discontent.

Friedman also doesn’t mention that in the 1930s, there was a huge gap between lifestyles in urban America and the rural U.S. since only 10% of farm families had central station electricity in the mid 1930s. 

It took America forty-five years to establish a power grid in one state, Pennsylvania.  China has accomplished this feat for all of its cities in less time. Source: America Electrified — China’s Road Map

In fact, Friedman points out [without knowing it] the solution that will soften the threat of political instability when he writes, “the Chinese government is trying to modernize the countryside in an effort to quell discontent.”

China may have learned how to deal with this potential threat from the U.S. by providing the same liquid and virtual drugs.

In America, watching TV is the leisure activity that occupied the most time (almost 3 hours a day). Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics

Like many Americans at the low end of the economic ladder, guzzling beer and staring at TV sooths discontent. There is no reason that won’t work in China too.

America ranks 14th globally in beer consumption and the Chinese 36th—an area that needs improvement to numb the have-nots. Source: List of countries by beer consumption per capita

However, for those who do not calm down, there is always prison and America has the largest prison population on the planet—another role model for China to study.

See China’s Stick People

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. 

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Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

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