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Fountain of resentment
IT IS a fact of life in China: people have very little peace, privacy or personal space. At home, three to four families share tiny two-room apartments. Outside, they jostle one another in crowded streets and shops. Neighbourhood and workplace committees keep a wary eye on residents and employees. Slogans in large-character cloth banners and curbside news bulletins on criminals brought to justice provide a stream of mental barrages on correct behaviour and thinking.
Nobody is encouraged to think for themselves; private discussions are considered vaguely subversive, especially among young people. The newspapers have lost all credibility since the June 4th 1989 Tiananmen massacre. A curse has settled across China -- the curse of old leaders who have overstayed their welcome. The supreme leader, Deng Xiaoping is 83 years old. Some of his other colleagues, still with a firm grip on the party and the army, are even older. They all possess a rock-hard conviction that only the Communist Party has the mandate to rule, perhaps forever.
Slowly, but surely, a fountain of resentment builds up within the youth of China. Many have gone to college. Many have been exposed to outside thinking and lifestyle. They have met tourists from Hong Kong, Taiwan and Singapore. These tourists are also ethnic Chinese but they appeared to be far better-off than the locals. It is common to see a tourist casually paying $200 (Chinese dollars or reminbi) for a mediocre painting or handicraft item. $200 is the average monthly salary of a local.
Worse, the Chinese dollar has been deteriorating in value for years. In 1984, I got roughly one Singapore dollar to one reminbi. Today, one Singapore dollar is exchanged for close to three reminbi. Inflation and unemployment have also hit the Chinese hard.
On the streets of Shanghai there are hundreds of thousands of people. Most are outsiders, attracted to the bright lights of the city and job prospects. With a current recession on, few jobs are available and many people have turned to begging. They wait outside the four-star and five-star hotels. When I took a walk outside the swanky Shanghai Hilton, I was immediately surrounded by men and women, carrying babies and pleading for a few dollars to buy a train ticket back home.
"Help me, elder brother," a woman approached me. She must have been at least 20 years older. She was holding a child in one arm. "We haven't eaten for two days. We need just $10 to take a train back to our village."
The tragedy was that these people are not beggars. In fact, there are not supposed to be beggars in a classless society. For 40 years, Communism has taught the Chinese that every ablebodied adult is entitled to a job. Officially, everyone gets the same rate of pay. The porter in a hotel puts in the same hours as the general manager. Both therefore draw the same pay (about $200 to $300). The level of responsibility is irrelevant.
But economic reform, began in 1980 has caused a dramatic rise in imports. The state is now strapped for cash. It owes foreigners about US$26 billion. It is difficult to provide work to everyone even if, according to communist ideology, they are entitled.
The reforms do not seem to be working. The conservative party members long for the "good old days" of the 1950s and 1960s of plain living and high thinking. They are upset by the number of karaoke night clubs in Beijing and Shanghai (reportedly the largest number in the world), and even the smaller towns. Prostitutes (unheard of 10 years ago) are available in many hotels.
The good old days for the conservatives are the bad old days for most Chinese. The general population feels frustrated with the central government's new policy of re-imposing discredited communist doctrines and values. Even the provincial governments -- particularly the rich maritime provinces of Fujian and Guangdong -- oppose such moves. Man in China cannot live by platitudes alone.
But there is little forum of expression for all the pent-up feelings. The Chinese themselves have a name for this grinding state of frustration: Alive in a bitter sea. (This is also the title of a 1983 book by a New York journalist on China.)
In the luxury double-decker train, a fat policeman in the ubiquitious olive-green baggy uniform and oversized peak cap got up. He scrutinised each passenger in detail. Two gaudy red and gold epaulettes on his shoulders made him look like some brass band musician in a funeral march. But the business-like revolver in his holster is a grim reminder that he was the representative of the most unrepresentative government on earth.
Power comes from the barrel of a gun, Mao Zedong wrote many years ago, and his ruling Communist Party never forgets this dictum. The party controls the army and security organs, and through them, every facet of life of 1,000 million Chinese, from the frozen waste of Sinjiang and Tibet to traffic-clogged Shanghai and tropical Hainan.
There was another reminder that people should always look up to authority. The woman broadcaster said: "I will now hand over to our train director who will give you a welcome message." A man's voice came over the intercom. In rough-hewn guttural Mandarin, he spoke of the accomplishment of the railway ministry and the party, and urged his listeners to be good, law-abiding citizens. Mercifully his speech was short but ominiously pointed. The woman's chatty monologue took over again.
Then two stewardess came with porcelain tumblers and a large thermo of plain tea. The two girls were fair, good-looking and dressed in smartly-cut indigo uniforms. They smiled brightly as they went around serving drinks, greeting each passenger with "Ni hao" ("You're fine", the standard hello in mainland China) and even lingering for brief chats.
In the coach was a group of Japanese teenagers. The stewardesses -- who were Nanjing residents -- felt uneasy serving them. There was no smile for the Japanese.
In 1937, an impatient Japanese army overran much of northern China in unprovoked aggression. There was little Chinese resistance until the invaders came near to Nanjing which serves as the gateway to the south. Outside the city, the Chinese army for the first time stood and fought and halted the Japanese briefly. When the Japanese finally occupied Nanjing on Dec 12, they carried out an orgy of rape and mass killing. Three hundred thousand Nanjing children, women and old folks perished.
The Rape of Nanjing had long been forgotten in Japan. Japanese schoolchildren now study history text that dismissed it as a mere inevitable war "incident" without elaboration.
One of the train stewardesses told me that she had not forgotten. She wasn't born during the war but her older relatives had been victims. She said: "Two years ago along this same railway line, a terrible collision occurred. In the train were a number of Japanese schoolchildren touring China. They died in the accident. No Chinese was killed except an attendant.
"Call it what you will -- accident or vengeful destiny. Many people at that time said it must be that the barbaric deeds of their fathers were visited upon these poor kids," she added. But there was no satisfaction in her voice.
