Travel Permit for the Tibet Autonomous Region

We're planning a trip to Tibet in June. Here's an excerpt from the travel permit we must sign to keep the Chinese government happy. My favorite part is that I'm not allowed to "disrupt the peace and prosperity of Tibet."

• All foreign tourists receiving a permit for the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) through SnowLion Tours and our Lhasa partners must read and agree to the clauses provided in this agreement before applying for a permit.We cannot process permits for diplomats, press agents, Tibetan expatriates, or individuals involved in Free Tibet organizations or activities.
• Travelers to Tibet cannot apply for the Travel Permit or other necessary documents by themselves. Only Travel Agencies in Tibet (TAR) can apply for and handle these permits and documents.
• Individual travel outside of Lhasa is an illegal activity. All travelers outside of Lhasa must be part of a guided tour from a government approved agency.
• The TAR is NOT a fully open area. There are some places that are closed to travelers. Check with the travel agency in Lhasa for the current policies in the areas to which you wish to travel. They will help you to legally enter the areas you desire, if possible.
• Train tickets in the summer are very difficult to get and we cannot guarantee that we will be able to get your tickets. We will do everything we can, but sometimes we are unable to get the tickets for your preferred date of departure.
• All foreign tourists in Tibet (TAR) must follow all local laws and regulations. Do not participate in any activity that would disrupt the peace and prosperity of Tibet or do anything that would destroy the Tibetan way of life or their cultural heritage. You will take full responsibility in accordance with Chinese law for any illegal actions you participate in.
• Understand that any illegal activities will also bring repercussions on the local agencies through which you have obtained your permits. Please consider how your actions affect not just yourself, but also the local Tibetan community!
• We are not responsible for policy changes. We do everything possible to operate the trip as planned, but policies regarding foreign travel to Tibet may change at any time. We are not responsible for the cost of cancellation, change, or delay due to policy changes.
• By booking with SnowLion Tours, the purchaser acknowledges that travel in Tibetan regions is remote and unpredictable. Given that these conditions are inherent to travel in the region, SnowLion Tours is not responsible for travel disruption, safety, injury incurred during transportation, or healthcare emergencies. We recommend that you apply for travel insurance in your home country before traveling in Tibet.

Mao: The Unknown Story

I just finished reading Mao: The Unknown Story, a biography of Mao Zedong (Mao Tse-tung) by Jung Chang and Jon Halliday. It is based on years of research including extensive interviews with many of Mao's inner circle. It's full of intriguing history, especially the close relationship between communist China and the Soviet Union. Ultimately, it's a story of an utterly evil megalomaniac who delighted in inflicting violence and suffering on other people and caused the deaths of tens of millions of Chinese.

Some of the book's revelations:

• Mao was never driven by ideology. The communist party was merely a convenient vehicle by which he could gain personal power.
• The so-called "Long March" of Mao and his band of communists in the 1930's, one of the most overblown myths of Mao's personality cult, was no heroic struggle. Rather, deals made between Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalists and Stalin allowed Mao's army to proceed. Later in the march, Mao intentionally sacrificed a huge number of Red Army troops under the command of a rival for his power base, Chang Kuo-t'ao.
• In 1946, Mao and the Red Army were on their last ropes fighting the Nationalists in northern Manchuria, where they had only one remaining strong post in the city Harbin. The Nationalist Army was advancing with much superior strength, and Mao had become resigned to abandoning the city and resorting to guerrilla warfare. He was saved at the last minute by a most unlikely ally - the United States. The US put heavy pressure on the Nationalists to call a cease fire - at the very moment Chiang Kai-shek was on the verge of victory. Mao issue an order to disperse the troops and resort to guerrilla warfare on June 3, but rescinded it on June 5 when the cease-fire was declared. According to the author, this cease fire was probably the single most important decision affecting the outcome of the civil war, which of course the communists won.
• The Great Leap Forward, a 5 year economic plan from 1958 to 1963, caused the deaths of 38 million Chinese from starvation and overwork. As if that's not bad enough, these deaths were not the unintended consequence of failed economic policy. Mao caused the famine by selling most of the nation's crop to the Soviets and other allies in order to buy weapons, and especially nuclear weapon technology. Even when made fully aware of the mass famine across the country, Mao pushed to extract even more crops from the peasants.
• The reason Mao launched the brutal cultural revolution in 1966 was to purge his rivals in the party and in the Army, whose influence was becoming a threat to his totalitarian power. Even his closest and most loyal supporters were subjected to torture and imprisonment. Liu Shao Chi, one of the top party members, was imprisoned and tortured for 3 years until dying in prison in 1969. Amazingly, his death was not made public until after Mao's death, because Mao was so worried that it arouse sympathy for Liu.
• Over the course of Mao's rule, 70 million Chinese died at Mao's hands.
  

