For example, while Twitter is blocked in China, sinaweibo, a microblogging service hosted by China’s internet portal sina.cn has dominated the microblogging market in China. Han Han opened his account on sinaweibo on February 4, 2010, and, before he had even sent one message, he had gathered 30,000 followers. Three days later, he simply typed one Chinese word “Wei” (Hello). This single-character post immediately generated a frenzy on sinaweibo, with more than 6500 reposts, and over 13,900 “comments” from other sinaweibo users. In Han Han’s signature combination of humor and a sharp tongue, he then said: “I meant to type ‘Hey’ instead of ‘Wei,’ but I made a typo. I didn’t correct it for fear people would blame the ‘relevant agencies’ [ie censors].” [Han Han's blog posts are often targeted by censors, and each time, such censorship generates protest from his fans, and more netizens repost his censored text in other forums.]

On March 4, Han Han wrote a post on his blog titled, “Han Feng is a good cadre.” The post commented on the online leak of the personal diary of Han Feng, the Tobacco Bureau chief in Guangxi, which became the hottest topic in Chinese cyberspace. In Han Feng’s diary, he recorded, in a matter-of-fact way, activities such as his sexual encounters with several of his female subordinates, bribes taken in his work, and some other personal hobbies or work-related matters. (Han Feng was subsequently arrest for bribery, which was announced in a brief statement in official media after his diary became public.) Han Han’s post says that according to what Han Feng’s diary reveals, Bureau chief Han should really be considered a “good official”, since the amount of bribes and number of sexual relationships he had was peanuts compared with so many other officials in China today. Han wrote, “If his diary is true, I dare to say he is a good cadre. In six months, he only accepted bribes of 60,000 RMB. This is the first time in recent years I have seen a five-digit number after the word “bribery.” Where can you find such a clean bureau chief?”

The following are excerpts of Han Han’s new post, entitled: “Where can I find people as good as you are?”, translated by CDT:

In the post before my last post, I set a voting function (The two options are: 1) Han Feng is a good official, I hope that he will stay in his position, 2) Han Feng is a bad official, I hope that he will be punished severely according to the law) Over 210,000 independent IPs have voted, and the results show that 96%, which is to say, 200,000 voters, felt that Han Feng is a good cadre and hope that he will stay in his position. Less than 10,000, 4% of voters, felt that Han Feng is a bad cadre and hope that he will be punished severely according to law.

Of course, from now on I will set up the voting function more often, in order to compensate everyone’s dismay that no one has seen a ballot but somehow so many representatives in National People’s Congress have been elected.

From today on, I made a unilateral decision that I will be the strategic collaborative partner of all the main government websites. When they start to vote on some event, I will do the same on my blog. I will not write any text about those events to avoid misleading or indicating voting results, and we will see how different the results will be.

Among voters this time, some from the bottom of his or her heart felt that Han Feng is not a bad official, since he was not that greedy. Some others sincerely felt that Han Feng was actually relatively better stock among officials; some others are just being sarcastic, and then some are only following the crowd. Nevertheless, everyone feels quite powerless. In my grandfather’s time, when people knew things were difficult, if you went to the officials, they may have even more difficulties. Later on, everyone knows that there were good cadres and bad cadres in this country. The result of the vote on Han Feng tells us that we have officially entered the era in which there are almost no cadres who are not corrupt, and the only difference is between good corrupt cadres and bad corrupt cadres. Everyone obviously thinks that Han Feng belongs to the good corrupt cadre category.

…. (Ordinary people in this country’s) expectations for cadres are not that they will serve the people, but that they don’t make trouble for people. You can have your fabulous house, drive your luxurious car, have your mistress, we will not bother you as long as you do not step over my son, evict me from my house, or take my girl; then you are a good cadre in the eyes of ordinary people. If netizens have a problem with this, just delete their posts; if writers have a problem with it, just harmonize them; if journalists have a problem with this, just one sentence instruction — “do not report negative news.”

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Post tags: corruption, Han Feng, Han Han
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As the son of a steel worker in provincial Chongqing, Yundi Li was born into a world permeated by Chinese folk music and pop, but at the age of three, he was suddenly entranced by the sound of an accordion. His parents bought him one, and two years later he won a competition with it. Then he chanced to hear someone practising the piano. “I had never heard a piano before,” he says. “And this sound, with its rich range of colour, was instantly very special for me. I hung outside the window for half an hour, drinking it in.”

