Smokin, drinkin and eatin in the country.

Until I came to China I hated cigarettes. They were addictive, they gave you cancer, made your lungs all black and icky too. At least so I was told by the countless ad’s on TV, radio and billboards. Alcohol, on the other hand, was breathlessly promoted and weed was silently accepted. But oh! to be a smoker! you might as well be a rat or cockroach, poisoning the air and what not… But after arriving in Beijing my perception changed.

Not only were those annoying ad’s gone, cigarettes were everywhere, not to mention dirt cheap. I quickly found that they were a perfect remedy to help deal with the stresses of living in a land whose language you are clueless of. I still remember the first time I smoked a cigarette from a pack that I bought myself. It was a chilly fall night and I was antsy and frustrated from having spent the previous four hours cramming Chinese characters into my head, a truly Sisyphean task. I took my pack of 14mg Zhongnanhai out of my top drawer and walked into the crisp air. The campus radio station was playing Chinese pop over the loud speakers. Music from the latest boy band echoed across the dark sky and mixed with the light howl of the approaching winter wind. I pulled my sweatshirt hood down over my head to protect my ears from the wind, and pulled out a cigarette. I put it in my mouth, lit it and took a drag. The thick mellow taste of cheap tobacco and tar filled my mouth and lungs, a feeling of clearheadedness also came to help push out some of the memories of today’s vocabulary assignment. Instead of stressing about the impossibility of the class’ homework I began to focus  on the late October night, the yellow glow of leaves under the streetlamps and the shadows of figures coming and going on the dark campus road.

That feeling of reflection has as much to do with the chemicals you’re inhaling as with the very process of smoking. Standing relatively still, breathing deeply, clearing your head to focus on the smoke, the sky, is fairly similar to meditation, just more harmful to the health.

In the small village that I lived in for half a year just about every man smoked. The massive trend of addiction helped make it a part of a culture of politeness that meant when you were a guest at someone’s home, a participant at a feast to mark a wedding or funeral, or you happened to meet a friend on the street cigarettes would be offered to you in the same way as a glass of tea or a plate of fruit may be. To refuse was taken a bit awkwardly, so to not seem impolite you would feign pleasure and gladly take the cancer stick. The secret was then to quickly tuck it behind your ear and stuff your face with the nearest plate of food or take a nice long sip of the drink that was in front of you. Doing this multiple times could save you the experience of waking up the next day feeling like your lungs are two sizes too small. More often than not though I smoked with the farmers, drank with them every now and then too. I could barely understand their dialect so the alcohol or nicotine acted as a convenient starting point.

When I first arrived at the village I brought a pack of unfiltered Camel Turkish blends that I had taken from America with me. They were damn good cigarettes, strong enough to make me slightly dizzy at first  but with a rich taste that you could actually enjoy. Smoking them with the cook and a couple teachers after the school day was the first time I saw them completely relaxed, half-reclining on their beds with sounds of opera blaring in the background. I struggled to catch bits of their conversation and they were patient enough with me to let me slowly reply. Those few minutes of talk about their day, their life and land was the first connection I felt to the often bewildering area that I was living in. I say tobacco made it possible.

President Hu Jintao rides to greet the soldiers before the march.

The powers that be couldn’t have asked for better weather today. Whether or not, as rumors say, Mother Nature’s hand was forced in creating it is not really a concern. The skies were blue and there was a light gentle breeze that felt surprisingly fresh for being in Beijing. Such miraculously good weather marked a day that the entire country had prepared for these past months. National Day had arrived and since I wouldn’t have been let anywhere near Tiananmen Square that morning, I was sitting in my living room watching the ceremonies on CCTV.

President Hu addresses the soldiers with the help of mics on the roof of his car.

