You NO buy enough junk! You buy More!

More riots in the land next to the rising sun. This time it seems tourists are getting fed up with having to shop till you drop on organized tours. It's an old scam, though, as back in 2000, when we went to Mexico, we were also deposited at a couple souvenir shops here & there. I can, however, understand how they might feel.

Some Chinese tour guides make extra income through commission given to them by shop keepers who make good sales out of tourists. One guide with a group of 100 or so spend-happy tourists, can rake in an extra few thousand RMB per trip. The greedier the tour guide, most likely, the more you're going to land at a few shops & stalls here & there.

In this case, the tour guide made all the wrong moves.

They were on a day trip from Hong Kong on Tuesday, but after visiting one or two local sites and a number of shops, were told they had not spent enough by their local guides. ~Richard Spencer

That's a hell of a thing to say to your group. The tourists were told they must spend at least 421 RMB, were then dropped off on a beach, and were not allowed back on the coach. According to one of the tourists (as seen on the video), they were threatened by the tour guides that if they DIDN'T spend that much, they would be abandoned there. They rioted. Police showed up, riot police showed up, and it didn't end for the next 5 hours. Anyways... see for yourself. Courtesy of Reuters.

Chinese in the US in the 19th Century

"Kiwi" of Shanghai Expat fame posted this piece on the forums, and I thought I would share here. Written by Mark Twain, the story gives interesting insight into what Chinese life was like back then, some in Virginia, but mostly in California.

Chapter LIV

Roughing It - by Mark Twain

Of course there was a large Chinese population in Virginia--it is the case with every town and city on the Pacific coast. They are a harmless race when white men either let them alone or treat them no worse than dogs; in fact they are almost entirely harmless anyhow, for they seldom think of resenting the vilest insults or the cruelest injuries. They are quiet, peaceable, tractable, free from drunkenness, and they are as industrious as the day is long. A disorderly Chinaman is rare, and a lazy one does not exist. So long as a Chinaman has strength to use his hands he needs no support from anybody; white men often complain of want of work, but a Chinaman offers no such complaint; he always manages to find something to do. He is a great convenience to everybody--even to the worst class of white men, for he bears the most of their sins, suffering fines for their petty thefts, imprisonment for their robberies, and death for their murders. Any white man can swear a Chinaman's life away in the courts, but no Chinaman can testify against a white man. Ours is the "land of the free"--nobody denies that--nobody challenges it. [Maybe it is because we won't let other people testify.] As I write, news comes that in broad daylight in San Francisco, some boys have stoned an inoffensive Chinaman to death, and that although a large crowd witnessed the shameful deed, no one interfered.

The story continues on ReadPrint.

Judging by the treatment of the Chinese historically in the US, according to Mark Twain, one can see some of the same treatment in China given to some expats as Americans to the Chinese in the essay. During my recent "Field Trip" it was suggested that all of "us laowais" can earn so much money here, and yet disrespect the local population. While they were lining their pockets with our "fines", they made sure we would understand that the Chinese people were proud. Are all expats like that to Chinese? No. Are all Chinese like that to expats? Of course not. While my views & opinions can get somewhat extreme (I'm not as bad as my laowai friend here is), never confuse my bitterness toward the powers that be with any bitterness toward 90% of the local population. There is still that 10% though that I'd love to toss right into the Huangpu River & watch them sink in that oily, chemically enhanced cesspool.

Field Trip to the PSB office!

I made it to the PSB office yesterday. The PSB are hunting down ALL the foreigners in the Hongquan, WuZhong Road area in an effort to catch those with either illegal passports or those not carrying passports with them (as in my case). This area houses a good number of Koreans and a good number of them were also at the PSB office with us, including local business owners we know.

