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bluejeansbj

Listed below are comments made by bluejeansbj between Tuesday, 17th February 2009 and Thursday, 9th July 2009.

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Three years in China 04:03am on 09 Jul 2009 My fragments of reading and commenting on this blog in the past couple of years:

1. the blog that I loved most is the one about the Sichuan earthquake, where James interviewed a local official who lost his family but was still doing his duty and helping the others; the other blogs that have impressed me include the one listing out 10 Chinese that you have to know, and the one describing James' weekend trip on a train
2. Several of my mild, kind and polite comments were removed by the moderator, and this really makes me understand the so-called "freedom of speech" that the western countries are always preaching
3. despite all his negative reporting about China, I'm very willing to believe that James is a good person, with a kind and decent heart. This can be shown by the blog that I love most - his sympathy and respect to the people in Sichuan has won my respect to him as well. But sometimes I can't help wondering whether James is criticising China because he wants to help China to improve, or if he is criticising because he wants China to fail. Because of this, I'm not sure if James and I can be friends.
4. nevertheless, I wish James all the best with his next posting.
The right qualifications 08:19am on 11 May 2009 Is there anything wrong with persuing an area of specialist to become an expert?

Maybe the Brith people feel otherwise, but I (and most of Chinese I believe) would be much more comfortable with a doctor as the country's health minister.

If Miliband's job is to persuade his audience, then for the Chinese audience I'm afraid they've sent the wrong representative - here we do believe that everybody needs to know what he is talking about in order to convince the others.
Petitions in China 2:54pm on 15 Apr 2009 Prof. Sun specializes in judicial psychiatry. He used to teach a course on this subject in Peking University (not sure if he still does) which is highly popular among the students due to his openness and sense of humor. He analyses people's mental illnesses and I believe that in his mind 80% of people are somewhat mentally ill (which is probably true).
China's Olympic venues now 2:36pm on 15 Apr 2009 This article is unnecessarily sour. There is nothing wrong with selling tickets for visiting those stadiums, as long as there is a market for the tickets. I took my entire family to the birds' nest last October. We had a nice and relaxing time there. My 92 year old grandma was absolutely stunned by the magnificence of the stadium.

But one thing that makes me happy is that at least James now admits that there is "glory" to be relived; I still remember his many gloomy predictions about the Olympics before the games started last year. Alas, the games turned out to be a success, all your predictions proved wrong, and all that you can do now is to make fun of how the Chinese recoup the investment.
Communists turns to Confucius 08:23am on 24 Mar 2009 To #2 heyone,

No I don't think the Confucius requires a son to go to such extremes as covering up his father's sin. Confucius has been in place for thousands of years and has been subject to countless interpretations, and some interpretors may have brought it to certain extremes. But I'm sure that you are aware of the term "da yi mie qin", which means for the sake of general or large "yi" (a word that can only be roughly translated into justice or right-eousness) one may sacrifice his family. I'm also sure that you are aware of the thousand-years' debate about which one to choose between "zhong" (which again can only be roughly translated into loyalty to your country or countryman) and "xiao" (which means, roughly, the obligation towards your parents)when one can not have both, and the fact that the most respected heros (for example, Yue Fei) almost all chose "zhong" ahead of "xiao". If anything, the CCP encourages "da yi mie qin" and my text books when I was a child were full of stories of heros who sacrificed himself/his family for the sake of the general justice/the wellbeing of the country or society. So if you want to use the Confucius doctrine about father-son relation to attack the CCP you've picked the wrong tool.
Communists turns to Confucius 08:03am on 24 Mar 2009 To 32 by freequind:

"But unfortunately, if confucianism works, why China has so many dynasties?"

But after so many dynasties and thousands of years, China is still there. I wouldn't say it's purely because of Confucius, but there is no doubt that it helped the Chinese to stand together with a distinct culture and endure all the hardships.
Tough words on human rights 02:45am on 03 Mar 2009 When the US is attacked, see how vehemently and passionately its citizens defend it. See Summerfirex and AnonymousCaliforian's posts as an example.

They have not even a single doubt that their country is the best in the world, and that the other countries cannot even compare with it.

Honestly I am touched by their patriotism. But on the other hand I also remembered another blog that James did a while ago in which he asked the question why do Chinese feel proud of their country. It's as if a justification is needed for the Chinese to love their country.

Another funny thing is that the arguments that the Americans use to defend their country are no different from what the Chinese use: they are all basically saying "since this problem exists in your country too, you have no right to criticise us."

If this is the ultimate logic then there is no need to publish either report (and I guess the Chinese government would prefer it this way). But personally I believe it's a good thing that both reports are published because they help both governments to better realize the problems. As the Chinese wisdom goes, when you hear a criticism, "fix the problem if it exists, compliment yourself if it does not." (you ze gai zhi, wu ze jia mian). I guess this should be the attitude for both governments to take.
Losing their heads 02:34am on 26 Feb 2009 I guess it's just common that the robbers forget faster than the people being robbed. But it is still quite surprising that the robbers would have the audacity to ridicule those being robbed for not having the same short memory.
How-to-save-the-world club 09:11am on 24 Feb 2009 To Topcat1802:

don't worry, every taxi driver in Beijing knows who is Hillary and who is her husband, and what does North Korea refer to. But it is just appropriate for CCTV 9 to use the official name of the country.

And how many Chinese language channel does BBC or CNN have?
Saying sorry to the Chinese 03:19am on 17 Feb 2009 To heyone:

I would consider head of the engineering department part of the "leadership". If you have to go further up then it will have to be the president or vice president of CCTV, and I personally don't feel it fair or necessary to arrest or fire any of them, unless investigation shows that they have approved, are aware of, or should have been aware of the plan of the fireworks. It's as if firing Wen Jiabao for any misconduct of any of the ministry heads.

To post 53 by beamused:

I don't entirely agree your theory about apology: it's as if only volunteered apology counts. Unfortunately in this world there are plenty of people who lack the wisdom of realizing their mistakes and the decency to acknowledge them and apologize for them. That's exactly the reason why they made the mistakes in the first place.

And frankly speaking I think this entire blog is pointless. So Phelps apologized to Chinese audience, so what? I didn't even know that and I certainly don't care. And obviously his apology was not requested or forced by the Chinese. So how on earth did James draw the conclusion that apologies matter to the Chinese or that the Chinese are face loving? Even in two of the other examples that James cited, the apology was not requested or forced by the Chinese. And in the third one, ie, the aircraft collision, an apology is certainly justified - they entered China's airspace without permission, that's an invasion, and an apology is the least that they can do. So in all these incidents, China did nothing wrong, the other sides did something wrong and apologized, and amazingly James once again picked China as the subject of ridicule. What's wrong with China becoming the recipient of an apology??

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