Saturday, October 21, 2006
The low down on China
Two saxophones and an oboe played slow, sad songs in the park. The musicians were all retired and one man sitting near me of that same generation knew all the songs and sang the best parts of them. His scruffy dog got attention from all the kids who passed by. He asked me where I was from, and another guy joined us.
Just a little older than I, with short hair in the back with a long tuft in the front sticking straight out, came over and asked me the same question. He sat next to me, facing away, and without making eye contact he began to speak to me in impeccible English. He spoke quickly, almost nervously, and began to tell me a story.
His story began with how hard it is for people to find work in Xi'an. "There are no factories anywhere near the city center so there is very little opportunity. Wages are low, and government corruption is high. Without the welfare system, China would fall apart. Even I am on unemployment, these musicians are retired, that's why they can play here." Pointing to the old women in their simple, colorful clothes walking in close groups, he said "see them -- all these women are from the countryside."
In China, it's very hard to get a job. To get a good job, you have to have a masters degree, but even then, it's hard.
He went on to talk about Education in China. "Education in China is expensive. Parents have to pay for their schools, even primary school. Rich kids get spoiled - because of the One-Child policy; poor kids get left behind. In the countryside, it is particularly bad. You see, none of the kids who get an education will go back to the countryside to work. The wages are too low. Too low to live off of. So what winds up happening is older students teach thier younger piers instead of trained teachers. For the kids, all that matters are exams. They are always multiple choice. For English, kids may be able to choose the right answer, recognize nouns or verbs, but won't have any idea how to understand the language.
"When I pass my certification exams, I want to teach English. Or maybe I want to be the headmaster at a private school." All the headmaster does is make sure students attend class, and he will call the parents, or if the kids don't go out for morning exercises, he will make them go out. But, even headmasters do not earn good money. Now, what's happening is college students are offering tutoring in English for younger students.
"The young people here, they worship Western culture."
"Our economy is bad now. Too much political corruption. It used to be that politicians earned the same as the common people, and that led to corruption. Now, they will buy up land and sell contracts to develop it, then sell it for more money. They will buy up large pieces of land very, very cheap. Now they all have big fancy houses, their kids get the best education.
When someone buys a house in China, the land still belongs to the government. Your house will get a 70 year lease, after which, it is returned to the government. So if you buy a house on land leased sixty years ago, you don't know what wil happen to it after 10 years. The lease will expire, and you may not have any legal claim to it.
"In Mao's time, things were better. People had less, but everyone was satisfied. Now," pointing to the ladies from the countryside, "even the poor country people wear nicer clothes than the politicians then. Now, people have cell phones and they need things. In China, if I loan you money, or if the bank loans you money, you never return it. It just disappears."
Today, a teacher at a public school in Xi'an earns about 2000 Yuan a month. 20 years ago, it was less, maybe 100, but everybody earned 100 and people had enough. Today, our future is black. NObody knows what will happpen in china in the future.
Now, our president is better than the last one, but he cannot create change. He cannot fulfill his promises. Nobody knows what is going to happen to China. I don't know what we need to do.
"China is a peaceful country. We never attack other countries. Only small countries attack us. Vietnam, England, Portugal, Japan. That's why we need a big army: to defend against small countries. How does Portugal defeat China? Because we think Portugal is a big country, we listened and when they said give us money, we gave them silk adn backed down. That's why China is poor now. Small countries have always been taking from us. We're not like America, who is just invading small countrys, just attacking Iraq for oil."
Two saxophones and an oboe played slow, sad songs in the park. The musicians were all retired and one man sitting near me of that same generation knew all the songs and sang the best parts of them. His scruffy dog got attention from all the kids who passed by. He asked me where I was from, and another guy joined us.
Just a little older than I, with short hair in the back with a long tuft in the front sticking straight out, came over and asked me the same question. He sat next to me, facing away, and without making eye contact he began to speak to me in impeccible English. He spoke quickly, almost nervously, and began to tell me a story.
His story began with how hard it is for people to find work in Xi'an. "There are no factories anywhere near the city center so there is very little opportunity. Wages are low, and government corruption is high. Without the welfare system, China would fall apart. Even I am on unemployment, these musicians are retired, that's why they can play here." Pointing to the old women in their simple, colorful clothes walking in close groups, he said "see them -- all these women are from the countryside."
In China, it's very hard to get a job. To get a good job, you have to have a masters degree, but even then, it's hard.
He went on to talk about Education in China. "Education in China is expensive. Parents have to pay for their schools, even primary school. Rich kids get spoiled - because of the One-Child policy; poor kids get left behind. In the countryside, it is particularly bad. You see, none of the kids who get an education will go back to the countryside to work. The wages are too low. Too low to live off of. So what winds up happening is older students teach thier younger piers instead of trained teachers. For the kids, all that matters are exams. They are always multiple choice. For English, kids may be able to choose the right answer, recognize nouns or verbs, but won't have any idea how to understand the language.
"When I pass my certification exams, I want to teach English. Or maybe I want to be the headmaster at a private school." All the headmaster does is make sure students attend class, and he will call the parents, or if the kids don't go out for morning exercises, he will make them go out. But, even headmasters do not earn good money. Now, what's happening is college students are offering tutoring in English for younger students.
"The young people here, they worship Western culture."
"Our economy is bad now. Too much political corruption. It used to be that politicians earned the same as the common people, and that led to corruption. Now, they will buy up land and sell contracts to develop it, then sell it for more money. They will buy up large pieces of land very, very cheap. Now they all have big fancy houses, their kids get the best education.
When someone buys a house in China, the land still belongs to the government. Your house will get a 70 year lease, after which, it is returned to the government. So if you buy a house on land leased sixty years ago, you don't know what wil happen to it after 10 years. The lease will expire, and you may not have any legal claim to it.
"In Mao's time, things were better. People had less, but everyone was satisfied. Now," pointing to the ladies from the countryside, "even the poor country people wear nicer clothes than the politicians then. Now, people have cell phones and they need things. In China, if I loan you money, or if the bank loans you money, you never return it. It just disappears."
Today, a teacher at a public school in Xi'an earns about 2000 Yuan a month. 20 years ago, it was less, maybe 100, but everybody earned 100 and people had enough. Today, our future is black. NObody knows what will happpen in china in the future.
Now, our president is better than the last one, but he cannot create change. He cannot fulfill his promises. Nobody knows what is going to happen to China. I don't know what we need to do.
"China is a peaceful country. We never attack other countries. Only small countries attack us. Vietnam, England, Portugal, Japan. That's why we need a big army: to defend against small countries. How does Portugal defeat China? Because we think Portugal is a big country, we listened and when they said give us money, we gave them silk adn backed down. That's why China is poor now. Small countries have always been taking from us. We're not like America, who is just invading small countrys, just attacking Iraq for oil."