Our place got fined a couple thousand RMB plus about 1000 RMB each for its 3 foreign employees. This is because the organization is Chinese-owned. Other places, schools, restaurants, bars & such, got sacked with a lot more, some ranging up to 60,000 RMB including sending a few people home packing. These were foreign-owned. Their fines included up to 10,000 RMB per person, for some, deportation (with the option of returning on a new visa) and a nice long speech from the PSB declaring how they were rich, yet should abide by the local laws. Where the rich part comes in, I've no idea. I've heard so far, roughly five Koreans, one American & one Canadian got deported, within the last few days. And this has been going on for about a month now. You do the math.

The real reason, however, is because the local jurisdiction is gearing up for the Spring Festival. For every foreigner & foreign-owned business they bring in & fine, they get a bigger, better New Years Bonus. By the looks of the PSB office we were at, they're making some decent bonuses. About 20 people were waiting, and that's only for the afternoon. I can see eventually other jurisdictions following suit & jumping in to cash in on the rich foreigners. So watch yourself.

As one of my colleagues mentioned, eventually you stop asking how someone on only 4000 RMB/month can afford a BMW.

Another Stop over at the PSB

A couple weeks ago, the Police raided an establishment I happen to be frequenting. That establishment, a school that caters to the Korean Expat crowd. At about 9pm, about 6 PSB officials came in & demanded to see all our passports. We didn't have them (what expat actually does carry their passport around EVERYWHERE they go?). Because of this, we had to go to the PSB office a few days later, where they basically gave us a slap on the wrist.

What went wrong:
We had to sign a piece of paper that neither they nor the school admin could tell us what it said.
They referred to a PSB Guide book written in rather vague English.

Regardless, we had to sign, or face possible deportation. My problem is that this gig is only for a little extra drinking money. I'm an IT consultant. Not a teacher. My visa says so. But they didn't say anything was wrong.

Now, however, they called said establishment again, and demanded to see our passports again. That was Monday. We got our passports back Monday evening. Yesterday, we were told that we will again go talk to the PSB. All I can think is that they somehow didn't bribe enough money to the PSB and now are looking for more.

We'll see what happens I suppose. If I get deported, I leave all my earthly possessions to my lovely wife. ;)

Tongren Road, Wretched Hive of Scum & Villainy

Considering most people I know already know the story, including family... I decided to reprint this story for the blog. This was originally posted on Shanghai Expat, edited slightly considering the time difference. Here goes...

I'm not entirely sure how all this went down last week, but suffice it to say, I got myself a good ass whupping that night. After the quiz night, I decided to make my way closer to the Nanjing Xi Lu area, via Tongren. Yeah, I know... "Tongren Road Sucks!" my old battle cry. But even I had to find something to do before going back to Judytown.

Well, busted up hand, face & teeth later, I certainly found something to do. (How my computer survived, I've no clue!) A gang of locals were out there, sticks, chains, pipes & all, and they were beating the living shit out of a laowai (foreigner). Tongren Road cops didn't do a whole hell of a lot.

So I did. Stupid Stupid me.

I rushed the first guy with a pipe (thinking chains hurt less) and knocked him to the ground. Then... I got my ass kicked too. Did any other foreigners jump in? Nope. Locals? yep.

The other laowai got his ass out of there, and I ended up taking his place in the scuffle. Needless to say, I've a bit of a headache today.

Whoever that laowai was, if you're reading this, you owe me one, dude. No good deed goes unpunished.

Since that incident, I do remember rushing a 2nd person, but, well... 15 vs. 2 aren't very good odds to say the least. And as last night was St. Patrick's day (or St. Sneaky Pete's day if you will), all the fun people were out in force. I was out with Alex & a few of his friends, not Shanghai locals, but Chinese locals at least. And I almost saw a repeat of last week, as... this time a foreigner was fucking with one of the locals. Took his Guinness hat, pointed to it & said, "is this mine?".

Highly unlikely.

The foreigner did actually give it back, no incident required. And the whole thing took like 5 seconds. But I did realize, apparently I'm an equal-opportunity brawler.

Sorry, no pics of the newly... renovated teeth.