His words tumble out quickly and eagerly, with self-deprecating charm. The contrast with Lang Lang – for whom an interview is a tiresome formality prior to the more serious business of a photo-shoot – could not be greater.

Had he been raised in Britain, Lang Lang would have been put on the abused-child register for the way his raveningly ambitious father treated him – throwing his toys out of the window when he was five, and at one point ordering him to jump to his death from a balcony when he’d been rejected by a teacher. Yundi Li’s parents, on the other hand, were devotedly supportive: his mother gave up her job to look after him while he studied at the Sichuan conservatory, but she and his father seem to have put him under no pressure: “They just tell me to enjoy my life.” He stayed from eight to 18 with the same teacher, Professor Dan Zhaoyi, during which time he won a string of competitions, including the Stravinsky Youth Competition when he was 13, the Utrecht Liszt competition at 17, and the Warsaw one the following year.

Video: Yundi Li perform’s Chopin’s Nocturne No2

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Post tags: classical music, Li Yundi, musicians
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China is neither wholeheartedly supporting corrupt dictators, nor filled with ambitions of empire. The Dragon’s Gift, by her account, is no Trojan horse. Subtitled The Real Story of China in Africa, the book is the culmination of some 30 years of research and experience in both places.

At one point, Brautigam warns her readers, “The level of detail on the history of the [Chinese aid] system and its component parts may be more than you want to know, particularly over the next few pages.” Though she is referring to one chapter, this lesson is true for the entire work. As Brautigam moves us beyond assumptions of exploitation and control of natural resources, a more complex story emerges.

The truth is that China is itself a developing country that has successfully reduced its poverty from 53 to 8 percent over twenty years, while Africa’s poverty persists despite 60 years of aggressive foreign aid. Deng Xiaoping, the Communist Party leader who is credited with opening up China’s economy, once declared, “To get rich is glorious!”

Chinese policymakers believe in this not just for themselves, but for Africa.

Read another review of the book by Howard French.

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Post tags: Africa, Africa investment, foreign aid
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Zhang joined the CASS in 1991 as an Assistant Researcher after getting a PhD. By 1993, if not for political reasons, he should have been promoted to the next rank. He explains how the system works:

The position at CASS (research grade) is comprised of four ranks: Researcher, Deputy Researcher, Assistant Researcher and Research Intern, respectively corresponding to senior, deputy senior, middle and junior ranks. According to regulations at CASS, fresh PhD graduates can join as Assistant Researcher. Two years later, they can apply for promotion to Deputy Researcher. At the end of 1993, I can apply for a Deputy Researcher position. Although I haven’t published any articles in China after 1989, I have already published one major work, one translated work and over ten articles before the ‘June Fourth Incident. In 1993, my English work was also due to be published. According to the norms at CASS, one book or just one to two influential articles would be sufficient to get you to a Deputy Researcher position. Despite my plenty of research, I was not promoted because of my insistence on political principles.

He applied for a promotion in 1994, but was rejected again. This had financial implications, and between 1995 and 2000, he ventured into businesses, which included opening two schools and one private enterprise. But throughout this period, he was still officially affiliated with the CASS, and his plan to start a private university in 2000 made his relationship with the CASS closer. It is under this background that he applied for a promotion again in 2000, only to fail once more.

Between October 2001 and January 2002, he went to a university in Michigan as a visiting scholar. Upon returning to China, he started working on the sensitive book From May Fourth to June Fourth. In 2004, 2005 and 2006, he made applications for promotion, which were all unsuccessful. As a result, he had been an Assistant Researcher for a total of 19 years, from 1991 to 2009.

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Post tags: academic freedom, CASS, Zhang Boshu
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From my perspective, the digital camera is most significant in how it’s changed the way I organize and use my notes. Digital voice recorders have never played the same role — it might be great in other places and other situations, but recording an interview in China makes people nervous. I learned that they’re far more comfortable if I’m taking handwritten notes, so that’s what I’ve always done.

