老虎是未来的表面。 新的十年已经在西方，在中国，我们在红牛和老虎之间的太阳能和农历新年之间，没有人的土地。 现在是时候回过头来看看我们所处的位置。

在世界政治中的时间是几十年来测量，很多人会致电中国00十年。 这只是一个简化，这10年不过78开始一个较长的过程的一部分，并可能仍然持续一个十年更。 然而，如果我们要选择一个事件，标志着在世界政治中的十年，像冷战的结束，标志着90年代，中国的崛起是最合理的选择。 没有其他的事件可能是在世界历史上的决定性。

在今年年底前版的第一篇文章中，我们证明了的十年内，一般增长趋势，2008年为中国在世界媒体的存在的巅峰，和2009年已经回到比较正常的水平。 此峰不能掩盖大势所趋，中国越来越多，不可避免地成为世界超级大国和它已经改变了人类的力量平衡。

测量中国十年

如果我们要选择一个参数来衡量这一上升，这是经济，可以给我们最好的线索。 中的小数，十年发展趋势进行分析时，有没有点，所以计算很简单：中国已经成长约7％的速度比西方国家在过去十年中，一切似乎表明，这将继续进入10S 。

计算*很简单：1.07 ^ 10 = 2

率在7％，差一年，中国经济相对西方国家的经济规模是每十年增加一倍。 今天大多数中国国内生产总值的地方的估计之间的1 / 4 和1 / 2的美国经济，如果它是在名义国内生产总值或购买力平价衡量。 这意味着，如果不出意外在未来十年的变化，中国经济将成为2020年和2030年之间，在世界随时最大。

此计算的后果是巨大的，他们今天已经运行。 这是因为在政治上，我们想在股市的表现：决定是考虑到可预见的未来，而不是目前。 在世界政治中，中国已经取代欧盟，即使是欧洲经济的一小部分，即使它并不想成为主角。 媒体和政客对中国的未来价值投注。

“十年”的问题

当然，没有任何担保的00秒的增长模式将继续在10s。 有一个重要的思想学校坚持对中国制度的不可持续性的。 他们提到腐败，日益加剧的不平等，缺乏公民权利和公民社会的，压制创造力和自由市场，不能打造世界级品牌，在混乱的金融体系，在其他问题中，来证明自己的预测，迟早中国经济必然崩溃。

我们这些在中国生活和工作的了解，这些问题是严重的，很真实，和某处行，必然是一个严重的调整。 然而，相同的预测已作出定期几乎每年都在过去的三十年，和崩溃没有实现。

在这个十年真正的问题是什么时候？

中国经济停止增长之前或之后，它已成为美国大型超级大国？ 中国严重的需求更多的中国之前或之后的权利和自由，已成为发达国家？ 经济和政治的调整逐步进行新一代中国领导人，或在这十年内将有一个危险的爆炸？

我们没有今日的答案，你不应该相信任何人声称他们的中国问题专家。 所有我们能做的就是帧上面的问题，并观察早期征兆回答在未来几年。

不过，今天我们可以做出的一个语句。 看世界，这是显而易见的，许多重要的球员已经对中国的崛起投注，这种观点是每年收集更多的支持。 正如我们上面看到的程度，在世界大多数人认为在超级大国的情况下，中国已经是一个超级大国。 政权是在国内生产总值提前几年，新的世界秩序已经是今天的一个事实。

照片： 埃里克Risberg

*这是一个工程师的计算，任何严重的数学家的恶梦。 然而，大多数的桥梁，我们做的仍然站立，当我们说十年趋势什么比这更准确，是一个笑话。

我已经一段时间，因为我所有的假期时间已经由上海的两个引人入胜的故事，其中一人是电视连续剧，另一种新型的吸收。

串行WoJu，蜗牛的家，愣神Dwellingness窄，或任何翻译成英文。 它在中国已经在11月首次播出以来的炽热。 爱丽丝刘单位“和优酷言论博客最近涵盖。

由于这些博客指出，这一直是最具爆炸性的成功，我们还记得在中国的电视连续剧。 在不到一个月的时间，它引发了激烈的辩论在互联网上，吸引了数百万在线和关闭，并与该检查员狰狞的手。 快速成功的原因之一是有关的问题，买房子，正好碰到年轻的中国观众当场的中心主题。

但是，Woju是比房地产和腐败的故事。 这是一个扣人心弦的戏剧，丰富的次要情节的发展，围绕中央的三角恋爱，非常真实的字符填充。 一个近代中国社会的急剧的批评，和迄今为止最好的产品，我曾经在大陆电视上看到。 最初它是Liuliu，在2007年出版的一种新型的中国作家 ，我们应该在未来更加紧密地看。

这里是我的印象串行现在我已经完成了第15章。 我将重点放在两个主要的兴趣点：为希望了解中国的人的信息内容，并独立于其他方面的考虑产品的质量。 到底是我观察到相关的审查和其他一些有趣的事情。

内容

这个序列是中国通，有抱负的中国问题专家的天堂。 任何人想了解中国，应该看它。 如果字符是不完全真实（没有小说可以被）他们的忧虑，他们的问题和他们的动机是一个Hi - Fi扩增反映当今中国的年轻公民。 这是一个中国的现实集中。

过去几年我们一直讲的所有的元素都在那里，没有一个是失踪：广西建设，干部“二奶（爱好者），上海男人欺负自己的妻子，谁也不能看到自己的婴儿，非法工作的父母高息贷款，开发商和地方官员，shanghaiers和外地人之间的冲突，一夜之间丰富的温州，新中国的伦理道德，拆迁或“破坏和移动之间的”官商勾结，“钉子人”谁抵制，山寨手机... ...你的名字。

所有如此精确，你甚至可以看到多少的人物都在自己的工作收入，高利贷问什么兴趣，或付出多大的代价一个党员干部，以获得他的第一个小二奶（情人）。

肯定有更好的描绘中国社会在过去的书籍，但主题是变化如此之快，他们都过时。 我不认为有任何其他的小说今天的工作，更准确地反映上海社会大约2010。

“你好，我是局长宋的市委（我只是shagged你的女朋友）”

如果你正在学习中文，该系列双必须是一个伟大的地道的普通话。 如果你不是，然后站配有英文字幕的DVD，希望海盗与他的托福水平的翻译人员。 这有一定的市场，我不会感到惊讶，如果他们都与电影明年，只要政府不停止。

质量

但比上述更重要的是产品的质量。 这是很好的小说和良好的娱乐。

故事是由一个强烈的爱为中心的三角形就被美丽的女演员扮演，年轻的Haizao 李念 。 上面列出的所有要素，包括房地产热的赢家和失败者，倾向于解决此爱/恨的故事，接触了两个不同的世界：laobaixing和干部，这两个类的中国城市。

但也许串行最好的方面，一个中国的电视节目中呼吸新鲜空气，是绝对缺乏公众的道德教训。 这里没有英雄或恶棍。 贪婪的开发商，难耐徒劳的妻子，缩头缩脑的上海丈夫，神秘的， 离谱的上海姑娘李念饰演。 他们中的每单之一是人性的弱点和所有人一样的野心。 他们每个人可以以最好的和最坏。

即使是贪官是太人性化。 一个软弱的人在中年危机，在他手中的权力太大，不检查他的行为和系统。 腐败，爱情一样，发生的事件的自然过程，一个病态的社会​​和一个邪恶的个人计划的结果。 江州，中国世界街头，为上海站，是所有的人物都无可救药漂流行动的强大旋风。

检查

毫不奇怪，串行一直由政府审查。 然而，它已被审查的方式，罢工假正经我，如果不是太白痴。

因为我现在在欧洲，我已经能够观看YouTube上的串行和比较中国网站优酷上的审查。 图像上没有审查以上，其中上海市委的一位官员，公然与他刚刚被强奸免费使用他的政治实力的女孩的男友聊天。

相反，下面的图片审查：

在中国看到的原始场景，并低于审查的版本。

这是第一个正确的性教育的串行现场。 在原始版本中，您会看到在屏幕的四分之一Haizao呻吟面对，而其他的图像对应各自的妻子和男友，谁是在家里，担心自己的亲人，而他们正在奥运类的乌龟。

Haizao比上面显示的快乐先生宋淫秽的呻吟面对？ 绘制自己的后果。 同样有趣的是要注意在审查过程中，生产者参加的火爆场面不只是切出，但编辑和其他原件取代放大图像在上面的妻子，。

