CONTRADICTION: Gaining face by losing it

You'll often hear, on getting to China on business, that drinking culture here is a bit different. As it's put by some: "it's good to puke." Overindulging at a client dinner shows new friends that you are willing to hold nothing back in dealing with them, that you're "letting it all hang out" and are able to let them "have something on you." In other words, by losing face, you gain friendship and can form guanxi.

I have been getting back into basketball these days. The realtor who is trying to sell the apartment I'm living in (for my landlord, not for me) was adamant that I come to the 6:30am game in Taiyanggoing park, down the street, to hang out and 锻炼身体, "work out, exercise your body"--and to help them practice their English, which I'm happy to do. When I first got to China, I played basketball on the college campus where I worked. I certainly got worked out. Inspired by the moves of Russell Westbrook and Kobe Bryant, and generally with no previous formal coaching, recreational Chinese ballplayers have an out-of-control style that led to my having no less than 3 bloody noses and a handful of bruises my first month on the court. This danger was exacerbated by the fact that I myself am totally out of control and am still trying as hard as I was in 7th grade to move gracefully walking down a sidewalk much less driving down the lane. In an effort to reinvigorate my spoken Chinese, get a workout, and have some fun, I decided to give basketball in China another shot and join the daily game down at the park. I've gone twice now, and while I've not shared some baijiu with the fellas (yet), I've built up a respectful, friendly relationship with some of them.

Today, setting up shop down in the post, I was being d'ed up by one of the bigger guys--one with a Fresh Prince-style flattop hairdo that generally is associated with military types, according to the dictionary of Chinese hairdos. The dude is actually way nicer than his hair would let on, and we were playing each other with the right kind of competitiveness, contesting shots cleanly and playing pretty closely. At this particular moment, gassed after about 20 minutes running around a half-court, I pushed off with my back to gain some separation for a turnaround, and nothing was there. I stumbled into the air and did a backwards somersault on the concrete, as I went down hearing the rising "oooooOOHH" of the guys on the court and the dudes playing pingpong next door. Just total amateur hour. After popping up with a smile--unhurt, but with my 面子 mianzi, or "face," flung out the window and screaming as it fell to the ground--I was helped up and high-fived as I jumped back on the court. After the game, chatting amiably, it felt genuinely friendly, like a gap had been bridged. I had "gracefully" embarrassed myself, let it all hang out, but shown myself capable of having a good time. In the West or in China, that's what life is all about, isn't it?

The Congo and China

Just watched an episode of Anthony Bourdain's Parts Unknown which touched on a connection that is shared, in my mind, between China and the Congo in the way both places are perceived by the world outside.

An eastern Congo city on the shore of Lake Kivu is the launch point for Bourdain's run to the Congo River, a part of the world brought into memory for many westerners through Joseph Conrad's The Heart of Darkness. The city of Goma, it is described by Bourdain's fixers, could be seen as a stand-in representative of the Congo's larger situation; surrounded by at least 8 different tribal militias battling for influence, everything from levels of danger to the availability of food and water fluctuate wildly from day to day, hour to hour. The culture is amazing, to Bourdain's main interest the food and people are amazing, but the Congo as it exists now can simply not sustain any type of sustained media attention--it's too crazy, it's by turns stable and unstable, the situation is too complicated. As a documentary filmmaker on the show describes, "you can't fit the Congo into 3 sentences on a nightly newscast."

I'm not the first person to note that China is best conceived--can only be conceived--by casual observers, journalists, policymakers, or anyone else by allowing for a tremendous amount of cognitive dissonance, for the existence simultaneously of contradictory information leading to contradictory conclusions. The "contradictions" thread on this blog is dedicated to fleshing out some examples. China is organized and built up in a way that, from the images I saw just now, is lightyears ahead of the Congo. It's problems, however, are well-documented, and its situation--political, economic, social--is just so incredibly complex. It is a place that cannot fit into 3 sentences on a nightly newscast, yet because of its rising importance this is what we try to do many evenings on CNN, NBC, ABC, and FOX News. It is a place that is convenient for western news outlets as it accommodates so many different 3 sentence wrap-ups, each of which can be substantiated in some way--made to mean something by different people, for different watchers, to different ends.

