In today’s blog post, I am going to quote both Edward Snowden and Donald Trump in relation to China, and it’s going to make sense. This is the first installment of “Critical” Reading – a biweekly post in which I analyze and critique an article, a movie, an Internet comment, or something Donald Trump said. If you remember from the first Republican debate this year: Donald Trump stated, “This country is in big trouble. We…
This semester has changed my life. From a young age I have read books as a way to gather knowledge about the world. Both of my parents share an ardent love of books; my dad a passionate devotee to non-fiction, my mother with her perennial stack of bedside fiction that never seems to shrink despite constant reading. Growing up, my mother filled the house with movies and TV shows, and some of my fondest memories…
Getting a cab back was tricky—we had to downgrade to a three-wheeler. It was probably the jankiest car I will ever travel in. It only had three wheels and the motor groaned when it tried traveling faster than 30 miles per hour. When you are in China, you usually want to avoid these “unofficial” taxis like the plague, but since I was with my Chinese friends I figured I was in safe hands. We arrived…
After visiting the Great Wall in Dandong, we took the bus back to town. The bus didn’t have any seats left, so we sat in the bus-equivalent of a trunk, behind the last row of seats. I’m not quite sure if that’s legal, or safe, but I chalk it up to a “when in Rome” sort of situation. Apparently the ticket taker asked my friends if I was American. Most of the people on the…
The following is a reflection I wrote for my film class, Moving China. Our assignment this week was to visit the Nanhu Peasant Market in Beijing and film and edit a video (which I’m in the middle of right now). For those of you who wish to see my films, I’m sorry to inform you that I cannot post them until I return in December, but no doubt I will keep you posted on the…
I know that it’s been about two weeks since my last update, which is a virtual no-no in the blogosphere. Since the Silk Road trip, I have been struggling to find that nice balance between classes, sleep, and actually going out there and getting to experience Beijing (for some reason, sleep always gets the shaft). When I say struggling to find a balance…I’m not kidding. In the past two weeks I have: gone to Tiananmen…
My friends and I met up, going to dinner and settling on McDonalds (Xi’an is very westernized). Since the beginning of the trip, my digestive system has had trouble keeping up with the Chinese food. It’s kind of amazing, that in America, McDonalds upsets my stomach, whereas in China I was using it to settle my stomach. Apparently McDonalds can run out of fries, or at least in China, because we were served curly fries…
We arrived in Xi’an around 7:30am. My last shower had been the previous previous night in Xia’he, about five cities ago. I brushed my teeth, wet-wiped my arms, and changed my shirt, but that was still not enough to rid myself of the gross feeling that comes after a Chinese night train. Xi’an was the train’s last stop, so we waited 10 minutes or so after stopping to disembark. We dragged our stuff across the…
We finally arrived in Lanzhou around 5 or 6pm. A number of my friends decided that they didn’t really like Lanzhou. Perhaps it was the layout of the city, but I think it was mostly because of the people. The staring there was the worst, and after one day my black friend couldn’t stand it anymore. At least in other cities, a nice portion of the people don’t bother to stare at you (at least…
(There are four blog posts to Day Nine…feel pumped) I might as well mention what I talked about in my presentation on Chinese music. I talked about the importance of music in Chinese history (in case you didn’t know, it’s very important). The characters that make up the word music in Chinese mean “tone”(aka the essence of music) and “happiness.” Throughout Chinese history, music has been used mainly for entertainment and ritual. Music has been used as a…