其他细节和问题

我会回来更多的细节时，我与串行，但目前我有2个问题，为市民，尤其是许多中国人我知道是谁已经观看了整个35章：

1 - 为什么会如此显着的串行显示“Coogle”的Haizao shanzhaied电话，它只是为了使其更切合实际，或者是报复，因为谷歌拒绝赞助？

2 - 有一个阴谋的一部分，我只是无法理解：Haizao如何能是处女当她第一次与宋睡觉，如果她一直与男友生活多年？ 这是一个情节的差距，我失去了一些严重的（和担心）中国文化的元素？

看看我今天在我的信箱中发现。 的广告“露齿兔的儿童情商训练营！”

那些有足够的耐心坚持到这个部落格可能还记得我self-help/business书籍在中国的普及做的最后发表的帖子 ，尤其是那些与情商（EQ）。 我并不感到惊讶，我们说，在教育系统是无情的社会里，R.戈尔曼的情商替代的概念是由数百万中国几乎宗教信仰的欢迎。

但不知何故，我认为他们得到了所有错误。

在营地的计划，包括对课程的领导，控制情绪，增强竞争力，决心和社交网络等吓人的项目之中，。 访问营地的最低年龄是3岁，和小册子的不完全描述游戏，而是铁杆从一开始的EQ培训。 它看起来很成功，与10个中心在中国已开放，你可以看到下面的地图。

小女孩学会抬起手像胡金涛

现在我不意味着更snarky比这个博客上有绝对必要，我恐怕我可能是从一个非常欧洲的角度看这。 有人告诉我在美国以及在中国人相信这些东西，我尊重你，如果你。

但家长：请让孩子们玩，结识新朋友，约nongtang形成的小乐队伺机不法分子 ，像坚果的上海的士大院周围骑自行车回家，在口袋里撞伤膝盖和一颗牙齿每隔一周。 这将使他们的均衡负载。 我作为一个孩子，看看我现在，一手运行Chinayouren。

我只是不能等待获得一个“古怪的鼠标未来的小册子，移动你的奶酪为幼儿夏令营“

上星期五，我写了一个很长的职位，我结束了太多的想法。 主要的一点有点模糊了结果，但它是简单：词汇起着至关重要的作用，并在学习一门语言，因为这个中国不仅极其困难的先进水平，但也越来越难与时间。

我不认为这是开创性的研究的，但有趣的是，因为大多数人都没有意识到这一点，也为在语言和政治的betwen限制的影响，有两个字段，我们要培养在这个博客。 以下是结论充分的论据，例子和详细信息，请参阅以前的帖子，其意见：

• 要学习一门新的语言所需的主要知识是在三个方面：语法，语音和词汇。 语法和语音的不同之处主要从词汇，前两个规则适用于无限的情况下，而后者则是原始数据。 我们可以把它们的语言代码和数据元素。 代码元素是有限的，而不是增长。 数据元素的几乎是无限的和不断增长的的的，这是没有完全掌握母语。

• 学习一种语言时，代码元素发挥至关重要的作用水平在初级和中级，但在先进水平的真正障碍的沟通，因此进步是数据。 例如，在德国的先进学生，有时可能会使用错误的变格，并在西班牙，他们可能无法区分“RR / R”的声音。 这些东西往往不妨碍沟通，因为人类的语言是高度冗余。 我永远不会明白“佩罗”（但是）当一位发言者说：“perro”（狗）。 最终，不完善的地方口音相同：大多数的时候，他们仅作为元数据相关代码元素的含量。

• 但同时一定水平以上的代码是高度冗余，数据仍然在各个层面的关键。 从这个伟大的借款文章 ：短语“按摩在治疗静脉炎的有效”是毫无意义的的名词一方或双方是未知的。 一个单一的缺字，往往可以掩盖整个段落或文章的含义。

• 在现实生活中被动使用的单词的数量远远超过了典型的标准列出的语言水平。 这是因为半专业的话等离子，J acuzzi 或矩阵不包括词汇表，因为它们被认为是太稀有。 当然这些话是很少使用，但也有那么多，作为一个整体，他们实际上是非常经常使用。 此数据元素是如此之大，不能在课堂上背诵的，并获得它的唯一途径是通过多年的浸泡。

• 大多数语言学习者从来没有意识到这个问题的原因是因为他们是“欺骗”。 在世界上的大多数语言，这种高水平的词汇实际上是相同的，它并不需要学习的。 以上，最现代的话是国际和数据是没有更具体的语言的每种语言有一定的限制级别。

• 这个词汇衔接的限制水平为每一种语言不同，但它并没有这么多的依赖于语言家庭或地理来源，而是取决于大小和扬声器社会的发展。 这是极易中级以上的原因，甚至非印欧语系语言，如巴斯克：社会是不是大到足以支持复杂的条款，以及所有更高的数据是从国际的话通过。 大多数人往往误解和太重视语言的家庭的概念，并拿出一样荒谬列出这一项。

• 国际化的词汇越来越多的电信和全球化的进展，特别是因为英语已成为科研的唯一语言。 在科学发明新的瑞典方面有多大意义，例如，当所有的科学界正在阅读/英语写作自己的论文。 通常情况下，尽管政治努力，以促进本地的词汇，语言的经济恢复更高的数据传输回Internationalese。

• 在世界上只有一个语言，历史，政治和人口的原因，一直保持这一趋势的一个例外：语言是中文（普通话，粤语或其他人，这里是无关紧要的差异）。 它构成了一个高层次的数据的并行系统，其余的Word的共同很少说话。 日本和韩国，他们利用从中国和国际体系，但现代的话越来越国际和这些语言的趋同，其余部分例外。

• 此外，中国有一个可笑的困难其缺乏一个功能拼音脚本的唯一的书写系统。 这种化合物的词汇问题：不仅有更多的言语来学习比在任何其他语言，但每个字包含更多的信息，因为它需要其相应的字符。

• 此外，因为没有标准化的方式来抄写外国专有名词，甚至地方和个人的名字往往被“翻译”成中文，有时甚至完全离开原来的语音和成为中国自己的权利名称。 这增加了在中国的语言已经大量的数据元素。

这一切都需要我们的结论是：中国是最困难的语言学习在一个较高的水平，无论学生的起源。

这是特别有趣，因为到现在为止这个问题的正确答案是：“取决于你自己的母语”。 随着日本/韩国学生可能是个例外，这个职位需要，中国实际上是每个人最难的。 成反比的是，它也很难对中国学习其他语言，虽然这是由其他语言功能拼音脚本缓解。

另外一个有趣的结论：中国不仅难度大，它实际上是越来越困难。

随着世界变得越来越相互关联和技术占据了我们生活的重要组成部分，新的半专业词汇需要在日常语言中的增加部分。 参考国际概念，如“垃圾邮件”或“等离子电视”的表达式越来越多​​指当地文化遗产的表达式的地方。 在这个意义上说，我们可以说，在世界上所有语言的融合，而中国是一个岛国，其余所有分歧。

再就是，我们可以从中得出政治结论，但我决心写较短的职位，所以我们会离开的第二天。 批注和更正，欢迎到我的论点。

有一些信仰，虽然原本不从中国，接受由中国如此彻底，他们成为当地文化的一部分。 一个例子是在古代佛教，从印度进口。 另外一个，我发现，是现代管理大师的教学，从美国进口的。

有趣的是，如何继续解释时，在我看来，，儒家传统，所有的社会现象 Johnsonian 和 Golemanian认为必须至少具有影响力，如今中国的分析师。 走进任何一个中国书店，或者检查当地海盗的三轮车看到自我完善和奶酪 的管理职称规则最高法院。 前表上的光亮和最具流动性的书籍的喜欢：“训练自己，开始下一个谷歌”，“我是如何改变自己从一个完整的白痴是”财富“500强的CEO”，或“我是如何建立了一个公司的收购公司的前一本书“白痴。

现在，在这一点上我要警告你提到的标题可能不是100％精确的，我在自我完善领域的文盲。 作为一个自负，自封为自由思想家，我不能帮助对这些作品几乎classist斥力，我皱眉，甚至 三轮车，卖他们。 在我多年的老欧洲，我高兴地远离从个人生产力的仪式。 但自从我搬到了中国，新的理念是潜伏在每一句话，一切阻力也是枉然。