One of the strangest sights I’ve seen in China greeted my eyes when I first turned on the TV. President Hu was standing up through the sunroof of a car exiting the front of Tiananmen. In front of his stiff figure were placed four microphones that were planted on the roof of the car. He and a military officer, who was standing in his own car, turned and faced each other, gave a greeting and then signaled the beginning of the review of the troops. The President motored down a good stretch of Changan Street shouting greetings to each military division that he passed, to which they enthusiastically responded. Past green, blue, white and red uniforms, then on past colorfully decorated tanks and anti-aircraft missile carriers. Occasionally the camera would cut away from a close up on the President’s emotionless figure to a bird’s eye view of the proceedings. From there all the troops and weapons looked like so many neatly arranged toys, the rainbow colored backdrop of hundreds of performers only added to the odd fantasy.

Bird's eye view of the National Day celebrations.

Politicians stand on Tiananmen reviewing the troops.

The President and his cohorts eventually turned back to Tiananmen, signaling the troops to get into position to start their march before the highest members of the Chinese government and military. Jiang Zemin was in the review section along with all of the members of the Communist Party’s Standing Committee. As division after division of troops and military equipment thundered past the grandstand, the politicians looked solemn when facing the camera and carried on small talk with each other. Though they managed to perk up a bit more when a women’s division of the PLA wearing red skirts and white boots marched past. I took notice too, they had wonderful legs.

A women's division of the PLA. They wear skirts and carry guns.

My neighbors take pictures of the jets as they fly by.

When the military ground equipment started passing by I started getting a little bored and turned to my computer to do some work. It wasn’t soon until I heard loud roars coming from outside my window, followed by gasps of astonishment from my neighbors on the ground floor. I finally put two and two together realizing that it was the air force’s jets flying passing right over my apartment! I grabbed my camera and rushed out. By the time I got outside and looked up I saw dozens of fighter jets and military helicopters passing just hundreds of feet over my head. I snapped pictures of the aircraft, all the while cursing myself for not bringing out a longer lens.

The planes are tiny, but I took this with a 35mm lens. They were flying pretty low.

Getting back to my apartment I saw that floats were now passing in front of the camera now. After seeing enough giant portraits and slogans I resigned myself to my computer again. Though not before I recognized that some of the objects that the performers were holding were the same ones I saw in the bags of the college students that I had encountered last month. I guess their training was worth it.

A memorial float dedicated to Deng Xiaoping, previous leader of China.

No luck seeing the fireworks.

In the evening a friend and I went to watch the night’s fireworks in a part of the city south of Tiananmen, but to no avail. We weren’t able to see them even though we were just over a kilometer away and on level elevation to where they were launched. The show didn’t live up to the expectation of it being a couple times bigger than the Olympic’s pyrotechnics, or at least we figured. Luckily the hotpot restaurant we ate dinner in turned on the TV to the nights celebrations at Tiananmen square. We had already missed the fireworks but what we saw made our night: The biggest public square in the world was filled to the brim with thousands of colorfully dressed performers singing, dancing and enjoying themselves. Students were there, young and old too, all smiling for the camera. This was the celebration that I had been waiting to see. It felt full of the energy of the country.

It felt good to see a side of the country broadcast that was a hundred times more genuine than the morning’s stiff events. The difference felt like night and day. The night’s events captured what I think of when I think of China: it was loud, a bit messy, boisterous and overdone but of all things it was vibrant and good natured. Of course there is the fact that all this took place in a well secured zone that spanned about a square mile but… well that says something about the country too doesn’t it. My favorite moment of what I saw on T.V. that night was of the members of the Standing Committee, President Hu included, dancing with the performers at the end of the event. The stiffness of their movements brought to mind the results of spending more than half your life as a bureaucrat, but it did seem that they were enjoying themselves in a somewhat awkward fashion.

Ah! The games of show and spectacle that our governments must play! Thank you CPC for letting me see the lengths that you put yourselves and your people through to entertain and amaze! And thank God it’s finally over!

Artist representation of the upcoming National Day march.

