When I first learn that we would be having a kid, I went through what I imagine to be all the standard emotions from excitement to apprehension. But after a few weeks I found myself with the feeling of why do I have to wait so long. I had dealt with the emotions and I was ready to have a kid. But I still had 7 and a half months to wait before the child arrived.

So, the result was… I kind of forget about it. Now, we still went to the doctor every month and started to buy things for the baby (crib, stroller, car seat, etc. By the way, the prices of these things in China is CRAZY!!). We organized the baby’s room, but these were all preformed as tasks, just like washing the dishes or cleaning the house. They were just things that had to be done and while doing them I didn’t have the sense that a third person is about to come into our lives.

During this time, Christine was getting bigger and bigger. It’s a long slow process that you don’t notice, like watching grass grow. Nothing seems to happen and then one day you look and she’s carrying around a basketball under her shirt and it’s no longer giving little flutter kicks, it’s practicing Kong Fu. So once again, being only a month or so away, we are very excited and have a real sense that a little person is living inside Christine. But again we find ourselves in the position of waiting.

This feeling is exasberated by the approaching Spring Festival, the biggest holiday of the year, when everything slows down. Which adds to the feeling of “is the baby hear yet?”, but alas she’s a few weeks off.

The long and short is that very soon I will be a proud Papa. Take a look at the attached gallery to see the pictures of a pregnant Christine.

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Google has recently pulled out of China, or re-directed traffic through its Hong Kong site, over the hacking of some of its Gmail accounts and the censorship of its search engine in China. I will not be discussing the hacking of emails as this is beyond by knowledge and interest. What I will be discussing is internet access in China. First, the Web sites that cannot be accessed fall into three major categories: adult sites, sites that report on/discuss certain recent or historical events, and foreign social networking sites.

I will start with third category and work back. The reason I say foreign networking sites is that China has its own versions of Facebook, Myspace, etc.. which are not blocked. The blocking serves the dual purpose of censoring and of providing an opportunity for local companies to develop their own products. I do not own a Facebook account so the effect of not accessing it is not an issue for me. But I get the impression that the disruption is limited to mainly foreigners visiting China who want to chronicle their adventures here. Thus I don’t think a lack of Facebook is registering very high on the list of concerns of local Chinese. This leads to somewhat more interesting questions: 1. Is the content on these Chinese Social Networking sites censored? Yes, as every company, country or group use one form or another of censorship. 2. What is censored and how is it done? I do not know the answers. But I suspect the censoring involves limiting any discussion that involves immanent and mass “protest”.

There is a misconception about the censorship of sites that deal with certain recent or historical events. Not all sites that do or have ever mentioned these events are censored. Only sites that deal almost exclusively with these events are restricted. It is important to note that news sites such as the BBC, The New York Times, Al Jeezera, etc. are all accessible in China, thus information from outside China is plentiful. Many Chinese do not read English at a high enough level to make use of these sites, but they are available. I think that not dealing with some important issues from the past is problematic and very dangerous. China is hardly the only country that does this, but it is something that needs to be dealt with in the near future.

The third category is adult websites. Now the best argument I have heard for why they should not be blocked is “once you break the chain of freedom, we are all constrained by it”. While this does hold water, China has many more issues to deal with first. Freedom is not simply a word; just because someone decrees you are free, does not mean you are free. True freedom comes from the ability to make choices that affect your life. The ability to go to a good school, regardless of who your parents are, the ability to get a job because you have the talent and desire. These are the indications of freedom, and the things that need to be achieved before we worry about how many adult Web sites are available.

China has many issues, some of which risk derailing the giant, but as I look back on the history of the United States and its seemingly inevitable rise to power, I cannot help but think that China is on the same path. The climb will not go smoothly, but the Chinese don’t except it to. The question is: how bumpy will it get?

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The Chinese program is a four year degree program. Each year is divided into two semesters. The first runs from the beginning of September to the end of January. The second, from the end of February to the end of June. For the first year, students must complete three classes: Speaking (会话), Listening (听力), and Writing（精读). Passing requires at least a 60% mark. From the second to the fourth year an extra class is added: Newspaper reading (报纸). In the first year, students are encouraged to learn Chinese, which means for the most part they will pass no matter what. What the teachers are looking for is effort. If you are trying to learn Chinese then passing will not be an issue. However, how well you speak Chinese is a different story.

