Protection Babies

What’s with all the babies? This is a question I used to often ask myself when I would walk outside the gate of Renmin University. The gate faces the street. There are many somewhat scruffy looking men and women sitting by the fences and on the curbs holding babies. And it has been this way almost everyday, especially as the weather got better. I have never seen such a congregation of babies in one area. One thing was obvious though. All these people holding babies are not there to have their babies play with each other or share parenting advice. Rather, they sit and with half-mumbled shouts, bark out at pedestrians as they pass by.

Since my Chinese has gotten better I finally could decipher what they are saying. "Diplomas, Graduation Papers, Drivers Licenses, Residency Permits!"

See, these people are selling illegal documentation. You can buy a fake Renmin University Diploma for about 500 RMB or about 60 dollars US. And moreover, you can buy it right in front of the university gate! How is that you ask?

Well of course, it is fake, but I hear that many companies do not take the effort to check an applicant’s documentation such as a diploma, so some people can get away with using a fake diploma. Need a Driver’s License? No problem, just buy one from one of these scruffy ladies on the street. Forget the hassles of going to Driver’s school, getting tested, and waiting for weeks. Not a resident of Beijing, but want to live and work here? Get a residency permit!

In China, people are not as free to move, reside and work as they would like. My understanding is that in some cases you must be a student or get some invitation from a company in Beijing to live there. This alleviates the crush of people trying to get out of the countryside and live in the city to improve their lives. So for some, a fake residency permit may well be worth the risk of getting one.

So why doesn’t the government or local police crack down on this blatant sale of illegal documentation in front of the school.

Well, that is where the babies come in. I guess the police have tried to make arrests. However, if the person they try to arrest is carrying a baby, then the police must also take custody of the baby as well. The police rather give warnings than go through the trouble of making arrests. Thus there are maybe twenty or more people carrying babies around in front of the school trying to sell stuff. One sale by one of these illegal peddlers may give them the money to live a whole month. Nonetheless, I shudder to think what kind of an education these babies get and what they will grow up to become.

Matter of fact, I just got a part time job teaching English to youngsters in the mornings for three weeks. The pay was too good to pass up, 140 RMB on hour, compared to the normal 100 an hour at my regular school. I may be forced to move out of my dorm in a few weeks. Thus I need to come up with some quick cash to put down a deposit and such. This part-time job should do just the trick.

The young kids I teach have never been overseas, but they can all read and speak English very well. I am just so impressed by their ability. They are all much better than many of the adults I teach in the evenings. Anyway, one can see how divergent a path people lives can take starting off so young. If I ever have kids, I will certainly want to get them started off right!

In China - expect the unexpected

What should a goal be? What is a good goal? A goal should have a high Return on Investment. Meaning that it should be at least worth what you have given blood, sweat and tears for. My mind is pondering what I want to do in the future. I feel it should be something that has a big return for the effort.

Speaking of benefits/cost (i.e. value)...for a long time I have cut my own hair, more or less just shaving my head. However, on very rare occasions with encouragement (her money) from my mother I have gone to a barber. I started shaving my head around 1997 when I was living in Japan. I was looking for a barber and all of them wanted about 3000 to 5000 Yen! That was about 30 to 50 dollars US at the time. I decided to hell with them and I would buy a shaver and learn how to do it myself. I ended up just cutting it all about 2 millimeters from my scalp.

I was not unhappy with the results though. I saved money on shampoo and barber fees, saved time after getting out of the shower and thought I looked cool too. So I kept this up for years. Even in the US, I felt it was still hard to get a decent cut for a fair price month after month.

Now I am in China, land of the greatest barbershops on Earth. I could not more pleased. First, think of your own barbershop experiences back in the states or wherever. If you are like me you may pay 12-15 dollars, plus maybe a tip! For what? Maybe you get your hair washed. Then you get a haircut, but very quick with a style I would swear I saw on reruns of Hee-Haw. I remember the two style choices I used to be able to get back in high school. The Block or the V. The block was straight across in the back or the V was the back in the shape of a V. And the V cost extra!!! Once they are done they are nice enough to wipe the hair off your face.

