The 2nd tier city: Harbin

For the past week, I’ve been staying at my grand parent’s house in Harbin. I was born in this border city many years ago and lived here until I was 6 – after which I moved to the US. I come back intermittently every so often to visit friends & family – especially my relatives on my mom’s side.

Since moving to Shenzhen almost 2 years ago, I have went to Beijing, Shanghai, Nanjing, Guangzhou and other cities in China many times. I have even been to Bangkok twice. I have yet come back to Harbin, until now.

Harbin is the typical “2^nd tier” or “3^rd tier” city that all business people talk about. It is the 10^th biggest city in China, famous for its winter Ice Festival and ready to grow like its counterparts.

Personally, going from the most modern city in China (Shenzhen), to a less-developed city (Harbin) in which its population is synonymous for eating with their shirts off, drinking a lot of beer during lunch, being “rednecks”, loving to fight and being generally uncivilized and barbaric when compared to the rest of the China. This is the place I call my “hometown”.

In the past couple of years, however, there has been a growth in construction immediately outside where my grandparents live. A medium sized mall has been built with a KFC, McDs and Carrefour about .5km away. The “Paris apartments” now tower the skyline with five 30+ floor buildings within view of our 2^nd floor balcony. Even a highway, overpasses and parks have been connected nearby as well. Walking around the city in the past few days, I’ve been unable to recognize many neighborhoods in which my family used to live. The amount of construction in the past 3-4 years has been tremendous – a constant cycle of demolition and construction.

What I’ve seen as the best part, or the most interesting part of Harbin is that it still has some of the same charm, innocent & traditionally Chinese life it has had in the past. I see this very keenly from my grandparent’s house.

My grandparents’ house is nestled in a small community of about 30 6-8 story buildings within the grounds of a university. I can honestly say that very little has changed in this area. The same old people are walking around in the morning and outside playing cards or mahjong in the afternoon. Every morning at 4:30am, scores of old people go out to parks, tracks and local gathering places to practice qigong, exercise and do the same routine they’ve done for such a long time. The same fruit & veggie markets are still selling the same cheap produce right outside the gates. Even the day-care kindergarten that I went to when I was 4 years old – more than 20 years ago – is still in the same place still taking care of small kids. Starbucks still has not opened its first coffee shop in Harbin.

Wages have also been lacking. The average monthly wage of my cousin’s wife, a social worker in Harbin, is 1000 RMB. She’s 40. My cousin is now working as a driver for the 271 bus route. His previous job was a taxi driver. They can live and get by due to the low living standard.

The people here in Harbin seem to be much more content with living life. They might not have the income of the people in Shenzhen, Beijing and Shanghai. They might not have the starbucks-drinking, bar-hopping, constant traveling life of the people in the 1^st tier cities. They don’t have these luxuries. They do, however, have the constant relaxation of enjoying life, not taking things too seriously and having a slower pace to life. They don’t need the stress and constant desire filled consumerism existence that comes with it. Coming from a place like Shenzhen, this is something new and really special.

Not to mention, I really like the densely blue skies and the long-sleeves summer climate as well.

Chinese Version of the "Birds and the Bees"

I was hanging out with a friend a couple of days ago, just screwing around, wasting time. My friend has a belly button ring, so I was joking around that she was hampering her reproductive organs.

This might not make sense for my western readers....but in China, when kids ask the world-wide question: "mommy, where did I come from", they are told, the belly button. This answer, although weird, seems like a very natural choice now. This is what my parents told me when I was young.

When this topic came up, I continued to ask what my friend's parents also said to her. She responded with: They told me that they found me in a dumpster. （我是在垃圾里面检出来得。）

What?! What are Chinese parents thinking? I know it is hard and uncomfortable to talk about sex with a kid so sometimes, flat out lying is not too bad.

However, Chinese customs have gone way beyond this. Parents, instead of doing the "birds & bees" story tell their children that they were adopted. Not only were they adopted, but their previous family threw them out into the trash, only until your parents rescued you.

What a fucked up thing to say.

Come to think of it, my parents told me that I was found in the trash too...

Chinese College Entrance Examination - 高考

June 7,8,9.