在谈话中，最经常出现的概念之一，是EQ或情商在其1995年，由D.戈尔曼创造的畅销书。 中国分拆后的几十多年来，它已成为这里的日常生活中的表达。 这并不奇怪，像EQ的思路应该是如此受欢迎，在竞争激烈的中国系统，它提供了一些急需的舒适：不用担心，如果你没有使之成为一个顶级的统一 - 书说 - 因为它的不是智商而是情商，将决定你的未来。 两人的IQ / EQ是在中国也被称为智商/情商（治伤/清商），虽然我觉得是比较常用的英文缩写。

每当情商在交谈中，我想指出，这个概念是不科学的，特别是在松散形式，它是用在这里，。 但我wikipedic博学总是无法打动当地人，和我看到我的均衡器，简易在多个场合分析。 这发生在我第一次是在与我的同事，否则明亮的工程师贾的午餐，我留在中国的第一年。 我还记得它几乎淋漓尽致：

- ULN，中国是不错的。
- 谢谢 - 我忽略了它。 注释是标准普通话的破冰船。
- 你有一个很好的智商 - 他继续。
- HM，谢谢，你也不会坏。
- 是的，但。
- 但是呢？ -

他看着我目不转睛的眼睛。 它必须有被称为“坦率的积极有力的”情感的书第362页表达。 当看已经成立，他着手：

- 智商不够好。
- 无？
- 不，你应该看你的EQ。
- 你的意思是，阿Q，鲁迅吗？
- 不，我的意思是情商。
- 所以谁写的，一个呢？
- 没有任何人。
- 这不是一本书？
- 这是许多书籍。
- 是什么好？
- 在这里听。 情商是什么解释了为什么智商低下的一些人在生活中，进一步获得更高的智商比别人！
- 你的意思是，像关系。
- 不，像情商。
- 啊，我还以为... ...
- 广西，只是它的一部分。 EQ是你的技能，在生活！
- 我看。

但我没有看到。 ，人类的关系和非技术技能是一个人的职业生涯中的重要是显而易见的事情，我应该检查我像一个胡思乱想的旧机动车参数是一个完全不同的。

- 你的智商是好了 - 他坚持 - 但是你应该看你的EQ。
- 像什么？
- 就像有总部的未平仓合约，这将是一个为您的职业生涯中的好棋。
- 什么？
- 一个企业的水平位置是利用外籍经验的方式。
- 但我不想住在巴黎！
-你看，那是EQ。

我开始感到有点恼火哲学。 我风化的另一种“移情积极渗透”，当我绘制我的反击。

- 那么，为什么你不申请去巴黎自己呢？ - 我终于说。
- 什么，我呢？
- 是的，当然，你有经验得多！
- 但我不是一个外籍！
- 那么，它不是必需的。
- 你知道，ULN - 他略微停顿了一下 - 我有我的孩子要照顾。
- 有家庭套餐。
- 她永远不会让我，我的公婆会杀了我！
- 哈！ 我说的胜利 - 你应该看你的EQ！
- 但我已经这样做！！

而这个时候，他迅速扭过头去，忘了的EQ看起来，仿佛隐藏一些可耻的思想。 但为时已晚，我抓住了他已经。 轮到我来拉线程。

- 贾？
- 是吗？
- 你是相当严重，对此EQ吧？
- 呃，我... ...我可以做什么。
- 建立良好的联系，在该公司是一个很好的的战略，对吗？
- 呃.. 你可能会说。
- 例如，在总部的朋友一样吗？
- 咦？ 不，不，我当然没有说..我不会...
- 贾？
- 嗯？
- 你有一个很好的均衡，贾庆林，你知道吗？
- 哦，哈哈，不，不，谢谢，你有一个很好的智商... ...

因此，奥巴马是在中国，即使他是不是我的总统，他仍然是我最喜欢的总统。 这里是我的第一手访问分析。

令人惊讶了所有观察家注意到，最重要的新闻，是奥巴马希望成为欧洲在中国广西巴马。 这就是我读他的名字以字符的新拼写 ，白宫网站的建议：

欧巴马（oubama）将取代奥巴马，其中欧是欧洲的汉字，像欧洲，巴马在中国的名称声音。

也许有人会说，新的拼写是选择更大的拼音的相似性，或因为它是在台湾的标准，但是，当有政治家听取语言学家？ 在欧元奥巴马命名有一个明确的的政治动机，我看到一个光明的前途的项目。

我觉得我的欧洲人大量说话的时候我说，我们非常高兴地看到，最后在执行这个计划。 奥巴马先生，请一扫一堆不称职的总统和总理，并成为欧洲联盟的国王。 然后，也许在下次会议上与中国，你可以代表我们的美国利益，而不是让每个欧洲部落中共发送小的可怜的行政巧妙地划分和 操纵A LA “孙子兵法。

我喜欢被欧洲的事情之一是，你可以对UE进行彻底的爱国，无人问津。 亲爱的华盛顿邮报的评论员，请不用担心了。 美国不是尚未下降，并不会很长一段时间。 除其他原因，因为它是需要太无能团结在国际政治中的欧洲国家。 事实上，当中国人看到奥巴马，他们看到尽可能多的西方领导人，因为他们看到美国的领导者。 因为从这里看到，西，欧洲，美洲，或Euramerica（欧美）的概念从未所有鲜明。

这个重要的地缘战略考虑后，可以继续阅读还有什么是阅读有关的访问。 从本质上没有什么，因为没有真正的新闻已经出现，但大多数记者和博客都各尽其能与中国泛泛填写在其列。 除了上面的链接，有趣的问题是：

• 奥巴马对人权观察的黑监狱和其他人权问题的报告有何评论？ 当然，这不会发生，没有比胡锦涛将阐述新的理论 ，解放西藏。 但有趣的是为辩论起见。

• 也许更可能的是，他提到的环境，这个博客。 我敢肯定两国领导人将就提到它，其实，不同的是将来自会议的承诺有多少。 从无声的世界的其余部分，我们将拭目以待，看看2巨头终于决定做出的举动，并退出其油烟发送到我们​​的后院。

• 最后，有很多的文章奥巴马狂热的发言，使一个大的处理Obamao图标，因为在选举之前已在中国流传。 我的看法是年轻现代的中国人往往喜欢奥巴马，他是轻微比布什更受欢迎。 但是，作为Obamania没有这样的事情，我们看到在欧洲，和大多数人采取“观望”的冷的立场。 分钟欧也提到了一些微妙的问题，或遇到一些老喇嘛，它会采取不超过一分钟的措辞的中央电视台新闻抹到空气稀薄的Obamania。

已经退出了Obamaos，给我一些Eurobamas，我们越来越政治累了，在这个大陆的另一边。

我最近已经意识到，由于在我训练的某些不平衡的方法，我的中文阅读能力可能会跑在前面，我的发言，我一直被迫采取严厉的纠正措施。 在风险变成一个SM的博客，我今天发言，我对自己施加使该错误的可怕的苦修。 支撑自己：我看了整个22小时的共产主义电视连续剧在中央电视台，都在一个星期停下来了解每一个字，成渝。

这是最新的超级生产“红军反对资本家”的一种，所谓的冷箭，或“刺在后面” 。 第一章是推出60周年的日子，在中央电视台黄金时间，证明它诞生大。 即使没有辜负期望（后来被交换到中央电视台8晚），我猜测，更多的人有比“共和国的基础”的电影，太激动了西方的头脑观看。 诚然，关于冷箭互联网上有点麻，但也只是因为目标受众是不同的（和更大）比互联网社区组。 我自己的出租车司机的调查表明，它有以下很强的，至少在第一个星期。

对于所有那些抱怨在“共和国基金会”（或在独立日，对于这个问题）的政治宣传，这些都是业余的努力只是未来这个“刺在后面”。 由于刺不歪曲事实，但有启发性的，为人民提供了一个完整的道德体系。 最喜欢这些广泛关注的中国电视连续剧，它仍然遵循忠实于20世纪30年代在陕西的党羽所举办的第一个道德说教起着精神。

一个小的批判

关于艺术价值，我只是简单地说，虽然这看起来像最高的预算“红军”系列的最新，质量的改善不遵循。 主要问题是可见的生产者和演员几乎无一例外的无能。 知道中国有很好的能够做好电影时，给他们一定的自由，我只能假设这是官僚选定和培育央视木乃伊干部的死想像力的结果。

In this case the main story is about — surprise– a Long March towards the West, where the Captain discovers that there is a Capitalist enemy spy infiltrated in the team. In fact not only one, but two, and three, and more are found in every chapter, until by the end of the serial the largest part of the brigade are actually undercover agents. This gives the poor captain played by borderline Huang Zhizhong countless occasions to run his fits of histrionic paranoia, apparently a main selling point. One can't help wondering why all those spies don't just get together to kill their clownish captain, rename their brigade with the KMT star, and get on with their counter-revolutionary business.