The only reason a student may not pass is if he or she miss more then 10 classes (15 if they have family, emergency or medical problems). They will not be allowed to write the final exam and thus will fail.

The students studying at BNU, both foreign and domestic, are incredibly friendly. Most of the foreign students are from Japan, Korea, Thailand and Indonesia. There is also an entire class from Great Britain. They are taking a four year degree in Chinese in Britain and they spend one semester here studying Chinese and getting first-hand experience of the country and its culture.

There is also a smattering of students from Europe, North America and Australia.

Jorge, a good friend of mine, and I are the only westerners in my class. Jorge is from Mexico and has spent extensive time living in the U.S. He is keenly interested in languages and currently speaks English, Spanish,  a little Japanese and Korean, and is learning Chinese. Having so many non-English speakers in the class makes things much more interesting as we learn about China and the rest of Asia. It is also an ideal situation for those living in the dorm as it forces people to speak Chinese as Chinese becomes the bridging language.

While at BNU I have managed to make some Chinese friends and I hope to make more in the coming year.

Below you will find pictures of BNU and my classmates. Some pictures on the blog have the title 同学 or 我的同学。The meaning: 我的同学=wo de tongxue.

我wo=me

的de=possessive

同学 tongxue=classmates.

The meaning of 同学tongxue is derived from 同tong =together and 学xue=learn.

Just a quick Chinese lesson.

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Last month I went on a school trip to the Great Wall of China. The trip began at 7:30 a.m. Saturday morning and involved a convoy of 10 buses travelling to the Great Wall. Now I should mention that the vast majority of students at BNU live on campus. I, on the other hand, live about a half hour bike ride away, which makes for an early Saturday morning. This also brings up a good point, that I have yet to formally introduce my school and classmates. Therefore the subject of my next post will be my school and classmates.

Now back to the Great Wall.There are a few different options when travelling to the Great Wall. You can go to one of four major ‘tourist’ locations near Beijing, each about 1 1/2 to 2 hours drive from the Wall: Juyong, Ba Da Ling, Mutianyu and Jin Shan Ling. Or you can hire a guide to take you to one of the more remote parts of the Wall. I have been to the Great Wall twice now. The first time was to Ba Da Ling, the second was to Juyong Guan. I can say that Juyong Guan is a much more pleasant experience: there are less people, less shops and in general it is much less touristy and more about the Wall. That being said, the Wall is an amazing sight and, regardless of which location you go to, you will be awestruck.

A quick note about going to a remote part of the Wall. It sounds very cool and probably is, as long as you have a good guide. But the Wall is very old and in some locations is in great disrepair. Climbing on these parts of the Wall causes even greater damage. So as cool as it may be, consideration should be given to those who will come after you?

So we arrived at the Great Wall at about 10:00 a.m., disembarked and began the climb up the mountain to get to the Great Wall.Yes, it is a bit of climb to get to get there. Once we reached the Wall, we continued our climb because the Wall rises and falls with the mountainous terrain. After about a 2 hour walk we reached the highest point, or at least the highest point we were prepared to go to that day. I looked out and tried to imagine what it must have felt like to guard this Wall all those centuries ago and what it must have felt like to see the barbarian hordes coming across the land. Then I realized I was looking the wrong way, and if I did see hordes it wouldn’t matter because they would be half way to Beijing by then. So I turned around. The view and the feel of the place was something I recommend everyone to experience at least once.

To wrap up, here is some basic information about the Great Wall.

The Great Wall was built between the 5th century BC and the 17th Century AD to protect the northern borders of the Chinese Empire from attack. The majority of the existing wall was built during the Ming Dynasty (a common theme in Beijing).

The Great Wall stretches from Shanhaiguan in the east to Lop Nur in the west and is made up of sections of wall and natural defences such as hills and rivers.There is no interpretation offered at this part of the Great Wall (I.e an audio tour) other than some display panels located at major points. The panels are written in both Chinese and English and provide some interesting context.

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The Temple is located on a giant piece of land inside the city making the area both a popular tourist spot and a park for the locals. This gives the Temple and surrounding area a very relaxed and peaceful feeling. As you can see fron the pictures below, the buildings throughout the Temple are large and very ornate.

