River Elegy is a 6 episode Chinese documentary about the Yellow River in China and the culture behind it filmed in around 1987-1988. It is still available on YouTube but English subtitles are probably not easy to find. I started looking for it after I read something online about how open-minded this documentary is 25 years ago comparing to China these days. I was genuinely shocked when I watched it and I realized there was a time in Chinese history before 4th Jun 1989 that China used to have so much hope.
The narration was the stereotypical communist tone but what it delivered was nothing but. It called for much more social and economical liberty than anything you could imagine broadcasting on any Chinese TV channel now. It correctly identified communism as the obstruction to greater succeed of China and admitted openly that cultural revolution and the "great leap forward" were both big mistakes made by the government. It called for science and conscience in terms of deciding China's future. I could not have said it better.
There are certain things you do need to say about the government to enable a show to be publicly broadcast on CCTV (China's largest national television broadcaster, controlled by the Communist government of course), especially in the 80s not long after Mao's death and the end of cultural revolution. There are a few places in the show where propaganda just seeps through, and not anywhere in the show did they mention the Communist Party is part of the problem (no one would expect them to though being on a government-controlled media). At that stage though, China was really willing to adopt capitalism (well at least the economic aspects), and was ready for a change. It was the Tiamanmen massacre that changed its path for good.
One thing is clear, we have not seen anything like that coming out after the Tiananmen massacre and I don't believe we will as long as China is still controlled by the one and only almighty Communist Party.
Showing posts with label China. Show all posts
Showing posts with label China. Show all posts
Sunday, January 19, 2014
Saturday, February 18, 2012
What Made Me Different
I meant to write this one a week ago but well... Here I am anyway.
I left the Japanese kitchen that I'd been working for almost a year in Central Market, and started my new job as a cellarhand in Clare Valley. When handing me my last payment my boss included a thank you card in the envelope. My boss' wishes were brief and straight forward but his wife gave me a relatively long one, in which she said I was the first Chinese person she met that is reliable and modest when it comes to topics about China.
I was thrilled to be given such a comment, but I wasn't that surprised because I know exactly what sort of Chinese people she's talking about and I've met plenty of them. They are brainwashed going through the Chinese education system that aimed at anti-intelligence and reverse-elimination of elites. I would have been exactly the same had I not come to Australia to study. The thing is, those other Chinese people she's talking about also live in Australia, what do I have that is different?
They did not open their eyes to what the Communist Party hadn't informed them. Although there are no heavy censorship of the internet in Australia (The fact that the government is proposing one enrages me) as in China many of those people are still voluntarily limiting their internet experience to what they were used to offered back in China, using the Chinese mimic of Facebook, Twitter etc instead of the real thing. I was like that for the first few months being in Australia, reading news from Xinhua instead of Reuters and other trustworthy news outlets.
But then I accidentally discovered a Chinese forum rxhj.net, which were set up by overseas Chinese who are extremely hateful towards China, Chinese people and the Chinese government. They hated the brainwashing education and came to realize it after going overseas and they set it up to tell the truth, reverse the brainwash process and try to educate people to adapt to a conservative Western life, they discuss current Chinese events on the forum but in a very different perspective than the official news outlets in China. I was pretty angry the first few times when I read about what they were saying, but I was also extremely curious so it started to become a daily task for me to check on there for new posts and see what they have to say about things. I started comparing their version of the story to what was told on Xinhua just to see how different people interpret or how they lie about an event, using my conscience instead of what I was told when it comes to judging. And gradually I dropped Xinhua as a source for news, and when it showed up on google I try to avoid clicking it. I realized I have been living in a big fat lie for such a long time, and all the Communist Party cares about is stupefying its citizens so no one voices up against its dictatorship. The result is immensely arrogant and greedy creatures that is not fit to be called human, and there are 1.5 billion of them. They do not have morals, they scream out their patriotism towards China whenever they can and they claim you being racist when you have anything against their views. It is until you got rid of every bit of "Chinaness" in you that you are reborn to be human.