I don't know if you have experienced this before when watching a film, but it is one of those instances when deplorable script and performance manage to kill the suspension of disbelief right from the first sequence. Then, suddenly, you find yourself watching a bunch of adult people walking around in funny clothes and uttering pointless nonsense. The result is embarrassing.

I have never been much of a TV watcher, but I do understand that TV films are substandard anywhere in the World, and nonsensical plots or braindead dialogs are by no means exclusive of China. Even the fixation with the deeds of the Red Army marching West is not necessarily more ridiculous than, say, the fixation with illiterate cow herders during the golden age of Westerns. But there is something in these Chinese serials that makes them unique beyond the obvious propaganda and quality issues, and that is the complete set of values that they embody for the edification of the masses.

Edifying the Masses: A Communist Catechism

This is the first time, (and most surely the last) that I watch a complete Chinese propaganda serial, but I believe that the effort is not wasted. Because only getting inside these long works one can appreciate that deeper level that flows underneath, the construction of a public moral system that is very much akin to Religious Instruction .

Here are a few of the points I noted while watching the Stab, for the benefit of those who want to understand these works without throwing 22+ hours of their life down the drain:

• Love: The scenes of love are tacky to nauseate an armored brigade, with perhaps the best example in this scene in minute 40 chapter 4, when the captain “falls in love”. In general, love among the communists is virtuous and innocent, and always secondary to the interests of the organization. There is not the slightest romantic indulgence, no concessions to passion other than for the party. When the communist lover is told that her beloved is a Capitalist spy, she abandons him on the spot, and volunteers to kill him if necessary.

• Sex: Of course, this puritanism does not stop the young lieutenant from having proper sex (under the sheets) starting chapter 25, in a clear effort by the authors to attract more audience. “乱搞男女关系!” (disorderly do man-woman relations!!) chastely exclaims the captain when he gets the news through a disgustingly virtuous informer. But worry not, the ethical purity is safeguarded. These two sinners have betrayed the higher cause, and they receive their deserved punishment without further delay: death at the hands of some brigands.

• Violence: We have seen enough of the likes of Eastwood in Alcatraz to have some expectations about the frightful fate of new prison inmates (especially if they are male!). I don't know to what extent this violence is consistent with reality, but what I am pretty sure is that prison wardens do not tell off the inmates screaming “don't be naughty”, and major disputes in the common cells are not settled through pillow fights. This is exactly how things are done in 冷箭, making the whole experience for the high level KMT prisoners like a children's Summer Camp. This is one of the most puzzling parts of the communist ethics, and the most difficult to grasp in a movement that was imposed largely through violent revolution. It seems to come from a belief in molding mentalities through peaceful labour, but, as we will see below, it has little to do with the Christian notion of “turning your other cheek”.

• Class virtue: Virtue is presented as a characteristic of the proletarian class, and salvation must necessarily follow. Like the ancient Christians looking for consolation in the Bible before they were thrown to the lions, so the Chinese Laobaixing today seem to find solace in these serials, while they wait for the next corrupt CCP cadre to come and tear their homes to serve a rich developer. The notion of a Final Judgment that accompanies this kind of teaching is represented through the iconic verses of the Internationale, sung at several points in the serial, with the main theme conspicuously inspired in the melody of the first verse.

• Forgiveness and Revenge: There is an appalling scene of revenge (ch 31 38:00) when the main spies are apprehended, that completely shocked me after 20 hours of mellow bloodless harmony. The righteous blows of the officers are completely devoid of mercy, enjoying the raw pleasure of revenge. In my observation of the Chinese, this represents very well the paradox of their ethical system: Chinese are by nature far more tolerant than any Western people, but –perhaps as a necessary consequence – once a certain level of crime is attained, this sets off a mechanism of ruthless punishment where the object ceases to be seen as human. This is perhaps the most important difference with Christian influenced ethics, where our less tolerant natures were softened by the love doctrines of the New Testament. The whole discussion of d eath penalty in China vs. Europe is an interesting modern development of this difference in outlooks.

Some Conclusions

There are many ideas here worth commenting further, perhaps one of the most interesting would be to see how this communist system of ethics is working (or failing) to keep the always delicate balance between 道德 (virtue) and Deng Xiaoping's 致富 (getting rich).

Clearly, Chinese are not the only ones to introduce ethics into their TV serials. Popular Western serials have long been educating us with teachings as varied as respect for minorities, tolerance of homosexuality, patriotism or democracy. But crucially, while the Western system of moral instruction has evolved with the times and deals with problems facing today's society, the Chinese system has remained stuck in the 1930s, with the characteristic rigidity of Religious ethics . As a consequence, there is a growing, insurmountable gap in China between the ideas preached and the real needs of the ordinary citizens. This may be having the catastrophic effect of eliminating all ethics from mainland Chinese life.

When we speak of problems like perceived racism, corruption, lack of respect for the public goods or environment, how much of these are related to a lack of a realistic, up-to-date moral support, or to the hijacking of ethics to serve the single interests of the CCP power elite?

I would like to say more about this, but unfortunately this post has got out of control already, and I know nobody reads past the first 1000 words. Write your ideas below about any particular point and if we get some interesting discussion going on we can try to expand the subject in a new post.

我知道，我应该现在学习，而不是写帖子。 但我只是呼吸稍微模拟考试的两届会议之间，和我学习一门新的语言的引人入胜的过程，以及如何，当你通过几次反映，你开发自己的秘密方法，爬了陡长阶梯。

我学习中国今年的做法是基于一个我用我以前的语言使用的阅读方法。 它只能用来从中级水平开始。 在普通话的情况下，我会说这是不是前2年就读于正常速度。

该方法包括收购第一个词汇的最低水平，以了解最简单的文本，并奉献您的学习时间，以尽可能迷人的小说阅读愉快的爱好，从这一点来说。 如果你是一个像我这样的书呆子，这工作得很好，因为你最终把远更多的时间比你的研究（阅读），如果它是正常的演习。 我知道光标翻译包括互联网上阅读中文也有很多资源，但电脑会分散你的注意力非常快，而读一本好书，得到你的眼睛紧盯着为几个小时就结束的字符。

这种方法的结果是，你结束了一个广阔的被动词汇和出色的字符识别能力。 然后，它是由你，在你的社交时间走出去，尝试使用这些话在交谈中，当地人说你的声音华而不实风险，。 有时候，你甚至可以解除从一个新的的完整的词组，它是有趣，当你管理他们在现实生活中使用。 例如，当我在读鲁迅的“AHQ的”我摆放整齐我最喜欢的路线：

小易：我讨厌我的老板，怎么办？

ULN：你先估量对手，口讷的你叧骂，力气小的你叧打。

小易：天哪！

ULN：怎么啦？

小易：你又在练习！

ULN：我没有啊？。

诚然，我使用的方法是有点激进。 但社会的阶段是必不可少的一部分，因为一旦你用一个字一个次成功的情侣，迅速移动到你的积极词汇，并后，很少再离开你。 这是唯一可行的，如果你住在一个中国的环境中，它从未工作过，当我在欧洲。

阅读速度

关键的临界点的阅读方法是当你意识到，你可以读故事足够快，真正享受它的那一刻。 这不仅是一个功能字符/字的知识，而且书的利益和自己的个人nerdiness。 当我看到我的第一部小说“兄弟”去年，我太激动了品尝中国的通俗文学风格，我很高兴地花了两个月的深耕成渝缠身余华700页。

从那时起，我有多大的提高我的阅读速度，到一个点，在那里我可以可持续读非小说没有入睡。 编制的HSK高速要求帮助了我很多这，我必须说，尽管我在前面的咆哮后，它意义，迫使学生有点。 Because the ability to read characters at normal native speeds is one of the most difficult to acquire, in my opinion.