Every year, these 3 dates are the most important dates for millions of Chinese students (and their families and friends) taking the annual Chinese College Entrance Exam.

The Contra Costal Times has a great article titled "College exam impacts all of China" that accurately describes the test process that influences soo many people each and every year.

College admissions in China is strictly based on the score from the test.

Unlike the U.S., where standardized test scores are just one factor weighed by universities, how Chinese students do on the "gaokao" determines everything. Students list their top three schools and their major and hope their score is high enough to win a place.

Extracurricular activities do not count, and neither do high school grades. And forget writing about volunteer work; there are no essays to persuade admissions officers.

Every student is tested in 5 different areas. Each student is required to take the Chinese, English and Calculus test. The final 2 areas are different depending on the student pursuing a Bachelor's of Arts or a Bachelor's of Science degrees. They take History and Social Studies versus Physics and Chemistry, respectively.

Each test is scored on a scale of 150 points for a maximum possible of 750 points. Each university has a low cut off point. The top universities like 北京大学 choose first and pick the best students. Students with more than 600 points are considered. Those who were not chosen are then available for the next schools. This process goes on until all of the spots in every university are filled.

This process is accurate for the vast majority of students in China. A few percent of students go to school in other ways. These might include going to a specialized school where the student was recruited. Just as schools in the US recruit for sports, Chinese schools recruit for sports, as well as other areas of study.

Chinese gaokao has been such a important thing that kids are tutored and nurchered at a young age, to be ready for it. College exam impacts all of China describes a mother waiting for her daughter to finish the test.

Li Yukun gripped a bouquet of pink roses, a gift for her 18-year-old daughter who has been tutored every weekend since middle school.

"These 12 years have been so hard. These roses are to show her that I care, it's been so hard for her, not one day of rest," the mother said.

Due to the importance of the test, high school in China has also become a "breeding ground" and very different than its US counterpart. The typical Chinese high school lasts 3 years. In the first 2 years of high school, a student takes all of the classes as a normal US high school student with new material. In the 3rd year (senior year), high school transforms from a place of learning to a place of preperation. Instead of learning new material, the entire year is used to review and focus on the old material (in order to be ready for the entrance exam). Students prepare with extensive study sessions, mock tests and outside tutors.

Years of study, hope, investment and hard work all comes down to the exam. Make or break. Win or go home.

June 7,8,9.

Chinese Children Get Married at an Early Age

Work has been very busy lately. The toy industry never seems to stop pushing and I’ve been cought in the middle of it.

Because of the job, I’ve been neglecting to read all of the Google Alerts on China and Shenzhen that I receive daily. Today while reading articles from the last few days I came across an interesting story from the Shenzhen Daily (web edition) entitled Kids’ Virtual Marriages Causes Concern.

Interesting. That title itself just drew me in.

It turns out that elementary school kids in Shenzhen have found a new hobby. Instead of collecting Pogs, like I did, these kids are getting married…online.

A survey by the newspaper of 49 pupils at a primary school in Luohu District showed that 24 percent of them had virtual "marriages", and 14 percent of them had even "married" twice.

Not only did the children get married (kinda like Vegas, but better, and 24 hours)…but they also

…"giving birth" to virtual babies online…

While some people questioned the game and its possible influence on the kids’ future love life…

Parents and educators worry that the virtual marriages would lead the kids into misunderstanding the reality of marriage.

…for teenagers, it's much easier to blur the line between real and virtual marriages. A junior high student identified as Guo Guo said many of her classmates had acted as if they were really in love with their virtual spouses. "In the game, the virtual husbands and wives claim to love each other so much. How can you say the virtual love will not influence your real emotions?" argued Guo Guo.

…others asked why marriages are put into online games in the first place…

"I don't understand why game developers put marriages into the games. With children marrying and divorcing so easily online, they may become irresponsible when they do marry in reality," [a mother] said, adding that children may get upset if their future spouses are not as prefect virtual spouses.

There are many other interesting tidbits in the article. You have to read it for yourself!!

