From Shanghaiist:

A video now going viral on iFeng.com shows a white blonde male putting his feet over the seat before him and a Chinese female passenger’s head on a train from Shenyang to Beijing. It is not clear what happened before the start of this video, but the woman was clearly irritated by the man’s behavior. She stood up, turned around, and hit the man’s feet with a magazine, saying “you are a big shame to your country.” (“你真给你国家丢人”)

However, the foreign man showed no intention to move his feet away and instead called the woman’s beating a “a massage.”

The woman finally threw her magazine at the man as the man hurled other insults at her, saying she was “Shabi” (傻屄: “silly c*nt”). (read more)

Articles across the English-language state media are reporting that the government intends to crack down on illegal foreigners in China.

China is getting tougher over foreigners illegally entering, living or working in China, Vice Minister of Public Security Yang Huanning said yesterday.

When delivering a report on the administration of entry-exit, residence and employment of foreigners to the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, the top legislature, Yang said the crackdown will include improving visa policies, strengthening border controls, repatriating illegal aliens, and setting up repatriation locations in regions that have large numbers of such foreigners.

Most illegal foreigners are from neighboring countries, according to Yang. Language training, housekeeping and labor-intensive industries were the main sectors employing them.

Police last year investigated more than 20,000 incidents in which foreigners illegally entered, lived or worked on China’s mainland, double the number in 1995.

Couple that with the following:

China is likely to introduce a nationwide system to archive information about foreigners in the country, according to a draft law proposed to lawmakers on Tuesday.

The suggestion, if put into practice, will replace current scattered records set up by different administrations to which access is limited to one government agency. Experts said the change would effectively crack down on people who overstayed their visas or worked illegally.

The draft on regulating arrivals and departures from China was tabled before the National People’s Congress Standing Committee for a second reading. It was put before the top legislature in a first draft in December to allow the government to gather and store biometric data on foreign visitors “whenever they deem it necessary”, expanding the government’s right to collect such data.

The good news is that it appears the country is also expanding the availability of permanent resident permits and giving foreigners more ways to “get legal”.

Zhang Yan at China Business Watch sums it up well:

For long-term residents, these plans sound like nothing new: indeed, reports about databases and crackdowns are regularly carried in state-media. Recently, however, lawyers are reporting increasing numbers of cases of foreigners being caught and punished for overstaying. Their advice: get legal, stay legal, and enjoy any favorable policies that get introduced.

One of the things which I find hardest to understand is the tendency of young, university-educated Chinese people (and especially women) to take astrology seriously. And I mean Western astrology, not the traditional Chinese variety. To be sure, the idea that our personality is somehow related to the time of year we were born (various scientific studies have found no support for this, in case you were wondering) is one which still has its popularity in lots of places.  However, it seems to me that it is currently more widespread here in China than it is in the West.

I have sometimes confronted Chinese female acquaintances who believe in horoscopes, asking them how they justify it rationally. Some of them will claim, when pushed, that they don’t really believe in it, or “they’re not sure if it’s true or not”, but they think astrology is “fun”, so they follow it. Others will defend their beliefs, claiming that “not everything can be explained by science” and other stuff in a similar vein. One of them told me that science is “lagging behind”, and one day it may yet prove astrology to be right (sigh). Almost all of them claim that astrological predictions about personality seem to be correct most of the time for their friends, so they must have some validity (personally I would put this down to the extreme vagueness of such predictions).

Another superstitious belief which seems to be rather widespread among young Chinese (especially women, once again), is the idea that our ABO blood group is predictive of our personality. This belief (which is completely unsupported by science) is especially prevalent in Japan and Korea, but it has also made inroads in China. In Japan and Korea it reaches the point where matchmaking services will include their members’ blood type, because it is seen as important information. Infoboxes for celebrities will always include their blood type, and books explaining what jobs fit people with different blood types sell millions. Japanese and Koreans also may find it surprising to meet a foreigner who doesn’t know their own blood group. Perhaps because of the popularity of Korean pop culture among certain sectors of China’s youth, this superstition has made its way into China.

It is especially ironic that Chinese people should subscribe to this notion, when you consider how it originated. It is a fact that different ethnic groups tend to have different distributions of blood groups. In the late twenties, some Japanese researchers took an interest in the idea that blood type determines personality, partly motivated by racism. A researcher called Furukawa was particularly instrumental in popularizing the idea. After a rebellion against the Japanese occupiers in Taiwan, he conducted a study aiming to show that the “cruelty” of the Taiwanese was due to the large proportion of people with type O blood among them. His theories even interested the Japanese military regime of the time, but they lost popularity during the thirties, when their unscientific nature became clear. The belief that blood type and personality are related regained popularity with the Japanese public in the seventies. This was the result of a book written by Masahiko Nomi, a broadcaster who had no scientific background, presenting anecdotal and unsupported evidence. From Japan the theory spread to (South) Korea, and then on to China.