Note that, when I say speed, I am not referring to the speed that comes from knowing all the words in the text. It is obvious that by using less the dictionary it is possible to read faster. My point is that, even for simple texts where all the words are familiar, I still read almost 3 times slower than a native Chinese, even after 1 year of reading books. This is an issue that has appeared only when studying Chinese, and not in any of my previous languages that used latin script, so I have strong reasons to think that it is tied to the use of characters.

I think it probably has to do with the way the brain processes the characters, and the way people schooled in Chinese from an early age have developed differently in this field. The post about reverse pinyin last week pointed me in this direction, and a few experiments I have done with my Chinese neighbours as well. I hope I have the time to write a bit more about this next week.

In the meantime, if there is a non-native advanced reader out there, I would like to hear your experience. Does it eventually get better, and do you manage to read at the same speed as the Chinese? Or do you have the same problem I note here? 让我知道。

OK, off-line I go again. I already missed all Tuesday and Wednesday in an absurd meeting in Changsha so I need to catch up. I'll be back after the HSK, if I haven't showed up by Monday call the fire brigade.

First impressions are usually mistaken, but they are also interesting because the eye is alert to any novelty, and the culture clash is rich with ideas. Warning: this post contains sweeping generalizations. Take it for what it is, and if you are serious about understanding Japan you might want to look somewhere else.

I came to Japan quite randomly, I wanted to spend the holidays in a quiet and relaxing place, and in the week of the Chinese National Day, Japan seemed the only place near enough with the right conditions. I am preparing for the high level HSK later this month, and the plan was to take a few hours a day to practise my characters.

I chose the South of Japan on purpose, with the vague idea that they would probably be a bit more relaxed than in the North, and therefore more suited to my Southern European nature. I soon found out my assumption was wrong. For one reason, there seems to be no such a thing as “South Japan”. Although this place is clearly in the South, they call it West Japan. And the character of the people here is diametrically opposed to any notion of latin indulgence I might have harboured.

The cultural shock came right from the first contact. It was the passport controller at the airport of Fukuoka. I had been given the immigration card in the airplane and, like usual, I had quickly filled my “address on destination” box with a lazy “Hotel Nagasaki”. I couldn't remember the real name of the hotel, and anyway these things are never checked in any reasonable country. In Japan they are. And that is how I met my second Japanese.

“What did you write in this box?,” said the inspector when I was led to his office, pointing at the place in my card.

“Hotel Nagasaki?” I said.

“There is no hotel by this name”.

“No, no, I didn't mean it literally,” I explained, “It is short for 'a hotel in Nagasaki'.”

“Reservation receipt please?”

“Er.. it is in my mailbox, I haven't printed it out.”

And they took me to a series of offices until they found a place where I could connect to the internet and produce my hostel reservation from hostelworld. This took about an hour, enough to convince them that I was a dangerous outlier, so the inspector led me to the searching department.

My third Japanese was an older man who did the most meticulous search I have seen in my life, even feeling with his bare fingers all along the sole of my well seasoned travel socks. He searched into every possible hiding place in my bags and my body, except for that precise one that you were just imagining.

All the while, the three of them -my first three Japanese - treated me with scrupulous respect, constantly smiling, and polite to the point of scary.

One of the things that was shocking in my first dealings in the shops is the “hi!” sound that they emit all the time, to say hello or to hand you something. It comes constantly and accurately, timed like a semiquaver, dressing any human exchange with a singular martial tone. But the most awe inspiring feature is their absolute, compulsive, anal obsession with cleanliness. This country must be the cleanest place I have seen in the World by a large margin.

I came to this conclusion during lunch in one Western cafe in Nagasaki, were I witnessed some peculiar behaviour. It was raining outside, and every time a new client finished paying his order, the cashier walked around the bar with a clean tissue and bent down to wipe the drops of water left by the client's shoes. A completely unreasonable action, even for safety purposes, because the other side of the cafe next to the entrance door was permanently wet and left unwiped.

The only explanation, I figured after a while, was that the entrance area was out of the field of vision of the cashier, hidden by the tables. It wasn'ta safety procedure, it was just that she just could not bear the sight of some drops of water on the spotless floor in front of the bar, even if it was almost pure H2O from the immaculate street outside.

I am impressed by this aspect of the Japanese culture, and I wonder how the thousands of Japanese living in Shanghai cope with the hygiene situation there. I guess this explains why, being by far the largest foreign community in Shanghai, we see so little of them. They must all stick to their Gubei compounds and restaurants and avoid leaving the area unless it is strictly necessary.

The service in the restaurants here is excellent, and the food is prepared with so much care that you actually feel sorry to eat it. The Japanese like things well done, and they manage because, like most Chinese, they are very hard workers. But there is an essential difference in the motivations: Chinese exert themselves for a dream, to buy a car or a better house, or just to avoid being left behind by their fast ecoomy. Japanese already have all those things. Like Westerners, they have little left to dream that can be bought with money. So it seems that they work for the sake of work well done, out of a strong sense of duty and perfection.

When I came to Japan, I was prepared to find meticulous people who revere order. I thought it would be somehow similar to Germany, and although that kind of country is not exactly my idea of fun, it definitely fitted the bill for my week of retirement and study. But Japan is not even comparable to Germany. As far as I have seen it goes further in the field of obsession, to an extreme that for a newcomer -a Southern European one, at any rate- feels like borderline pathologic.

I don't want to judge the character of the different peoples. Each culture has its own ways, and all is well as long as we get along. I just wonder if the little world of efficiency and perfection that the Japanese have built around them is not but an exhausting illusion, and if, somewhere in the middle of all their productive activity, they find the time to think of what is important and just enjoy. The people I am meeting here–starting from the fourth one– are positive and friendly, and I have no reason to suspect they are not contented.

I have just been speaking with a PhD in electro microscopy who is in Nagasaki for a World congress in the field. He tells me that more than half of the participants are German and Japanese, because these two countries rule in electro microscopy applications. Somehow I am not surprised.

“It is a good thing we have Japanese and Germans,” I told him, “Otherwise we would be in trouble to wipe the dust between the atoms”

I was pleasantly surprised when I booked my last minute flight to Japan, I got a very reasonable price for the 1st October National Day. When I went to Pudong airport I understood why: the streets were empty in Shanghai, nobody flew at that time because they were all at home with the eyes glued to the TV set, watching as thousands of men and women, looking silly in their flowery dresses, marched on Beijing's Chang An Avenue.

I had the chance to watch the parade for 30 minutes as I waited to board my plane. I have to say it was beautiful. Sure enough there were cringeworthy moments, like when the TV showed the communist model peasants, workers and miners , shining like Mario Bros in 256 colours. But of course, a good deal of hypocrisy is always mandatory in these State events, in China and elsewhere. And regarding the execution, I have watched quite a few of the famous mass events in Pyongyang, and I am pretty sure North Koreans are white with envy watching this one, if their state channel even cared to broadcast it.

All this display of patriotism reminded me of the conversation I had last week with little Yi. It was after we watched an advert on TV, the one where the little girl stands on Tiananmen Square squeaking in that ghastly toddler tone: “妈妈我爱你!” (mum, I love you), and a similar girl says the same in Tibetan in front of the Potala temple of Lhasa. The screen then goes white, and a message comes up: “祖国我爱你”. Motherland, I love you. I don't remember which was the company announced, but the advert has been showing continuously for months, and it was the eleventh time I watched it.

I had a delicate stomach that day, and pushed to the limits of resistance, I couldnt help bringing up the subject:

“This is ridiculous,” I said bluntly, “you can't love a country like you love your mother!”

“Of course you can,” said little Yi, “you don't understand the feelings of the Chinese!”

“Yeah, right.”

Babbling toddlers and feelings of the people. That was about as much as I could take before lunch. I regretted I'd spoken at all.

“Our country is like a mother for all the Chinese, ” she continued, “that is what they mean.”

“Yeah, OK, except that it is NOT the same. A mother gives you life, she will always love you and no matter what happens, no matter what mistakes you do or how stupid you behave, she will be there for you. A country, if you fail to comply, will just abandon you or even put you to death ”

“Well, it is a different kind of mother. If you fail, the punishment is terrible. If you work hard and succeed, the prize is much greater. It is a mighty mother with higher stakes, what is wrong with that?'

