[The second part of this comment, a critcism of Shaun Rein, violates my comment policy and has been removed. While I don't object to discussing Shaun in the context of the post above, I do object to the insults. -W]

What I learned is this: all cultures/languages have ritualized greetings, but one only notices those that come from one’s adopted culture. Ritualized greetings from your “birth” culture generally slip right by without notice, but believe me they are just as annoying to non-natives as theirs are to you.

“Hot, isn’t it?” // “How about my AFL/ARL team?” // “Did you catch any of the Test Match/current-affairs show/reality-TV show?” These are the terribly annoying (to non-natives) things that Australian taxi drivers say to their passengers. I know, because for a couple of university years, I was one. These things are not annoying to natives (well, not *very* annoying, anyway) because they are just ritualized greetings.

“Where are you from?” // “How tall are you?” // “How much money do you make?” // “Your Chinese is as good as Dashan’s!” These are the terribly annoying (to non-natives) things that Chinese taxi drivers say to their passengers. Although perhaps “How tall are you?” is only for two-metres-in-shoes me. I know, because for ten years I’ve been a waiguoren in China. These things are not annoying to natives, because natives enthusiastically ask each other these questions constantly! They are just ritualized greetings — with “well-known characteristic of people from Your Province Here” substituting for the Dashan comment when it’s local v. local — and conversation starters.

What I learned from Dashan is to look within for the answer to why you like/don’t like anything, well before “hating on” anything.

Consider the average guy brought up in a normal post Cultural Revolution nuclear family: he doesn’t go for jewelry, does not think bespoke suits or shoes is really important in a land where phlegm on the sidewalk will ruin the leather and crowded subways will cause the cashmere to “pill”. What to do?

Like most guys, he likes gadgets, and is fascinated by the intricate workmanship of micro mechanical wizardry found inside the 38mm of a metal case, though the technology is not exactly cutting edge. The brands have been bombarding magazines and billboards since China is the “Great Red Hope” for these luxury goods sellers based in Europe. He goes into a boutique, tries on a fine steel cased chronograph with a see through display back and is smitten at how he controls time by pushing the buttons to start, stop and reset the stopwatch as the time ticks on smoothly. Yeah, the price is a bit shocking at first but he’s worked hard and deserves to wear something his colleagues can admire and he’ll comfortable with as it won’s come across as garish but makes a statement. He is a Chuppie, after all.

A Swiss watch: the last refuge luxury accessory for a man in the 21st century. Consider it, Will.

*note, author of this is in no way connected to the Swiss watch industry, the marketing of Swiss watches, nor the pushing of luxury goods…

Oh, and my only quibble with Shannon’s “hideous foreign bore” comment is that I’m not sure if that should be “bore” or “boor”, or perhaps a combination of the two.

A read bread pud, though, now *that* is a dessert.

None of which is to say “Chinese can’t do dessert”. Of course they can. The tangyuanr you mentioned are absolutely divine when done just right.

Methinks this “controversy” is derived from ye olde source of all such: considering that the phrase “bad Chinese desserts are” is probably just the end of the longer sentence “I don’t like Chinese food and don’t get me started on how…” I think we can instantly dismiss both as the sort of cobbled together not-even-wrong mouth-fart of the kind of Shunyi-villa-dwelling ten-years-in-China-but-no-Mandarin hideous foreign bore that would be saying exactly the same thing (substituting, of course, the country name) if they were in France, or Laos, or Turkey, or other noted home of both a unique high-quality cuisine and unbelievably fantastic desserts.

The sad part is that when they eventually fuck off (from wherever) they will undoubtedly be able to obtain a six-figure book contract to expound upon their “experiences”. Bastards…

It’s not too late for you, Will. Instead of trenchantly taking up for the truth as you so often do here, you merely need to turn this blog into “Xi Te! My Years As A Special Westerner in China!” and the advance cheque will be in the mail.

The bread/ice cream thing is amazing. Hard not to order a second one.

There does seem to be a lot of good dessert from HK/Taiwan. The kind of stuff you can get at 满记甜品.

A WordPress upgrade broke the old template a few months ago, so I took it as a sign that it was time for something simpler. This is the most vanilla WordPress template, though I made a couple of css changes and swapped my own image in.

Happy holidays! And what happened to the old website design?