So what to do? Give up on understanding these places? Unlike the Congo, China at least has the benefit of rising clout as a growing global power. There are lots of economic and other incentives for everything from people-to-people exchanges to foreign investments that will continue to build greater understanding over the near term. Congo, to this point, has had no such luck. An interesting comparison: urban Chinese routinely lament the horrors of traveling home by train each Chinese New Year. The trains are packed, there's barely space to move, and tickets are difficult to get. One of the most heartbreaking parts of the Bourdain's program is when they visit an old Congolese railway station that used to be the hub of a route that went all around the country and then all the way down to South Africa. Now, there's no more locomotives, and no train transportation across the city, much less the country. At least in China, there are trains that exist that can be crowded in the first place. Appropriately, Bourdain ends the show describing the hope of the Congolese people in the face of a very uncertain future.

CONTRADICTION: Urban and rural

In a courtyard garden hidden between new-built art deco skyscrapers, a group of 3 old women sit on a concrete abutment screaming at each other. If you were standing on the other side of the 10-foot wall forming the other side of the yard, you wouldn't be able to see the ladies, but you could certainly hear them, and might wonder when the cops would be called to break up a fight. But there are smiles all around. One lady with short, permy gray hair makes an amazingly quick move that seems decades younger than her years, shoving her conversation partner forcefully. Nearly tumbling off her seat, her buddy regains herself and takes a swing back at the perpetrator.

There is a timelessness about the exchange: people enjoying each others' company, gossiping, soaking in sunlight which does get through the clouds sometimes here in Beijing. This is a scene that has happened every day in China all over the place, for thousands of years. Surrounded by supermarkets, malls, movie theaters, and Starbucks, it seems that most people--especially older folks and families--keep some kind of routine that feels like it has been ingrained here since antiquity. Sitting under a tree together, chatting in the park. Taking a stroll around the block after dinner. Practicing taiqi in the courtyard, late at night once the city is calm. As many Ferraris, Bugattis, and Rolls Royces as you see stteaming down the avenues, it cannot take away from the undercurrent you get than this place is so, so old, with ways of doing things as ancient as the Wall.

A friend visited here some time ago, it was his first trip ever to mainland China. I asked him what was his strongest impression, just several hours after getting off the plane. Despite all the KFCs, McDonalds, luxury brands, and news reports about China's economic explosion, the proximity people maintained to a rural way of living is immediately palpable. "Not just the way people dress, but the way people walk, the way the look at one another.." Like you're in the middle of a village in the midst of a city. There are downsides, but in Beijing there's a village's warmth and a rawness, a realness to the lifestyle here that you simply don't get in the developing world.

CONTRADICTION: Weather

This is what Beijing looks like today--65F, sunny, pm2.5 of 76... first official t-shirt day of 2014. You can visibly see the spring in people's step walking down the street. I've read about the phenomenon, in Russia, when the winter breaks and "white nights" set in, how folks get almost hysterically happy that the cold and wind has kicked out for at least a little while. This is the best time of year in Beijing, aside from the couple weeks in September/October when the summer breaks and its cool with a bit less wind. The restaurants are breaking out the tables to let diners sit outside on the sidewalk, the 串儿 vendors are moving their grills outside too. Nothing better than Chinese dining al fresco.

CONTRADICTION: iPhone dominoes

China is a developing country. Hundreds of millions of people here live in rural poverty with limited access to basic necessities.

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http://bit.ly/1j88jmi

What is as crazy as spending all that money on all those phones is then posting it online with a "Happy Holidays" greeting expecting... what response? Why the choice of English? Easier to domino than Chinese characters?

CONTRADICTION: Foreigner feelings

Dudes in Chinese gyms go pretty hard, but none go harder than the oldest guys. It's literally the 60-70 year old bracket that I see constantly pushing sets to failure, sweating their brains out, and really letting out some noise when pushing out their reps. Oddly, when lifting weights, there is little or no spotting (I've often considered why: face? concerns about manliness? just unaware of the practice? there are coaches walking around the gym but don't seem to help out unless they are getting paid for 1-on-1 training). I needed a spot and called her over to help me in case I was going to drop the bar on my head. As I was doing the set and giving some instruction, a couple of guys who were there working out together were looking on, seeing what this spotting thing was all about. It seemed like having a girl being the one giving the spot was of special interest. Although they had been working out for a half-hour on the bench press and other exercises, neither one of them had been watching out for the other; right after we were done, they waited for us to walk away to change weights and gave spotting a try. Within a half-hour, I saw 3 other sets of people helping themselves with spots on other benches.

