我的最新日志

  • Lunar eclipse

    2008-2-22

    Lunar eclipse took place in America. I visited a website and found that a Chinese student took some pictures of the eclipse. That guy must have very professional cameras to get these images. It’s beautiful (check the photos).

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  • Doris Lessinbg's prediction--the death of a black US president?

    2008-2-22

    I have been really busy these days and did not update my blog. I also missed the democratic presidential debate between Hillary Clinton and Barak Obama (a black man) on CNN last night.

    Anyway, now it seems that Obama has great potential to win Hillary and become the Democratic presidential nominee, who then will compete with the Republican presidential nominee McCain and the winner will be the next president of the United States of America. McCain is a weak candidate (and his “US troops in Iraq for 100 years” suggestion?! This man is crazy). So many people believe that the country will have their next president from Democratic Party, Obama or Hillary Clinton. No matter who finally gets to the White House, it will be a big change in American political history: the first female or a black president in the country’s history.

    I personally think that Hillary is more experienced and has better understanding about international issues than Obama. But some American people say that they are tired of the “Bush-Clinton-Bush (-Hillary Clinton?) presidential pattern. The elder Bush (the father of George W. Bush) was US president for 4 years. Then Bill Clinton took his place and stayed in the White House for 8 years; after that 8 years of George W. Bush’s government and now Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton’s wife is running her campaign so the family will return to their old home, the White House. More Clinton years? Some people think it will make the legacy look more like a dynasty. People are tired of the politicians from Washington and are looking for change, for fresh faces. Some people think that Obama’s fresh face represents the real changes that they are looking for. Fresh face will bring real changes; the logic is right but change for the better or worse? I am not saying that if Obama is elected as the president, bad changes will happen. It’s just that people should be more careful with their decision. From promise to action, still a long way to go.

    Martin Luther King made a wish: “…one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood”. He’d be very pleased to see Obama doing presidential campaign. I do believe that now in the US, people judge a person not by the color of his/her skin. But are Americans really ready to have a black president for the country? The 2007 Nobel Prize owner for literature, Doris Lessinbg, made a prediction, saying that if Barak Obama is to be elected as president, he would be assassinated. Lessinbg is in England so I do not know why she is so sure about this American issue. But what some Americans think about this prediction? The following are quotes from an American’s blog and the responses left by visitors to that blog:

    --------------------------

    Marc:

    So this lady in Englad - Doris Lessinbg - who won the Nobel prize for literature in 2007 is predicting that if Barak Obama is elected president - he’ll be assassinated. Unfortunately I agree with her.

    This country (my country - the U.S.) is filled with crackpots, nut case, bigoted racist assholes - and they would go ballistic if we elected a Black Man - even a half-Black man.

    You never hear about left-wing nut cases assasinating people or blowing buildings up. Yet the right-wing is full of these kind of people. They call themselves ‘militia’.

    That’s the truth about this country. They reelected Bush - they don’t seem to care about anybody but themselves and their ignorance gets them issuing second and third mortages on their homes - which then then lose. These kinds of folks are what fills up the states between both coasts and inhabit what we call the red states - the states that elected Bush - twice.

    So what to do?

    Lessing says we should elect a Clinton/Obama ticket.

    Hmmm - well then what happens when Hillary is assassinated?

    Walid Says:
    February 9th, 2008 at 11:35 pm

    This is a hypothetical assessment. There are people who hate all sorts of other people. But does fear of being attacked make us not dare to take the next step? This is precisely what their aim is. If we just back down because of those possibilities or even credible threats, we may as well forget about elections as a whole because they would have dictated the way we live our lives.

    Those ‘assassination’ claims are precisely why people should vote for Obama. Time to end the era of fear once and for all.

    Doug K. Says:
    February 11th, 2008 at 10:11 am

    One of the most biased posts I have read in a long time. I voted for Barak in the primaries so you can’t say that I am from the right. I can feel the hate in your writing. You should be ashamed.

    NJ Says:
    February 11th, 2008 at 11:29 am

    I can’t say I’m not worried about this myself and had a similar thought regarding a Clinton/Obama ticket. But … if Obama were to be elected and if he were to be assonated … the United States will have a civil war on it hands!!