The thousands of troops preparing for National Day have given photographers from around the world plenty of opportunity to take pictures that show the unity/sameness/discipline/scariness… of China’s massive military.  The first picture I saw was stunning to me:

A press photo of practicing soldiers (REUTERS/Nir Elias)

They looked like some sort of Photoshop effect brought to life: a bunch of cookie cutter people practicing in the sun for hours to mark their country’s birthday. But then I saw the effect again:

Another press photo of cookie cutter soldiers practicing.

And again:

Whoa...

And again and again… Now I’ve seen so many Chinese in uniform strutting their stuff in tight formation I half expect to see an army division goose-stepping outside my building. I wonder what the international audience sees when they look at these pictures. Do visions of Pyongyang dance in their heads?

James Fallows a veteran journalist who just got back to America after living in China for three years, repeatedly tells the reader of his blog that the well organized masses of troops you see in all the pictures are not representative of day to day life or the mood of the country. I fully agree and think that the government is spending a lot of resources celebrating it’s birthday in a way that’s close to North Korea or Soviet Russia. It looks even more out of date when compared with the stunning show put on last year for the Olympics. That again was a large performance, but the mood was about celebrating a rich culture and history. The military was involved in providing a lot of the well drilled performers but there were no tanks or marching.

The government is putting on a show of strength with all the road closings, marching, long security checks etc. But it seems that such messages are unneeded nowadays. The military is not the face of the New China. Innovation, business and the hard work of hundreds of millions are what ensures this country’s bright future. There’s no question that the powers that be know this but you wouldn’t guess so from the photos that are being released.

A crowd waves the Chinese flag during the opening day of the 2008 Olympics.

Unlike in America where proud citizens show their patriotism with a bald eagle t-shirt, a lapel pin or ‘ the Calvin piss bumper sticker’, Chinese show their love for the country with flags. During last year’s Olympics I saw the red flags just about everywhere: hanging outside of store windows, in advertisements, even on peoples faces. Many are out now for the current round of National Day celebrations, but going to Tiananmen Square these past few days I saw less flag-waving than I expected. The most common flag bearers I saw were toddlers whose parents were taking their picture. They were probably more interested in how the red fabric was waving in the breeze than in any thoughts about the motherland. Adults were posing with the flag as well, usually not taking themselves too seriously while putting on their best face in front of the giant portraits of Sun Yatsen and Mao.

A scene from Tiananmen Square with a portrait of Sun Yatsen in the background.

The Chinese do have Americans beat in the song department though. I can count the number of American patriotic songs that I know on one hand. The one etched most deeply in my memory is “God Bless the USA” which I had to sing with my first grade class during that burst of patriotism that followed the first Gulf War. The others are all done by Toby Keith and country musicians I think. In China, the CPC puts our CMTV to shame. If not directly responsible for writing the songs, they do a great job of organizing, promoting and broadcasting them. And there are plenty to choose from. Putting a search in Baidu you can find lists of the 100 top patriotic songs and news about concerts organized for the singing of them.

My aversion to my own country’s patriotic fare makes hearing the occasional ‘red’ song a bit of a chore. Mostly because like in any propaganda simple messages and repetition abound. Chinese patriotic songs lyrics also have the tendency to go pretty far in their love for country too. See below lyrics for ‘Dongfang Hong’ (Red East) as an example:

东方红，太阳升，中国出了个毛泽东。
他为人民谋幸福，呼儿咳呀， 他是人民的大救星。
毛泽东，爱人民，他是我们的带路人。
为了建设新中国，呼儿咳呀， 领导我们向前进。
共产党，像太阳，照到哪里哪里亮。
哪里有了共产党，呼儿咳呀， 哪里人民得解放

Red east, sun rises, China gives rise to Mao Zedong.
He seeks happiness for people, hu er hai ya, he is the peoples’ savior.
Mao Zedong, loved people, he is our guide.
In order to build a new China, hu er gai ya, guide us to advance.
Communist party, is like the sun, wherever it shines is bright.
Wherever the Communist party is, hu er gai ya, people are free.

