Harry, I just got to thinking about you sneaking into the museum and getting accused of espionage and then I started wondering about the whole communist country thing. I know China has really loosed up (evident in your pics) but is it like living anywhere else now days or one wrong move and you'll be working rice patties till the end of your days with out anyone knowing what happened to you?
Reply to Captain – Part 1
To tell the truth Captain, in some ways China has a lot more personal freedom than the UK these days, where, so I’m told, there’s a closed-circuit spying TV camera for every 5 members of the population and the Brit Government is trying to introduce national ID cards. Last time I went to the UK it felt like I had entered some Grim Soviet Police State from the 1960’s.
With the Chinese visitors visa's I obtain in Hong Kong I'm supposed to either live in a hotel, or register my abode at the local Police Station within 24-hours of arrival. I usually give my passport to my other half and she nips down to the Cop Shop and gets it done for me. Last time I was home for 3 weeks before I found out she'd forgotten all about it until a couple of days before we were due to travel to Hong Kong together. So I chased her down to the Local Nick with some cash to cover the "
fine for late registration" - aka “
bribe that went straight into someone's hip pocket”.
That’s one of the reasons why we visited the British Consulate in Beijing during March and have to go again at the end of this month – and in July. Among certain other “issues” that need to be addressed at the Consulate, I’m getting the documentation necessary to obtain a one-year visa which will cut out a lot of the registration kind of nonsense.
There's very little personal crime that I’m aware of in Dalian. I've never seen anyone being beaten up or mugged although I’m sure that personal crime does go on. Nor am I aware of any crimes against women – in fact open exhibitions of unrestrained public contact between the sexes such as slobbering kissing, is generally frowned upon. Holding hands and walking arm-in-arm is okay though, and the standard greeting between men is a bold handshake and small inclination of the head; while that between a man and woman is a very slight handshake and peck on both cheeks – probably a habit picked up from the Russians. Oh, and the average citizen is forbidden possession of firearms although that might not be strictly true in places like Shanghai, which just happens to be my favourite out of all the larger Chinese cities I’ve been to.
I can't read the newspapers of course, and I can’t pick up the BBC world service or Voice of America on the Short-Wave Radio, but Missus H does give me her cock-eyed Chinese version of what's going on in the world – which can be rather entertaining at times. The International CCTV9 English Language TV channel is pretty sanitized as far as national news is concerned, but surprisingly candid with International news coverage. It also has some really good travel programmes. I get most of my real news from the BBC on the internet.
They'll steal anything of course; I know an ex-pat who had the brake pads disappear from his chained-up bicycle while he was visiting some shop - they left the wheels on it though(?).
I was sitting in the Departure Lounge in Beijing International Airport one time sipping a can of beer. Turned around for about 30 seconds to check something in my computer bag - and the can of beer was gone...!!! The 3 guys sitting next to me were busy staring off into space with such angelic looks on their faces that I couldn't help but burst out laughing. Didn't bother remonstrating with them about the amazing disappearing can of beer trick, cos these guys were huge.
Apparently drink driving attracts four days in Sing-Sing and a fine of around US$15. Financial crimes are dealt with much more harshly, and I've seen the convicts – and don't fancy that caper too much. The local prison is right next to the hotel I was put into on my first ever visit to Dalian, probably as a warning to behave myself.
Really serious crime is a Capitol offense and I'm led to believe can be a public event in high profile cases, (not certain how true that is).
It’s pretty obvious the authorities keep tabs on me. The neighbours and local housing officials all somehow (?) seem to know whenever I'm home, even though its usually 23:30 by the time I arrive on Madame’s doorstep and I don’t normally leave the house the first week I’m home. So that one’s always been a bit of a mystery to me – unless they too have strategically placed closed circuit spying cameras as well. Or maybe it’s the smile on Missus Heid’s face and the spring in her step that gives the game away – I dunno.
The food can be a bit strange; that's dried fish behind that handsome devil in the photo below. I'm getting used to it though.
