Last words

I take it as a sign from the powers that be that my hair dryer dies on my last day here. Really time to call it quits and go home. It's really weird. Until two days ago it hadn't sunk in that I'm actually leaving. Wow. So that's it.

As I walked across campus today it struck me how I don't feel any different in relation to my surroundings than I did a year ago. I still stick out. I still don't fit in. To those people who look at me it makes no difference whether I just fell off a plane yesterday and am completely clueless about China or whether I have lived here for a year. I am still the stranger, the Laowai, will always be. I'm still totally helpless in dealing with bureaucrats, even though I manage to get a hair cut all by myself. Still, it feels like not much has changed. China is quite impenetrable.

So, before I go and ponder some more whether to pack another box to ship home or pay about ten times as much when they get to me for over-weight luggage tomorrow, let me post something I wrote for my Tostan application (I had never before applied for a job that required a writing sample and something told me they wouldn't want my last paper on string cosmology). I have to say, when I wrote this little piece I felt a bit more optimistic about China's future than I do at the moment, but without further ado, here we go...

What is the status of women in China? This was one of the first questions friends asked me after I had moved to China. Almost one year later, I still have not found a good answer. The best I can do is to sketch the pictures of a few women I met on the background of what I learned about Chinese history and tradition.

Traditional Chinese culture rests on three main pillars. Confucianism, which emphasizes obedience (to the state, superiors in general, fathers and husband in particular) above all other virtues, places women on the lowest rung of society. Their education is not desirable, they should only excel in household duties. Taoism, a religion that focuses on balance and harmony of the yin (dark) and yang (light) and therefore does not encourage any excess in either direction, associates female with yin (dark) and male with yang (light) – the good and strong. This does not go as far as Christianity in calling women seductresses and responsible for the original sin, but it also paints them as the weaker, more passive gender. Finally, Buddhism, like most organized religions, does not allow women to ascend to priesthood and remains a male dominated sphere.

Starting from these premises, it is not surprising that women rights in China were in an abysmal state at the end of the Qing dynasty, about a hundred years ago, when China entered the “modern era.” Confined to their courtyard homes, only able to go out in the company of their parents, and having their feet bound starting at the age of six, even girls from modestly wealthy families lived a life of seclusion and virtually without freedom of choice. After their arranged marriages they entered the home of their new husband and were henceforth subordinate to their mothers-in-law. Lin Yu Tang portrays life in families around the turn of the century quite vividly in his novels. The female ideal had changed from rather plump women in the Tang dynasty (like the most famous concubine Yang Gui Fei) to fragile, frail girls with “feet like lotus blossoms.” According to “China: A new history” by Fairbank and Goldman (Harvard University Press), even countryside women were under pressure to adhere to this beauty ideal and with farmer's wives having their feet bound, they were not able to work in the fields, which led to an increased poverty in the countryside. Talking to Chinese, however, I got the impression that foot binding was only a fashion among the very rich. Things changed after the fall of the monarchy, the establishment of the Republic and subsequently the People's Republic of China. One of the first laws the communist party imposed was to forbid foot binding. Officially, women and men are equal under the constitution.

I believe, socialism has done more for the promotion of women's rights than to impede them, not out of a humanitarian ideal, but simply out of the necessity to have a large work force. Take East Germany, an example I am familiar with because I spent my childhood “behind the iron curtain.” After the turmoil that followed World War II, women in West Germany returned to the ideal of being a housewife and mother, whereas women in the East were not only encouraged to have jobs, unemployed women were actually rather frowned upon (there was officially no unemployment in GDR). I remember when we were asked “What do you want to be when you grow up?” in Grade School, we were not only presented with teachers or nurses as role models, but just as well crane operators or doctors. Now, in reality, women still got paid less than men for the same work and in many families the burden of housework was still on the woman's shoulders – two realities that are true even more so in today's China, where women still wait on men when it comes to cooking food or washing their clothes. The East German system did take active steps to keep women employed – free day-care was available for all children above the age of three, and one was guaranteed to be able to return to one's work place after maternity leave. Another striking contrast to West Germany is the fact that East Germany had much more liberal abortion laws. I think as a result of all these factors, women in East-Germany had a stronger sense of independence and self-worth. Even without a feminism movement as that in the West, the typical female/male roles were no longer applicable.