Not bad right? And there are dozens and dozens more where that came from. To give a good idea of the song in action I’ll invite Hong Laowai (Red Foreigner) to sing a few bars.

People aren’t singing these songs in the streets but they will most likely be playing during the broadcasts on CCTV in the next coming days. These songs help to add to the atmosphere of National Day. A time for some to look at the country with pride and hum along in tune. Most others I’m sure will just be taking advantage of the long holiday break to rest and travel.

Three Shadows Photography Art Center (www.threeshadows.cn/en/index_en.htm)

A while back I made a long journey by subway, bus and on foot to the Three Shadows Gallery in Caochangdi. The entrance to the compound is about a five minute walk from the two lane road that carries traffic into the northern suburbs of Beijing. Walking on the narrow road hearing nothing more than the gravel crunching under my feet and the birds chirping gave me a temporary respite from the noisy masses in 798 and the larger city center. It seemed that here was a space meant for reflection and art. I approached the trademark grooved brick buildings of the Three Shadows space ready for just about anything.

Yet I was surprised to be  greeted by the sight of workers pushing an electric car into the center courtyard when I passed through the front gate. From the signage displayed throughout the exhibition center and staff testing the PA system in the middle of one of the main galleries (!)  I quickly came to the painful realization that the center was in the midst of preparing for an event involving a car company. I endured throughout all the noise and lightshows to browse the work of 刘香成’s（Liu Heung Shing） photography from the beginning of the Open Door Movement.

Liu Heung Shing (trends.com.cn)

It was interesting to see that photographs telling the story of China’s transformation from socialist planned economy to a special state-sponsored brand of capitalism would be accompanied by the preparations for an event that was celebrating the arrival of a foreign car company. It functioned almost as an end-note to the photographs (the latest which was taken in the early 1980’s) to show just how far this country’s relation to art, capitalism and foreign influence has traveled from the stiff doctrine of the Mao era.

An image by Liu Heung Shing

The photographs were taken with a clarity of meaning that makes the viewer feel that they were meant to grace the pages of a newspaper or newsmagazine. Many captured the key moments and people from some of China’s most important events during the stormy period of reform in the late 70’s and early 80’s. Telling details such as the first billboard advertisement in Beijing (Golden Fish Colored Pencils, if you’re curious), gigantic portraits of Mao that had been taken down, coverage of the Star Artists Group fighting for their voice to be heard, etc. are photographed with the knowledge of their historic weight and journalistic importance. Yet several of the images style and composition transcended the single event to became something of art.

The photographs of figures in Beijing’s large public squares are examples of this. The use of a wide angle lens captured the massiveness of the environment without losing it’s relation to the subject. This delicate use of composition and perspective is truly a work of skill and has shown those important public areas in a new light. In the images the viewer can see how in China the individual is able to fight for dominance and balance with these huge architectural spaces built by empire or Communist party. Instead of being engulfed by the negative space the subject is supported by it, embraced in a way.

In all the trip to Three Shadows was worth it. I plan to routinely make a pilgrimage to the outskirts of town in order to check on their latest exhibitions and browse their collection of photographic books.

Read an interview given to Liu Heung Shing by ‘the Beijinger’ magazine here.

The entrance to the Forbidden City looms in the distance as tourists take pictures and guards patrol in Tiananmen square.

Checking out Tiananmen Square yesterday, I can almost believe what’s been on the newspaper, TV and billboards. The government is putting on a great show for the thousands of tourist from China’s hinterlands and abroad. Already an impressive space just for it’s sheer expansiveness, the Square now is decorated with four massive display screens. The two ultra-super-wide-screens located in front of the Monument to the People’s Heroes has to be at least 25 yards long combined.  While there are two large box shaped monitors standing more than twenty feet tall standing along Changan Street. All have ‘中国制造’ (Made in China) displayed proudly in front (take THAT Samsung!). When not displaying a patriotic slogan the size of a row of houses, the wide screens play a short film filled with shots of scenery, laughing children, old and new architecture, etc at 20 minute intervals.

