Late Night Thoughts

Apologies to people expecting a nice, polished blog post, but it's late and I'm doing a lot of reflecting, and I feel the need to pour out my thoughts into the void that is the internet.

With the exception of two brief weeks in August, I have been living and studying in China since the first week of June. The time up to now has given me a lot to think about when it comes to this country, its people and its future. I'm not professing to be an expert after a few months here; in fact, I'm asserting the exact opposite. The more I learn about the whole concept of "China," the more I realize how much I have yet to learn and understand.

What did "China" mean to me before coming here, or even before taking an interest in studying Chinese? Superficially, it was that weird, exotic country out east. It had silk, it had tea, and it had a billion people. Economically, it was where everything was made. And it owned a lot of American dollars. I knew that. Politically, it was the world's biggest conundrum: a successful Communist state? A progressive authoritarian regime? How in the world was it working?

Panjiayuan Flea Market!

After our impromptu journey to Tiantan Park, we headed back to the bus station and grabbed a bus back to Panjiayuan Flea Market. The gates were actually open to us this time, so we sauntered in and prepared to deal with the incredible clutter of random nonsense for sale. As almost any Beijing guidebook will tell you, most of the stuff here is fake. Fake antiques, fake jade, fake "original" artwork, etc. But it's a great place to buy random trinkets if you're into that sort of thing. To give you an idea of the magnitude of this place, here are some pictures of one section of the market:

umm... lucky tassel things?

artwork lane

Early Morning at Tiantan Park

After watching the Chinese do their flag-raising ceremony at Tiananmen Square, Nicole and I grabbed more food and got on the subway for 潘家园, otherwise known as Pānjiāyuán, Beijing's famous flea market. By this point, it's about 6:45 AM. We finally get off the subway and take a 15 minute walk to the gate of the flea market, only to find out that it doesn't open for another hour.

So what do we do? We consult this bus schedule below...

...and choose the one that says 天坛北门. Can you spot it?

Wal-Mart... in China

The fruits of my covert mission to photo-document the Wal-Mart products of Beijing, China...

Red Flag Over China

This past Tuesday, I got it into my head that I wanted to see the the Chinese flag being raised over Tiananmen Square at dawn. It's actually incredibly important to the Chinese people that they see it at least once, and I figured there was never as good a time as any to witness the occasion than National Week. So I mentioned my plan to my friend Nicole, and the both of us decided to pull an all-nighter and catch the first (5:10 AM) subway from the university out to Tiananmen Square.

The flag is raised at Tiananmen exactly at sunrise every morning, every day of the year. That means 4:30 AM during the peak of summer, and about 7:30 AM for the dead of winter. On Wednesday, October 6th, when we went to see the flag, it was scheduled to go up at 6:15 AM.

So, come 5:15 AM, we were up, alert (ish) and ready to venture out into Beijing. The subway was, predictably, almost totally empty. I was torn between frolicking among the empty cars or laying out on a string of seats to sleep.

China Rebel Wins Peace Prize!

Click here for the New York Times article.

What happened...
Liu Xiaobo, an avid advocate for democracy in China, received the Nobel Peace Prize while serving an 11-year prison sentence in his home country. He was recognized for being a persistent and unquenchable voice for freedom in a state that notably lacks it. He is the first Chinese national to receive the prize.

How I found out...
When I got back from a day out in Beijing, I got on the Times website, as usual. I was totally stunned by the cover story I saw floating right in front of me. Apparently my reaction panicked one of my Chinese "suitemates" sitting on the couch opposite me, because she asked if I was ok. I just told her, "Come here! Come here! Oh my God, come read this!" In hindsight, maybe having a Chinese national come read about the oppression in her country had the potential to end very badly. Good thing it didn't.

新疆: Conclusions

When we left for Xinjiang, I thought I had no expectations for what I was going to see, but that ended up being completely false. I had to have some kind of expectations, because otherwise I wouldn't have been so surprised by what I saw.

Most important realization first: Chinese people are not all Chinese
...or at least, not the traditional Western perception of Chinese. I thought I had realized that fact after going to the Chinese Ethnic Culture Park, but I wasn't prepared for the stark difference in culture between the Han Chinese and the Muslim Uighers. To me, they're truly two different races of people living under the same national flag... and unfortunately, they seem to be two unequal races.