One of the most interresting spots is the Echo Wall. The wall encloses the Imperial Vault of Heaven. If you stand at the east or the west side of the wall and whisper, a person standing on the opposite side will hear clearly what you say – the theory of sound waves in action 400 years ago.

There are three Echo Stones located just outside the gate of the Imperial Vault of Heaven. If you speak while standing on the first stone and facing the Vault, you will hear one echo. Stand on the second and then the third stone, you will hear two and three echoes respectively.

While visiting the temple I decided to take advantage of the audio tour. The audio tour is self-triggered, meaning you don’t hit any buttons it just automatically starts playing a message when you reach a certain location. Or at least that is the idea. However in practice it starts talking about things and locations which you cannot find or are nowhere near. Not very useful or informative, and also not cheap. At ¥40 I could buy food for a day.

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Last week I went to the Forbidden City with my class. The Forbidden City is located in the centre of Beijing on the south side of Tiananmen Square. The City was commissioned by Yongle Emperor and completed in 1420 AD. It served as the ruling seat of the Chinese empire for almost 500 years, from the Ming Dynasty to the end of the Qing Dyansty.

As you enter the Forbidden City from Tiananmen Square you are struck by the enormity of the place. The high walls and grand entrance are an imposing sight. It took only 14 years to build the 950 buildings of the Forbidden City, covering an area of over 720,000 square metres. Supposedly, a million workers including one hundred thousand artisans were driven into long-term hard labor.

The Forbidden City is comprised of large open spaces leading to three major halls: the Palace of Heavenly Purity, Hall of Union, and the Palace of Earthly Tranquility. The sides are lined with self-contained courtyards and minor palaces where the Emperor’s concubines and children lived. This layout means you are likely to miss some things unless you walk in a never ending zigzag from one side to the other.

Currently the Forbidden City is undergoing a major renovation, which I can only imagine will also be never ending due to the sheer size of the place. This renovation includes changing the side buildings into small museums that will display aspects of daily life in the Forbidden City. We viewed one that displayed artifacts from an imperial wedding and described what the wedding ceremony would be like and what rituals would take place.

At the back of the Forbidden City is a beautiful imperial garden, which also displays art exhibitions from local art schools. Being in the garden provides you with one of those moments that makes you realize how good it would have been to live in the Forbidden City; it is a peaceful place where one forgets that one is in the middle of a city of a million people.

A trip to the Forbidden City is a trip to one of the great man made sites. You realize how privileged you are when you consider that for almost five centuries only a select few ever got to see the inside.

Since around 1925, the Forbidden City has been run by the Palace Museum whose collection is made up primarily of artifacts from the Ming and Qing dynasties. A large part of the Museum’s collection is now located in the National Palace Museum in Taipei, Taiwan. At the end of the Chinese civil war, the Nationalists took a lot of artifacts with them to Taiwan. Interestingly, artifacts taken by Western powers are described as stolen, while artifacts in Taiwan are considered still part of the Chinese collection.

The interpretation offered is the standard fair, an audio tour that I did not take. I took it the last time I visited the Forbidden City and, much like the Temple of Heaven audio tour, it left much to be desired. They do provide interpretive signage at all major points.

As a final note, you will notice that one of the pictures is of me standing under a Canadian and Chinese flag in Tiananmen Square. This was because my trip to the Forbidden City coincided with Mr. Steven Harper’s trip to China. The Chinese reaction to his trip was very interesting and will be the subject of a future (quite soon) post.

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Walking: Beijing is a massive city, so while walking is a good option 
in a given neighborhood or area, it is not a real option to get
 between different areas.

Driving: Beijing is set-up with a series of six ring roads  that go
 around the city. The first ring surrounds Tiananman Square, followed by
 highways that circle the city and go further and further out. Every ring road has a side road around it that provides 
access to city streets. Next to the side road is a bike lane, then a
 sidewalk . The ring roads within the inner city (i.e
 ring #2) have tree-lined walkways with parkettes, sport facilities such as ping
 pong and basketball courts, workout equipment, etc. a manmade canal encircles the city along the 2nd ring road. The highways are designed so that they are lower than the surrounding
 roads. This helps in mitigating the effects of being around so many
 cars when you bike or walk. When the ring road crosses a major
 intersection it becomes a bridge and goes over the city street.

 There is a lot of traffic, especially during rush hour and at major intersections. 