China is a whole new experience. Once you go in the barbershop, they take your coat and bags and put it in a locker and hand you a number. I appreciate this, because I don't want to leave my stuff on the floor or unattended. Then one of the service people puts lots of shampoo in your hair and washes and rubs and massages your scalp for several minutes, then you go to have it rinsed out. They put a towel on your head and while you wait give you a head, neck, arm, hand and back massage! This lasts for about 10-15 minutes! Finally, you are ready for the haircut. The stylist spent at least a good 15 minutes cutting my hair, making sure it was even, that he didn’t miss anything, and not talking to anyone else while cutting my hair. Then there is a second hair washing. I assume this is to get rid of any cut hair leftover on your head. Finally, the drying and styling. The total cost, 35 RMB, about $4.37 US. And no tips are expected!

Tiger Claw Strike! Flying Duck Kick! - Chinese TV

Did I mention there is a plethora of Kung-fu movies and shows on TV. I like martial arts and will forever be a fan of Bruce Lee, so it does not bother me much. However, sometimes you flip the channels and its one kung-fu fight after another. Sometimes it looks realistic and practical, and sometimes fanciful, magical and unattainable. If well done, it can be fun to watch.
Many movies, shows and music come into the mainland from Taiwan and Hong Kong. However, more and more are being produced on the mainland. I watched a part of the New Years Special Music and Entertainment Special on TV. It lasts for hours, leading up to New Years Day. I read the Super Bowl, the most watched show in the US, was watched by about 100 million Americans. The Chinese New Years Special was watched by an estimated 800 million Chinese. Notice that is 8 times more than how many watched the Super Bowl. That happens to equal the number of Chinese who live on less than $2 a day.

The Chinese New Year Special was performed live. It had the top new and favorite celebrities singing, dancing, comedy sketches etc. A good performance by a new talent can bring instant stardom.

Another thing Chinese like to watch is acrobatics and super-human feats. Some of the acrobatic stunts are amazing. I think of the long, long hours of practice that went to doing them. However, I do not enjoy watching girls who can do amazing feats of contortionism. It just sends creepy shivers down my spine to see a girl touch her nose with her toe, over her back! I have a hard time just touching my toes with my fingertips without bending my knees.

Chinese TV is certainly unabashedly commercialistic. Not only do commercials interrupt programming as much as in the states, there is no shortage of Infomercials. Infomercials selling everything from masks that will turn your skin a lighter, whiter complexion, bust and butt enhancers, shoes that add 7 cm to your height, body suits that straighten your back and improve your posture, magical hair boosting and restoration creams, liquids, sprays, and helmets that shoot some kind of beam into your scalp. For kids who are pressured to studying all day and night, gadgets and games for children to help them learn English faster and make studying more fun.

Are people lives determined when they are kids?
You can see the extremes people go to sometimes. I have kids as young as 12-14 in some of my English classes. Their parents make them go to school to pick up and absorb what they can, knowing that if the kids read and speak English well they are more assured of a bright future. I have also seen kids made to grope, pull and beg on people, especially foreigners until they can get some money out of them. I have seen a child about 5 or 6 years old laying out on a pedestrian bridge everyday for over three weeks. The little child acts like a child, rolling around and fiddling with the little can, showing little awareness of anything. I got fed up of seeing this day after day and talked to the Security at Renmin University on how to report that. But they said I was wasting my breath informing the police. The child is being watched by someone and being used to beg.
But when you compare some kids who are starting off early in school to study versus a child who spends his days holding a can, I wonder how the begging child can ever reverse course and have a better life.

Trade Deficit
I have been reading articles about the US and Chinese economy. As far as America is concerned, the trade deficit was the largest ever recorded, and China is the biggest so-called culprit. Some blame the Chinese government for not allowing the Chinese currency, the RMB, to fluctuate according to market factors. The Chinese have the RMB pegged to about 8.11 to the US dollar. This helps keep Chinese goods cheap and drives exports. I feel this certainly needs to be looked at.
If you look at Chinese exports, a majority sells based on its value. Decent quality at a cheap price. The cheap price primarily comes from cheap labor. It is my feeling that cheap labor is the biggest contributor to China’s growth. With 800 million still making only $2 dollars a day, that reserve still can be tapped for years.