    Jeff Says:
    February 19th, 2008 at 10:26 pm

    If Obama were killed…the neo-cons and the ultra-rich are as likely to have it done than some skinhead. If McCain wins, America will continue on exactly as it has under Bush….the rich get richer, soldiers keep dying, the middle class goes away and a whole lot of Chinese, Indians, illegal immigrants get to eat because they are doing the jobs that big business has pulled away from American citizens. Truthfully, I don’t like any of the candidates…. I am not sure Hillary is any better than McCain, Obama is either the real deal of full of crap….I’m just not sure… I think poor old Huckabee is the most honest of the bunch… but I just don’t agree with much he says…HaHa.

     

    This last comment, well I got something to say about Chinese taking jobs in big companies away from Americans in US. Chinese who can get job offers from big American companies in US usually have Master and/or Ph.D. degree in science/finance/accounting. They are not illegal immigrants who are taking easy jobs at low wage that common American people can do. When I started my studies at an American university, a friend of mine who studied in Chemistry Department told me that when they had graduate student meetings, if the professors did not attend, they spoke Chinese. And the Computer Science department, graduate students were half Indians half Chinese, no Americans at all. Maybe the person was talking about American big companies’ manufacture outsourcing. I doubt the new president, whoever s/he is, can resolve the problem since it’s not only an American issue and it came with the development of the economic globalization worldwide.

    Anyway I will follow up the campaigns. By the way, I think George W. Bush looks like a monkey and now if Obama becomes the new president, these two presidents have something in common.

     

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  • Are you guys angry?

    2008-2-18

    Three days ago, I went to have dinner with one of my Mexican clients, E, in New York City. He came to New York to have meetings with some banks here and since I am in NY on vacation, we decided to have dinner together and talk about some new trading business opportunities. He came with his sales manager J and we ate at a Greek restaurant, Milos. We had a great time there.

    E is a funny guy. Last year I traveled with him to 10 Chinese cities in two weeks to purchase steel products. He did not give me enough time to set up meetings for him, so I had to make phone calls to many steel mills while we were already on our way to their offices (of course I had been in contact with those steel mills before E's arrival without confirming to them the date for the meetings). By the end of the business trip, we made a summary at Shanghai Pudong International airport. While discussing the following-ups we needed to do to conclude the deals, E suddenlyl started to laugh and said:" I have to tell you this. You know what? Every time when you made a cell phone call to a steel mill and you begun to talk in Chinese, after a while, I thought that probably there wouldn't be any chance for us to get the meeting set up since the way you talked, in Chinese, really made me feel that neither you nor the person who you were talking to was in a good mood. Of course, you were not shouting, but I just felt that way. However, when you finished the phone call, you turned to me and told me in Spanish--Good news, they want to meet us! How wonderful!" Then we both laughed. 

    When I worked in Mexico City, during the weekend, Chinese staff in the company we would drive company's van to make some short-distance trips. We always had an informal meeting to discuss where to go on  Friday during lunch break at the office. Mexican colleagues usually went out for lunch and would come back after 2 hours. One Friday we did it again but Yohana, a Mexican girl, was on diet so she stayed at the office to eat some fruits. We had several options so we discussed almost about 20 minutes. We finally made up our minds and everyone went back to his/her place happily. Yohana had her cube in front of mine. After I sat down, she turned to me and asked (when she asked me this, she looked pretty worried): "What happened? Why were you guys so angry?"

    Why the way we talk to others, in Chinese, would cause misunderstanding and confusions among foreigners? Maybe we are just too tense? When we make a business call, we only think about the issue that we need to get through and we speak very fast and dry? When we are with friends, we also speak fast for sometimes they do not let you finish your words so the only way to fully express oneself at once is to speak faster and louder? Maybe we shall try to relax and slow down a little bit or maybe it's just a cultural thing that we do not need to change?

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  • Was Confucius Korean?

    2008-2-16

    My friend Lei told me today that two Koreans in his lab told him, face to face, that Confucius was Korean and that it was Koreans who invented Chinese characters (Hanzi). I remember that I saw online news about this. But this came out from the mouth of two well educated Korean young men who are Ph.D. candidates, it’s pretty shocking. One of them, according to Lei even said to Lei that the three provinces in Northeast China was their territory and then he went: “Give them back to Korea!” I thought that Lei was kidding when he told me this but he said it’s true. I asked Lei how he replied. The answer he gave was: “Ok, if you want, take them tomorrow.” How funny was the situation, but of course the Korean Ph.D. candidate took it very seriously?