My biggest concern regarding this game is that some might get the notion that getting married or into serious relationships will increase your points in life…

About 37 percent of the kids polled by the Shenzhen Evening News said they had virtual marriages to "increase their credits in the game," and 28 percent of them said they did it for fun.

…and we all know that’s not true.

I wonder how long it will be that a similar game pops up in the US, becomes popular, gets embraced and chastised by the religious right, then reported on CNN. Any bets?

Money Money Money

Before getting to the views of the US of A, I wanted to first discuss the beauty of Hong Kong.

Before I left for the US on Feb. 23^rd, I was fortunate enough to spend a day-trip with my grandparents in Hong Kong. My grandfather is almost 80 years old and going strong (he plays tennis 3x a week). My grandmother is approaching 76 and destroys me at pingpong every time. I wanted them to get a glimpse of Hong Kong before it was all done and over with. It had been many years since they had been to the US to visit my family and a little western life would be new and cool.

I had originally planned to take them around by myself on a two-day excursion, preparing everything and staying overnight at my company apartment. However, realizing that that would completely stress and overwhelm me with planning during my vacation, I decided against it. Instead I spent money for the 3 of us to do a day trip through an agency. 250 RMB a person for 2 meals, tour guide, a Victoria harbor boat ride, and most importantly, no planning to worry about. Good deal.

Since I had traveled in Hong Kong a few times (and I work there sometimes) I was prepared for a pretty boring day of sightseeing. However, I was pleasantly surprised by experience and most especially, the tour guide.

Our tour guide was a Hong Kong guy in his mid-30s. He was very social and engaging in his monologue on the bus. With his crude humor, knowledgeable factoids and decent 普通话 (putonghua), he entertained everyone on the bus, especially my grandparents.

Here are some of the highlights of the his tour:

• A description of Hong Konger’s love and admiration of 邓小平 (dengxiaoping) and the economic reforms he introduced. It was his visionary look on the future that helped make the new Hong Kong happen.
  
• A simple, yet interesting description of the difference between HK’s Capitalist society versus China’s Socialist society.
  
• Interesting stories about Jackie Chan, and bus rides past his house and office. Hot.
  
• An accurate and informing history of Hong Kong and the various waves of immigration with respect to Chinese influence (ie. Cultural Revolution = Rich people coming to Hong Kong)
• Honest care and advice for his tour.
  
• Money, Money, Money.

In the presentation, I noticed that the tour guide always talked about money. With this, I had to count how many times the he referred to money. It could have been how much something was, making money, how to make money, how much a house was, how much the value of the house has grown, ect. (I usually count the amount of “umms” or “likes” people say while they’re talking if they do it a lot. Just one of those things).

It turned out that he referred to money more than 120 times during the trip.

WOW.

From how much Jackie Chan bought Bruce Lee’s house for to how much the going rate for a box for your cremated remains, from the taxes on alcohol and cigarettes to how much money he lost during the Asian Financial Crisis in 1998, he didnt leave anything out.

This vast and consuming discussion about money brought me back to the different conversations I had with my cousin TT during Chinese New Year’s Eve. That night she discussed how much she disliked Shenzhen and its lack of culture. The city was based around finance and didn't have any semblance of culture. Money and how to make it was what everyone talked about.

When I started thinking about it, I realized that this was dead on. I rarely talked about anything with my friend Simon other than which stocks are good, what business models would be successful in China, how to make money, ect. That’s what Shenzhen revolved around (and I guess, that’s what it was built for).

My cousin Ding, who works for the Shenzhen municipal cultural department agreed as well. It seemed that people were brought up differently here. Here’s what he described:

In the north, kids are brought up with the importance of education (me included). The goal that the kid are pushed to strive for is good grades and going to a good college. True merchants were looked down upon and an entrepreneurial mind was discouraged.

In the south, however, school is very seldom stressed. Instead, the goal that the kids know is financial based. Through experience and hard work, maybe you can do something to make a lot of money. Simon, who has lived in Shenzhen all his life, described the various business ventures he did when he was a kid. He and his friends formed at least 2 different small businesses each year based on the timing starting when he was 9. They would go into selling flowers, shoes, book bags, basically anything to make a profit. This is how they grew up. They believed that “learning by doing” was the way to go. If they ended up losing money in the venture, they would just look at that loss as the price of their education.