Not if you view the Party’s “goal” as local political benefits to the exclusion of all. Most of China’s soft power is inward-facing, IMO. And the proof is in the pudding: no sign of the middle class rejecting that “you shut the f*** up about political reform and our gross corruption and we might make you rich” bargain. At least, not this year!

In this way China is unique in history, in my view. It is almost completely indifferent to “foreign based” political benefits and the potential uses of all kinds of power to accrue same, but hyper-sensitive to anything that will “play” at home.

Example: recent iron ore contract shenanigans — cheap iron ore being fairly central to growth China-style — are turned into “bad foreigner” morality plays for the locals. And hang the absolutely devastating long term expense, and long term damage to China’s “foreign facing” soft power, and medium term damage to growth, that the decision to “play it for the yokels” had and is having. It doesn’t even appear to be in the calculation, if a perceived local benefit is to be had.

Anyway. Let’s take this offline!

I think the real strength of exporting something like Mickey Mouse is that while it does demonstrate soft power, it wasn’t intended to. It was one of a series of figures created by an animation company to entertain masses of bright-eyed, hopeful, and mostly innocent children (and also used to make profits, sell war bonds, and create an overrated theme park, but still). The Chinese recognize the soft power in this and as a result they put great effort in trying to wield the same type of influence abroad.

Maybe the problem is they are trying too hard…

As for the light-up wand, the less said the better. On the way out Zach finally decided he wanted one of the cheap-n-nasty toys that vendors were hawking outside. He’s not normally tantrummy, but he sure pitched a fit when I wouldn’t get him one. I ended up carrying him from the Worker’s Gymnasium to Sanlitun Village, which, for those who don’t live Beijing, is significantly further than you want to carry an unhappy three-year-old. But he did get a treat at the Village, and everybody forgave everybody else.

@Shannon: As regards the attractions of Marxism etc., my father was briefly a Maoist in the sixties. I don’t consider that conclusive of anything, but, ahem, my mother sure does. I would never suggest that China is devoid of attraction (after all, we’re here), but with regards to the US, I observe that China has struggled to convert many of its very real assets into meaningful political benefits in the way that it seeks to do. The economic story is better, but capital has a way of conveniently not giving a damn. Jokes aside, the unstated point of the post above is that pop culture should and could be a much more important weapon the Chinese soft-power arsenal than it is.

The 7 Habits of Highly Successful Hard Power Wielders, if you will.

And it is completely untrue that authoritarian governments have never had any effective soft power. See two of the three examples above! I also clearly recall several of my high-school classmates who religiously listened to Radio Moscow in the early 80s, bought “teach yourself Russian” books, Lenin and Marx, said things like “140 million Russians can’t be wrong”, had posters of Foxbats and Badgers on their bedroom walls, and said things like “That’ll outfly an F-16, you know” if you so much as didn’t ask. This while Afghanistan I rages, by the way! Anything that’s “forbidden-yet-rumoured-to-be-powerful” will attract (hello hard liquor and teenage boys!), despite the fact that the Soviets almost went out of their way to make their soft power ineffective and unattractive.

I think it’s easy to find failures of Chinese soft power — but then it’s easy to find failures of American soft power, too, despite its immense budget. Successes of Chinese soft power are there too, if you look.

TCM. Fengshui. The popularity of Chinese food despite the fact that it hasn’t been “regularised” like Italian or Thai or, indeed, American — and watch out when it (inevitably) is! The tens of thousands of businesses pouring money carelessly into China (and losing it all) despite all the warnings and all the advice of how to do that so you’re least likely to get taken, because “the game’s in China!”. The tens of thousands of young Westerners “doing a semester in China” because “Chinese will be important in the future”.

These are all successes of Chinese soft power. Chinese soft power is not more successful only because Chinese hard power is essentially a wet firecracker. That won’t be the case for much longer, though. Chinese boots on the ground to help the “correct” (from a western standpoint) side in a South East Asian conflict? It will happen. And probably pretty soon. Soft power stocks will rise dramatically when it does, mark my words.

The best part of all this is that your Mater addict will grow up. One of my triumphs as a father and nerd was taking Hose-B Jr. to go see J.J. Abrams Star Trek and as we walked out of the theater have him tell me “That was the best movie ever.” Totally worth the hours of Bob the Builder I had to endure.

Now, lately there’s been talk that I may have to take Hosette-B to go see the Disney Ingenue tour. I’d appreciate any advice on getting out of that or at the very least, surviving it.

can’t think of any.