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  • Before democracy, some human concern?

    2008-2-16

     scoundrel1972  wrote an ariticle about China's development and how the economic achievements we obtained made us better off. The following is my comments and I used that as today's article for my blog:

    And then you talked about China’s fast economic development, concluding that in China everyone’s life has been improved during this development. You mentioned food and housing as two main indicators. I’d like to share with you some of my thoughts and concerns about this “economic prosperity” in our country.

    When Deng promoted his reform and opening up policy, he said: "Socialism is not the same as shared poverty." and "Some must get rich first!" His idea was that some people and regions would be encouraged to get rich first and others would be brought along. However, what's happening now is not what he exactly expected to see when he implemented the policy. Some did get very rich but what they are doing now is simply try to get richer and they seem to forget the essence of Deng’s policy from which they greatly benefited. The gap between the rich and the poor, in China, is huge and I do not think that the government is doing enough to reduce the difference.

    Talking about the housing price, let’s do some numbers. On the list of China top 10 richest people in the year 2007, I found the name of three whose business is in real estate.  The top one on that list is a 26-year old young lady who is running her family real estate business, valued at RMB 130 billon. It’s important to mention that none of these three were on the list of China top 10 richest people in the previous two years, 2005 and 2006. So people in real estate they were able to grow their wealth at an astonishing speed during the years 2005, 2006 and 2007. From 2004 to 2006, in Beijing, newly built apartments average price increased by 42% and reached at RMB 7,825 by the third quarter of 2006. However by the end of Nov. 2007, people had to pay an average of RMB 15,267 per square meter to buy apartments in the city. Price has been going up at higher speed in Shanghai and Shenzhen.

    But when the Real Estate folks are busy counting their revenues, what’s happening to common people who need to buy an apartment to live in? I’ve heard that in Beijing new graduates from college are competing for job with a monthly salary of RMB 1,500.00 or 2,000.00. They live on that salary, payroll to payroll. So when are they gonna be able to save enough money to buy even one square meter??? On top of that, the prices of eggs, pork, other kind of meat, gas etc in China rose dramatically in China during 2007. The rich won’t care. But how about the poor and common people? Compared to the apartment price of RMB 7,825 per square meter in 2006, common people were and are less possible to be able to afford an apartment in 2007 and 2008. This “prosperity” did not eliminate the “shared poverty”, rather if we cheat on ourselves and let this situation continue, we won’t  have any chance to see the wealth to be shared. So instead of saying good things about this prosperity, we need to urge our government to work hard on reducing the gap between the poor and the rich.

    Maybe I shall correct myself. New graduates from college, with the monthly salary they earn, do not fall in the category of “the poor” in China.  What about the 70-80% of our population who live in rural areas? Those who work their land and when there is no many things to do at home, they go to big cities to work as temporary construction workers, those called by many people living in cities as “peasant workers” ? And those who are also in rural areas but did not have even a chance to see the outside world? They may be living the very same way that their fathers and grandfathers lived. What does this prosperity and stability mean to them?

     Many people in China say that it’s natural for the development to go gradually. Maybe that is right in theory. But what is wrong here is their indifference and their taking it for granted. People who got rich first (those real rich guys) and those who are also enjoying the so called “prosperity” (people who live in cities), most of them, only think about how to get richer themselves. And they ignore the true realities in our society and the bad situations in which many other Chinese are suffering.

     In China when people get together, they ask each other how much money they earn, how many apartments they purchased, what car they drive. They are making economic comparisons. So if they have more money than others, they’d feel very proud and happy; if others have more fortune than they do, they will be sad and immediately try other ways to make more fortune.  Have you ever seen in China that people get together to talk about our education, what the government shall balance the gap between the poor and the rich, issues that do not have to do about how one can get improved economically, but are important for our society in which we are all members and will suffer if bad things happen to the economic or whatever system in it? If there are such people, others will see them as blockheads. They would think that these people are wasting their time and instead of talking about this nonsense, they’d rather go and try to earn more money.