Chinese tattoos

Chinese characters and themes are en vogue as tattoos these days. Here's a bit of advice: if you're gonna get some Chinese characters permanently tattooed on your body, make really sure you know what they mean.

Some of my Chinese former co-workers are in Denver now, and one of them went to the Dragon Boat Festival a week ago at Sloan's Lake. He was working at a booth for the Chinese American Council when an American guy approach and showed him the tattoo of a Chinese character prominently displayed on his leg. He asked, "can you tell me what this means"? The character on his leg was the Chinese word for "stupid".

How appropriate!

China Blue

I just finished watching China Blue on PBS - a documentary about a factory in China making blue jeans. Even though I spent 4+ months in China, I was stunned by what I saw. A 17 year old girl left her farming family with 100 RMB (about $12) in her pocket to find work in a far-away city. She found it at the Lifeng factory, where she not only worked, but also lived in the factory dormitory, sharing a room with 11 other girls - not women, but girls as young as 14 years old. Among the revelations that stick in my mind:

• She earned only about 6 cents per hour
• Minimum wage and overtime laws were completely ignored. She often worked 15 hour shifts, and sometimes more than 24 hours in a single shift - with no overtime pay.
• Unions and strikes are illegal. Anyone attempting to organize would likely be jailed. Thought China was a communist/socialist country? Think again.
• The factory owner said, categorically, his rural workers are not only uneducated, but cannot be educated and cannot learn a work ethic.
• Workers' first months pay is withheld as a "security deposit", and they are never paid it unless they receive "permission" to leave the factory, which of course they are never granted.
• She worked more than 3 months before receiving her first pay. In the meantime, she had no money. Need medicine? Sorry, you're SOL.
• Under public pressure, the international companies that buy from China started sending inspectors to verify working conditions. Factories know in advance when the inspectors are coming, and coerce workers into lying about working conditions and pay to keep the inspectors satisfied.
  

She and all her coworkers were virtual slaves of the factory, rarely leaving the premises. During one long shift, she left to buy an energy-boosting tea (for 6 cents) from a street vendor. She was fined 2 days' wages for leaving.

You can't pin all the blame on the evil factory owner here, though. He faces intense competition from within China and elsewhere, and he couldn't possibly compete if he were to follow national labor laws - as long as other factories continue to break the law.

I'm sure many of my own clothes were made in China. And there's no doubt that working conditions in other countries - India, Pakistan, wherever - are just as deplorable. So what to do? I suspect it would be pretty difficult - and fairly expensive - to fill my closet with clothes that don't weigh so much on my conscience.

Token white guy

I don't have too many opportunities in my life to be the person who is adding racial diversity to a business-related function. I did, however, have that opportunity while working in China last year. My company's China office quietly invited me to a career fair in Hangzhou, where I would ostensibly help the recruiting effort. My main qualification, as is turns out, was my undeniably Caucasian appearance, which apparently lends a certain international credibility to a Chinese company's operations.

Now I'm considering changing careers to be a professional Caucasian. Consider this story I found today in my daily email from steepandcheap.com, of all places.

Last night I ran into a friend who had just returned from living in China for three years. He taught English and mostly stuck to Beijing, but he said he found another job that allowed him to travel a bit even if it didn't pay too much money. Chinese companies would pay him to sit in on meetings. It wasn't for his advice or his mediating skills, they brought him in so their company would look more international when they had meetings with other companies. It was a pretty good gig, he said he only had to talk once, but it was a ten minute spot in front of 600 people while pretending he was the designer of some project. Apparently national media was there and the whole thing was pretty stressful. The whole thing sounds like an 80s movie I would watch on a Sunday afternoon.

