News

Two items of China-related news got understandably overshadowed this week by the international media's coverage of the 9/11 anniversary, the anti-Islam movie, and the subsequent violence at the U.S. embassies in Libya and Egypt.  Those stories are certainly of more significance to both the world and especially the US.  But if it weren't clear to me before that I now live in a country with a completely different set of political norms, these two stories make that quite blatant.

The first: Oh Xi....where are you??

This month was supposed to mark the once-in-a-decade pre-planned transfer of power at the top of the Chinese Communist Party.  After 10 years in power as General Secretary of the CCP and President of the People's Republic, Hu Jintao was set to step down in favor of Xi Jinping.  Party Premier Wen Jiabao was to be succeeded by Li Keqiang.  Much had been made of this peaceful transition of power, and all signs pointed to a heavily planned 18th Party Congress, with all of the pomp and circumstance one could expect from the Chinese Government.

Instead, Xi is missing -- he has literally evaporated from public view, last seen on September 1st.  There is now speculation that his disappearence is health related, and that he had suffered from a heart attack.  Naturally, those rumors have been confirmed by no one at all.  The Party Congress is now likely not to happen until at least mid-October (dates have still yet to be confirmed).

Even had the transition of power gone through without a hitch, the distinctions between the political climate here and back in the US would have been obvious: on the one hand, a politically charged, often bordering on the ridiculous, campaign leading to the very definition of democracy (a free*** national election) and on the other hand, a stoic and meticulously planned transition of power from one set of unelected heads of state to the next.  Instead, Xi's absence can now be added to the Bo Xilai and Chen Guangcheng sagas as part of a year of Chinese political theater that is steadily approaching farce.

Story number two: The new definition of "work study"

The most disturbing part of this story, for me, is that it elicited, at most, a "ho hum, look what they're doing now" reaction.  It strikes me as so very Chinese to put children to work, without recourse, and label them as "interns" and, perhaps, equally Apple to view the practice as an evil necessary to churn out enough iPhone 5s out in time for the big release.  It provides little comfort that Foxconn assured us that the student laborers make up only 2.7% of the workforce there, since that still amounts to 32,000 kids putting together cell phones in what has already been widely reported as substantially less-than-optimal working conditions.

The two stories are similar in that a) I read about them in international, not Chinese, news sources, and b) nobody seems to care very much around here.  I admittedly don't understand everything my colleagues say when they're chattering away in Mandarin, but I've been paying a fair amount of attention this week, and I'm almost positive they are not talking about Xi Jinping and Foxconn.  There is, naturally, far less of a hunger for news here, both domestic and international.  That's what happens when the definition of "news" deviates so very far from what we recognize as news in the US.

In other "news", I walked past an old Chinese man today on the street wearing nothing but boxer shorts and orange Crocs.  I considered taking a subtle picture but chickened out.  I seriously regret that decision now.

***I can't help myself but drop this footnote to clarify that our free elections of course don't extend anymore to some people with historical tendencies to vote for Democrats.  Who knew that being physically capable of driving a car was a prerequisite for one's Constitutional right to vote.  And all in the name of rectifying a voter fraud problem that doesn't exist.  Hooray for the American spirit!