Uncertainties

Economists laugh at risk lovers and hail risk-averse preference based on their utility models, while psychologists make fun of these meaningless curves and straight lines, arguing that people's misperception of losses and gains leads to poor decision making. Uncertainties can be so annoying in the real world as it prevents us from future planning. With certain results, a lot of things can be arranged in advance. If I know the result of my bidding, I can be better prepared for the coming projects; even if it's a rejection, at least I'd know whether to go for alternatives. If I know where I'll be in the next years, I can plan my settlement better, rather than keeping all my stuff packed. If I know my boyfriend is going to propose by the end of this year, I could start planning our lives from now on. But uncertainties impede us from doing any of this. Thus in the real world, majority still prefer certain results under the same expected outcomes. (As shown in the graph, D in superior to B in terms of expected outcomes, but the their utilities are the same.)

But uncertainties can be very enjoyable if you don't have to pay the bill. I'm one of those who like watching people doing exercises more than exercising by myself. When I watch Olympics (sorry again), I find events like swimming, gymnastics more entertaining than table tennis or diving: the medalists in former two events are always uncertain, where traditional teams and emerging powers compete fiercely, while the latter two are basically dominated by Chinese. It is relaxing to watch games when you can foresee the results, but the real excitement lies behind uncertainties. It's fun to guess whether they will surprise us - either by extraordinary performance or mistakes, and stirring to see how youngsters will challenge their predecessors. Things could change in a few seconds (depending how fast Bolt can be), but until then everything is still a mystery.

Likewise, the uncertainties in our lives may be fun to others as well. For strangers, it is sometimes interesting to see how we can finally get things done, and what results we'd be able to get in the end. But for those who really care about us, they'd enjoy the uncertainties less. And for people who have a big share in our losses or gains, they'd be very happy to reduce as many uncertainties as they can. The best we can do is to play the role of "strangers", pretending the result is irrelevant and focusing on pushing the process towards the best outcome. The worst situation that we'd easily get trapped in is to worry about others' unknown future when we couldn't be any sort of help.

No matter how hard we have tried, uncertainties never leave us. They come one after the other, like a series of blanks to fill. Have you ever listed the top 10 must-do before turning 30, and did you "check" all of them when celebrating the day after the last day of your 29-year old. Have you ever been inspired by "I have a dream" speech and proudly claimed to have your own, and did you ever reckon whether you were on the right track to this ultimate dream? Once we accomplish or fail to accomplish something, new options always follow, which may or may not be the ones we want. Then should we reduce uncertainties by choosing one from them or increase uncertainties by exploring more options? There will be only one fact in our biography, but we all had the opportunities of writing it in a different way. Now we probably aspire for stable careers and lives, but when we have got old, we may cry over the opportunities missed over the period of our life time.

So facing such a fast-changing world, a wise choice is to go easy with uncertainties. Do what we want to, and leave the outcomes to the fortune. Sometimes we may pull off what we are yearning for, sometimes we may not. But even the failures will be worthwhile if we can still surprise ourselves and surroundings occasionally, and have some unplanned sweets.

Good-looking Olympics

Jude Law, Alain Delon, Takashi Kashiwabara, Hyde...what do they have in common? Attractive appearances can be so impressive that people only remember their glamorous images on screen, but forget - intentionally or not - their mediocre acting skills, nasty personalities or messy private lives. Similar things happened 12 hours ago in London, where Japanese and Chinese teams were competing for the gold medal in Men's gymnastics team final. Sports commentators mentioned that judges seemed to favor Japanese gymnasts, and had been quite generous in grading their performance. Coincidentally, most Japanese gymnasts are very good-looking. Kato Ryohei (pictured at left), born in 1993 attracted most attention from the audience during his first play in Olympics. He only attended two of the five group competitions, and (honestly) he's probably below the average in Japan, but people soon started to talk about his movie-star like looking, not the real superstar Uchimura. There is rumor that all the Japanese gymnasts wore make-up to please audience and judges, which proved to be a quite successful strategy.

Similarly, Germany team also gathered a bunch of good-looking people. Marcel Nguyen (see the right picture) won thousands of fans in China soon after his performance. Sports events which require subjective evaluation from judges, like gymnastics, diving and skating, tend to favor good-looking athletes, who are more advanced to feast audience's eyes on their performances though athletes in the same event always have similar figures. Accessories, including their sportswear, hairstyle, etc, though not relevant to a tidy performance, are significant contributors to high grades. Other events, whose rating system is not so "soft", like weightlifting, swimming and sprint, are less picky of the appearance.