    So now in China we have these three groups of people, the rich, the poor and the in between. The third group is divided into two subgroups, one calls themselves “white collar” to distinguish themselves from the “peasant workers” and low income groups with sense of superiority and the other labels themselves with “little capitalists”, they think they are the elite of the society, with money and fine tastes. People are so excited to mark social class and the benchmark is money. The group in between dislike the poor and look down on them while they envy the rich, the richer and will try whatever to get richer and upgrade their social class. People are selfish, only think about money and one’s own development/benefits. They do not care about the poor and/or the poorer, they do not think about others.

    So we do have economic prosperity, but came along with it, a moral disorder, a spiritual emptiness and lack of basic human concern.

    Maybe we shall think about why this moral disorder?  China started to change with Deng’s idea of reform and opening up. Deng said:’ No matter if it is a white cat or a black cat; as long as it can catch mice, it is a good cat.” Maybe he was right by saying so at his time when any attempt to develop national economy would be accused as capitalism tendencies. But the spreading of this saying definitely started to erode our country’s moral foundation, which had been already very weak after the Cultural Revolution during which religious beliefs and Confucian moral concepts were all beaten down.  The whole nation begun to aim at economic development and achievements, at national and personal level and we suddenly had nothing to fear or worry about since white and black are all at our use, with justification.

    So we have everything pirate, that’s ok; the mines’ owners send the workers underground without proper protection, that’s happening everywhere; citizens and companies do tax dodging, that’s understandable and who cares about the poor and the disadvantaged group? Scoundrel1972 said that we Chinese are no longer “the Patient of East Asia”. Where is the future of a nation full of people who are physically well formed but morally ill, “calloused” and “numb” as described by Mr. Lu Xun decades ago?

    That’s another reason why when I hear any foreigner saying that China needs democracy, I would get bothered. They do not know a thing about Chinese people. If a foreigner read this, s/he may argue that education will help. But they do not know what kind of education we have in China. Education now is seen by many as a way to get rich quicker: good preliminary school, good middle and high school then to a top 10 university, and you will have your ticket to be “white collar” or “little capitalists”. At school, they do not teach you how to respect others (only respect to the authority), they do not help you to think independently so that you will not be comfortable to challenge authorities, your opinions and point of view are not important as long as you give RIGHT answers. Doing that you are a good student and will have your degree to get out there on to the society and make your money. This kind of education is not good to prepare people for democracy.

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  • Mexico City 1

    2008-2-14

    I had always been eager to go to Spain when I was at college but ended up going to Mexico, a country of beautiful natural scenery, friendly people and delicious food. I will start writing about what I have seen and experienced in Mexico in my blog.

    I still remember when I was at college, once our professor from Mexico, Fernando, gave us a lecturer on Mexico history. He talked about the ancient Maya and Azteca cultures, la conquista and the formation of the New Mexican nation. He invited us to imagine what the native Indians thought when they witnessed the birth of the first mestizo (Spanish word for mixed-blood between Spanish conquistadors and native Indians), then that of a whole new generation of mestizos who did not only think and act in a different way under the whites’ influence but also looked so different from their Indian parents.   The loss of Indian religion, languages and traditions was gradual but with firm pace. What kind of identity confusion and mental shock it would have caused among the conquered!

    For many Chinese people, Mexico is a land of mysteries, thieves and abductors (they read it on newspapers or news online). And they just are not that interested in this country as they are in some other Latin American countries, such as Brazil and Argentina (the soccer teams of these two countries have lots of fans in China). So when people got to know that I have been in Mexico, the first question they’d ask me would always be: “Have you ever been robbed there?  

    I was lucky. Nothing bad happened to me. But one of my Chinese colleagues, our finance manager once was in trouble.

    One night at around 9:00pm, he left his apartment to go to the office (as Chinese staff working overseas sometimes we had to participate conference call held by the headquarter in Shenzhen). The office was not far away from the apartments the company rented for us and when we were not in a hurry, we usually walked instead of driving company’s van or taking taxi. But that was a cold night and was kind of late, so Li decided to take a Taxi. Taxi in Mexico City look like Beatles car, small, tow-door and painted in green color. They look very cute outside but very uncomfortable inside since the space is very small.