But a digital camera is quick, unobtrusive, and easy to keep in a pocket. It’s great for signs and notices — infinitely faster than my terrible Chinese handwriting. Sometimes a picture captures a key moment, and later, when I’m ready to write about the scene, I’ll put the image alongside my notes. At one point in my road trip, I was searching for a section of the Great Wall near a remote village called Temple of Peace, and an old man told me to take his grandson as a guide. The boy was twelve years old, and he jumped into the car; five other kids immediately joined him. The grandfather said nothing — he was perfectly happy to let me drive off with what was obviously a high percentage of the children in Temple of Peace.

That was one of many moments when I understood how trusting people are in rural China. And later, when I looked at the photo I took from the driver’s seat, I recalled the silence that settled in the car when the kids suddenly realized that they were on the road with a laowai:

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Post tags: foreign correspondents, peter hessler, photography
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In all, the MTA discovered 174 burial sites as well as many artifacts — including buttons, Chinese porcelain, glasses, rice bowls, jade, coins and opium pipes.

All the bones and artifacts will now be reinterred inside Evergreen Cemetery. The process, which will take several months, will start the first week in April, the MTA says.

The MTA spent $2 million on the project — on excavation, archaeological research, DNA analysis, construction of the memorial wall and the purchase of burial plots and coffins, said Carl Ripaldi, principal environmental specialist with the MTA.

Members of the local Chinese community look forward to the end of the story.

“It’s been too long for these remains to be out there in some laboratory,” said Daisy Ma, president of the Chinese American Citizens Alliance. “We do not want to wait any longer. We want closure.”

The community has, however, expressed a desire to make educational use of what was learned when the grave sites were dug up. The MTA has promised to document the large collection of objects buried with the bodies and provide records to the Fowler Museum at UCLA. They have also had replicas made of some of the artifacts to give to the Chinese Historical Society and the Chinese Benevolent Assn.

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Post tags: emigrants, history, U.S. immigration
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China Publishing Group, which had Rmb3.9bn in revenues last year, is a cornerstone of Beijing’s policy to keep publishing under state control while allowing private investors a limited, but legal, role.

“There will definitely be significant changes in our international operations,” Mr Nie said. “At least we can learn from some multinational publishers from developed countries, like Oxford University Press and Harper Collins … We will not just be there to propagate Chinese culture, but also to run a commercial business.”

Last year, the General Administration of Press and Publications, the regulator, promised to dilute the state publishing houses’ monopoly by allowing private companies to produce books for the first time in more than half a century.

Private publishers have long outperformed state rivals in spotting and producing best-selling manuscripts, but they operate in a legal grey area. Chinese law excludes them from publishing books, so they have to buy or rent International Standard Book Numbers from the state companies. Mr Nie said that he would seek to greatly expand this kind of partnership.

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Post tags: GAPP, literature, publishing
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The son of a Tibetan herder, Gendun Choekyi Nyima was only 5 when he was selected by the exiled Dalai Lama as the reincarnation of the Panchen Lama. Police swooped on the boy’s village in a county to the north of Lhasa and, pro-Tibet exiles say, removed the child and his parents.

He has not been seen or heard from since. But Tibet’s new governor, Padma Choling, revealed yesterday that the young man, now 20, is still living in Tibet, where “his brothers and sisters are at university or are doing regular work”.

He gave no hint as to the family’s whereabouts but repeated the Communist Party’s mantra: “As far as I know, his family and he are now living a very good life in Tibet. He and his family are reluctant to be disturbed. They want to live an ordinary life.”

The information amounts to a revelation compared with the secrecy that has surrounded the life of Gendun for the 15 years since he vanished and was described by human rights groups as the youngest political prisoner in the world.

The man that Beijing appointed Panchen Lama gained a more public profile this week when he was appointed to the CPPCC and attended the two sessions meetings.