Now I am living a China-free-wherever-possible life, simply to survive. Chinese people put toxins in infant formulas and heavy metal in toys, they produce vaccines that kill, cars that guarantee death during a collision and online chat clients that scan your computer for 'suspicious' files and report them secretly to the National Security. How could I trust anything Chinese? There are genuine and good quality 'made in China' goods out there but for now they have lost my trust completely and wherever there is a possible alternative to Chinese made goods I will go for it and I am willing to pay more for the quality and trust. I use English operation systems on my computers and avoid any Chinese software running on it as much as possible and I pay for German antivirus software instead of Chinese ones which themselves are like viruses. I buy Chinese books published in Hong Kong or Taiwan instead of the mainland. I own a $10 Swiss made potato peeler and a pair of $20 made in USA scissors (as opposed to Chinese made $1 peeler and $2 scissors), I am proud of them and they have never let me down. Anyone that got to use them have expressed surprise of how good a potato peeler can be. What I told them was that they are always supposed to be that good but the Chinese just never made it that good. People that fell for cheap Chinese made goods had severely cut back their quality of life.
My attitude towards things had also changed over time, I will focus more on human life above anything. For example historic events such as the Big Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution, Chinese people are too used to avoid the damage these events had done to them and only call them minor mistakes made by Mao Zedong that should not harm his glorious reputation. The fact is during the 28 year regime of Mao, which is a period of peace instead of war, more people died than the sum of casualty of the two World Wars. It is rightful to say Mao is eviller than Hitler.
I feel there are things here that I could expand further but I think I might do it later.
I left the Japanese kitchen that I'd been working for almost a year in Central Market, and started my new job as a cellarhand in Clare Valley. When handing me my last payment my boss included a thank you card in the envelope. My boss' wishes were brief and straight forward but his wife gave me a relatively long one, in which she said I was the first Chinese person she met that is reliable and modest when it comes to topics about China.
I was thrilled to be given such a comment, but I wasn't that surprised because I know exactly what sort of Chinese people she's talking about and I've met plenty of them. They are brainwashed going through the Chinese education system that aimed at anti-intelligence and reverse-elimination of elites. I would have been exactly the same had I not come to Australia to study. The thing is, those other Chinese people she's talking about also live in Australia, what do I have that is different?
They did not open their eyes to what the Communist Party hadn't informed them. Although there are no heavy censorship of the internet in Australia (The fact that the government is proposing one enrages me) as in China many of those people are still voluntarily limiting their internet experience to what they were used to offered back in China, using the Chinese mimic of Facebook, Twitter etc instead of the real thing. I was like that for the first few months being in Australia, reading news from Xinhua instead of Reuters and other trustworthy news outlets.
But then I accidentally discovered a Chinese forum rxhj.net, which were set up by overseas Chinese who are extremely hateful towards China, Chinese people and the Chinese government. They hated the brainwashing education and came to realize it after going overseas and they set it up to tell the truth, reverse the brainwash process and try to educate people to adapt to a conservative Western life, they discuss current Chinese events on the forum but in a very different perspective than the official news outlets in China. I was pretty angry the first few times when I read about what they were saying, but I was also extremely curious so it started to become a daily task for me to check on there for new posts and see what they have to say about things. I started comparing their version of the story to what was told on Xinhua just to see how different people interpret or how they lie about an event, using my conscience instead of what I was told when it comes to judging. And gradually I dropped Xinhua as a source for news, and when it showed up on google I try to avoid clicking it. I realized I have been living in a big fat lie for such a long time, and all the Communist Party cares about is stupefying its citizens so no one voices up against its dictatorship. The result is immensely arrogant and greedy creatures that is not fit to be called human, and there are 1.5 billion of them. They do not have morals, they scream out their patriotism towards China whenever they can and they claim you being racist when you have anything against their views. It is until you got rid of every bit of "Chinaness" in you that you are reborn to be human.
