A Voyage in the East

Today we had the most interesting lecture so far: Foreign Investment Law. Our lecturer was one of the real movers and shakers in China - a senior partner with Jones Day - one of the world's largest law firms. The guy spent a large part of the class telling us interesting stories from some of the biggest deals being done by foreign firms here. The guy is ubber articulate in 4 languages, has law degrees from USA and France, grew up in Hong Kong, has practiced law all over the world.
When we came to talking about Foreign Direct Investment, he presented us with a graph. He told us to look at the years 1989 and 1990. He took a nervous glance outside the classroom. This is a time frame that is to say the least sensitive in China and I won't be talking about it more, but you know what I am talking about, if you know anything about China. His point: Foreign Direct Investment INCREASED between 1989 and 1990, from $56 billion to $66 billion.
It has gone up a lot in recent years, in 2002, it stood at $848 billion. This is because in 1992 Deng went down to Shanghai and told the city to open up. He then went to other provinces in the South and told them to do the same. Shanghai has taken off like a rocket. Next Monday, I will see for myself how far the rocket has soared.

I have come to believe that Edmonton and Beijing have a lot in common. The most famous culinary delight from Beijing is Peking Duck. It is fried duck, served in a roll, with delicious, sweet and sour sauce. It is absolutely fantastic and Beijing feast on it when they are celebrating a special occasion. This brings me to my analogy with Edmonton. In Edmonton we also enjoy feasting on Duck, although these Ducks used to be Mighty and are owned by Disney Corporation. After deep frying the Ducks in 5, the people of Edmonton spill out onto the Blue Mile to celebrate.

OILERS ALL THE WAY BABY!

I have 6 days left in Beijing. This afternoon I will be braving the throngs at the Beijing Train Station to get my grubby paws on an overnight hard sleeper ticket to Shanghai. From Shanghai, I will be taking a 46 hour train trip to Yunnan. For there I will be travelling south to Thailand. I think that I shall fly. I think that I am going to not go to India (it is freaking hot there at this time of year and incredibly rainy.) I think that I'd prefer to hang out in Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Malaysia (truly Asia). There are more backpackers in that part of the world and therefore more fun, interesting people to meet. I kind of want to take it slow so I can read, write and drink.

Currently, I am sitting in an internet cafe near my hotel. Whiny Chinese love songs are playing in the background. Yesterday, I went for a walk in the park with some friends. We saw the best sign ever, "flowers and trees are living things, please love them." True dat! I'm tired today. Jimen Hotel apparently has a bit of a reputation for being seedy. I was phoned twice in the middle of the night to ask if my roommate and I wanted "massageee." Then my roommate came stumbling in piss drunk and decided that it would be funny to wake me up. He he! Very funny!

The other night a bunch of us went out for Sichuan food. Sichuan food is spicier and has more diversity than food in Beijing. We let James do the ordering. One of the dishes looked a lot like chicken. I dove in. I decided that it didn't taste quite like chicken so I decided to ask the server what it was. The response: frog. I laughed but continued to eat the meal. We should eat frog in North America. The second dish just looked wrong. We were immediately turned off when we noticed the holes where the eyes were and the teeth. I looked at it for a minute and decided that it would just be wrong for me to eat it. I ordered some more rice.

Today I had a lesson in how honest most Chinese people are, and how stupid we barbarians (the literal Chinese translation for foreigner) are. I desperately needed to buy a bottle of water. I went into a small shop next to my hotel and requested a bottle of water. The lady said the numbers, but I, being an ignorant fool who hasn't learned much Mandarin, didn't understand. She had a telephone and entered the number 1 and 5. I thought she was wanting to charge me 15 yuan, about $2. I said, no way, and began the bargaining process and offered her 4 yuan, which is a little steep, but a reasonable price. She got upset and pulled out money. She communicated that she wanted 1.5 yuan, about 25 cents. Talk about honest, if I were her, I would have said, "okay you dumb barbarian, I will take 4 yuan for your stupid bottle of water." But she didn't.

The other day we had a lecture on Chinese Intellectual Property Law. The message was that China takes intellectual property seriously and is developing a legal system to protect it.