“Nothing wrong, just that that is not Love”

“这是，”她坚持。 “Or don't Christians teach love of God, and isn't He much more terrible, that if you fail to behave even your life is not enough, and you get an eternity of pain?”

“I…,”

I shut up. She had some point there. I don't particularly believe in the Christian god, and besides, 2000 years ago they invented a mother Mary precisely to deal with the rough edges of the Old Testament. But it is true that, in religion and in politics, many people in the West feel that same kind of loving feelings as the Chinese. So this was not really a discussion about China, but a more general one on patriotism.

My problem is that I do not accept the word love to refer to a country. For one reason, because I understand love as a feeling that can only happen between persons, perhaps sometimes with animals, but not with things. And definitely not with abstract and easy manipulable concepts like “nation”. But granted, this is merely a problem of language, and I don't have the authority to prescribe how the word “love” should be used, even less how “爱” is employed in Chinese. Still, there is a more compelling argument against love for the motherland: I think it is not in the best interest of the “loving” party.

Let's look at the facts. Human society has to be organized some way, and the power needs to be held by someone. In the past it was the tribe, the emperor or the feudal lord. Now it is the nation-state, nothing particularly wrong with that. All forms of organization require the respect and participation of the citizens to work, and it is in the interest of everyone to treat them accordingly, once their legitimacy has been established. Therefore, I understand it is important to respect and work for the improvement of one's country, and I try to do it, just like I do for my company or for my university. But love them like a mother?

It might be that I am speaking from a very European perspective–though by no means mainstream even there. Perhaps I am failing to take into account the particular circumstances of countries like China. Europeans used to be the haughtiest and most virulent motherland lovers, until their excessive feelings brought about ruin and destruction. Patriotism in China never caused any catastrophe of even comparable magnitude, and instead worked well to save the people from foreign-imposed sufferings. So the feelings of many Chinese are understandable, if not necessarily beneficial today.

And still, the key question we have to ask ourselves is: are these feelings in the interest of the citizen, and in the interest of mankind as a whole? Can the World really be in peace if the relation between citizens and their countries is one of blind love, like child to mother? When there is a conflict of interests, is the loving child not forced to fight for his beloved to the last consequences? Since conflicts of interests and greedy rulers are facts of life that will not disappear, is not the love doctrine in contradiction with the ideal of World Peace that most of us profess?

I would like to hear opinions about this. Of course, I understand that for many sentimental people the feeling of love for their country is very much alive, and there is little to explain since it is just a feeling . But Chinese tend to be very rational and in control of their feelings, and when they choose to love it is rarely out of blind passion, but rather because they consider it a good option. I suspect their patriotism is in most cases the result of a prisoner's dilemma : if other countries act patriotic, the only rational attitude is to do the same.

But I wonder if people are actually following this logic (ultimately a defensive attitude) or are really so in love with their country and their flag that they don't even think much about it. And if you do think about it, do you actually believe that a peaceful World is possible in the long term?

Perhaps I think too much sometimes. Perhaps the fact that I am writing from Nagasaki, where I have just seen one of the most chilling exhibitions of human-caused horrors, might have some impact on my thoughts today. And still, I stand by all I write here.

What are your views?

(PS. On the same subject, also see this post just published on Chinageeks )

One of the things I learned this Summer is that, while I may leave on holidays to Europe, China doesn't really leave me anymore. More than just a country, it is a force of nature, the other face of mankind that is now part of my life. China is always there, and she is everywhere, showing up in unexpected circumstances.

Take Spain, for example. The Chinese community there is largely new, not fluent in languages, and originated from one single point in China: the tiny county of Qingtian, upriver from Wenzhou. When it comes to languages, the Spanish are not much better than them, and the whole situation is full of opportunities for the literate laowai. While a simple “nihao” is usually enough to be the hero of the day, some preparation yields better results. Just wander into a Chinese shop casually dropping a Qingtianese greeting, and comment on the remarkable history of the old stone-carving county, home of the Chinese-Spanish. This makes you popular. And you can drink tea and practice your Chinese conversation for hours on end.

What follows is a true story that happened in my last day of holidays. It includes a Chinese family with extraordinary sleeping abilities, and a team of adventurous Spanish ducks. I hope you enjoy it:

It was the first morning flight from Bilbao to Paris, where I was scheduled to connect with the Air France to Shanghai. As I entered the cabin of the A319, I marked immediately a Chinese family sitting in one of the front rows: a middle-aged mother with her son.

She was wearing a shapeless purple jacket in the style of the hundred names, and her teenage son covered his head in a Korean hip-hop hoody. They stood out in the business atmosphere of the early flight. But what made me notice them—and I couldn't help a smile—is that they were already fast asleep before I even got to my seat. As far as I could see, they didn't switch their positions for the duration of a rather eventful flight.

From the start, the journey proved trying for my nerves. As we were taking off, there was a loud bang coming from the back of the plane, followed by a vibration that grew stronger as we flew. For a while nothing else happened, but then, as we were approaching France, the plane suddenly leant to one side, and the Pyrenees mountains turned 180 degrees around us, until we were headed back West from where we came.

The noise grew worse, and the passengers with notions of geography were increasingly anxious. The town of San Sebastian appeared below us for the second time, only this time the ground seemed much closer. All the service call beeps went off one after the other. I looked around to the other passengers and they were all looking around. Nobody spoke.

Finally, the cabin crew appeared on the aisle, delivering row by row the official version of the facts: during take off a flying object had collided with the blades of engine 2, producing the bang and subsequent vibrations that we were experiencing. It was a common occurrence, and there was no danger. As part of the normal safety procedure, the captain had decided to return to the home airport for maintenance.

“It was probably a bird,” said the stewardess when she got to our row.

“A bird?” laughed the steward, “that was a team of big fat ducks!”

I figured he must have been instructed to keep a light mood. I tried hard to laugh, picturing circles of ducklings turning in the turbofan as we struggled to get past the sharp Basque valleys.

***

After an endless flight we were safety landed back onto Bilbao airport. As we were waiting to disembark, the pilot confirmed that the airplane was done for the day. We had to pick up our luggage first and then go to the Air France office on the second floor to request a new ticket. As usual, my suitcase was one of the last to appear on the rolling band, and by the time I got to the office there was already a long queue, about the length of a duck-stricken A319, and every bit as noisy.

The crowd was growing unruly. Some French passengers harangued the masses with true revolutionary spirit, launching slogans against all winged creatures, including ducks, airbuses, and Air France pilots. Since I was last, there was not much point in queuing, so I just stood on one side in a way to signify my disapproval. Then I noticed the focus was gradually shifting, as the keen Robespierres directed their anger to some unidentified target at the front of the queue. I walked over to have a closer look.

It was the Chinese family.

Clearly, they hadn't understood the instructions to pick up the luggage, and they had come straight to the airline office before anyone else. They were first, and they showed no intention of giving up their position. On the contrary, they were holding it admirably. The mother covered the rearguard with her fierce eye, while the son held fast to the desk. They were obviously well trained in conflictive queues, and they seemed unimpressed by the mob.

Linguistically, the situation was not ideal. The mother was screaming in Qingtianese, the son translated into Chinglese and an Air France employee replied in elaborate Spanglish, while the French head of office stared in disbelief. I was alone, and my faithful friend the Electronic Dictionary & Thesaurus was out of reach in the bottom of my bag. But the time was to act, and I did not falter in the hour of peril.

I cut right to the front and put in a “Qué pasa?什么事?”. All four faces turned to me at once. The queue became suddenly quiet.

“They want to go to China!” cried the employee in Spanish.

“We want to go to China!” cried the son in Chinese.

The positions of the parties seemed to me very much unanimous, and ripe for an easy consensus. But further enquiry proved that it was not exactly so. I managed to reconstruct the following facts:

The family had slept through the flight, right until we landed back in Bilbao. Then they had not understood the strongly accented message of the pilot and they had dashed out of the plane straight to the connections desk, where they had been redirected to the airline office. And they acted so urgently because they only had one hour to catch the connecting flight. All they asked is to board their plane immediately, and they were pretty suspicious of this whole attitude of the staff in Paris.

Because they actually thought they were in Paris.