Now I am living a China-free-wherever-possible life, simply to survive. Chinese people put toxins in infant formulas and heavy metal in toys, they produce vaccines that kill, cars that guarantee death during a collision and online chat clients that scan your computer for 'suspicious' files and report them secretly to the National Security. How could I trust anything Chinese? There are genuine and good quality 'made in China' goods out there but for now they have lost my trust completely and wherever there is a possible alternative to Chinese made goods I will go for it and I am willing to pay more for the quality and trust. I use English operation systems on my computers and avoid any Chinese software running on it as much as possible and I pay for German antivirus software instead of Chinese ones which themselves are like viruses. I buy Chinese books published in Hong Kong or Taiwan instead of the mainland. I own a $10 Swiss made potato peeler and a pair of $20 made in USA scissors (as opposed to Chinese made $1 peeler and $2 scissors), I am proud of them and they have never let me down. Anyone that got to use them have expressed surprise of how good a potato peeler can be. What I told them was that they are always supposed to be that good but the Chinese just never made it that good. People that fell for cheap Chinese made goods had severely cut back their quality of life.
My attitude towards things had also changed over time, I will focus more on human life above anything. For example historic events such as the Big Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution, Chinese people are too used to avoid the damage these events had done to them and only call them minor mistakes made by Mao Zedong that should not harm his glorious reputation. The fact is during the 28 year regime of Mao, which is a period of peace instead of war, more people died than the sum of casualty of the two World Wars. It is rightful to say Mao is eviller than Hitler.
I feel there are things here that I could expand further but I think I might do it later.
Saturday, February 26, 2011
Are You Happy?
70% of university graduates are unemployed a year after graduation.
There is no trust amongst people. But it's fair enough because no one is trust-worthy in this country anyway.
People in the countryside were excluded from the unemployment figure, which would have been pentupled.
People are forced to abort and be sterilized when they are 'reproducing outside of the plan'. People volunteer to take abortion when they know it is a girl.
50 million men would never find a wife because there was 50 million less women in the country than men. This situation is worsening.
Free publishing, political party forming, rallying and speech are constitutional but illegal.
Laws are only there to be broken.
Youtube, Wikipedia, Facebook and Twitter are non-accessible without superior internet techniques to go pass the great firewall. However, similar (pirated) websites of perverted control under the government had been popular.
The most popular IM service watches every single word you type and searches your computer for any signs of political material.
Domestic antivirus services leave back doors and Trojan horses for government to access the computer while deleting political materials.
In an effort of establishing a 'harmonic society' any voice different from the party is muted, any people to try to protect their own rights are jailed or hospitalized as 'psycho'.
There has actually been a significant population of professional petitioners in the capital who were treated inhumanely both in the capital and in their hometown. They are professional beggars begging for their justice, but usually got chased around and beaten up by police.
People are able to vote for their local government, although all candidates are from the same political party.
Many in big cities could not afford one square metre of an apartment with their annual salary, while public servants took 90% of public housing on a 6-digit monthly salary plus countless benefits.
House prices are skyrocketing while large real estate developers buys up land like crazy and not really building on it, which only pushes the house prices even higher.
People were forced to relocate from 20-year-old buildings, given around 10% of what their property is worth to have their houses demolished and rebuilt and sold for 10 times the price, only to be demolished again in 20 years.
Despite the high price of property, people who bought a house does not own it, instead, the government will have it back after 70 years.
Health insurance of any kind is non-existent, while a cold could cost people a third of their monthly salary to be cured.
Expensive and non-relevant medical checks are always prescribed.
Even medications could be fake.
Food prices went up 300% in the past 5 years, while people's income barely ever increased.
Food is poison. Seafood treated with formalin, nuts and dry mushrooms with sulphur, cured meat with artificial colouring and extreme level of nitrous, milk with urea, grains with mineral oil...
Over 5 million people were forced to relocate in order to build a dam.
In some cities air pollution is undetectable because it is way over the range of measuring devices.
Less than 4% of the state budget was directed to education, while more than 30% was used to keep the government functioning.
Education is brainwashing. People are educated to lie, the higher education they receive the better liar they are.