It's cool and fun to see this kind of knowledge dispersed in real time. I don't know if "knowledge dispersal" is even the right term. Maybe these dudes already knew about spotting, and seeing two foreign people do it gave it the imprimateur of, "OK, I guess this spotting idea is legit" or "oh, that's how you spot someone." You take for granted the Phys Ed classes in middle school where most American kids learn about this stuff, about how to lead not only a healthy lifestyle but also how to exercise properly and effectively. China is developing so fast, and the involvement of foreigners isn't important just for building English skills, taking international technology, or the other stuff you see in the news. There are just so many "best practices" in so many areas of life in China where there is room for sharing--for education and exchange. And there is a genuine respect, appreciation, excitement among folks here to learn more about other cultures.

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It is often observed that there is not a lot of love lost between China and Japan. Politically, right now the two countries are at odds over a number of issues: Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands, Japan's prime minister visiting WWII shrines commemorating war criminals. On an individual basis, people are people, and many locals I know have great friendships with Japanese expats here in Beijing. I think there is a difference between urban China and rural China, where less exposure to foreigners as real people means that people are more susceptible to influence from movies and TV. And Chinese CCTV certainly does not help to quell any negative feelings. From Murong Xuecun in NYT yesterday:

The state prohibits content that “incites ethnic hatred,” yet according to Southern Weekly more than 70 anti-Japanese TV series were screened in China in 2012. And in March 2013 the newspaper reported that 48 anti-Japanese-themed TV series were being shot simultaneously in Hengdian World Studios, a film studio in Zhejiang Province, in eastern China.

There is no doubt that anti-foreign nationalism is a key component of how the CCP has chosen to define Chineseness--which is weird, given the myriad ways Chinese people I see in Beijing both respect and seek out foreigners as friends, sometimes primarily for practical purposes like English learning, but many times simply because they're curious. That the government has chosen to define a group of people not for what they are, but for what they are not--"we are not Japan, we are not the West"--leads to the confusion behind what Jonathan Spence calls "the search for modern China." Negative definitions of things don't really lend any clarity to a thing's true nature. It's kind of like Boston Red Sox culture--there is none. The Yankees all shave? We'll have handlebar mustaches. They're elitist snobs? Red Sox are dudes of the people. It's not "Red Sox culture," it's "not-Yankees culture." As China culturally and politically regains some confidence lost during the "100 years of humiliation," it will be interesting to see if so much anti-foreign nationalism remains in politics.

CONTRADICTION: Manners

Confucian codes or morals and behavior are stringent on the way one is supposed to treat foreigners. I was part of Beijing-based event recently whose motto, "不亦乐乎," is based on the Confucian phrase, "有朋子远方来，不亦乐乎" translating as something like, "isn't it a pleasure when friends visit from afar." As I see it, this is interpreted by most Chinese as seriously rolling out the red carpet when they have visitors: whether it's a foreigner from outside China, or a distant family member or traveler passing through, it's not uncommon to see someone give up their own bed and sleep on the floor while you get to crash in the most comfy place available. Once you've entered into a relationship with someone--be it in business as a client, as a guest, as a friend--there are these very intricate, highly developed rituals of how you're supposed to defer to, give way to, and help out one another.

Lacking any kind of relationship with someone, however, seems to make these rituals and cultural prescriptions moot. On sidewalks, on subways, in other public places, some people display what appears to a foreigner as a frightening lack of consideration for strangers. As Hilary Spurling quotes of Pearl S. Buck, "the Chinese can appear to be thoughtful in big ways, but not as thoughtful in smaller ways." People spit while walking in front of you, jostle you sometimes necessarily sometimes not necessarily in getting on and off the subway, parents sometimes let infant children crap and pee right on the sidewalk, or even inside public areas. I emphasize some people, as increasingly cosmopolitan Beijingers are starting to scoff more and more at this stuff, but it's still pervasive enough that it will be one of the most striking things most notice about China as new arrivals. I couldn't believe, in trying to get on the elevator a moment ago, an elderly man made eye contact with me as I was inputting the door code in the lobby, then as I was coming through the door the elevator was already closed and going up. At the end of the day, none of these little annoyances are a big deal individually, but they compile to produce an everything-stinks "China day" every once in a while.