I do in fact understand a lot more Mandarin than I pretend to, but I don't speak it much cos of the hilarity my atrocious accent causes. There are five tones for each word and the meaning completely changes depending on how you "tone" the word.
"My goodness, what a beautiful dress you're wearing today Miss Du Shei Gou", to one of Madame Zhai's friends, can just as easily come out as,
"Gee whizz, your pet parrot has just fouled upon that disgusting rag you're wearing yesterday Mister Carrot"....
....When we go out together Missus H tells me that taxi drivers, shop assistants, and so on always ask her if I'm a Russian; who are not all that well thought of in the region where I live – the Russians were in Manchuria for some considerable time during the late 1800’s/early 1900’s and again just after WWII. But when she tells them I'm Scottish I get along famously. The younger Chinese are too hip and cool to be all that interested in some Bronzed Adonis Foreigner, but it’s usually all beaming smiles and thumbs-up from the older folk.
They've all see Braveheart of course and I think they identify with Mel Gibson's entertaining nonsense movie because of their own recent history, (the past 100 years or so). A lot of Chinese also like "The Patriot" movie for much the same reasons. It's drummed into them at school how
Bad The British were to China in the 19th Century. We stole Hong Kong, made opium addicts of half the population, burned down the Summer Palace, and so on. All true I suppose, and I can see these things from their point of view, but they don't seem to associate those events with Scotland, probably cos they don’t really know where Scotland is - which is fine by me.
I can’t play Mah Jong, but I have on occasion been invited by the old folks sitting on the street to a game of dominoes for small stakes (about 50 cents/round), a game one of my old uncles, who was with Monty’s 8th Army in N. Africa BTW, taught me to the stage where I can cheat at it pretty well. Of course when they old folks see Missus H unable to suppress her laughter at what I’m up to and they suss out that I’m cheating, it’s all beaming smiles, thumbs up and hilarity all round again, cos they love that kind of thing and get me to explain in a mixture of sign language, mime and Missus H’s translation service, exactly how I do it.
So I suppose I'll end my days sitting on the street, playing dominoes to put rice on the table and keep slates on the pagoda roof.
In nine years together, (apart from the three we lived in Dubai), we've only had a couple of ugly incidents when we’ve been shouted at in the street by some drunk guys. Not too difficult to figure out what the problem was on each occasion, but then again, they probably thought I was a Russian.
But all in all, if you're a Foreigner and just keep your nose relatively clean, there's no problem.
Believe it or not, it's the Japanese tourists who cause most trouble - not me. There was a celebrated affair around six years ago down in Guangzhou, (used to be called Canton), when a group of Japanese businessmen took over an entire floor of a local hotel and invited 25 of what I suppose would have been the equivalent of their Geisha Ladies to a party one night. According to the newspapers as read to me by Missus Heid in between outbursts of tears-of laughter-in-the-eyes hilarity – and it made the national news on TV,
350 of them turned up for the shindig. Naturally, the cops were called and managed to arrest some of the ladies, but the majority of them escaped by jumping out of windows, out the rear exits, down fire escapes, across roofs, etc. how they did it while wearing stiletto heals and ultra-tight mini-skirts is beyond me? The upshot was most of those arrested were released next day after a night in some overcrowded Nick, but the Mama-Saan got sent down for 6 months hard labour in some sweat-shop prison factory, sewing convict uniforms – probably for letting the side down by exhibiting such sheer stupidity.
Now that would've made a brilliantly funny movie...!!!
The first time I went to China, (1995, I think), I ended up in Tibet of all places on a United Nations sponsored geo-thermal project. I’m sure I’ve a photo of that particular adventure somewhere on this laptop so I’ll see if I can find it, and I was simply amazed at the Chinese Engineers I was with quite openly expressing their deep dissent and dissatisfaction with the Politburo in Beijing – not what I had expected at all.
Found it;
Part 2 coming up.
Cheers
H