So how does this apply to China – a socialist country founded on Confucian ideals? It is easy to look at the numbers – the government is led mostly by old men, the top 100 companies are almost exclusively run by men, women earn less for the same job, and the birth of a boy is still more desirable than that of a girl. However, statistics also show that more than 50% of newly enrolled university students are female and the “Gaokao” (Chinese college entrance examination, which is held nationwide) consistently sees girls with the top score. Women are also represented in a large variety of fields – from bus drivers to doctors, from sales personnel to university professors. From my personal experience it seems that women are used to working, simply being housewife and mother is not the most common goal. Chinese parents put so much emphasis on education – especially for their only child, no matter whether it is a boy or girl - this education cannot just be wasted, can it?

Another strange consequence of the one-child policy established in 1980 is that the “after 80 generation,” as they are called, is dis-proportionally male. This is probably due to prenatal diagnostic and selective abortion, but also to the fact that a family whose first child was a girl is more likely to face the penalty (either pay a fine or lose promotions/job opportunities) following the birth of a second – hopefully a son. Ironically, this makes it very hard for these precious sons to find a suitable marriage partner. In addition to the fact that there are 108 boys born for every 100 girls, city women are also better educated and it is difficult for a man to find a partner with lower, or at best comparable, education and income level (of course, the situation is different in rural areas, where girls often only complete middle school – higher education is not free anymore). Still, maybe because of the high “marriage pressure” (I was told a girl is not supposed to have a boyfriend before she is eighteen, but if she is not married by 25 she is considered an old spinster, whereas it is normal for men to marry late), Chinese girls pay extreme attention to their appearance – the gap to their mothers' generation, who grew up during the cultural revolution, when anything bourgeois such as make-up was banished, is strikingly apparent. The new beauty ideal can be summarized as “skinny and white,” tanning is absolutely out of the question. This goes as far as carrying a parasol at all times or using “whitening” body lotion. Fashion is a major topic and “shopping” is past time number one. Does this mean these girls are giving up some of the progress, the abandoning of traditional female roles their mothers had achieved, for the sake of being fashionable and popular? A question one might ask not only about China...

Fortunately, this is not all there is to Chinese girls. The female physics students I met are very determined and much more mature than their male peers. They have a good understanding of their current position and their future goals. Furthermore, I was surprised to discover there is a still small but growing number of very independent-minded young women in China, who live neither by their parents' ideas nor follow any fashion trends, but choose their career, lifestyle and boyfriends – even go as far as living together with them before marriage. They travel as backpackers through China and Southeast Asia, practice yoga and are interested in re-discovering ancient Chinese traditions, such as Taoism or Buddhism. I was fortunate enough to become good friends with one such an amazing woman – Liu Xing – who does not only devote her vacation time to teach Chinese to school children in Thailand, but is also involved in an organization helping Chinese children from rural areas to stay in school. Her volunteer work involves traveling to remote places and checking first-hand on the living conditions of children who apply for subsidy. In the incomprehensible mess of today's China she is struggling to find herself and help others – it is women like her who make me feel inspired and hopeful, for China's future in general and that of women in particular.

More on freedom

A truly moving interview with the founder of 1984bbs, a Chinese free speech website (that closed 2 days ago). He lost his job and was taken in by the police for questioning three times. Makes you wonder how many Liu Xiaobo are out there...

Also check out Evan Osno's blog on the topic, I find his observations quite insightful (not just for an American :P)

On a personal note... this is the last week of me in China, and therefore the last week of my blog. I think I have had my share of exhibitionism and will return to a private life from now on :) Thanks to all of you (yes, both of you ;-)) who kept following me on this journey. Chances are, I won't be able to sit still for more than three years... maybe I'll blog from Africa next time!

Congratulations, China!

Finally a Nobel Prize! Isn't it amazing? What we've all been waiting for? China gets to prove its rightful place in the world?! But wait, where are the fireworks? Where is the on-end media coverage? Oh, right... it was one of those Nobel Prizes, the Peace Prize, the goddamn thing the Dalai Lama already got (in 1989). Shit! Not another one of those! Can't we have a real Prize for once?

