june 4th

Yesterday was the fiurth of june here in china. Now while that may seem like nothing of consequence it is in fact the date of the "incident at tiananmen" 20 years have passed since then. Testerday I decided to go down to the square and look around for myself. Usually it is a public space with lots of people chinese and others walking about. Yesterday it was security checkpoints, police looking at passports, and then the square itself was loaded will regular police, plainclothes police, army, and "helpers". Now here is my question, why if the government here feels that the students were "counterrevolutionaries" and the protesters were "trying to harm the stability of china" why doesnt the central government celebrate the day? Why hide as a secret the fact that the government killed rebellious citizens. If there was an insurrection against the US government and the police/military stopped it I think that the government would be proud of that fact. So what exactly is the problem china? Were the citizens gathered 20 years ago really trying to destabilize china, or was the response from the government a heavy handed reminder of power and an attempt to consolidate and keep that power. Dont answer I think I already know the answer, after all a thousand police in tiananmen sends almost the same message as a tank rolling over students that wanted to change the system. Nothing to see here move along, buy your goods and be happy.

tix

I am going to indonesia. Well not right this minute and only if everything goes well. I first have to finish grading my final exams, then turn in my grades then go to the US for a few weeks then come back to beijing then avoid being quarintined, then cantch a train up to tianjin then fly to malaysia then clear customs then fly to bali and hope that they will give me a visa on arrival. So I should rephrase the first sentence I bought tickets to indonesia we shall see if I get there or not. I actually got a really good price for the tickets, all told from beijing to bali and return from jakarta to beijing it was only $210. Not too shabby eh. I did learn that I will have to be back to teach in the middle of september but that is ok. I can handle the 13 weeks vacation instead of the 16. They will pay me for all of it no matter what. So now I just need to do a bit of grading and tada I am outta here. By and by one of the chinese friends that I have here sent me a text message asking if something was wrong with this website or her computer, funny how much power the government has here, blocking loads of websites seems anti-american, but hey this aint america. But really a message that tells you the server accidentally dropped the request. It is not in anyway an accident, just admit it already.

smoke em if you got em

Here is something I heard about a bit ago and meant to get around to commenting on but it is hard as the good people here keep blocking my ability to get to this site. I will post the link http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/have-a-smoke-and-help-save-the-economy-china-tells-party-officials-1679006.html
Now I do in fact realize that there is probably a good reason for trying to improve the local economy but really forcing people to smoke. Seems a bit short sighted and counter productive. Couldnt they have sid that all government employees must go to the theater, wouldnt that have served the same purpose, pumping money into local pockets and employing workers. But it would have had the added bonus of enlightening the people gernerally and adding to the cities cultural landscape. Ah well just remember when your company tells you times are tough and there are going to be some changes, remember if you lived here that could mean that your about to get a new habit.