I'm highly qualified for that job. In fact, I can't think of anyone who is more clearly Caucasion than myself. Time for a new career?

Elizabeth's birthplace

Today we took a 90 minute journey through the countryside of the Jiangxi province to Elizabeth's birthplace in Fuzhou (in the Linchuan district). The district is home to about 1 million people, which makes it a small city by Chinese standards. She was found as a newborn at the Hua Li restaurant, a non-descript eatery along the town's main road. A dozen or so people, including several small children, were gathered outside as our van pulled up. Foreigners like us are an extremely rare sight in a town like this, so folks were very curious to see us, and especially the little blond-haired boy, who everyone says is piao liang (beautiful). Everywhere we go, people ask about Elizabeth and what she is doing with these strange-looking foreigners. We've learned to tell them ling yang, which means adoption. Our adoption agency has a guide for us, Evelyn, who is usually with us on our outings. Repeatedly, Evelyn has translated the locals' reaction - they say that Elizabeth is lucky and will have a great life with us. It's heartwarming to know that people here understand and appreciate what we're doing.

The Hua Li restaurant in Fuzhou

Galactic Peace and Pocari Sweat

Our hotel in Nanchang is the Galactic Peace International Hotel. No kidding. Crazy name, but a really nice hotel. For about $70 per night, we have an extra large room with a larger-than-king-size bed (call it the Emperor size), huge TV, spacious bathroom, and plenty of space. Besides the nice room, it also has a nice pool, gym, and all the amenities you'd expect. The concierge will even retrieve Pizza Hut for westerners who don't want to venture out into the crowded streets.



One American family is here with their 3 and 5-year-old boys, who provided Andrew with much need playmates. We offered to take the kids to the People's Park, which is one of the nicest city parks we've seen in China. Their mom asked how we would get there, and we said "by taxi, of course." That nixed the deal. Apparently they'd been on 1 other Chinese taxi ride and the experience was too harrowing for them. It is true that the simple act of crossing the street here is a death-defying experience, and a typical cab ride will raise your blood pressure.

The Galactic Peace is near the city center, and is a popular place with adoptive parents. We're sharing the hotel with both American and Spanish groups who are here adopting. It's been good to share our experiences with others.

You might be wondering about the 2nd half of the title of this post. What is Pocari Sweat? Well, Elizabeth was sick for a day or two, and we were looking for something like Pedialite for her - electrolyte replacement. A trip to the local Wal-Mart led us to an "ion supply" drink called - you guessed it - Pocari Sweat. Sounds tasty, eh?

Wondering what Wal-Mart is like in China? Not so different the Wal-Mart experience in Lakewood, Colorado, actually. I'm one of the only people in the whole place speaking English, and everything there is made in China.

Ba Ba

Ba ba is the Chinese (Mandarin) word for "daddy". It's also the word for "poo poo". Ok, technically they are different words because they're spoken with different tones, but to tone-deaf westerners, they sure sound a lot like the same word. I guess that means I should think twice about trying to teach Elizabeth to say "ba ba" because she might think I'm issuing a command for her to do something.

Surprisingly, she's fairly well potty trained already at 11 months old. All you need to do is sit her on the baby potty and whistle, and she knows it's time to pee. If you add a carefully-toned "ba ba", she knows it's time for #2.

Her first night with us went quite well. It did take about 30 minutes of crying before she fell asleep, but we were pleasantly surprised that she slept all the way through the night; we'd been warned that she likes a midnight snack.