We can't really blame this as unfairness or discrimination against athletes with plain looks. Preferences for fair faces and rosy lips exist everywhere simply because beauty brings over more pleasure. Although people accolade diversity and eulogize different sorts of beauty for different ethnic groups, and claim that every one is beautiful for what he/she is, the truth is they still have unanimous aesthetic standards. It's undeniable that watching beauties is very enjoyable, and there is a price that people'd like to pay for the enjoyment. When judges watch a beautiful athlete performing on the stage, they probably gain some joy for his/her appearance, which will more or less compensate for the mistakes committed.

The world is not fair anyway. It's not surprising that you may have to give up singing if you're not beautiful enough, but disadvantaged in sports events for appearance sounds much more cruel. Endowment like a straight nose and rosy cheeks will remove some barriers in career life for sure, but people will unattractive looking can still have lovely smile and clear eyes. How much our personality can make up for the disadvantages in appearance remains in doubt, but at least worth trying - you never know when and how you will get paid back.

Olympics with Chinese Characteristics

Since the opening ceremony, I have been preoccupied by Olympic Games, tracking its schedules, marking the key events, cheering for the champions and grieving for those who missed their opportunities. Today there is some interesting news that I'd like to make a few comments on.

One story is about a weightlifting gold medalist from North Korea, who magically lifted the barbell three times of his own weight, burst into tears during the interview and attributed his accomplishment to the "love of Kim Jong Il and his successor Kim Jung En". The silver-medal winner, a Chinese athlete, cried over his failure and told the reporter that he was very sorry for "disappointing his beloved country and people." He shouldn't be sorry: among those who are not blessed by the Kims, he is still the best.

Also in the weightlifting competition, a 17-year old Chinese female athlete who was assigned to Group B failed to lift the barbell three times and ended her performance with a score of 0. This probably doesn't happen that frequently in the Olympics, but shouldn't be a big surprise: uncertainties are very common in sports events. But later Chinese reports claimed this entire event to be a "shameful event in Chinese weightlifting history", as an athlete ended with a score of 0 in a sport that Chinese teams have been good at traditionally. A long report released the inside information about the selection procedure of weightlifters, which seemed to be a compromise between local governments. The poor girl was interviewed after her performance, "I didn't know what happened, I was probably too nervous." She said with a blank look.

Zufilya, a female weightlifting athlete who won a gold-medal in women's 53-kg weightlifting final for Kazakhstan, was revealed to be a Chinese athlete. She was "arranged" to become a Kazakhstan citizen in a so-called exchange program by the General Administration of Sports, who forged her resume to be qualified for immigration. She is alleged to return to China after this Olympics, as agreed in the exchange program. When Zufilya was on the podium, singing the anthem of Kazakhstan, her colleague Ping Li, who was viewed as the most valuable athlete in women's 53-kg weightlifting, could only stay at home due to the compromise in domestic power games.

All these stories, give us a jigsaw of China and its communist comrade's state-run sports systems. Obsession with gold medal is only the start of all the tragedy. I think it's amazing for an athlete to be eligible for participating Olympics. Gold medals are precious for sure, but silver, bronze ones are beautiful too. But this is not the case for Chinese sports officials. They sent congratulatory telegrams to a gold medalist without even mentioning the name of the bronze medalist, who is also a Chinese athlete, let alone those who attended the competition but not getting a medal. Thus you will find Chinese athletes very depressed if they miss the gold medal, while athletes from UK, US, etc still happily kiss their silver or bronze medals. I couldn't constrain my anger when I saw such a hard working athlete apologize for "getting a silver medal only." This simply doesn't look right.

Behind the dream for gold medals is the cost of billions of dollars and huge wastes of human resources. Government squanders tax payers' money on training athletes to win models (and reputation in their eyes) in international sports games, the number of which determines promotion and demotion of sports bureaucrats. Kids from poor background choose to get engaged in sports for better lives, and own their livings on their rankings. When they're not able to participate competitions any more either because of their ages, wounds or other political reasons, government usually offers them paychecks based on previous achievement. Thus too much burden is laid on these communist athletes, for all their competitions are connected with national honor and pride. The quality of their future lives are largely determined by a few competitions as well. Some athletes are very successful, like Deng Yaping, a Ping-pong player who won four Olympics gold-medals, has become a senior-level government official after receiving her degree from Oxford. But most of them, who fail to make a name of themselves, suffer from sports injuries and low payment for the rest of their lives. If we do understand the harsh side of the whole story, we may find Olympics in China very different from Coubertin's original intention, but more similar to an ancient Chinese proverb: one general achieves renown over the dead bodies of ten thousand.