Today, I tried to visit Mao's Mausoleum (the Lonely Planet had the wrong info, it was closed) which is right across the street from the People's Congress, the seat of national government.

A guy approached me and offered to sell me a fake rolex. I have a great picture of my friend Mike negotiating with the guy with Mao's tomb and Tian'anmen Square in the background. After an unsuccessful negotiation (the guy wasn't the shrewdest business man ever) we were hungry and decided to have some fries at McDonald's and look out the window at beautiful view of Mao's tomb.

I have to admit to not being there, but yesterday's lecture was apparently the most stirring, thought provoking, and challenging lecture ever given by a university professor in the history of academia. The prof, who couldn't speak English or French, read the Chinese Labor Act section-by-section.
Today's prof was not much better, he had such a strong accent and mangled sentence structure that many of us thought that he was talking about the agonies of going to the dentist.

So I was walking down the road in Xi'an's Muslim Quarter on Tuesday with Alison and James. We noticed a chicken crossing the road and a man throwing water at it. We wondered why.

The realization by China's leaders that China is in, and will be for a very long time, the first, capitalist stage of socialism, has resulted in the opening of many night clubs, bars and discos. Wednesday night a bunch of us decided that it was high time to do something stupid and put ourselves in a physical state which would render us incapable of attending class the next morning.
The propaganda club has old pieces of propaganda on the wall, a leaky roof, and a poorly lit dance floor and sells all the worlds best liquors. Being cut-throat capitalists they offered us a special deal: $7 cover charge and all the booze we could drink. Naturally we took advantage of the offer.
The club was truly international. I talked to a bunch of students from Germany, a law student from Cameroon doing his Phd in Helsinki, Quebecers, and more Germans.
It had such a fantastic time that I didn't make it to class the next day.

From my limited experience with China I can say that hubris is a huge part of Chinese history. The Great Wall was constructed by an Emperor who decided that he needed to build a huge wall to keep out the Mongols. Millions of slaves were employed in the walls construction, which is truly one of the greatest accompishments in human history. A 50 foot high wall, 30 feet wide wall was constructed at the top of a mountain range. 1 million people died in its construction, and it didn't work. The Mongols bribed the guards at the gate. (Corruption has always been a problem in China!)
It is a similar story with the Terracota warriors. 1.5 million people were involved in carving stone soldiers and digging a big tomb so that the emperor could be buried with his armies.
At times, hubris became nemisis, such as during the Cultural Revolution. Given China's history I say that the current China is better off than it has ever been before. There are some signs that a society based on the rule of law is developing in China. If that is the case, it is a real step forward in Chinese history and life will most likely be better here because of it.

Yesterday when I was returning from Xi'an I thought that I had hit pay dirt. I was browsing through the magazine store at Xi'an International Airport when I came across a truly precious item, for a news starved foreigner: a copy of economist magazine. I instantly decided to part ways with 8 of my hard earned dollars and contently made my way to the airport gate. I was particularly intrigued by the headline: What China needs to learn from Mao. Thoughts of the lessons of the cultural revolution danced through my head. I was anxious to know what the Economist thought China had to do to succeed in the future. I get on my plane and begin to browse through it as the plane soars over the Chinese countryside. I look in the index and see that the article about China is on page 28. I flip to page 26. I turn the page, excitement racing through my vains. I see page 30 and a neatly cut page. Obviously some bureaucrat had spent their day with a pair of scissors cutting the page out of hundreds if not thousands of Economist magazines.

Just finished my first final exam. It seemed to go well. Fairly basic questions about the Chinese legal system. Just going to the airport now to fly to Xi'an to spend a couple of days checking out the Terracoter Warriors.

I would invest in KFC. The Chinese love chicken. In fact, China is a giant chicken farm. There are 5 chickens for every person in China. KFC is perfectly suited to capitalize on Chinese modern dietary tastes and lifestyle ambitions. They are popping up all over Beijing. Currently, 2-3% of the population of China has middle class incomes and can afford to eat at KFC. The prediction is that 20 years from now 40% of the population is going to have middle class incomes. That is nearly 500 million people having the necessary means to eat at KFC.

The Oilers win again!!!! Why do they wait until I am out of the country to make a run? They must not like me as much as I like them!