It would be funny, this quest driven by insecurity and pride, if the government would only completely ridicule itself by talking about Nobel Prizes non-stop right until the very second the Peace Prize is announced, just to completely drop the topic from any media coverage the second after. Also, blocking cell phones has a certain we're-used-to-this kind of charm, that's how we deal with these things here, right? But that people who (after agreeing to meet on twitter, I think) gathered to celebrate Liu Xiaobo's win were arrested (according to the German weekly Die Zeit), that's not funny anymore. It sends cold shivers down my spine to be reminded that amidst all the feel-good sinophilia, I do live under a cold-blooded regime that, no matter how funny their feeble attempts at playing world politics may seem, don't hesitate to brutally walk over corpses at times.

Between the lines

In case I haven't been blunt enough - but I am sure you can read between the lines - this is getting a bit tiresome. Travelblogs are not my kind of gig. I much rather rant about whatever comes to mind without any seeming connection. This whole keeping a journal of what we saw and did turned into something that feels like a job, not fun. So, enough! It's back to all about me, me, me! But I do realize that this blog looks much nicer with pictures in it, so here you go... a snapshot of our beach on Ko Samed (yes, that's in Thailand) where we stayed August 18-22. After that we paid a little visit to Bangkok and, via a short detour to Guangzhou (nothing worth mentioning), back to Nanjing August 25th. And that's it! All done. Finally. Thailand was absolutely wonderful. Even Bangkok felt like a vacation from China. Can someone explain to me how it's possible that Thailand is so clean, even though it's almost impossible to find a garbage bin on the street, whereas in China, where you have litter boxes every few meters (in cities, that is), people just throw their garbage everywhere?

At the danger of overstating my case - China reminds me a lot of the US. It's a huge country with a large geographic (and formerly ethnic) diversity, but now it all just feels the same... Yes, every Chinese is quick to point out Tibet and Xinjiang, but it's also no secret that the minorities there don't partake much in the economic development (meaning, they still mostly live in villages and do agriculture, whereas the cities and factories are predominantly Han). When I visited a company in Urumqi, I didn't meet a single person who wasn't Han (and they very much feel like Xinjiang is their province - they don't consider themselves visitors there). Most of the diversity attributed to minorities can only be found in souvenir shops... here, buy this guaranteed authentic Uighur cap, which is mass produced in a factory in Shenzhen! Well, considering most of these factory laborers are migrant workers, there's at least a chance it was made by a Muslim. Is this all that much different from the Native American Tribes in the southwest of the US? The souvenirs they sell are made in China, but the lack of economic and educational opportunities is just as obvious. My impression is that China is not nearly as divers as they like to (make) believe. This is not to say that there are no true Uighur, Mosu or Naxi people, but they don't contribute visibly to the whole of China.

I have seen dozens of small towns that were absolutely exchangeable and forgettable. Those that aren't are turned into tourist destinations, run by Han Chinese. Don't get me wrong - I don't have a problem with Han Chinese. I am not one to judge if they suppress minorities. It's quite possible they just see the business opportunities where the local minorities don't - and maybe don't want to. Maybe they just want to be left alone and tend their sheep and carve yak butter sculptures. I simply dislike the over-romantization of everything "ethnic." Especially, as you made have gathered from my rants, everything that has to do with Tibetan Buddhism. The more I learn about any form of organized religion, the less I like it. You have to give the Thai credit for a wicked sense of humor though... This picture shows a shrine we saw in Bangkok. Apparently nobody really knows why, but once started, the trend of leaving phallic objects to pray for fertility got somewhat out of hand...