People drive a little crazy in Beijing. I say a little because it is 
not as bad as I had imagined. However, it is not for the faint of
 heart. If you can imagine driving in New York City as a dance, and 
as long as you know the steps you can move in and out fairly well
 (this does not include gridlock which is also a big problem in 
Beijing.) Then driving in Beijing is like a dance that everyone is 
still learning. There is almost a semblance of order to the chaos, but
 not quite. For example, people change lanes as if they are the only 
ones on the road; they also move in and out of traffic with the same 
abandon. If someone misses an exit they simply put the car in 
reverse and go backwards to the exit.

 As a note, gas in Beijing is not cheap — ¥6.3 per litre, meaning that, 
relative to wages, gas is very expensive!

Biking: Beijing has bike lanes everywhere. So getting around on your
 bike is a snap. On major roads, the bike lanes are separated by a 
barrier (although it does sometimes double as a right hand turn lane).
 Compared to driving, biking is therefore safe and organized. This, and the fact 
that biking is very cheap, means biking is a popular mode of
 transportation in Beijing (as you can see from the pictures). Beijing
 has two types of bikes, regular pedal bikes and motor-assisted bikes.
 Motor-assisted bikes fall into two categories: ones that are bought new
(usually mopeds) and ones that are basic bikes retrofitted with a motor. When you pedal the latter the motor
 uses no power and you are recharging the battery — very ingenious.

 Monday to Friday, I bike from my home to University. The trip takes 
about 30 minutes, depending on the traffic lights. 

In rush hour, bike lanes can become another lane of traffic. So watch out!!

Public Transportation: Beijing has an extensive subway and bus system. 
Currently Beijng has 7 subway lines to be expanded to 15 by 2015.
 (See the diagram below and compare the current and future subway lines. ) The
 subway is clean and very efficient with trains arriving every 2-3 minutes. The only downside is that the system is only open 
from about 5:30am to 11pm. So if you have a late night you have
 to take a taxi. The subway costs ¥2 (yuan) per trip. The bus fare is
 based on distance and costs between ¥0.40 and ¥2.50. Most trips
 cost less then ¥1.

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(All quoted prices are converted into Yuan the conversion is about ¥6.5 Yuan to the Canadian  $1)

1.  China has no legal drinking age …. anyone can drink alcohol and you can buy alcohol anywhere. As with a lot of things in China, beer is cheap.

Tallboys of imported beer (Stella, Heineken) – ¥6.00 @ the corner store

Domestic Tallboys                                                     -¥2.50  @ the corner store

However, if you to go to the club district, where there are a lot of foreigners, you will pay foreign prices (¥30-¥40 a beer).

2.  You can smoke almost anywhere …. though very few people seem to smoke, at least consistently and in public.

I’ll give you an example:

When smoking was allowed in restaurants in North America they would be full of smoke.

In Beijing you will probably see one, maybe two, people smoking in the entire restaurant.

As a note: smoking is allowed (or at least tolerated) in the university bathrooms, though not in class.

A pack of cigarettes costs between ¥8 (domestic) and ¥20 (foreign and very high end domestic)

I know this may seem confusing as reports say China has nearly 350 million smokers. But something to keep in mind is that while 350 million is a lot, China has a population of over 1.3 billion. What surprised me was that I was expecting everyone in China to be lighting up yet, even with very few restrictions, there seems to be only a small amount of smoking.

3. Bikes … lots of bikes and nobody locks them to anything; they merely secure the back wheel to the frame. If this was North America, every bike would be stolen. I have come up with two reasons for this:

a. Theft is not a big problem (I would like to believe this, but…)

b. It would cost more to steal the bike then buy it legitimately: i.e. a truck, tools, steal the bikes, set-up the show and hide from the police. Just not cost effective.

An average bike cost between ¥80 and ¥550 depending on new/used and what features you want (speeds, shocks, etc..).

I will examine transportation in Beijing in a future post.

4.  The weather. When I first arrived, and for the month of September, the weather was generally cloudy and foggy (smoky). Pollution is definitely a problem. However, since the beginning of October it has gotten a little colder (fall like) and the sky has cleared. We have recently had a string of beautiful days.

Interesting article about the weather in Beijing: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/17/world/asia/17beijing.html

I cannot stress enough how much nicer the weather has been since the 1st of October.