The problem was not an easy one to explain. Not only the mother's mandarin was as bad as mine, but also she was determined, and she had a deep rooted common sense. They had just flown into Paris and therefore this was Paris, she would take no nonsense from a laowai. I used all my persuasion. I noted how the souvenir shops were selling bullfighters, and not tour eiffels. Finally the young son understood, and he helped me convince her. The fact was settled: We were in Spain, and there were no direct flights to Shanghai from this airport.

The rest was fairly easy to manage, and after a few minutes the three of us left the office with a new ticket. Once their infinite gratitude had been sufficiently expressed, I couldn't help asking the son:

“But, how could you not realize that this is the same airport as before?”

“Well,” he smiled shyly, “Mum was just telling me that she finds all airports in Europe look strikingly similar!”

And his mother, who was tough but good-humoured, found it rather funny, and we all joined in a face-saving laughter. Then I knew I was engaged as official interpreter of the sleeping family.

***

In the end, my work as a translator served my interests well. We got our new tickets before anyone else, the last three places left to connect with the evening Paris-Shanghai. The revolutionaries were so stunned by the performance that they forgot to guillotine us, and the Air France employee gave us some free lunch vouchers for the VIP lounge. To make our wait more pleasant, she said, the company was offering one of their specialty dishes in the “Restaurant des Mondes”.

It was still far from the Spanish lunch time, so we had to wait while they opened the kitchen for us. The prospect of a free lunch worked well to improve the mood of my Chinese friends, and we had a lively chat in the VIP sofas. I took the chance to impress them with my baidupedic knowledge of their hometown. After that they opened up to me, and the last lines of suspicion finally vanished from the woman's brow.

I listened distractedly as the son informed me of the state of the rap scene in Zhejiang. A terrible state that was, apparently, and I waited for a chance to switch topics. It was his mother that I found most intriguing. All the while she was sitting very still, as if lost in her own thoughts. She had an outside appearance that in China would be classified as “peasant”, but her proud, resolute eyes didn't quite fit in the picture. What was she doing flying around with her single son? I finally asked him.

As it turned out, she was a renowned chef back home. Qingtian is the origin of thousands of Chinese restaurants across Europe, and their extended family had made a fortune with a popular chain of Chinese food. She had come as an expert to establish new recipes in the family restaurants in Spain, all the while teaching her son the secrets of the Chinese cuisine. They had toured the country for three months, making the company's food “more delicious, more authentically Chinese”.

“Her most famous recipe is Beijing Duck,” said the kid, licking his lips, “You have never tried anything like that!”

“I would love to have a chance to try it,” I answered, suddenly hungry for duck.

Then the mother, who hadn't said a word all this time, looked at me with a strange smile. I felt there was an invitation coming. Instead, she opened her eyes wide and nervously shook her son's shoulder.

“Heavens!” she cried, “we still haven't picked up our luggage!”

***

When I took them down to luggage collection, their belongings were still lonely turning around on the band, a number of shapeless pieces covered in woven tarpaulin. As we loaded them one by one onto a trolley, the son suddenly found something was wrong. It was the last packet, a cardboard box with some strange little holes pierced on the top. He held the box on his knees and showed me one of the corners where it had been torn open. The box was empty.

The woman was very upset. She started moving her arms up and down and speaking in her sing-song dialect at an alarming speed. I couldn't understand a word of what she was saying, but the replies of her son were more composed, and I could more or less make out the gist of it:

“I told you we couldn't take them on a plane, mum!”, he was saying.

“But how can we pass the long winter without them?”, she replied.

Suddenly I had a very dark premonition. While they were busy arguing, I walked over to the broken box and examined it carefully. As I held it up in front of me, a small, delicate object floated down from the broken corner. It was a feather.

I dropped the box as if it burned my hands, and I kicked it behind the rolling band were it wouldn't be seen. I was in panic now, and I joined the arguing party with my own version of alarmed mandarin:

“We have to het out of here, NOW!”, I said.

“什么？ But the box?,” said the mother.

“Forget it!” I pushed the trolley towards the door, “we will see to that later!”

“什么？ But we have to file a complaint. They might have found …”

“No!”

I tried to control my nerves, as I envisioned charges for terrorism, and the dire diplomatic consequences of China's national dish being presented as evidence of the crime. I tried to relax telling myself that at least there hadn't been any human casualties.

“Please help us,” she said.

“We can't do this now! Spain is a bureaucratic country, these things take a long time…” I muttered. “And anyway I'm sure your little friends are going to be fine!”

She gave me another inquisitive glance, like the first time I suggested she was not in Paris. She was clearly reconsidering about my sanity.

“Well, excuse me ,” she said, “but they are important to me, and if you don't want to help me I will have to file the complaint myself”

Just at that moment the airport PA system cracked with a life-saving announcement. All the passengers of the cancelled flight were asked to go back immediately to the second floor, were new information was awaiting us from the captain.

“Quick, this must be our lunch, let's go before we miss it!” I translated, and this argument finally seemed convincing enough for the stubborn lady.

***

On the second floor, the slick French captain was putting in practice the company's open information policy. The maintenance staff had just confirmed—he said—that it was indeed the impact of external objects on the engine that had caused the vibration. The strange bodies had been already extracted and brought in from the hangar for analysis. The decision to return to the airport had proven a good choice, as it was the chief engineer's opinion that we would have never made it to Paris.

A drop of cold sweat fell down my right temple as I considered the chances of those little animals finding their way into the turbine. Even if they managed to tear open the box and then break free from under the piles of luggage, even if they could unlatch the hold door with their little beaks, still, how could they fly over to the engine? It seemed impossible. I remembered the laws of fluid dynamics, and how turbulent airflows exhibit nonlinear, chaotic behaviours. For the first time in my life I felt I understood the real meaning of the Chaos Theory.

In the meantime, the mother had sent her boy to inquire about lost objects, and he was explaining their problem to the captain in such a perfectly unintelligible English that the brave man could only smile politely. They looked around at a loss, only to see that their laowai friend was nowhere to be found. I had just in time slipped into the gentlemen's restroom.

At this point, the airport loudspeakers buzzed again:

Passengers of the AF2435 to Paris, please proceed into our VIP lounge. As a special attention, we are offering you the chef's specialty in our exclusive “Restaurant des Mondes”

***

I joined the family again as they walked down the corridor to the VIP Lounge. It seemed that the luxury meal kindly offered by Air France had conquered the heart of the frightful woman. Her expression showed no more pain for the loss of her beasts, and I hoped she had decided to give up the search. Presently, she was impressed by the quality of the service, and her mood was chatty.

“They know how to treat a client, in France,” she said conversationally, “back in China it's not even comparable.”

“Oh, sure, great service here,”

“Even if they don't have any proper backup plans,” she noted, “they are just great at doing nice surprises.”

“Oh, yeah, you can count on the French for surprises”

“It is all in the attitude, isn't it?”, she said, and her only child nodded in agreement.

As we approached the “Restaurant des Mondes”, the atmosphere was so relaxed that I thought we had passed the worst. I just had to get them on our plane right after lunch, and there would be no more nonsense of lost object complaints. Then I saw the stewardess at the restaurant door, smiling. She held a large sign written in all the major languages of the World, including mandarin. It read:

TODAYS SPECIAL DISH:

“Thin-sliced duck Beijing style”

In case there were any doubts, underneath the text there was a colourful picture of a team of ducks thinly sliced as if by fast rotating blades, swimming in the dark sauce of the traditional Beijing recipe.

I tried with my body to hide the sign from their view, but I was too late. There was not much point anyway, the pictures were all over the place, and the food was coming out any minute. As we sat down, I peeped at her out of the corner of my eye. Her expression was enigmatic, the initial apprehension had turned into something more lofty. Was it triumph? I trembled.

The dishes were served and, unexpectedly, nothing happened. I glanced at my two friends. The were obviously enjoying their meal, emitting now and then favorable grunts and other judgements with the assurance of the true connoisseur. Then, halfway through their ducks, they looked at each other with an understanding smile and, following some mysterious signal, the lady suddenly stood up, knocking her chair behind her, and crying out loudly:

“I want to speak to the person who cooked this!”

There was a spark in her eye as she glared at the kitchen door on the other side of the dining room. I could not think of anything to say this time, so I just sat still, helpless as the slings and arrows flew swiftly towards their target.