In my experience, his Ding's statements were dead on. A friend of mine made almost 1 million RMB in a year by doing the arbitrage game with shoes from Shenzhen to the north. He was only 19. Instead of his parents supporting him in his successful business venture, they were disappointed that he didn't go to college and tried to do anything and everything to get him to go. Currently he's at a random university in Australia, fulfilling his parent's wishes. Typical northern family.

This recent understanding of the importance of money in the regional culture of Shenzhen, Hong Kong and Guangdong province in general, has made me feel many different things. I had seen glimpses before but had never quantified it entirely. Now, after this realization, here are my thoughts:

• I have had off and on feelings of something missing from life in Shenzhen and I think this is it. It’s difficult to talk to people about anything other than money. After 6 months of this, a person thats previously had not focused on money (me) can go crazy.
  
• At the same time, this is good for me. I grew up in a strict-academically based home (my mom is a professor and her parents were also professors) and I need to add the entrepreneurial spirit that’s so strong in this area. Learning through experience is definitely apparent.
  
• I often try and think/develop business ideas. Moreover, I have a few possibly successful ideas that I’m working on.
  
• Where did this focus on money come from? Was it the influence on Guangdong province from Hong Kong or was it formed a long time ago?
• This is why Guangdong province is so incredibly successful in the world stage. This is not only where Chinese people who want to make money (whether it’s migrant labor trying to get ahead, HK businessmen with capital, ect.), but it is where the world is coming as well. Of course it’s location and proximity to HK has something to do with it as well.
  
• I wonder if the culture is similar in the Shanghai region as well. Can anyone who know about Shanghai add their 2 cents?
• This entrueural spirit feels like pure excitement. There are so many oportunities in China for anyone with a good idea. It is the ability as a person to take advantage of these opportunties. This is a big difference from the seemingly repetitive life of the US and even NYC.
  

In terms of my experiences, I am most definitely excited about being able to be apart of this. I feel incredibly fortunate. Simultaneously, however, I wonder how my views, observations and insights about Chinese culture is skewed by living in this area where there is only 1 focus. For example, how can I talk about the Chinese worker where the Chinese worker here might be completely money oriented where people in northern China might be totally different in their focus? You just never know.

As much as this lifestyle is different from what I'm used to, its absolutely pure and enjoyable. Who knows what come of my living here... but ultimately, I guess its most immediate effect is that it’s going to make writing this blog that much more interesting and challenging.

Guide to Chinese New Year

Happy Chinese New Year everybody! 新年快乐!

For the first time in a long time, I’ve been given the chance to experience Chinese New Year (cny) while being in China. The last time was when I was 5 years old. Even though, I have never really celebrated cny within in my own family, cny is such a big part of Chinese tradition that I needed to experience it first hand (rather than hanging out drinking in nyc).

In Western terms, CNY could be described as an elaborate combination of Thanksgiving, Christmas and Forth of July all in one. For a brief background, Danwei (an awesome blog) has good description here: http://www.danwei.org/china_information/chinese_new_year_and_chinese_s.php

Lets examine the various CNY customs and traditions one by one, with side notes about how people do things in other regions of China.

1. The New Year's Eve dinner.
My extended family had our family dinner last night at a cozy Northeastern restaurant. A total of 23 people were on hand, spanning 4 different generations. I have a lot of extended family in Shenzhen, full of 2nd aunts, uncles and 2nd cousins. It was quite a sight. It was the first time i'd seen many of my family members. We had 2 big tables, set up in our private room with the seating arranged by generation. The elders (my mom's parents) were at the head of the main table. They are seated at the "head" of the round table (usually reserved for the most "respected"). Around them was the generation of my mom. That's where all of my aunts and uncles were. The next generation down (me and my cousins) had our own "kid" table.

For the dinner itself, the food was good and so was the 2 bottles of MaoTai rice wine (aged 50 years). However, most families spend a lot more time eating and drinking than mine. It's tradition for everyone at the dinner to be fairly sloshed and tipsy before leaving. The thing is, my extended family seem to all have 2 things, diabetes and the inability to drink that much alcohol. Needless to day, the dinner only lasted about 1 hour and a half.