CONTRADICTION: Haves and Have Nots

When you drive out of downtown Beijing, before you're outside of the 6th Ring Road you begin to pass through villages where you can see the development of recent years has not yet come to pass. Storefronts vary between brick or concrete blocks to tin-roofed shanties selling groceries and mobile phone charge cards, and everything is surrounded by farm fields. The people here aren't destitute, but they are generally the part of Beijing making less than the city average of about 5,000 RMB (~$800 USD) a month--probably much less.

And then there's the haves. Grabbing lunch just now at 7-Eleven the guy behind me asked for a box of condoms from behind the cashier. Not a totally uncommon request, but it was asked in a kind of brazen way that's uncommon with locals here. He was wearing a baseball hat, common for Korean folks especially and Wangjing, but more and more for internationally-inclined Chinese locals as well. Walking outside I was impressed to see him driving away in an Bentley with no license plates--a sure sign of government connections, which I guess is ubiquitous for most rich folks here.

It comes up quite often in staff discussions, how unfair it must seem that foreigners make such high salaries for jobs like English teaching in comparison to Chinese white-collar workers doing work of equal or more difficulty and making fractions of foreigner pay. Then again, you see locals driving around in Bentleys and begin to see that the have-nots here are just surrounded by what must appear like ridiculous opulence at times, and there's not a whole lot to do about it.

We had an employee post a very damaging message yesterday on our company microblog site that gets circulated to all of our clients. It was known for a while that he wasn't happy with his pay, though he was being reimbursed at market with relatively decent working conditions. To be honest, can you really blame young Chinese professionals for the resentment they must harbor against all the riches they see around them? Thinking about it more, this is the same vein that Mao must have tapped into in inspiring popular support for the Communist revolt.

CONTRADICTION: Savings and Waste

The Chinese really know how to save. Pre-2007, when the savings rate in the UK averaged a slight negative percentage of earnings, the Chinese were saving 30% of each paycheck. Day to day you can see the incredible pragmatism of the people here in the ways they come up with to make money. Your local newspaper stand owner will generally also be able to fix your leather shoes and copy your housekey. Retirees drive around three-wheeled tricycles covered in recyclable styrofoam, cardboard, and metal that they exchange at the local dump for cents per kilogram. Waste is hard to find, as most of the time waste materials mean some kind of opportunity to someone else.

The blogosphere has been erupting recently about waste, however, in the form of food waste at restaurant banquets. When eating at home with their immediate family, even monied folks will eat a balanced meal consisting of simple stuff like rice, a couple meat dishes, and some vegetables. During business meetings, holidays, and special events, most locals celebrate by heading out to a restaurant, where they sit around a large table and order a ton of dishes, usually way more than could be eaten by double the amount of people sitting at the table. Between wanting to provide a show of genuine hospitality, and the high minimum fees required by restaurants booking rooms popular for private meals, almost anyone who's spent a significant amount of time here has been privy to scenes of waitresses dumping out handfuls of uneaten food into garbage cans after a Spring Festival bash. Recently, Xi Jinping came out with an "internal memo" made public about disgust with the practice. We'll see how much that changes things, and how quickly.

CONTRADICTION: "Police state" and "lawlessness"

The grand bargain made between China's leaders and the guy on the street goes something like: "The big guys assure steady economic growth, and in return you agree not to rock the boat." Sounds surprisingly similar to the Emperor's rule by the Mandate of Heaven back in the day, no? Another key component of the bargain involves assurance of stability in the form of an expansive security presence, from police to plainclothes cops to the People's Liberation Army officers to the young guy in the guardhouse at our front gate. To live in China is to be surveyed, watched, kept tabs on. If you cross a certain line, particularly the line of trying actively to involve Chinese citizens in some kind of mobbish political behavior, or group people together for an event of any purpose, you run a risk of activating this surveillance force. This is how folks "get disappeared" (Chinese folks mostly, as the international outcry if this was to happen to a foreigner would add to the massive PR problem China has already).

There is, on the other hand, kinds of lawlessness here that are startling to Westerners. To drive in Beijing, or even to be driven in a cab or bus here, is to feel a fear possible only in the midst of total chaos. Recent government transition has led to recent enforcement of several traffic laws, but in general, lane lines and street lights are interpretive, backing up on a busy highway to get to the exit ramp you missed is a frequent occurrence, accidents happen all the time.