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Post tags: Gendun Choekyi Nyima, Panchen Lama, tibetan buddhism
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The slang term 小资（xiao3 zi1) came up over dinner with my friends Min and Kai. I was discussing a Website I liked, and Min responded, “I don’t like that site. It’s too 小资.” Well, I had never heard the term. What is it? Min responded: “I don’t know how to translate it. People who are xiao zi like Western things, like to drink coffee at cafes…Shanghai is a very 小资.”
…
Quiz: Here’s 20 questions to determine if you or your Chinese friend is Xiaozi
Are they jaded about Chinese national events, and resist being defined by “official” and mainstream culture?
Do they like to sit in cafes? Do they like to drink coffee?
Do they appreciate red wine (and really appreciate it, not mix it with Coke)?
Do they crave outbound travel? Do they want to visit Tibet?
Are they focused on self-expression through fashion? Do they look down on people who spend money on brands without true appreciation of fashion?
Do they sometimes have a sense of being somehow different from the rest of society? That they are seeking something that cannot be found?
Do they use their English name, even with other Chinese people?
Do they like to socialize with foreigners? Do they like to date foreigners?
Are they picky in their love life? Do they feel that most traditional members of the opposite sex don’t understand their love of life, and their need for creative self-definition? Attitude of “if I’m not in love, I’d rather die”
Do they like foreign hobbies like Yoga? or Salza dancing?

[Full text]

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Post tags: Bourgeoisie, urban life, xiaozi
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The announcement that the Chinese artist Ai Weiwei is to be the next artist to take on Tate Modern’s annual Turbine Hall commission is unsurprising – though surprise, spectacle and a kind of art that is accessible to the widest possible public are what the Turbine Hall demands, even if the spectacle is of a quiet or understated sort. Subtlety and artistic sophistication are a bonus. The most successful Unilever commissions have not necessarily been the easiest, and the Turbine Hall is a tough testing ground for any artist. Subtlety and artistic sophistication are a bonus. But Ai Weiwei’s work is as often controversial as it is provocative. It is also – undeniably – fun. He fits the bill perfectly.

Most recent Chinese art has seemed at best secondary, at worst made cynically for the western art market, the kind of objects whose technical skill exceeds their interest. Much of the painting and sculpture one sees coming from China is mere product. Ai Weiwei is an exception, but how exceptional he is as an artist – he is also an architect, designer, curator and critic – is often obscured by his position in his homeland, where he is regarded as a sort of cultural irritant. He is an outspoken critic of government and officials, of state corruption and greed. His blog has been closed down, his bank accounts investigated, and last year he was beaten by the police for trying to testify in favour of a colleague with whom he was investigating casualties of the 2008 Sichuan earthquake. He later suffered a cerebral hemorrhage. Having collaborated with Herzog and de Meuron – also the architects who transformed the Bankside power station into Tate Modern – on the Bird’s Nest stadium for the Beijing Olympics, he went on to boycott the event, and criticize western artistic involvement.

See also past CDT posts on Ai Weiwei.

Read also: Chinese artist Ai Weiwei makes Internet his medium from Reuters:

Ai, 53 this year, has become an increasingly vocal critic of China’s Internet controls, helping to plan an Internet boycott on the day China was to require use of the controversial Green Dam filter, a program the government wanted installed on every new computer.

That boycott turned into a party in Beijing’s art district after regulators seemed to back down from the filter requirement.

Ai has never been arrested. He gets away with being outspoken because of the prestige of his father, poet Ai Qing, because he picks his battles carefully and because his own art has brought wealth and fame overseas.

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Yao’s personal life is closely followed by his many fans at home, from his 2007 Shanghai wedding to fellow basketball player Ye Li to last month’s reports the couple is expecting a baby girl in July… Yao’s baby would automatically be an American citizen if born in the U.S. She also could claim Chinese citizenship as the child of Chinese nationals. However, Chinese law does not recognize dual citizenship.

A few say it would be a betrayal of China, not to mention the China team could be denied a future basketball star. But most say they support Yao and don’t care which country claims the baby.

“Yao Ming is an individual, not a political tool,” said one comment on popular basketball Web site Hoop China. “He has the right to choose where his child is born and what kinds of medical care and education will be available to her. His child’s citizenship has nothing to do with loyalty.”… Yao and his camp have been tightlipped on the pregnancy and have not issued any public statements on the matter. It was not clear if Yao and his wife were indeed planning to have the baby in the U.S. or how they would handle any citizenship issues.