For the post-dinner activities, I expected there to be a nice family party of sorts and maybe even Cranium... (something you would expect from a western family). I was surprised to find that after the dinner, everyone returned home to watch the 春节晚会 (chunjiewanhui). There was no festive party. There was just sitting on the couch. At home. Watching tv.

How other Chinese do it:
The most "traditional" part of the New Year's Eve dinner in the north is dumplings. Families very seldom go out to eat for this meal. They usually get together at one member of the family's house and make dumplings by hand. It is very much a bonding experience to make the little things. Making dumplings and majong are definitely the most popular or Chinese activities during CNY.

It is also customary to eat dumplings at the stroke of midnight.

2. 红包

Part of CNY tradition is the giving of the 红包 (hongbao), or red bag. These little red envelopes are filled with cash and are given as a present to people. Last night during our family dinner, there was very little红包 giving. A couple of my 30 year old cousins gave them to their parents. Also, the “head” of our family (the aunt with the most money) gave 2 away to the children without jobs yet (my “2^nd” niece who is 2 years old, and my 2^nd cousin who is still in college).

There are different sayings of the 红包. In the north, you are usually obliged to give 红包’s away if you are working. If you are not, you don't need to. The people who have a job usually give them to members of their family, who are younger, don't have jobs or people who serve them (like the building doorman, postman, ect). There is usually no exchange of 红包s where person A gives one to person B and person B then gives one to person A (since that would just not make that much sense to trade money back and forth).

Some people, who are already grown up and have jobs often give红包s to their parents. This is less of a tradition but more of a way to show your appreciation for parents.

In Shenzhen, or Guandong province, the test is with marriage. If you are married, then you have to give the 红包 out. If you are not married, you don't have to bother. The money inside are to be new, crisp bills (there are huge lines at banks to get wads of cash in every denomination). The amount of money is based on the person. If you have tons of money, you had better give at least a few hundred. If your poor, 5 or 10 yuan might do it. It really depends.

I still don't know when the 红包s are given. We’ll see if I have to make any edits to these rules in the next few days, but for now, I still haven’t received any红包yet.

3. The 春节晚会

The 春节晚会 is a 4.5 hour showcase extravaganza, held by the Chinese Government annually. It starts at 8pm and lasts all the way until 12:30am. It has become a tradition within itself. There are 3 teams of hosts (who change wardrobe atleast 4x each), tons of different performances by ethnic groups, small comedic skits called 小品, not to mention classical favorite songs that are sung over and over every single year. I even recognized a song that was performed last night that I knew when I was in preschool! That's like 20 years ago.

My experience with the 春节晚会 is limited to my parents. My parents would always get tapes of the 春节晚会 a few days afterwards the event from random friends. While I never saw them watch it, it seemed like everyone did watch it at some point. What was also apparent was that people love 小 品. These skits are decently well and its actors utilize the humor of north eastern regional accents and vocabulary (where my family is from).

Instead of heading to a bar for massive amounts of drinking (like your typical NYC new years eve celebration), I spent last night with a few of my cousins drinking Jack Daniels, playing cards and watching the春节晚会. They really did seem to enjoy it and said it is definitely a tradition for CNY. Even though the performances have been “sucking” recently, they still enjoyed staying in that night and watching nonetheless.

How Other Chinese do it.

The春节晚会 seem to be very much a northern China thing. Although I’m sure that people in Guangdong province do watch it, they have their own tradition down here. After dinner with the family, many people go out to the “flower street” to hang out. These streets feel like a street fair. There are a lot of vendors for different flower arrangements, red CNY decorations as well as toys for kids, food and other random stuff. These streets, that pop up all over the city before CNY are usually PACKED for the hours before midnight on new years eve.

In various southern regions of china, a lot of people believe in Chinese vernacular religions. It is a tradition to go to the monasteries to pray at the strike of midnight. My cousin, Simon, was stuck in traffic for 5 hours when he went last night. It is his yearly tradition to pray immediately after midnight, and then hit the bars. Some people travel to far away temples that are considered “a higher level” to pray after midnight for good fortune and luck in the new year.