Kunming, August 12-17

The "Spring City" - Downtown Kunming is excruciating boring - malls around "People's Road" and a big "government square" - same old, same old... but the neighborhood around the university and Green Lake Park is a really nice hangout-spot; an eclectic mix of boutiques, pottery, tea and upscale liquor stores (the latter mostly selling Mao Tai, the most famous bai jiu, which supposedly can be good if you spend about twice as much as for a nice single Malt Whiskey) as well as cheap student eateries, bars and cafe's. Actually, I'd go as far as saying that I have never seen such a concentration of bars and cafe's anywhere in China. And the best thing? Some of them are really good! There's a French cafe with irresistible chocolate and raspberry tarts and their home-made bread beats the German bakery in Nanjing by far! Another cafe sells Illy coffee and Belgian beer (Rochefort!) - how to choose? But no, the really best part is that these places are not just frequented by tourists (we seem to be the only ones) or expats (occasional sightings) but by the locals, many seem to be students. It doesn't feel like in Nanjing, where bars either seem to cater to Westerners or appear to be an attempt to copy something Western just to be fashionable. The people here make these places their own, i.e. they usually come out to play cards (Mahjong and chess are not really popular with the young crowd, that's something for granny in the park's tea house).

The most popular game by far is San Guo Sha (The Three Kingdoms, based on one of The Four Chinese Classics), which B. already acquired :) We just have to figure out how to play it. But supposedly it's sort of a mock off of a game called "Bang," which some expats tried to play with Chinese friends and they ended up changing the game to a Chinese context and supposedly it's much more fun than the original. I wonder if this is also popular with the overseas Chinese crowd?

Kunming is rather small for a provincial government seat (1-3 Mio), and there's fairly little construction going on. Of course, there is some, otherwise it wouldn't be China, but the maddening rage of tearing everything down and building 40 storey apartment bunkers has not reach this place yet. As a result (and probably also due to the altitude and winds) the sky is clear - really, bright blue clear, in the midst of a city in China! Incredible! Of course, it's rainy season now, so the last two days when we had planned to visit some places outside of Kunming, it rained. Before that we had taken turns being sick, so we never made it far. One day it rained so bad, we stayed in our tiny hotel room playing Zak McKracken until the hunger drove us out in the afternoon.

Noteworthy food: Over-the-bridge noodles. The story goes that a wife who had to bring her husband lunch to his study retreat on an island (over the bridge), always had the problem that the food wasn't fresh anymore when she got there. On day she discovered that if the soup she cooked had a layer of oil on top, the soup could still be boiling hot even if removed from the fire. So, she'd carry this soup to her husband and add the raw ingredients by the time she got there - they would still be cooked but not be over-cooked. So, in restaurants you get an earthenware pot with soup, a sizzling layer of oil on top, and you are served raw ingredients that always include pork (in thin slices), egg (we had quail egg), noodles and greens (scallions), and you can order mushrooms and other stuff on top. Then you place all ingredients quickly in your broth and play with your food! Quite nice and tasty, but they should cut down the MSG in the soup.

And of course, Kunming has temples and other visit-worth stuff, but I won't bore you with that. One place we were utterly disappointed by is the LOFT, supposedly a factory district turned art gallery (like "798" in Beijing), but it was really lame. Most places were closed and the few paintings we saw were anything but avantgarde.

Albeit being pretty far south, Kunming doesn't feel very tropical, because it's not hot and humid, it's very pleasant actually (probably between 25 and 30 during the day, but not really cold like in the mountains at night). It's almost 2,000m high. You do find banana and other tropical trees and the food has a little South-East Asian influence (for exampel lime and chili in the usual wood ear mushroom salad), but we're off to Thailand to see what the real South-East Asia is like :)

Lijiang, August 10-11

Ok, Lijiang deserves the hype it gets. It's extremely cute with its traditional (Naxi - another ethnic minority, supposedly related to the Mosu but certainly not as cool :)) courtyard houses, cobble stone alleys and small water ways. And while that's nothing extraordinary, the fact that the old town is really big and consistently in this old style makes it special. But as with Venice, you can't help but wonder "how many tourists can a place take before it loses its original character?" My answer for Venice would be "quite a few more than you might think" whereas for Lijiang I'd say "not a single more." Maybe it's just because in Venice I am better at picking out spots where the locals go, there you just need to leave the big roads and turn into a small alley to be surrounded by real Venetians, drinking their apero in their local wine bar. In Lijiang's old town every single man, woman, child or dog (of whom we saw lots, but none above a few months old - where do you think they older ones went? Contributed their share to the tourism industry?) seems to have some connection to tourism. I didn't get the feeling that there are some people who just live there because it happens to be their hometown they are attached to, so they don't leave despite the tourists crowding their door steps. Of course, Venice is bigger and also has a university, so there's more than one raison d'etre. It's not a fair comparison. But I'm done being fair after the umpteenth prettied-up-for-tourists town.