By keeping the exchange rate fixed, this allows the Chinese to keep making use of cheap labor. If the rate of exchange were allowed to change, all the dollars being used to buy goods in RMB would cause the price of RMB to increase. Chinese goods would become more expensive, and production and manufacturing in China would be more expensive. Thus factories and jobs stay in the states, more goods made in the US are bought in US. I have seen US politicians putting more pressure on China to change its exchange rate policy, everything from direct comments to Chinese officials to putting forth bills in congress.

In the meantime, how can America compete? In the short term, getting China to change its exchange rate policy is needed. But in the long-term, it seems clear to me that Americans need to be smart, creative, inventive, and efficient. But that is too much for me to discuss at this juncture.

Ditan Temple Fair

I went to Ditan (Temple of the Earth) Park in the north part of the city. By the way, Beijing has a long history. Used during the last three dynasties, the Emperor's palace, also known as the Forbidden City, is in the center of the city. The entrance to the Forbidden City is the one that is particularly recognizable, because it now has a big framed picture of Mao Ze Dong on the front. There is something very conspicuous about this placement to me. As if they replaced the emperor with Mao Ze Dong. There is something fitting in that, replacing one dictator for eh-hem.

Anyway, Ditan, the Temple of the Earth is to the north of the Palace, Temple of Heaven is to the south, Temple of the Sun and Moon to the East and West. I understand one of the Emperor's big jobs was to go to these temples, offer prayers and sacrifice.

My visit to Ditan was not to make any sacrifices or offer prayers, rather to see the festival being held there. The Temples have all become public parks now, open to the people. The parks are used to hold public fairs and festivals. Inside Ditan, there were many shops selling all kinds of special New Years gifts, toys, games, arts and crafts, and food. There were areas that had games for people to play and win prizes like a state fair. I tried a few including throwing Chinese coins through a big wooden board in order to hit a bronze gong and trying to break light bulbs over a metal bowl. I don't know what the trick is, but I threw those light bulbs hard and still couldn't break a single one.

The crowd was big. The mass of people moved through the many different twists and turns of the paths. The shops outnumbered the entertainment and arts and crafts, but it was still interesting.

I saw food there I will never forget. Rather, they were unforgettable because they were disgusting. Something that one might see on Fear Factor! Bugs and scorpions, little chickens on a stick. I am not sure if the scorpions were some kind of gimmick food, but I did see people buy and eat them. Though I don't think that is normal Chinese cuisine, I have heard that in China anything that moves can be on the dinner table.

Beijing New Year's Festival

Beijing went crazy last night. I walked with some friends around 9 pm to have dinner at Bi-sheng-ke, the Chinese name for Pizza Hut, to celebrate the Chinese New Year. As we were walking there were many people on the streets unleashing powerful firecrackers and dazzling displays of light in all directions. Fireworks were going off all around the city in little alleys and next to main thoroughfares. People were swinging long strings of firecrackers around them and even holding pipes that shot off huge rockets that exploded into light. I thought it looked awfully dangerous, having been injured slightly when I was young by a little bottle rocket.

At around 11:50 the city just exploded. I went outside to hear the action. There were lights and explosions in all directions. I jumped because I would look in one direction to see a display when right behind me another guy lit a string of firecrackers that went off like a machine gun. Then I jumped again as the pops shot off from another direction. What really blows me away is how close to the buildings the fireworks go off. I would think lawyers or insurance people might be watching.

I hear that Chinese usually spend this time with their families. In some cases they sit around a table and make dumplings together. Kids are asked relentlessly by their grandparents about school and their grades. I understand that is a way of showing affection!

Its late January, and I have come to the conclusion Beijing winters are not sooo bad. Over the past month temperature hovered around the freezing point, but it has barely snowed and has been dry. It was windy in December, but not recently. Not as good as Arizona, but better than Chicago.

Recently Mom told me, "if you have a positive attitude you will be more successful".