I should mention that Beijing is a very green city. You find a lot of flowers, parks, trees etc…

5. A couple of interesting facts about the police. First of all, they do not carry guns.  Second, when a police officer writes a ticket a small crowd generally gathers to watch and the nervousness of the police officer is obvious.

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China’s National Day Festivities continued well into the night. The main attraction was again at Tiananmen Square and involved countless performances. Over 100,000 performers, including leading Chinese musical acts and an endless display of fireworks impressed the crowd and were the subject of many a conversation the next day. The preformance ended with the surreal site of top-ranking Chinese officials dancing with the crowd. (As seen in the pictures below)

As opposed to popular reports, there was no checking of I.D.’s at every street corner. Thee was an increase in general security but no more then you would see in any major capital. As for access to Tiananmen Square, it was limited, but it was also full of 100,000+ performers. So if you think it is unfair that they don’t let you run the bases during a Major League Baseball game or get up on stage during a Hamlet soliloquy, then yes they did impede freedoms.

The Mid Autumn festival is one of the most important festivals in China. It takes place on the 15th day of the 8th month of the Chinese Lunar calendar. The festival celebrations happen in the evening under a large, bright moon. As a note the fullest moon of the year doesn’t necessarily occur during the Mid Autumn festival, this year, that happened on the 16th day of the Chinese Lunar calendar (October 4th).

The majority of my time off during the National Holiday and Mid Autumn Festival has been spent eating with family and friends, and it has been delious. I will do a posting soon on some of the different foods I have eaten since my arrival.

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Today is the 60th Anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China. The day is marked in China by celebrations and parties all over the country. I have never seen a National Day celebrated with so much excitement and enthusiasm. Even Independence Day in the United States does not quite reach the swelling of pride found in China (this could be in part to the emerging of China as opposed to the Established U.S.)

Different celebrations can be found throughout the country, but the  morning’s premier event is the National Day Parade along Chang’an Avenue through Tiananmen Square. The parade begins (as everyday does) with the raising of the Flag. The Parade is broken into two major parts: the military parade followed by what the Chinese call a mass pageant.

The military parade consists of every branch and division of the military: from the navy, army, air force to the mobile missile defense units, the fighters and bombers and the mobile nuclear missiles. While I am not overly impressed by military parades, the organization and discipline of the troops is well done and on par with the great armies of the world. (There has been discussion about not only the advancement in military technologies, but in the professionalism of the army. A point not lost on the Americans who are great believers in the need for a highly trained and organized military establishment.)

The mass pageant consists of floats, marches and performances dedicated to different aspects of Chinese society. The first is the Ansai Drum Dance: a drum sequence that originated as a war symbol and later developed into a celebration of festivals and the harvest. It is an impressive show and by far the most entertaining part of the parade. The Parade continues with tributes to China’s four leaders: Mao Ze Dong, Deng Xiao Ping, Jiang Zemin and Hua JinTao. Followed by ‘Cherry Blossom’ parade that wishes all chines good fortune and happiness. Then Marches to different aspects of Chinese society: agriculture development,  scientific developmental,  environmental developmental,  etc… Then comes the largest section of the pageant, floats dedicated to the different provinces and cities from Inner Mongolia to Taiwan, (oh yes Taiwan). The parade ends with a procession of 5,000 children symbolizing ‘A better tomorrow’.

Over the past month I have had the opportunity to think about the China I have seen and the one you read about. Now I already had a good idea that these two vision would not mesh. But I thought today, National Day, would be a good time to give a brief reflection.

An Important thing to understand about China and the Chinese people (be careful here, since I am about to make sweeping generalizations) is that they are under no illusions about the government, corruption and the propaganda that live with every day. What they demand from their government is in many ways no different then what any peoples do/should demand: a constant improvement of their and their neighbors quality of life (living standards) and a responsiveness to the problems they face both as individuals and as a group. I think I can say with some assurance that the living standards have improved greatly for a lot of Chinese and that the prospects for their children are brighter now then they have been in almost 200 years. By this standard the government has and is delivering. What happens in the future will be interesting. But, if the rest of the world views Chinese people as passive and repressed, it does so at its own risk.

HAPPY NATIONAL DAY!!!

Part II will follow with a description of the evening festivities at Tiananmen Square.

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