More recently, at a pond hockey tournament on Houhai Lake this weekend, the organizers overlooked the need for a good, accessible bathroom for use by the players slamming copious amounts of Heineken over the course of the day. Eventually, the guys started pissing through a chain-linked fence bordering the hockey rink area, directly onto the ice being overseen from shore by hundreds of tourists. In a place where infant children routinely crap on the sidewalk, unable or unwilling to wait until the nearest public bathroom, and with parents who are remiss to throw money away on diapers, this must not have seemed like too much of a big deal to onlookers--at least the Chinese ones.

CONTRADICTION: "Modest" and "Proud"

In trying to express to students in class that they deserve to be proud of the good work they accomplish, I received some unexpected pushback. "Chinese people are very modest," or so I've heard from several friends in expressing how the quiet and reserved nature of Chinese folks when it comes to receiving compliments puts this feature on display.

That said, there is no doubt that Chinese folks are in many ways a very prideful people, no more so than when it comes to pride in history and culture--with good reason. Five thousand years of cultureal development (albeit a development fraught with fits and starts), with one of the world's oldest continuously-existing language systems, with a capital city spotted with ancient temples and alleyways winding among modern skyscrapers... I'm proud to be a Beijinger and I'm not even Chinese! On a personal rather than societal level, the self-effacement that comes in receiving compliments has its reciprocal: loss of face in instances of embarrassment. The nervous smiles that one sees accompanying people here when they do something as simple as drop a chopstick on a restaurant floor, or stand out for having done something minimally foolish or silly, displays a discomfort that makes even the observer squirm sometimes. This nervousness about appearances associated with maintaining face, to me, reveals something about an individual pride that seems to revolve around maintaining a "harmonious" appearance and lifestyle with people and things around you.

With that said, people here go about living incredibly stressful lives in the context of a confusing and developing city and society with an ease and grace that astounds me. Everyone here is bound by a sense that life in China is very difficult; I guess expats sometimes forget that they are not the only ones getting screwed by the system and annoyed by the crowds. It's amazing that most Chinese folks, most of the time, bear this burden with a Zen-like unflappableness that I'm still trying to approach. I believe this "unflappability" comes from a healthy lack of egotism, a kind of modesty: "I am not the center of the world, and I have to accept that there are things that are out of my control, do what I can, and move on. If I don't, I'm gonna drive myself and everyone else nuts." The Western sense of individual empowerment and agency doesn't help expats in China very much in these stressful instances, because ego usually enters into things: "I am being inconvenienced. The system is screwing me."

CONTRADICTION: "Developed" and "Developing"

This is the first in a series of posts I would like to write on how China is constituted by an enormous number of contradictions; it's a primary quality of the flux of this place, and one of the country's most interesting features. Let's begin would be with one of the centralmost points: China as both a developed and developing country.

The Beijing transportation authorities have just completed a subway line running underneath the entirety of the 3rd Ring Road. It's fast, clean, efficient... only time will tell how good the engineering really is, but for now it seems great. The CCTV Tower in Guomao, the so-called "pants building," is one of the most interesting architectural achievements I've ever seen. Terminal 3 at Beijing Capital airport is equally spectacular. Jinbao Jie boasts the Hong Kong Jockey Club and a Lamborghini dealership. All around you, there are constructed reminders of how Beijing has arrived as a global cosmopolitan center.

I am greeted every morning here by the crowing of a rooster outside my apartment building. I live in a typical apartment block, surrounded by other high-rises, malls, Starbucks and McDonald's. But the shop where I get my motorbike repaired still has a resident chicken from which the bike shop owner's family collects eggs for breakfast. The owner himself owns a clutch of finches, which he trains as what I think looks like carrier pigeons, to fly away and come back to him as he wills it. A good friend who visited Beijing last year observed how, despite all the modern trappings, the biggest first impression he received upon seeing the people in Beijing is the very slight remove everyone has from the rhythms and movements of a rural, agricultural lifestyle: shopping daily for fresh produce, chatting loudly to one another as if there was no one else around to hear, stolling carelessly on crowded city streets, spitting and bathroom breaks in public, extreme warmth and hospitality shown to foreign guests, a dedication to ancient medicines and practices. As built-up as Beijing may get, the countryside is never far away.