Lousy LAX

We arrived on time at LAX, dreading the 4-hour layover until our 11:50 pm departure to Guangzhou on China Southern airlines. Since Frontier and China Southern don’t have a baggage agreement, we had to pick up our checked bags and check in again with China Southern. The long underground hallway to the baggage claim was a throw-back to the 70’s. A myriad of brightly colored tiles decorated one wall and the place is lit up bright enough to be a surgery room. The baggage claim area looked like something you’d expect to see in South America, with decades old carousels, construction, and decor. To top it off, a high-pitched whine pierced the air, apparently the result of security alarms on various doors. The whine begins when someone opens a secure door and continues long past it’s closing. After a long wait for our bags, we learned that the international terminal is a separate building and made our way there, where the official airport signs marked with “China Southern” led us through throngs of people of all nationalities – to the wrong aisle. After wandering a bit, we finally found the China Southern desk on a different aisle, surprised to see about a hundred people in line already, more than 3 hours ahead of flight time. After a long wait here, we were chosen as the lucky winners of a bonus security check of our baggage! We carted our load to yet another long line. After a few millennia in this queue, they finally deemed our lugged safe, so we could go get a bite to eat before the marathon flight across the pacific. It was about 2 and half hours since we landed! Good thing we had that long layover.

Next we passed through security on the way to our “gate”, and I use the term loosely here. The gates at LAX’s international terminal are a crowded cattle call with doors opening straight onto the tarmac, where diesel powered busses, packed almost as full as a city bus in China, haul weary passengers for about 5 minutes to odd, free-standing jetways out in the hinterlands of the airport. Finally we packed ourselves into our 3 seats in row 30 of the fully-booked Boeing 777.

Day 1 to China

It’s been a long ‘pregnancy’ - 18 monthts since we decided to adopt – but our wait is nearing an end. At 6:10 pm on Saturday, we departed DIA to Los Angeles on Frontier Airlines (with a mountain lion and her cub emblazoned on the plane’s tail). We didn’t give Andrew a nap earlier in the day, hoping he’d sleep on the flight, and he did. We’re all anxious to meet Elizabeth for the first time! Just 3 airports stand between us now: L.A., Guangzhou and (formerly known as Canton) and Nanchang, the capitol of Jiangxi province.

One way ticket from China

Tomorrow Amy, Andrew and I will board a plane for Guangzhou China. A few weeks later, our daughter Elizabeth will have a one-way ticket back to the USA. Stay tuned for updates on our journey through China.

Back to China!

Our adoption agency called yesterday with good news. They received our travel notice from the Chinese government, which means we can travel to China as soon as we can schedule the necessary appointments with the US Consulate and the various Chinese agencies. Most likely, we'll be going over around March 5 and returning 2 weeks later, with Elizabeth (a.k.a Fu Ni Ying) in tow!

Good Things

After reading through the comments on our blog it appears that we have done an awful lot of pointing out things that are different in China. Not all of these things are bad, just different; pointing them out is not the same as complaining about them. We haven't done as good of a job at pointing out the things we really enjoyed.

Public Transportation: The bus system in Hangzhou was really good. With light rail coming near our house soon I'm hopeful that I'll be able to use public transportation here more, but somehow I doubt it.

The Food: Yes, picking bones out of every last bite of food was annoying to us, but the flavor of most everything we ate was really good. Much better than Chinese food you get in the US.

The People: Most everybody we met was very generous with whatever they had, especially with Andrew. We rarely encountered a day out when Andrew wasn't given some fruit, candy, or small trinket by total strangers. The people we knew personally were also very helpful with everyday things like translating menus and showing us around town.

The Parks: We really enjoyed being in a garden city like Hangzhou. Compared to other Chinese cities we were in the number and quality of public spaces was excellent. Walking around the lake and the surrounding hills could easily make any afternoon enjoyable.

The Community: Our apartment was in the "burbs" of Hangzhou with many young families. It was great to watch Andrew play with all the kids in the courtyard. It was nice that the ladies at the store got to recognize me. I didn't hesitate to let my son ride the horse in the front of the store while I gathered up the few things I needed. It was a small store so I could hear him call to me from anywhere in it, still I'd never do that in the US.

The Experience: All the new things we saw every day made each day unique and fun. For the amount of time we were in China, there was little chance of getting in a rut.

My Fabulous House

We really liked our apartment in Hangzhou, it far exceeded our expectations. However, I didn't realize how comfy our own home was until we had been away from it for so long. I've always thought we had a nice enough house, not the nicest or worst among the people we know. What I didn't know was how nice it is to have carpet in the bedroom and a washer big enough to wash your comforter. The strangest thing to me is how big my kitchen sink is - it just seems monstrous.