    Li got into one taxi and he found that besides the driver, there was a woman there sitting in the back seat. Before Li could take any reaction, the car started to move at high speed. Li said that at first he was not that afraid for the driver and the woman greeted him with “Hola” (that’s Spanish word for saying hello) maybe with a smile on their faces but since it was dark Li was not sure about this detail. Then the couple talked other stuff to Li in Spanish. They went for two minutes and of course, Li could not understand a word. Let’s say that Li’s Spanish vocabulary was not very impressive. The Spanish words he could understand and say with a Chinese accent were “Hola (hello)”, “Hello beauty (hola guapa)”, “beautiful girl (chica bonita)”, “Si (yes)”, “gracias (thank you)”, “taco (a typical Mexican food that Li always had for lunch), “muy caro (very expensive, this one is for shopping)” , “todo derecho (straight ahead)” and our office address. Before that night, Li believed that his Spanish was ok for him to move around. But obviously none of those words would help him with the communication in that taxi.

    Li did try to communicate with them though. He replied in Spanish to inform them where he’d like to go. The couple might think Li spoke Spanish since he said the address in Spanish. So they tried again to tell stuff to Li in Spanish. Li did not understand and did not reply this time. The couple must feel desperate so after a 2-minute-silence, the woman got a knife out from her pocket and pointed it at Li. She spoke in English with strong accent: “Money!”. I personally think that it was no need for the woman to practice her English at that moment. Showing a knife is more than enough to make Li understand what’s going on and what they wanted from him.

    Li was freaked out. He had more less 1,500 pesos (100 US dollars) in his wallet and immediately gave the money to the woman. The woman counted the money, took a look inside Li’s wallet to make sure that he’d handed in every peso, then, how funny is this one, said to Li: “Gracias (thanks).”  The driver pulled the car over and let Li get off. Li told us that once he got off the car, for one minute he did not know what to do. After he calmed down, he decided to go back to the apartment, WALKING. No mood for the conference call.

    Here comes the funniest part. While Li was walking towards his apartment, the couple drove back with the keys Li forgot in their car. They returned just to give back the keys to Li. Li felt that he needed to thank them for their “kindness” so he said to them: “gracias (thanks)”.  The couple replied in Spanish you are welcome and they left. Li was able to get to his apartment safely and tell us about what had happened to him.

    This is a true story and maybe you think it’s funny. But going out along at night, especially when you are a foreigner, might be very dangerous in Mexico City. There are other incidents that I will write, also about safety in Mexico City. I will stop here and cook my dinner.

    (the photo is of the Cateral in Mexico City. It's located in the Plaza. It's a great picture, looks like a post card. My friend Ding took the picture with his camera).

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  • the New China Town

    2008-2-13

    I went to the new China Town in Flushing Queens last Satuarday. We always go there for Chinese grocery shopping. In Flushing you do not need to speak English. Everyone speaks Mandrin or Cantones. I took a photo of the resturant where we had Zao Cha. So many people. Some of them wore Chinese tradicional cloth for people are still celebrating the Spring Festival.

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  • true colors

    2008-2-13

    I finally finished my report and got some time to write something for my blog.

    People in America, I suppose people all over the world, are talking about the presidential election in this country and who's gonna be in the white house next year to ran the country. I am not American but have found it pretty interesting to follow up a little bit the campaigns and debates. The whole process looks like a long job interview that goes up for almost one year.  The American people are the judges while the Democratic and Republican presidential candidates need to talk through, in front of the judges, their beliefs, their strategies and their plans to cope with the country’s major issues if s/he is elected as the president of the United States. They are in a race to best prove their qualifications and capabilities in public and to finally get the job offer.

    To tell the truth, I can hardly imagine this kind of presidential election take place in China. Not only because that we have totally different political system which makes it impossible to elect our political leaders that way (No more discussion on politics. Believe it or not I am not interested in it). Put aside the political concerns, Chinese people’s way of thinking and acting in a competition, their mentality and behavīor will just make it impossible.