Looking at the tourists flooding the Square made me put aside the snarky foreign-commentator-in-China viewpoint to look at the scale of the celebrations and how people from all over China were coming to enjoy it. In the crowds walking around the square I could pick out several dialects ranging from Sichuanese to Cantonese. Villagers wearing dusty suits mixed with chubby foreigners and their guides. When you think about the people and forget about the government’s heavy-handedness the holiday becomes just another time to reflect on the country’s rapid changes. Citizen’s will be able to wave the red flag and sing any number of patriotic songs (there are a lot), but they will also take advantage of the holiday to go travel, shop and watch the circus unfold on CCTV. Sounds alright to me.

A merchant faces the setting sun in Wudaokou. A neighborhood in Beijing's Haidian District.

Inside Yugong Yishan.

I spent one of the best nights since I’ve arrived in China jumping around in a sweaty pile to the sounds of Carsick Cars last Saturday. They played at Yugong Yishan with PK.14 and GAR well into the night. All of the bands proved why they are seen as some of the best in China. After seeing them live I definitely believe the hype.

Please check them out and support their record label Maybe Mars. I plug them so strongly because music like this needs all the help it can get when battling against China’s countless pop bands.

Young guards stand at an intersection by the Jinsong subway station in southern Beijing.

After eating our fill of Swedish meatballs and browsing piles of multicolored furniture with names like Fricka and Guudsvat, me and my girlfriend left Ikea in a hurry. It was 4:40pm and we just had twenty minutes before the section of the Fourth Ring road that was our only real way back home would close. After waiting a few tense minutes we caught a bus going south into the city. As it rumbled through the rush hour traffic we thanked God that we wouldn’t be stuck out in the suburbs for the rest of the evening.

A line of buses head west to Tiananmen in southern Beijing.

Why would such a crucial thoroughfare like this get closed at the start of rush hour on a Friday evening you may ask? The answer won’t come as a surprise to those who lived through last year’s busy countdown to the Olympic games. The government is pouring an immense number of resources and manpower into preparations for the upcoming National Day celebrations on October 1st. With the result of complicating my life and the lives of Beijing’s millions of residents, on Friday evening:

• The northern section of the city’s Fourth Ring road was closed to transport performers to an area to rehearse. (Tiananmen perhaps?)
• Changan Street was closed starting at Guomao Subway Station. A good thing too because I saw a line of more than a dozen tanks rolling down the wide avenue toward Tiananmen.
• All of Line 1 of the subway was closed! The whole line!!! Staff in the subway station confirmed this. I had overheard it while waiting at a bus stop but couldn’t believe it. This subway line runs horizontally through the middle of Beijing. It has a series of stops in the area of Tiananmen but it also runs for miles east and west of the city. To shut that down in the middle of rush hour is amazing to me and must have made the commute home a nightmare for thousands.

A series of pictures I took from my bus of volunteers positioned along the side of the road.

The rest of the trip back home was like a journey through a city that was mobilizing for something big, more like preparing for a war than a trial run for holiday celebrations. Volunteers were positioned for miles along the road that would be used to transport performers to the rehearsal. Streams of city buses with headlights flashing and police cars in tow carried hundreds of performers to their destination. Police, military and young guards (militia members?) in uniform wearing a variety of titles around their forearms stood at main intersections throughout the city… And this is just a rehearsal day!

Young performers sit in a bus on route to rehearsal for the coming National Day celebrations.

The government wants to flex its muscle next week to show the country who’s in charge. I’d say it’s doing a pretty good job of putting on appearances and gets an A for effort. I am very curious to know what the average Beijinger thinks about this. More on that soon.