Bye Bye Daily Adventure

Although it was exceedingly pleasant to be able to ask the butcher at the store today for exactly what I wanted, I already miss the daily adventure of living in China. My biggest adventure today was having to shift into 4 wheel drive to make it up the driveway while trying not to stall the car because it had a dead battery after 4 months of sitting unused.

I'm unlikely to go looking for bed sheets and accidentally stumble across the wholesale meat market complete with live fish and a big sign stating "Wholesale cuts of American Beef" complete with pictures.

I didn't even have to bargain for anything. I tried bargaining for the guy at Checker to install the new battery in the truck, but it was a no go. Boring, Boring, Boring .....

Zai jian, Zhongguo

Goodbye, China! We're flying home today. If all goes well, we'll depart from Shanghai airport Saturday at 6:05 pm, and land in Denver on Saturday at 5:55 pm. That's right - we arrive 10 minutes before we left. Ah, the magic of timezones!
We really enjoyed our stay here. It was a great experience. We look forward to being back home, though.

Hooters in Hangzhou

Hooters - that uniquely American sports bar chain - has set up shop in China. They have 2 locations in Shanghai, and one in Hangzhou which opened yesterday. We joined another ex-pat couple there after dinner, mainly because I was curious to see what it would be like in China. Hooters sends some of their American waitresses to China to train their Chinese counterparts, and they've done a pretty good job of replicating the American Hooters experience here. They wear the same tank tops and orange shorts, and they're really friendly and talkative, which is very uncommon among Chinese waitresses, in my experience at least. Andrew repeatedly asked us, "why aren't they wearing pants?"
My Chinese co-workers didn't seem to understand the appeal of such a place - in fact, sports bars are almost non-existent here. One of the problems is that satellite TV is illegal, and you don't get much in the way of good sports on Chinese television. The Shangahi Hooters put up a satellite dish anyway, but the landlord in Hangzhou isn't willing to break the law, apparently.

Friends

Before we came I imagined that I would spend my time hanging out with the wives and children of Brad’s co-workers. The wives would be much like my friends at home: highly educated women whose husbands make enough that they have the option of staying home. They would of course all be fluent in English.

The reality is, of course, much different. Most of the guys Brad works with are young and don’t have wives or children. I can’t think of even one of his male co-workers that has a child living in Hangzhou. Some of them come to Hangzhou to work leaving their wives (who also work) back in their home towns near their parents. There are a couple of female co-workers with kids around Andrew’s age, but they are obviously working with Brad all day, not hanging out with me.

Both parents work in nearly all the families here. In most cases there is also a resident grandparent or nanny to watch the kids. When that’s not the case, there is always daycare. There is one family in our complex where the mom works and the dad takes care of their daughter nearly full time. They both speak fluent English and their 5 year old does too. We’ve had a good time getting to know them, but I’m not sure our association rises to the friend level.

So what do I want from a friend? Somebody that I can discuss more than the weather with. We can complain about our husbands, our respective governments, and our kids to each other. The Chinese people we have met have been more than generous with their time, advice, translating services, babysitting services, and especially food, but not so much their innermost thoughts.

I’ve made many acquaintances but very few friends. The few friends I have made are expat wives like myself. They are fun to hang out with and we can easily talk, but I am leaving a little disappointed with not having made any good Chinese friends.

Frost in Hangzhou

On my run this morning, I noticed something new - frost on the grass. Today -- Dec. 19 -- is the first day it's been cold enough for frost in Hangzhou. A few weeks ago, it was about 45 degrees F inside our office, but they finally turned on the heat a few days later. I don't mind a cool office, but when my hands get so cold it's hard to type, that's too cold.

Tiger Leaping Gorge

I finally posted photos from our 4-day trek through Tiger Leaping Gorge back in Oct-Nov. Amy blogged about it in the post There ARE Stars in China. It was 4 days of good hiking and unbelievable scenery on the eastern edge of the Himalayas. Check out the photos on Flickr.