    I was a big fan of American reality show “the Apprentice”. Young and talented people of different backgrounds, high degree holders and street smarts, compete to become the apprentice of Donald Trump. Each candidate needs to prove that s/he is the best by showing his/her intelligence, critical thinking ability, creativity, leadership etc through working with other candidates on the assignments given by Donald Trump to them, real business to deal with. What’s more, s/he must know how to defend him/herself in the boardroom, if it happens that in certain week the team s/he longs to looses. If somebody screw up and even s/he is aware of that, the person will not give up very easily in the boardroom where Donald Trump and his two assistants will question all the team members who is responsible for them to be defeated by the other team.  Everyone will do his best to defend himself for it’s clear for them that the reason why they are in this interview is to get the job. And that’s what competition is all about: show the best of you and when time comes defend yourself the best you can. I think in the business world, it’s very important for one to know how to protect oneself. You may have made some mistakes that are part of the reasons why the project failed. But it can’t be all your fault. If you let others to take advantage of the situation, I believe, that’s a sign of you being weak.

    Last year when I went back to China, I found that CCTV had cloned this American TV show and the Chinese version is called “Win in China”. It pretty much copied the whole structure of “the Apprentice”. The reward, of course, is not to become Donald Trump’s apprentice. Rather, the top three that stand out from the competition will get investments of RMB 5 million, each of them (maybe I got the number wrong, really don’t remember). What called my special attention was Chinese candidates’ performance in the boardroom. Each time when a team was called in to the boardroom for they were defeated, you knew that to the question from the judges:”who is responsible for this failure?”, they would give unanimous answer. It seems that they are so comfortable to take the chance to talk about how wonderful job the other team members have done and how s/he is sure that him/herself is the sole reason for the failure. No exception. I was totally confused for I could not understand what’s their purpose to be there? Just to show what a loser they are in front of the judges and the nationwide TV audience? I don’t think so for they really looked very comfortable when giving the answer, sometimes even with a smile on their faces. So maybe that’s one hypocritical side of our culture which keeps us from showing our true colors, our true personality in front of others.

    Why it is so difficult for us to say in public: “I think I am much better than them in…for the reasons that…”?  Why in front of others, we’d like to hide ourselves behind a hypocritical modest? Why we are sometimes afraid of fighting toe to toe with our competitors for something that we really want or believe in? (what’s sad is that in our culture it is common that things people dare not say in front of you, they say it at your back).

    In one Democratic presidential debate, Senator Obama said: “I was friends with Hillary Clinton before we started this campaign; I will be friends with Hillary Clinton after this campaign is over.” That’s the attitude for competition.

    Show your true colors, are you up for this?

     

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  • Lonely Island

    2008-2-12

    pretty good weather today after yesterday's snow storm. i am sitting in a small room in long island, NY, in front of my computer to write this first article for my blog. when i first came here in 2001 i had no idea how long i would stay in this country and what kind of life i would have here. my spanish classmate natalia, who is getting married this summer in paris, used to call long island " the Lonely Island". one hour drive away from NYC, it's the opposite of the city almost in every way. you can have good and original long island ice tea here, though .

    i plan to get my ticket back to china this week. don't know when will come back this time. this country and this place is just too boring for me. i will meet the mexican client this thursday in downtown and start packing up.

    i went to the school gym and walked around the campus. nothing changed. will take some photos next time i go there. i saw more korean students and chinese students, no only on campus but also in the oriental store, run by the taiwanese couple.

    i made chinese dumplings this spring festival with some chinese friends living in chapin. chinese students' life here is still boring. they go to labs, do their TA thing, meet their boss (professors) and cook. i made a good decision on not going for phd. i can not imagine myself follow that routine for 5 straight years or more. american economy is down. i talked with some new graduates. they are all worried since big companies are doing the lay off or freezing head counts. some of them have been looking for job for almost 6 months. i do not understand why they'd like push themselves that hard instead of going back to china where they can find a decent job much easier. the salary won't be at the same level, but you do not pay so much taxes in China one of them told me that if he goes back to china only with a degree and no working experience, people may see him as a loser. but 6-months-long phone and onsite interview without job offer does not make him less loser, rather it makes the whole situation look even worse.

    i think i was lucky for i made the right decision at the right time. also i will not care if others call me a loser as long as i feel comfortable with my life, whether it's in US, in Canada, in Mexico or in China.  

     

     

     

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