Beijing is the most capitalistic city that I have ever visited. Here are some examples: A Starbucks in the Forbidden City (China's most important cultural site); huge new skyscrapers going up everywhere; hundreds of thousands of poor migrant workers who are protected by no social safety net; expensive luxury stores and cars; a rapidly growing consumer economy; liberalization of state industries.

It is going to be interesting when this city hosts the Olympics. I can't see the athletes liking the pollution. I don't think the world realizes quite how polluted this city really is.

I've got my exam on Sunday. Then I am going to Xi'an for a couple of days. In two weeks I will be starting my trek from the Great Wall to Agra!!!

Yesterday was the most interesting day that I have had so far in China. In the morning we were up early to present ourselves at the local court house. After the obligatory photo-op for the assembled media we watched a Chinese trial. It is incredibly different than our trial process. All the evidence was presented orally by the prosecutor (dressed in brutal blue uniforms) from witnesses written statements. The defence is then given the opportunity to rebut the prosecutors evidence. The judge from time to time threw questions at the defendant, a migrant labourer from Mongolia with only a primary education, who had confessed to trying to steal $50 Canadian from a woman. Because the attempt was not successful, and because it was the defendants first offence, the prosecutor asked for a "lenient" sentence. The defence attorney (who did not say very much during the proceeding) also asked for a "lenient" sentence. The judge agreed that a "lenient" sentence was appropriate and sentenced the defendant to TWO years in jail, where the accused will be reformed through labour. Jail with Chinese characteristics! For me, there were many lessons from this experience. The first is that heavy punishments did absolutely NOTHING to deter the crime. It is known by everybody that the Chinese authorities throw the book at offenders, yet there is still crime in China! Canada should not adopt a crime control model for our criminal justice system.

In the afternoon, a group of us went to the Great Wall. We found a guide who agreed to take us to a remote part of the Great Wall. The views were fantastic and I buried a Canadian quarter in the wall. Now a very small part of Canada is buried high a top a mountain in the Great Wall. A sign of growing interdependence? It was a shame that I managed to delete all my fantastic photos, what an idiot I can be! Still, it was a shame to leave behind the hussle and bussle, as well as the pollution, of the busy city of Beijing. This afternoon, I am going to the Zoo to see Pandas!

The Chinese have perfected the art of the light beer! It is tasty, goes down easy, and not that strong. It creates the perfect mindset and atmosphere for a relaxing afternoon in sweltering Beijing!

China has 20 of the world's 24 most polluted cities. Beijing is one of them and serves as a good example of the benefits of preventative smoking! People smoke in hotel lobbies, restaurants, and, most annoyingly, in the stall next to me at this very internet cafe! Smoking is probably not that harmful because, when on considers the pollution in this city, the average Beijingers lungs will be truly blackened by the time they are fifteen. It is so polluted that I am worried that I will get sick if I jog in the park next to my hotel.

Today has been a fairly productive day. We had a lecture on the criminal law this morning. There are 67 crimes for which a Chinese person can be executed, including corruption, 'crimes against the people', violent crimes, corruption, amongst others. The standard of proof is merely that of 'clear evidence', not 'proof beyond a reasonable doubt.' The standard has not been defined, which is convenient.

This afternoon we went downtown. As per usual, we were approached with the offer of tea, but we pretended to be a bunch of German tourists who couldn't speak English. We looked at fake Rolex's. I am scoping out the market for my purchase!

On Monday I am going to see the Forbidden City with my classmates. I am really looking forward to next Friday when I am going to the Great Wall.

Classes commenced today. We had a very interesting lecture on the basic structure of the Chinese legal system. The professor prefaced every comment about the Chinese legal system with 'in theory.' The reality is substantially different.
We were also given our course pack. I remember now that I am not really on vacation. The course pack is 600 pages - the same length as my Criminal Law case book!
The other students seem to be interesting. It is an eclectic bunch. Two students from B.C. One from T.O. A bunch of anglo-Montrealers and the majority pure laine Quebecois.
Tomorrow we are attending a function at the Canadian embassy.
I am still looking for a bar that shows the hockey games. The other day I ran into a guy from Edmonton who attended heroic game 6. We had a couple of beers and talked about what it is like to be so far away from home. The way things are going, it looks like the Oil will be joining Langlois's squad on the golf course fairly soon!