4. Fireworks

Fireworks was originally invented in China and it is a huge part of the CNY celebrations. In Chinese folklore, the new year was personified as a ghost-like bad spirit. Fireworks are set off to scare him off and any bad luck for the upcoming year. As my cousin said last night: “I don't feel like it’s the new year until I hear fireworks.”

This year, many cities eased their decade-old ban on fireworks. In Shenzhen, however, there is still a ban on it. However, Chinese revelers still ignore the rules and set off their own fireworks. I currently hear bangs and crackles in the distance as I write this. The use of fireworks, however, can cause a lot of injuries. Here’s a CNN article about CNY injuries in Beijing: http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/asiapcf/02/17/beijing.fireworks.ap/index.html

In rural areas, fireworks are a huge part of the celebration.

Hunters & Gathers

Yesterday, I was talking to my grandfather on the phone. They have a "winter house" in Zhuhai, the sister city of Macao (like Shenzhen is the sister city of Hong Kong). They usually interchange living in Harbin (freezing cold in the winter but perfect in the summer) and Zhuhai (perfect in the winter and too hot and humid in the summer). We were talking about why he's been feeling lethargic lately.

Gramps: I have nothing to do here. I only tennis twice a week in the mornings (he's 80). Otherwise, I play some majong and that's about it. Life is pretty uneventful during retirement.
Me: Doesn't my grandma go out all the time. It seems like she's always hanging out in the malls. Why don't you go with her?
Gramps: Because she walks too slow. It takes her hours and hours to do anything. I get too bored when I'm there with her. Do you know why she's so slow?
Me: Please tell.
Gramps: It's because in the old days, men were hunters and women were gathers. Women would be working in the fields and had to pick which fruits were ripe and which were not. They had to choose. However, when we men were hunting, we just shot anything that came along. That's why I just go and buy what I need.
Me: I guess some things are the same no matter where your from.

Chinese Small Business Taxation

For those of you who haven’t lived in the UWS of Manhattan or haven’t gone to school at Columbia, you probably don't know that much about Koronet's pizza.

Koronet's Pizza- between 110th and 11th on broadway is THE best pizza in nyc. TRUST ME. just go there. their pies are about 3.5' in diameter, and the slices are almost two feet long... fun! cheap! a definite neighborhood hangout if there ever was one.
http://www.citynoise.org/article/71

This place is small, cozy and friendly. The Hispanic guys behind the counter are quick and efficient and after a couple of drinks themselves, they become very generous. The best part about Koronet’s (aka K-nets) is that during the weekend, it is open until 3am. During my college days, I definitely made many a trips there for a last minute pit-stop before going to bed after drunken night bar-hopping the Columbia neighborhood. In fact, the first night I spent at Columbia included drinks at the West End (RIP) and pizza at Koronet’s. That greasy pizza just hits the spot.

The Chinese version of Koronet’s pizza is the neighborhood sidewalk barbeque. These are small mom and pop operations on the side of the street where all they need is a makeshift grill, meat and veggies on a stick, and a few chairs and tables. No matter where you go in China, you’ll find these little operations EVERYWHERE.

Last night I was walking around with my cousin, Simon, just south of the Shanghai Hotel (上海宾馆) in Shenzhen. We had already been drinking for a while, but wanted to go buy some snacks for the night. After getting our assortment of chips, crackers, cherry tomatoes and tangerine oranges, we started walking back to the KTV room all our friends were at.

In the middle of our walk, Simon decided to stop at one of these little bbq places and get some chicken wings. While waiting for the thing to cook, we hung out and chatted. The husband/wife team operating the place were very nice people. They gave us chairs while we waited and chatted with us. Being interested in their little business, I asked them about how easy it was to make money. It turns out that the margins were decent 30% to 40% but most of the profit depended on the volume of sales. In a given weekend night, they could sell as much as 700 yuan worth of food (remember: each the individual bbq skewers cost between 2 and 5 yuan. That’s a pretty decent side business for migrant workers trying to make a buck or 2 at night.