See, the problem in China seems to be that as soon as someone notices a spot is pretty and can be exploited touristically, they go all out and turn it into a Disney-like recreation of its former self. On the other hand, if a place has not been beautified this way, then there's generally speaking no reason to go there. We drove through quite a few small towns/villages and quickly reconsidered interrupting our bus ride their after seeing how desolate these places were. So, that leaves big cities or you have to suck it up to be surrounded by hordes of tourists. Ok, maybe Lugu Lake was a bit of an exception (because it's so hard to reach) and in Langmusi (for some reason unbeknown to us) we didn't mind. Maybe because there it felt like they weren't really pro at this whole tourism business yet :)

I should stop bitching, because tourism also has its advantages - otherwise it would be difficult to get coffee and internet :) The two things all foreign travelers seem to need. We met a couple in a tea house who (with desperation in their voices) asked us if we spoke English. They said they had such a hard time finding anyone who speaks English (I guess it's true - Lijiang caters mostly to Chinese tourists) and wanted to know something about the hike through Tiger Leaping Gorge (used to be the backpacker fire baptism but if already the 3-year old Lonely Planet says it has turned into a tourist scam, we won't stomach another bus ride for it - besides, we have to be in Kunming on the 17th because we booked plane tickets to Thailand :)) I guess I don't quite realize what advantage we have because I speak (poor) Chinese and can read signs. I don't think I'd recommend travel in China to anyone who doesn't, unless you are perfectly content with only seeing the major sights, you know, the Beijing-Shanghai-Hong Kong tour. Then English gets you all you need. Funny though how all Chinese expect every foreigner to speak English... as if we would expect every Asian to speak Chinese, just because the number of Japanese, Thai or Malay is so much smaller!

Mh, seems I'm mostly rambling and not actually saying anything about Lijiang, aren't I? Well, what can I say? There's only so much hanging out in cafe's you can do. One day we rented bikes and rode out into the countryside north of Lijiang. That was quite pretty but nothing to write home about. I was still recovering from my altitude sickness, so I certainly didn't feel like climbing up Jade Dragon Snow Mountain. Besides, it was hidden behind clouds all the time.

When we tried booking train tickets to Kunming, we were told they were sold out for the next week (there's only two trains a day and Lijiang is the end of the line, so it's really difficult to get away from here). We didn't have much of a choice but to book plane tickets (thank you God for inventing the internet! No, wait, those were the physicists at CERN... nevermind). Four times the price of a soft sleeper (around $130 p.p.) but so much more painless than a bus ride! Did I mention those suck?

Lugu Lake, August 6-9

You know those "places you have to see before you die"? Well, I don't mean to imply coming to Lugu Lake will surely send you to your grave (although it's quite possible considering the 8 hour mountain bus trip it takes to get here and to get away), no, it is - hands down - the most beautiful lake I have ever been to. Chrystal clear water that appears to be a deep turquoise color because the lake is so deep, nestled between mountains that look like hills because the lake sits at 2,700m, and almost no-one in sight apart from two or three villages you can see a and few lonely fishing boats... Ok, there is one village which has been hyped up for tourists, i.e. there are souvenir shops (mostly the local silver made into jewelery), guesthouses and cafe's with internet access (and bad restaurants, unfortunately). Other villages are trying to catch up, we saw a lot of new (charming looking) guesthouses going up, but right now transportation around the lake is completely unorganized, there is no regular bus route, and as long as the mini-vans keep charging such horrendous prices (200yuan for a 20min ride), not many people are going to make it into the smaller villages.

The only non-perfect thing about the lake? You're not allowed to swim in it! Well, they can't put signs everywhere, and we saw a few locals take a plunge, so we followed suit... of course it started raining (after weeks of uninterrupted good weather!) at that very moment.

Another great thing about Yunnan - wild mushrooms! In other parts of China they are hard to get and very expensive, but here they're everywhere and soooo tasty! Usually just wok-fried, either with bacon (speck e funghi, anyone?) or with chili and scallions. If they use decent oil, it's hard to spoil!