I wish I'd googled Beijing scams before I came to China because did I ever get taken for a ride! I was strolling near Tiananmen Square yesterday evening when I was stopped by an incredibly attractive Chinese student who spoke excellent English. We chatted for a bit about China and she asked me if I wanted to go for tea. At this point I should have offered to take her to the nearby Starbucks, but being an adventurer I figured why the hell not.
We get to the tea house and they brought me a menu. I noticed that the prices were a little high: 40 to 100 yuan for a tea (which translates between $6 and $15). I ordered the cheapest tea on the menu and my eyebrows were raised when my new friend, Mary, ordered the most expensive tea on the menu and ordered some fruit which was not on the menu. At this point my spidy sense was raised but I duly noted the police officer sitting next to the door.
My friend was very chatty (she obviously has some practice talking to stupid foreigners like myself) and bought me some tea (I'm guessing she will be paid back for it).
Then the bill came for a whopping 450 yuan ($60). Each plate of fruit cost 150 yuan. I was angry about being screwed over, but I was polite and decided that it was better to eat the bill rather than getting into an altercation. There was after all a police officer in the corner of the room and you never know who owns the tea shop and who is profiting from the scam. I figured that I'd just learned my lesson and won't be going anywhere on my travels with someone I don't know that involves me spending money and I will be asking the cost of things up front.
And I will be googling to find out the local scams before I arrive in a place.

I've been trying to view my blog from China for the past few days! But I can't! I've been censored by BIG BROTHER to stop those English speaking peasants in Sichuan from reading my blog and getting some dangerous ideas!!! I want to assure the Chinese authorities that this blog is merely a travel diary!
Speaking of travelling. Yesterday I went to the most expensive shopping mall in Beijing. I saw Ipods and expensive designer clothes for sale. I think that's great. Now when peasants come to town they can buy all these goods, just like their fellow workers in the west!!!!

In 1949, Chairman Mao founded the People's Republic of China. When he died in 1976, his body was put on display in a mausoleum in Tiennamen Square and he is recognized as one of the most important leaders and communists in human history.
Ray Kroc founded McDonald's in 1954. It has quickly become one of the world's most recognizable brands and stands as a symbol of American capitalism.
Now one can enjoy a big mac while having a great view of the people lining up to take a look at Chairman Mao's body. This is one image that sums up the end result of 50 years of post-WW2 politics.

So true to form I wasn't held back by the fact that I was incredibly tired. I met a couple of Aussie English teachers in the hostel and they offered to show me the ins and outs of a Chinese restaurant. We had three dishes: spicy pork, sweet pork and ??????! They also introduced me to Chinese drinking games.

They told me about their life in China. We talked about many things. They seem to like living here. They said that all the western guys go for the Chinese girls (who love the fact that we are exotic, wealthy, etc.) and all the western girls don't like Chinese guys so they also are interested in western guys, but there are slim pickings, because of the above interest of Chinese girls. Even in my fatigue, I immediately grasped that this is a great set up that one could and should take advantage of!

After my dinner, I decided to try to find Tienamen square. Instead I ended up on the far side of the Forbidden City. At that point I realized that I had a three part problem: 1. I was further away from the hostel than I had intended. 2. There were a lot of police officers around. 3. I had to go potty! NOW!

Well, I just arrived in China! The air today in Beijing is a smoggy soup. I think there is really no incentive to not smoke in China - the air will do a great job giving you lung cancer! My arrival has been auspicious. I sat next to this guy who is studying in Ottawa. He was very friendly and helpful and has invited me to visit his family in Southern China if I get the chance. I've been awake for 20 plus hours (even cafeine can't save me at this point) so I am going to chow down on some noodles and then explore the back of my eyelids!

Just over a day until I leave. My first five days I am going to be slumming it in a hostel 10 minutes away from the forbidden city. I'm looking forward to renting a bike and pedalling with the masses. It should be fun, but I am also a little nervous. It could be interesting finding my hostel in the maze that constitutes Central Beijing. Seems that the city was build more on the maze system than the grid system! That just adds to the fun!