Before we were done with the conversation, we discussed the costs of the coal, the veggies and meat, ect. The highest costs came from the meat they buy as well as their makeshift bbq grill. Each one of these stainless steel U-shapped sheets cost about 3 yuan each. However, they prepare a lot of them each night.

Without understanding the reasons behind that (I was a little tipsy), the husband, who was in charge of the grill quickly took the top grill piece of and placed it (with the meat) away from the grill. A split second later, a pickup truck/minivan with 3 guys quickly stopped right next to us. A person came quickly came out, went over to the makeshift grill and dumped the coals on the ground. In my confusion, I thought these people worked for the little business and were going to help them change their coal to a new batch. However, after the guy dumped the coal out, he went back into his car and drove off.

What just happened!?!?

“Why did a guy jump out and dump your coal on the ground?” I asked.

The husband/wife explained that those guys were cops who’s job was to enforce business permits. Since they did not have one and were doing their own thing on the street, they were something illegal. Who knows what kind of “cops” they were.>

Not completely understanding, I asked, “why didn't he just destroy your stand and throw your food on the ground?”

It turned out that these police never were violent, but only confiscated the different 3yuan makeshift grills. Without going into too much detail, the couple just continued saying how difficult it was to make money, while simultaneously placing the dumped coals back into the makeshift grill to finish our chicken order.

Before our food was done, the same truck made a U turn and came back in our direction. I could see it coming for a ways away and I became quite nervous for the couple. They don't make that much money in the business and have to constantly look over their back in search for police who could, at any time, screw them over.

After Simon’s chicken finished cooking, were continued walking back towards our private room singing KTV. Before we could walk too far, a different van pulled over. This time, the husband quickly ran over to his supply of grills to replace the one that was about to be confiscated. While stopped to watch from a distance, the husband quickly went back to his stand with his brand new grills before the police even left.

“What the hell is he doing,” I asked Simon. “Isn’t his new grill going to be taken away too?”

Before he could answer, the husband walked over to the police man who was confiscating his grill and GAVE him his new one!

WHAT JUST HAPPENED?! WHAT IS GOING ON?!

While walking with Simon and talking about this, I finally understood what was going on:

• The police officers could never arrest any of these people because there are just soo many of them. In the general area I was in, there were at least about 1000 different little bbq’s being run at that time of night. The jails can’t hold that many people.
• It was not in the officer’s interest to tear up the stand. It’s his job to deter these kinds of business, but in actuality, these officers were probably from the countryside as well and knew how hard it was to earn money.
• The business owners know that the officers have a certain “quota” for confiscated grills per night. Therefore if they just gave the officers the grill and extra ones, the officers would 1. leave them alone, 2. leave others alone and 3. not come back in a while. I kind of compare this to American State Troopers and their monthly “quota” for speeding tickets.
• A specific system of conduct has been created for these interactions…a social contract, if you will, between the illegal businesses and the police.

A couple of hours after this event, I revisited it with Simon while we were playing pool. He added something very interesting to the situation.

It seems that after the teams of 3 would confiscate about 50 grills per night. Afterwards, they would SELL the grills back to the operators of these businesses the next day for 3yuan!

HAHA. How crazy is this? It kind of reminds me my senior year International Politics class when we analyzed the illicit economies in Kosovo in the late 1990s. (If you don't know, a black market was formed where one side was basically supplying the other side with weapons that was shooting back at them.)

I really think this event shows how business is done in China. Of course, it’s true that not all business leaders and government officials are corrupt, but from my experience, it seems semi accurate.

For any business to be able to operate properly, it needs

• to find a good market (people wanting munchies after going out at night)
• to make decent margins/profit
• to work within the establish social standard of interaction between the government and the specific industry
• to “pay off” the proper people, whether its for building permits or restaurant licenses (the 3 yuan grills) so that they don't bother you too much

Ultimately, its true that the officials always have the upper hand. In this story, they confiscated the grills and resold them back to the businesses, only to confiscate them later…a revolving cycle. The funny thing is that this governmental advantage is very much part of the Chinese tradition where the government will, do and should profit from any of its businesses making a profit. Think of it as a tax…