The following is based on my observations from our trip though I am aware that we really only saw snippets of the country, since, for the most part, we were in tourist areas seeing the sights and staying in hotels that cater to guests from all over the world. The main purpose of this trip was to take Anna back to her homeland China to visit for an introductory tour, the centerpiece of which was visiting her orphanage and finding place.
Compared to what we saw in 1988, then 1995, and to a lesser extent, in 1999, on our adoption trip when the focus was really on Anna and the adoption process, China is a whole new place on the surface.
There are shopping malls with designer stores inside, many paved roads including highways complete with traffic congestion due to the fact that car/truck/taxi traffic appears to have replaced a lot of bicycle/cart traffic. I'm not sure that this is really progress, but that could be a debate in itself. Over here, we're trying to put bicycles back on the roads and improve public transportation, having suffered the consequences of traffic congestion and resulting pollution. Frankly, I would love to have a bicycle cart to go back and forth into and out of town. Maybe I can adapt my bike.
Also, we found that the bathrooms in China are now mostly outfitted with sinks, soap, and hand dryers or paper towels (as well as western style toilets though the squat type hold some advantages). We did not see one single open vat of water for people to use to wash their hands. This aspect was an example of the positive progress that's been made. Of course, adjacent to the Bird's Nest Olympic Stadium in Beijing, we did see some folks on a lake in a rowboat refilling water bottles with the lake water, but, hopefully, that's an isolated incident. Attempts were made on the part of some of the fellow employees there to try to conceal what the refillers were doing.
One might have the initial impression that the Chinese people are more well off than before, but the behind the scenes' views belay that impression, because it doesn't appear that the standard of living, in passing storefronts, alleys, seeing people on the streets and along the roadsides and in the fields working, has changed very much. We drove by multitudes of open storefronts which looked dilapidated on the inside and out, with few people about, not seeing a lot of action. Farmers were working by hand in the fields as were the laborers on the roads. (Gail and I would have liked to see a rice plant, but didn't have that chance on this trip). Other than lots of cranes in areas where large high-rises are going up, I didn't see any equipment larger than a bulldozer. Bamboo scaffolding continues to be the apparent norm. To add to the above, there are lots of young people in the retail business but it doesn't look like they have enough to do. The showrooms that we felt like our guides were required to take us to seemed large and full of merchandise as well as more than enough uniformed young women whose job it clearly was to push the wares, but it was evident they weren't doing a booming business as we were often the only customers along with other tourists present. The lights would go on and the retailers would emerge from unseen parts of the stores when we arrived. This appeared to be true of the restaurants also. We found ourselves suspecting that there is a whole kickback scheme going on in order to assure money be spread around: "If your group of tourists will buy from us, we'll take care of you/your agency" type of understanding and arrangement. The problem is that it also eroded our trust. As our trip progressed, this feeling grew for me. This all helps us to understand why the kickbacks might be the norm but still leaves us to wonder if regular people in China are making enough money to live on.
While we're on the subject of shopping, I need to mention something hilarious here. There were a few items that we were on the lookout for when we were in China that proved elusive, namely little "giftie" (as Betts would have called them...) items for Anna's friends. Lo and behold, when we were in Target in Annapolis in mid-August after we had arrived home, what did we find? The very sort of gifts that we thought we would find in China! Each for $1 and "Made in China"! The find included fabric covered Chinese food take-out boxes, bracelets with beads the color of jade interspersed with flat discs that resemble Chinese coins, and some pens in the shape of dragons.
What we consistently learned about the government workers, however, is that they're the ones who make money and it's their relatives who are the heads of business organizations. They might be sitting more or less in the lap of luxury, but it's not due to their own work efforts as much as what family you happened to be born into. It's very difficult, if not impossible, to get into government work in China otherwise. Certainly a key difference between our country and China is that it is definitely possible for someone in the US who is motivated, to do well, but that kind of opportunity doesn't seem to be afforded to everyone in China. It's no wonder that kickbacks are resorted to. It goes without saying that our systems of government are based on an entirely different set of values.
Then there's a need here to mention the one family/one child policy that was brought up by our various guides on more than one occasion. There seem to be all sorts of ways that people get around the kernel of the rule which is that each family can only have one child. One child, that is, that is supported by the government. For an additional child, there is a steep fine though I didn't learn the details of that. On the other hand, if there's a divorce, an additional child is OKd (though I wonder if that's true equally for women and men...). Also, the minority groups (of which there are 56) are allowed to have more than one child. (We were made aware of the minority groups as a result of the shows we attended with the various customs and costumes being featured). So there are rules and then there are rules. The topic of abortion did not come up, nor did the preference of gender though, interestingly, several of our male guides referred to the fact that women have more power in China now since there are less women to go around. As a result, some men go to live with the women's parents. A pretty dramatic shift culturally.
The food was fine. Most of our meals were hot, just cooked. The rice and noodles always had the right consistency, as one would imagine, and included a mixture of vegetables and meat - mostly chicken or beef. I especially loved the Sichuan food because of the spiciness, especially the eggplant. Anna chose a variety of foods for each meal, always having noodles at breakfast, I noticed. Of course, we avoided fresh vegetables and ice and stuck to bottled water only. (The hotels provide several bottles of water each day for their guests and there was a written reminder in each hotel to only drink bottled water).
Culturally, it's heartening that longstanding traditions, such as the stylized forms of painting - brush and inside bottles, for example - as well as the dances in native costumes - continue to stay alive. I wonder how much the traditions flourish because they contribute positively financially to the economic base due to tourism. Is this what drives the Chinese to continue in the same traditions, I wonder? The artists do not appear to veer from the styles or themes. To add to this, we couldn't help but notice that many of the younger performers of music and dance had such flat expressions on their faces. Several of the artists learned their skills from their fathers in the manner of apprenticeship. The music makers who seemed the happiest looked to be the older citizens who were singing (in Beijing) or playing their instruments (in Guilin) for the joy of it, but we didn't see such joy or enthusiasm on the part of the musicians at the Tang Dynasty music prelude or on the faces of the dancers who came out after the show in Guilin for pictures. Do the artists find that the stylization of the arts is restrictive or not? Do they yearn to use the styles in a different manner? Maybe we were just "on the beaten path" for tourists and didn't see the art behind the scenes. We saw some contemporary art in Hong Kong that was certainly compelling. Anna reminds me that Chinese artists learn by copying art versus learning methods to create art. She makes a point that is really significant and would be interesting to learn more about.
In summary, it is my hope - and one that I know is shared by Richard, James, and Ross - that Anna embraces her Chinese cultural heritage as well as the American ideals we hold dear in her quest to learn about herself and her passions as a Chinese American - or is it American Chinese (?). That's why we made this journey, and it was incredible.
Several days after our arrival home, Anna spent a quiet afternoon working on a lovely painting of a little Chinese girl holding a basket with fish in it that she says (and I concur) looks like her, amidst a scene that includes mountains in the distance, boats on the water, a rooster in the foreground, reeds alongside, and other details. This appears to me to be Anna's first summary of our journey. I wonder what she thinks.
No comments:
Post a Comment