Should these kinds of superstition be confronted, or are they just harmless fun? As long as they don’t take on racial connotations, as the blood group belief originally did in the twenties, I suppose they don’t really harm people. Having said that, they are still symptoms of a readiness to accept beliefs which clash with common sense and lack any supporting evidence whatsoever.

When we went to the Longmen Grottoes last Friday, we did our usual thing of strolling out of the station and looking a bit lost. In the past this has meant being instantly accosted by touts shouting random words at us. (I don’t mind the shouting. There’s one creepy guy who sidles up to you at Gongyi station, looking shady. He whispers “taxi” like he’s trying to sell crack.) We just tend to keep walking until the scrum dissipates and we can work out what to do. This time though, it was just one young woman. She was very polite and patiently explained that she was a volunteer, organising free buses for tourists. Bit suspicious, right?

We took a bit of convincing, of course, but everything seemed cool. There were Chinese tourists already in the minivan, seemingly none the worse for the freebie, and we assumed that our money/passports/kidneys would still be with us by the end of the day. She rushed off to find a few more people and came across an Australian family. Maybe we were just too trusting, or they were too cynical, but they were having none of it. They immediately decided it was a con. She became adamant and told them it was easier than getting the bus. They became more suspicious and asked why she was trying to convince them. She claimed to really want to help and it was her determination that ended up driving them away.

When a friend and I went to stay with a student’s family for a few days we were subjected to the full force of Chinese hospitality. From the moment we were woken up in the morning (woken up to ensure we had enough time to get ready before being carted off somewhere), we were bombarded with questions. Is there enough hot water? What do you want for breakfast? Have you eaten enough? Are you tired? Do you want to sit down? Do you need the toilet? What do you want for lunch? Do you want me to carry your bag? Eating at restaurants was when it got really difficult. They would hand us the menu and insist that we order, even after we’d explained, time and again, that we couldn’t read Chinese.

And it doesn’t end there. I’ve had cigarettes forced on me. I’ve felt obliged to knock back any number of drinks (I’m not complaining too much about that one…). I’ve been so stuffed full of food that I couldn’t move (or that…). I’ve been bustled from seat to seat to seat on a packed bus for a better view. I’ve had amateur tour guides follow me around all day, struggling to explain things in broken English. Parents have made their kids stand before insisting I take a seat. Friends have haggled for me, taking ages to get a few RMB off. I made the mistake of mentioning that I’d like a map for my wall once, and got taken all over town in search of one. Never mind that I wasn’t that interested.

I’m told it’s a face thing. I’ve only been in the Middle Kingdom since August and still haven’t got to grips with it. I’m wondering if I ever will. Sometimes it just seems to be a heightened sense of embarrassment so I try not to laugh too much when people trip over. As far as hospitality goes, I’ve heard that it’s important for people to be seen as good hosts. I’m a guest in China, wherever I go, but when I just want to be left alone for a bit, how can I refuse someone’s help without offending them?

Case in point is a message I received from a good friend of mine in Suzhou yesterday about an experience she had:

A man and woman came to my apartment today claiming to be representatives from a bank where my landlord had applied for a loan. They said they needed to appraise the apartment as collateral against the loan. I called our agent who called the landlord and they had no knowledge of this. Unfortunately my Ayi had let them in and they had already taken some photos and left before I found out they were phony and probably casing our home for a robbery. After talking to the guards in our complex and my ayis I figured out that these people knew that I was a foreigner and knew exactly where I lived before they came into the complex.

While I’ve never experienced the above, I have certainly had a fair number of random people come to my door, flash some sort of ID and ask to see something in the apartment (gas metre, water metre, etc.). It has occurred to me that the “official” wasn’t who they said they were (or there ID says they are), as faking a uniform and a badge is on the simple side of what gets faked in China.

Other than locking windows and doors securely at night as well as getting a dog and a bat, I’m not sure what more can be done. Even renting in an upscale community (as my friend above does) means little more than you’re likely to be a bigger target. I’ve yet to meet a community security guard who doesn’t look like they could be blown over by a subtle breeze or bought off with a pack of smokes.

Stay safe friends.

Thoughts? Experiences?

He explains:

Later this month, I’m finally returning home. As many expats know, leaving this country brings with it a mixture of emotions – everything from relief to a bittersweet sense of loss. As I reflect on this departure, I’ve been writing songs that talk about life here: both “the expat experience” and the local lives that I’ve seen.