Seeing that no help was forthcoming from my side, the mother ignored me and took direct action. She strode across the room and, without further preambles, she thrust open the kitchen door, roaring in Qingtianese. In a minute, the cook came out sporting a high chef hat and howling even louder than her. To my surprise, he was also employing some variety of Zhejiang dialect.

Then something strange happened. The moment he saw the chef, the son stood up and ran across the dining room charging like a fighting bull, and when the three of them were at a close distance, they came together in a long, warm hug.

I stood rather awkwardly next to them, wondering what was next. The chatter of the adults had risen to undecipherable speeds under the flow of emotions. I looked at the teenager for an explanation, but he was too absorbed speaking to the cook. Finally, I managed to catch some fraction of the conversation:

“Uncle Li, we knew it had to be you, nobody else in the World can cook Beijing Duck like mother! What are you doing here?”

“You know, I got a catering contract with Air France, didn't I tell you?”

“Uncle, you really need to help us, mother is really worried! This laowai is with us, but his Chinese is so-so, and he just doesn't get it!”

“Say, my boy, what is the problem?”

“It is the new down-filled coats that mum bought to take home for the winter. She was so upset when we found out that they've been stolen from our luggage…”

我不在那里，我不知道比按。 但根据现有资料，我认为这是值得看看另一个事件，看看我们做它。 参见插图上链接到纽约时报“图，这是很难犯罪嫌疑人的亲中共，信息包括：（证人证词）大约是尽可能详细，已出版5月5日的事件。

这一切都始于浓度沿解放西路，这是6.30左右满足人民武装警察，在人民广场抗议。 这里的一切都是“正常”，在街头骚乱的逻辑：有冲突，并可能从双方的一些受害者。 但解放路。 中央，很多人生活在那里，肯定纽约时报“，会发现至少有证人提到它，数百人被打死或在这一点上取得囚犯。

但之后，尤其是在8，沿团结和大湾路的轴，事件没有任何社会动乱的标准正常。 街头骚乱，可以像其他形式的暴力，附带损害，但这种情况并非如此。 警方是不存在的，韩小怪不能在这么短的时间举办的，并解释这些死亡的唯一途径是，这是一个蓄意大规模的大屠杀平民居民和路人。 与其他帐户的书面各种报纸，这是一致的。

123 *韩已或多或少地受到各方接受最低伤亡的初始计数是一个惊人的数字行动大多在5个小时的空间，并在这样一个面积减少的情况。 其他骚乱的地区，包括新疆，西藏或中国其他地区，我们可以看到这个比例是完全超出范围。 这是不是热的战斗中的政治骚乱。 这是冷血的迫害，行动只能痴迷者的工作。

谁是事件背后的

在8月2日发行，香港新闻周刊“亚洲周刊” 采访 Heyrat尼牙孜，维吾尔记者，博客和艾滋病活动家，什么样的人，谁是不太可能偏中国共产党。 Heyrat谈到伊斯兰解放党，党UT -塔利尔AL -伊斯兰，一个泛伊斯兰国际政党，这是正式的和平，但已在欧洲煽动暴力的过去的指责。 该组织已在新疆蔓延非常迅速，在过去的十年。

在乌鲁木齐的见证，尼牙孜注意到许多听到抗议的示威者和宗教口号的强烈喀什口音。 This brings to mind all the times the CPC has spoken of the menace of an Islamist group called ETIM, which might actually exist or not. 在任何情况下，一些激进组织确实存在，清楚地看到喜欢攻击这一项去年，16名警察冷冷地刀砍和正在运行的轰炸。

没有证据，我不会指责任何团体，我会犯同样的“固体块”的思想，昨天我批评自己。 但到现在我们已经看到，任何诚实的观察员好奇，它当然值得在激进的伊斯兰教在新疆领域的进一步调查。 在阿富汗和巴基斯坦等国家接壤的一个区域，它不是在所有不可想象的，沮丧的青年越过边境的例子，在一个变态的宗教版本的逃生。

响应

中国政府在处理危机的影响相对良好，鉴于这种情况。 其实，主要的反对，人们可以使大多数西方读者喜欢想象相反： 周日第五更多的力量应该已经用来避免的谋杀案。

如果你想起来了，你可能会同意，中国共产党领导人不正是理想化的梦想家。 当他们让到一个地方的外国记者，那是因为他们知道他们有什么可失去的，而这一次他们必须一直非常有信心，他们不怪。 同时，我们也不得不承认，即使在记者面前，它是在世界上大多数军队不寻常的展示这么多的纪律和约束，作为中国人对自己的人民不分青红皂白的种族主义攻击后。

一个西方媒体的很大一部分被搞糊涂，这样的态度，这也许解释了为什么要离开这么早。 事实上，这是一些深思和考虑，在连续第二次四川灾区后，中国证明它可以使一些较弱的精神萎缩，有时，一个专制政权可以做的事情比民主更好。 It takes some solid convictions and some understanding of ones own ideals to be able to look at the World without the mould of good and evil.

在任何情况下，毫无疑问 - 西方媒体给了我，否则认为没有理由 - 中国的媒体控制和适度的警察行动的双重方法已在危机中最好的结果。 不用说，这只能作为一个短期公式遏制暴力，更需要从现在开始，要真正解决新疆问题。 更多关于长期解决方案，在未来的职位。

热比娅

我不会在这里浪费时间抹黑热比娅，因为从一开始她抹黑自己。 她提供了她给媒体的信息大部分没有在所有的基础上，和她的一些索赔是如此荒谬的错误，它实际上是让我觉得她是无辜的：有人谁的业务不可能这种恶劣的骗子。 唯一的解释是，她是完全无能。

点击图片为她的最新索赔的一个例子。

最重要的是，热比娅给人的印象，她是绝望的看电视的时间。 她知道她成名的时间是运行结束，她是被迫的地方前所未有的强大的债权，提高各走木桩，吸引累观众。 正如博客Twofish的反映，如果她真的关心新疆的未来，她有可能抓住这个机会发出和平的信息，并尝试连接时，他们遭到了残酷的攻击时，其余的中国，也许赚取的尊重温和派。

但是，如何像热比娅，一个成功的商人，在她的时间这样的人被监禁，然后释放由中国共产党，截至作为事实上的维吾尔人的代表？ 热比娅被称为发挥作用，和她扮演的只是罚款。 这是一个已经写入中国共产党，西方媒体和观众，由美国和非执行董事的作用，是谁资助她。 这个故事写长之前，她到达时，一个很好的证明的情节，与公众，将使每个人都高兴。 这是一遍达赖喇嘛的传奇，和复制粘贴现在的编剧可以放松和享受他们的暑假。

Except, of course, that Rebiya Kadeer is no Dalai Lama, and neither her deeds nor her standing among the Uyghur justifiy any such comparison.

重要的问题

下来，许多人认为关键的问题：是在接触甚至融资安排杀人的极端主义团伙的热比娅，或者是她，我怀疑，在地面上的现实完全无知？ 我不认为我们会不断找出。 很难相信，非执行董事，由美国国会资助的，将赞助与恐怖主义有关联的人，但如果他们没有错，我相信他们会照顾好隐藏所有的证据。

请注意，无论哪种方式，在NED不出来从这个故事很好。 赞助机会主义者的机会为自己的名字，而她冷冷地观察杀害几十的跳跃，是很难在一个国家民主基金会的目标。

但实际上，这是如此重要呢？ 我不这么认为。 热比娅不会持久，她是否有罪与否，花生，非执行董事支付她真的不改变任何东西。 与她住的外籍维吾尔热比娅WUC不可能控制在地面上的一个恐怖组织的运作。 而且，作为一个鼓舞人心的作用，我怀疑它非常多，她 - 一个女子，两次结婚，业务和PC的背景 - 永远年轻的伊斯兰激进分子。 She will most certainly not turn into the new bin Laden.

No, the real questions for China and for the World are others:

W HO真的落后7月5日的杀戮？ 囚犯将如何判断？ 中国共产党未能各族政策如何？ 这种故障是如何喂养一些暴力团伙的基地？ 什么是这些群体与伊斯兰恐怖主义和“基地”组织入党的概率是什么 ？ 为什么中国还没有收到来自伊斯兰主义的一个大规模的攻击尽管在长达一年的维吾尔冲突，只有安理会的国家呢？

最后，要回答所有这些问题的人，都应该在哪里？

*请参阅下面我的意见，这个数字的基础上。