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Post tags: basketball, citizenship, yao ming
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With an extensive collection of over 2,000 pieces of Chinese contemporary works, including more than 200 Chinese artists and a list of names covering the most famous like Ai Weiwei, Fang Lijun and Wang Guangyi, Sigg is by far the world’s biggest and most successful Chinese contemporary art collector.

It has been widely reported that in his beautiful house in Switzerland, which people often refer to as “the largest private museum of Chinese contemporary art,” there are Chinese contemporary works in every corner – from the kitchen to the utility room every space is adorned with an early painting or conceptual piece by today’s most sought-after and heavily-collected Chinese artists.

Of course Sigg did not buy the works from galleries or auction houses, where even one piece sells for millions of dollars these days, most of his precious works were bought during the 1990s, when there was no recognized contemporary art market in China and it was hard for any artist to even sell a piece of their work.

During this time, as there was no transparency in the Chinese contemporary art scene, it was also much harder than it is today to get an overview as to what the artists were doing. Many works were created underground and connecting with the artists themselves was difficult.

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Post tags: art collectors, contemporary art, Uli Sigg
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Zhao, in his role as a simple peasant in the countryside, sits on the stoop outside his home, when two men — one with a video camera hoisted over his shoulder — come by introducing themselves as “online journalists.” They work for an imaginary Sohu.com program called “Seeking the Root of the Matter” (刨根问底). They want to interview Zhao’s character and make the interview available “to the whole world” via the Internet.

That may sound harmless enough. But the two reporters for “Seeking the Root of the Matter” would, according to administrative regulations in China, be denied press accreditation in the first place. And that means the entire fictional interview that provides the frame for the Zhao Benshan skit depicts an illegal act.

The Zhao Benshan skit — and its censorship gaffe — is particularly interesting in that it depicts something both increasingly commonplace in China — that is, information gathering and dissemination by unauthorized “citizen journalists,” or gongmin jizhe (公民记者), of all stripes — and increasingly vexing to CCP leaders who want, as best as possible, to control information at its source.

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Post tags: CCTV gala, Internet control, Internet news, media conditions
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“In the beginning I had seen the village as an escape, a place where I could hike and write in peace; but now I went there for different reasons. In China it was the closest I ever came to home.” Eventually, “after four years, Sancha felt as familiar as any place I had known during adulthood,” and “the longer I stayed in Sancha, the more I appreciated the rhythm of the countryside, the way that life moved through the cycles of the seasons. . . . Progress had arrived: each year led to some new major change, and always there was the sense of time rushing ahead. But the regularity of the seasons helped me keep my bearings.”

Hessler’s account of his years in Sancha is for me the highlight of “Country Driving,” but that in no way diminishes my admiration for the other two sections. In the first, “The Wall,” he takes a couple of car trips through places along the routes of various sections of the Great Wall — in fact it is not a single wall but a mishmash of many, built over the centuries primarily to resist Mongol invaders — that are rapidly emptying out as people rush from the country to the city. There is much here about the urbanization of China, a phenomenon far more vast and unsettling than most of us in the West understand, but there is also wonderful stuff about Chinese rental cars, speed traps, license-exam questions and the drivers themselves.

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Post tags: book reviews, peter hessler
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Freedamn 自由

n. Once you think you can do what you want to do, you are also damned in Malegebi.
一旦你以为自己可以想做什么就做什么，你在马勒戈壁也就玩完了。

ie. Life is dear, love is dearer. Both can be given up; then all you have is freedamn.
例 句：生命诚可贵，爱情价更高，二者均已抛，自由也未到。

Shitizen P民

n. a shitizen of a particular country like China is legally accepted as belonging to that country without any right of citizen.
P民是在特定的国家，如中国，在法律上被认定属于这个国家但没有任何公民权利的“公民”。

ie. “I’m a senior official as your mayor, and you are only a shitizen!”quote from a high-rank drunk Chinese official, Mr. Lin.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2010. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Internet freedom, online culture
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In China’s Temple of Eternal Happiness is a stunning, ancient wall mural seen by few people because of its remote location in rural Shanxi province.

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Post tags: cultural heritage, Shanxi, taoism
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An agreement was signed for a three-year project funded by China’s Commerce Ministry to explore waters near the popular tourist towns ofMalindi and Lamu, the official Xinhua News Agency reported Friday… The sunken ships are believed to have been part of a massive fleet led by Ming dynasty admiral Zheng He that reached Malindi in 1418. Kenyan lore has long told of shipwrecked Chinese sailors settling in the region and marrying local women.