We had booked a hotel online (it was difficult to find one on the lake, I guess all the smaller guesthouses are not listed on websites), but weren't quite sure where it was, the address just said "on the lake." So, once we got to the first village on the Sichuan side, I called them and they said "Oh, you're in Lige, well, just follow the road" (or something like that - my Chinese is not very good on the phone). People we asked had never heard of this place until finally some Mosu (the local ethnic minority) pointed us to a building on a peninsula - which is still under construction! So, we got there eventually (we climbed up the hill to the main road and haggled down a motor-rickshaw driver to a more reasonable rate than the 50yuan they wanted in the village just for driving us over the hill) and it turns out that the main building is indeed still under construction, but they have a few villas that are already rented out. We got a room with lake view and bath tub right in front of the window to better enjoy it. Apart from everything being a bit unfinished, the rooms were great. And the service very personal - they always asked us what time we'd want breakfast and when they should clean our room. I started feeling a bit guilty that we were occupying so many people and seemed to be the only guests, but the last day we saw more people...

Thankfully they had already opened their restaurant, because it would have been at least a 45min walk into the next village, so we had dinner there after our arrival. At first we were all alone, but they had set two more tables and sure enough, a large group started to pour in for a banquet. Turns out it was the owner of the hotel (a Mosu, as he proudly pointed out, this might explain why the Mosu men we asked about the hotel knew it) who was giving a dinner for his friends from other parts of China, but also local Mosu and some of his staff. We were included into the festivities and first had to drink with the owner, then with his regional and sales manager - two proud Mosu women who were giving the men a run for their money - they kept drinking with everyone (the men had to down their glasses of bai jiu (strong clear liquor) whereas the women were only drinking red wine - nevertheless, they were completely hammered by the time dinner ended and everyone went to the "club" next to the hotel for some Mosu dancing. Quite a few of them put on traditional costumes and practically everyone joined in the dance, which is some kind of line dancing, I suppose. I was quite impressed how well they could remember the steps even when totally drunk. I became best new friends with the regional manager, she kept talking to me all evening about how happy she is we came to her hometown and she wants us to be happy and experience Mosu culture and... sorry... but I'm sooo drunk! :) Of course we had to join the dance and B. was offered cigarettes all the time - the cliche about Yunnanese and smoking is true! It happened to us later in the villages as well, cigarettes are the ice breaker!

Mosu are famous for one thing - their "walking marriage." They are the last minority in China that still practises this enlightened custom. Basically, they don't have any traditional marriage arrangements. Men can stay in a woman's home over night, but leave in the morning to go back to their mother's house. Children belong to the mother and paternity is not considered important. If a relationship ends, the children stay with the mother, but the mother's new partner will also take care of these children. Now, this has led to the misconception among Han Chinese (and maybe also some foreigners), that Mosu woman are always game and don't have to be treated with respect (leading to some hilarious signs - see picture). Apparently, some Han men hope to find an easy one-night stand here. If anything, it's the opposite - we could witness first hand that Mosu women are much more confident than Han Chinese, they run the show and will certainly not put out for any Han guy that shows up with too much of an ego and attitude. Of all the places we visited, the Mosu seemed to have the most Western concept of equality and a certain "normality" about male-female interactions. Among my Han friends, girls always stick together, giggling and holding hands, and male-female interaction is almost always awkward. Among the Mosu, men and women take equal part in running a business, cooking etc. I find this rather surprising, as the Mosu are also Tibetan Buddhists, and those have not exactly struck me as progressive so far...

Our stay ended on a somewhat sad note- I fell victim to altitude sickness. The reason must have been that Xichang is at only 1,600m, so we ascended over 1,000m in just one day. Symptoms include light-headedness, fatigue, shortness of breath, headache, nausea and - who knew - diarrhea (as if we hadn't had enough of this on this trip). So the eight-hour bus ride (through winding mountain roads, interrupted by mud slide induced traffic jams every half hour) it takes to get away from there turned into quite a martyrdom for me. The other eight hours it took from Xichang were already bad enough - motion sickness has always been my foe. So, no more f**ing bus rides!!!