This past weekend, I filmed and uploaded a music video for a song called “City of the North”, a letter to this city in all its difficulty, challenge, and unexpected beauty. It showcases the faces and lives that intersect in this explosion of culture: the students, migrant workers, expats, laobaixing, and more.

Lyrics:

VERSE 1
I, started this rhyme as I waited for the train
On the platform, hearing instrumentals in my brain
My kicks dirty gray ‘cuz the air so foul
One hundred degrees out, so we pray for rain
The line pulls up, and it’s full as hell
Not to mention, these cats got a funky ass smell
LL might be somewhere ringin some bells
But as for me, I can barely even hear my cell
These are the middle class losers, beggars, students
Here, if you don’t got a car, you ain’t included
A place that turns flesh to stone, like Medusa
The ’60s, tried to make a ghost of Confucius
The car turns north as my head shuts down
Prepared to close doors like old John Brown
Done with the rhyme, and we’re almost out of town
And I almost missed my stop, I was busy with the sounds

CHORUS
Just another day in the city of the North
Some push foreign whips; some are just piss-poor.
Just another day in a city filled with schemes
Filled with teams who be dreaming of the cream, so it seems
x2

VERSE 2
I live in a city where the dust hits ya bones
Where to be heard, your words gotta use megaphones
Where everybody smokes and it’s killing them slow
Where you can sing out loud and nobody hears the tones
People tryna go hard, but they scared as hell
So they keep coming back like a carousel
no roots, so they move like a tumbling weed
Like police at the door while they bundling weed
They hear the knock outside and they stumble and flee
While I roam the city free like Grand Theft 3
There’s poison in the air, so he’s coughin up lungs
But he breathes in, the Spirit’s got him speaking in tongues
Coughed up some blood, guess he is a little scared
But he made it this far, guess he’s sposed to be here
A life well lived is a life without fear
Got more than 4 bars, am I coming through clear?

CHORUS

VERSE 3
I run the rings like Sonic, blaze like the chronic
Gaze at the stars, see my fate like a comet
But the haze on the city every day from the morning
No colors, just greys, like the city was in mourning
They poured over slums to make way for the champions
Now they got clubs where before, there were stadiums
Got bums, from locals turned aliens
An unmarked grave for the brave who remained in ‘em
I jumped off the train as I headed to the crib
and came face-to-face with a horse drawn rig
A man with blank eyes and a face like stone
Is this city mine, or his to call home?
Just another day in a city caught between
Tryna stay above water while we, chase our dreams
Some live and some die, tryna do their thing
Some live and some die, this big city, Beijing

CHORUS

The American Citizen Services Unit has received several reports of American citizens being injured following physical altercations with drivers of automobiles within our consular district.

Such physical altercations have sprung from the citizen tapping or otherwise making physical contact with an automobile driving across a pedestrian crosswalk very close to the US citizen. The ACS Unit urges American citizens to be cautious when walking as a pedestrian in China, as drivers in China may not follow the same driving customs as in the United States and may not yield to pedestrians. If a car does come too close as you are crossing the street, we urge you not to hit the car as this may lead to a physical confrontation.

I’m pretty certain Chinese law is just as clear as most any country’s law on this (and certainly correct me if I’m wrong) — pedestrians have the right of way — if not in the middle of a busy roadway, than certainly on cross-walks, sidewalks and the various other “no-cars-please” locations, where I’m sure these confrontations took place. I know Americans (perhaps wrongly) have a bit of an impetuous stereotype to live down, and they’re not extremely well-known for their cultural sensitivity (even the consulate says as much). Maybe the consulate realizes this, and is tired of defending themselves at State dinners. But on this one, I’ve got to say — good on the angry Americans.

In my mind cultural differences don’t really play a part. It’s not a cultural difference when some asshole nearly kneecaps you with his fender. The cultural difference isn’t that Chinese drivers don’t respect pedestrians, it’s that most pedestrians put up with it.

My advice, hit the car. Jump on the fucking hood. If you’re in the right, and you know you’re in the right, put a nice dent in that black sedan and then stare down the driver with all the hurt and accusation you can muster. Pedestrians have the right of way for a reason, meat and bone are harder to fix than paint and steel — sometimes drivers need to be reminded of this.

Oh, but only heed my advice if you’re tough, fast or both. I don’t need your black eye or broken lip on my conscience. I will happily buy you a beer and give you a pat on the back though.

1000 internets for the first comment that reminds me I’m an effing guest in this country.