40 million of mainly agricultural poplation starved to death during the years 1958-1961, not because they did not have food but because they lied about the productivity which leaded to taxation of their whole production.
While bragging about its minors policy, the minors are forced to abandon their languages, religious beliefs, cultural traditions and land or livestock they live on. Majority immigrants flooded their land, stole the natural resources and threatened their very existence.
The party in power knows precisely that what its name implies would never happen, but its members and non-members believed it and trusted the party will lead them there.
People believe a higher degree of authority will give them justice when they think they are wronged. When they found out even the highest authority in the country would not give them justice, they went for the United Nations for help.
Governments cover whatever they have done wrong, and every public servant covers for each other.
Corruption is the norm and bribery is mandatory.
Are you really happy with your life there?
There is no trust amongst people. But it's fair enough because no one is trust-worthy in this country anyway.
People in the countryside were excluded from the unemployment figure, which would have been pentupled.
People are forced to abort and be sterilized when they are 'reproducing outside of the plan'. People volunteer to take abortion when they know it is a girl.
50 million men would never find a wife because there was 50 million less women in the country than men. This situation is worsening.
Free publishing, political party forming, rallying and speech are constitutional but illegal.
Laws are only there to be broken.
Youtube, Wikipedia, Facebook and Twitter are non-accessible without superior internet techniques to go pass the great firewall. However, similar (pirated) websites of perverted control under the government had been popular.
The most popular IM service watches every single word you type and searches your computer for any signs of political material.
Domestic antivirus services leave back doors and Trojan horses for government to access the computer while deleting political materials.
In an effort of establishing a 'harmonic society' any voice different from the party is muted, any people to try to protect their own rights are jailed or hospitalized as 'psycho'.
There has actually been a significant population of professional petitioners in the capital who were treated inhumanely both in the capital and in their hometown. They are professional beggars begging for their justice, but usually got chased around and beaten up by police.
People are able to vote for their local government, although all candidates are from the same political party.
Many in big cities could not afford one square metre of an apartment with their annual salary, while public servants took 90% of public housing on a 6-digit monthly salary plus countless benefits.
House prices are skyrocketing while large real estate developers buys up land like crazy and not really building on it, which only pushes the house prices even higher.
People were forced to relocate from 20-year-old buildings, given around 10% of what their property is worth to have their houses demolished and rebuilt and sold for 10 times the price, only to be demolished again in 20 years.
Despite the high price of property, people who bought a house does not own it, instead, the government will have it back after 70 years.
Health insurance of any kind is non-existent, while a cold could cost people a third of their monthly salary to be cured.
Expensive and non-relevant medical checks are always prescribed.
Even medications could be fake.
Food prices went up 300% in the past 5 years, while people's income barely ever increased.
Food is poison. Seafood treated with formalin, nuts and dry mushrooms with sulphur, cured meat with artificial colouring and extreme level of nitrous, milk with urea, grains with mineral oil...
Over 5 million people were forced to relocate in order to build a dam.
In some cities air pollution is undetectable because it is way over the range of measuring devices.
Less than 4% of the state budget was directed to education, while more than 30% was used to keep the government functioning.
Education is brainwashing. People are educated to lie, the higher education they receive the better liar they are.
40 million of mainly agricultural poplation starved to death during the years 1958-1961, not because they did not have food but because they lied about the productivity which leaded to taxation of their whole production.
While bragging about its minors policy, the minors are forced to abandon their languages, religious beliefs, cultural traditions and land or livestock they live on. Majority immigrants flooded their land, stole the natural resources and threatened their very existence.
The party in power knows precisely that what its name implies would never happen, but its members and non-members believed it and trusted the party will lead them there.
People believe a higher degree of authority will give them justice when they think they are wronged. When they found out even the highest authority in the country would not give them justice, they went for the United Nations for help.
Governments cover whatever they have done wrong, and every public servant covers for each other.
Corruption is the norm and bribery is mandatory.
Are you really happy with your life there?
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