Between 1405 and 1433, Zheng He — whose name is also spelled Cheng Ho — led armadas with scores of junks and thousands of sailors on voyages to promote trade and recognition of the new dynasty, which had taken power in 1368.

… Zheng’s story has been heavily promoted by China’s government in recent years as evidence of China’s tradition of nonaggression abroad, although historical records show the treasure fleets carried significant firepower and participated in at least three major military actions.

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Post tags: archaeology, zheng he
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The future of golf has shifted to a most unlikely place: China, where statistically 0 percent of the population plays, where up until the mid-1980s the sport was banned by the communists for being too bourgeois, and where the construction of new courses is still technically illegal. It has been said about China, however, that while nothing is allowed there, everything is possible. So even during its supposed moratorium on golf course construction, China has managed to emerge as the only country in the world in the midst of a “golf boom”: Hundreds, some say thousands, of courses are expected to open in the next several years.

The epicenter of this growth is China’s tropical island province of Hainan, not long ago a lawless place with an economy built largely on smuggling, prostitution, and unchecked property speculation. Beijing is now determined to transform Hainan into a tourist paradise, with golf expected to play a major role (so much so that many joke Hainan is now a “special golf development zone” where mainland restrictions don’t apply). While between 100 and 300 courses are expected to be built here, the most mysterious project — and by far the most audacious — is the latest offering from Hong Kong’s Mission Hills Group, already owners of a 12-course resort in southern China’s Guangdong province. Its Hainan club, when completed, will be the world’s largest, with some 22 courses covering an area nearly 1.5 times the size of Manhattan. But the highly secretive Mission Hills development, a behemoth undertaking that displaced thousands of villagers, is also the most controversial, so controversial that it required a code name: Project 791.

With the central government guaranteeing a “top international tourism destination” by 2020, Hainan’s destiny appears predetermined. No one disputes the poor province’s many infrastructure needs, but the prospect of another decade of furious growth has some on the island concerned for its already fragile ecology and centuries-old ways of rural life.

Read more on this subject on Dan Washburn’s blog Par for China. Last month, the Financial Times Magazine ran a lengthy cover article by Washburn and Pyle.

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Post tags: golf, Hainan, wealth
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Mr. Hessler’s book is more ambitious than its subtitle makes it sound. This work is as much about staying put — about hunkering down and observing — as it is about barreling down the highway.

Mr. Hessler spends years in a small farming village in the mountains north of Beijing, and more years in a quickly growing city in southeastern China. He watches, and takes careful notes, as both places are irrevocably changed by major new expressways. And every now and again he hits the road himself.

The big story Mr. Hessler has to tell in “Country Driving” is about a country that’s feverishly on the move. Speaking of the early years of the last decade, he writes, “To drive across China was to find yourself in the middle of the largest migration in human history — nearly one-tenth of the population was on the road, finding new lives away from home.” His book chronicles the flight from rural China, and from farming and folkways, to new cities and their sprouting factories.

The story of this emerging China has been told before, of course, by other writers, and by Mr. Hessler himself, in his previous books and magazine journalism. But the reporting in “Country Driving” is impressive in its scope.

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Post tags: book reviews, driving, migrant workers, peter hessler
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The demolitions in Chaoyang district are only the latest of many. One person whose studio is threatened has been evicted four times already.

The artists say that some of them signed contracts for periods of up to 30 years and had spent a lot on improving the studios but had been in the Zhengyang and 008 zones for a matter of months before their landlords said the developers were moving in.

The group said that several of them had stayed at the sites on Sunday night because of concerns that people would try to demolish them overnight.

At 2am, about 100 men wearing black coats and white masks and armed with wooden and iron bars descended on the Zhengyang art zone, they said.

With his head wrapped in a blood-spotted bandage, Liu Yi described how a man grabbed his mobile phone as he rang the police. “When I tried to get it back, he got four or five people with sticks and iron bars to beat me. I fell down and he got other guys to watch over me so I couldn’t get away.”

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Post tags: artists, Beijing, redevelopment
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