I noticed an interesting contrast in microblog and facebook. Most of my microblog friends, who are Chinese of course, talk about Olympics intensely and cheer for every gold medal the Chinese team earns. But my facebook friends, most of whom are Americans, don't even mention a word of Olympics, but their personal lives - party, trips and family. I like watching Olympics, but I hate the fact that it is our attention to the Olympics that is making these children fight for the vanity of nation at the cost of their childhood, youth and future. To prevent more children from suffering these unnecessary pains, maybe we should start off showing less passion for the game, and caring less about the ridiculous national pride in international sports competitions.

Process and Outcome

If an athlete were informed of the likelihood of winning Olympic gold medals, which is probably one of the most unreachable career target in the world, would she/he still be determined to take the harsh training for decades? Some of them, if really interested in the game, will still enjoy the training and find the training process quite a treatment. But if you only focus on fighting for the gold medal, taking which as a stepping stone to a better life, it's really not a good deal. Just think of spending years on an impossible gambling - not wise, seriously.

Which is more important, processes or outcomes? People kept asking this question for thousands of years. When we are working on something, sometimes painstakingly, it'd better be rewarding enough to justify our efforts. But we are always disappointed: thousands of people apply for the same college, but only one tenth of them are accepted; a hundred capable graduates apply for the same position, but only one of them is recruited. What if you are one of the unfortunate nine tenth or the ninety-nine other applicants? Majorities are facing this question. Most of them continue trying, looking for opportunities with other universities or companies until they get one. And then they will tell you that they've enjoyed the process so much that the outcome is not that important anymore.

They are not telling the truth. It is the expected outcome that drives them moving forward. They make efforts only to achieve certain objectives. Very few people choose to file application materials if they know the application will end up nothing, and even less decide to apply just for fun. When they are bothered by rejections or "thank you for application but ..." letters, it's difficult for them to tolerate their (sometimes continuous) failures all the time without wondering whether they've wasted too much time on this issue, or if there is any inherent problems with themselves. People fight to win. They can appreciate failures, but only because that will help them gain more experiences and finally lead to future successes, not the nonsense of enjoying process rather than outcomes.

Back to the question raised at the beginning of this blog. Even if I like the game so much that I don't mind undergoing all the rigorous training, I may not choose to do so: there must be better ways to enjoy it. Why don't I just keep practicing until I think I'm ready for Olympics, instead of claiming myself an Olympic athlete before I'm good enough. If a gold medal has never been the outcome I'm after, the process will be more enjoyable with less pressure, frustration and superfluous ambition. It's the same with school or job applications. Set up targets at different levels, and then go with the one you're most comfortable with. It's in this way that process can lead to the outcome you're looking for.

Most people have dreams. But dreams are different from objectives. Dreams can be illusion, imagination and fantasy, but objectives should be more practical - at least attainable through our own efforts. Processes, which provide us with knowledge, experiences and understandings of the world, will surely lead us to some outcomes - whether expected or not, which are perfect rewards to our efforts in previous years. It is from the process that we should expect some outcomes, not the reverse: setting expectations for outcomes to fill up processes.

If I overstate this topic a little bit, it's also a question on life and achievement. We can still have happy lives without achieving anything unless we believe we're predetermined to accomplish some targets. But if we do understand the importance of enjoying living, some nice outcomes may come naturally.

Deep-mountain Monks

An ass in Germany is a professor in Rome. When I came across this proverb, my initial response was: oh Italians must really be stupid! Later I found its counterpart in Chinese: Monks from deep mountains are better at scriptures. Remoteness creates mysteries which gild normal people and make them look like masters to natives. Sometimes it's true: if you think of the better education system in the US, it's probably reasonable to assume that PhDs with foreign degrees may have higher academic levels. Sometimes it's not: people look better simply because of information asymmetry. In either case, students with foreign degrees have advantages over their peers in domestic markets. My previous blog Studying Abroad introduced "returnees" to China with foreign degrees, and some of them - specially those graduating from Ivy League, become professors and senior researchers. But their research experiences and academic achievement, though important, are hardly checked.

But now, better communication technologies and more frequent information exchange makes it possible for people to know more about lives of deep-mountain monks. Documentaries, reports and articles help non-travelers understand what's happening on the other side of the world. Their degree diploma, dissertations and published papers can all be tracked by a few clicks on websites or telephone counseling. A few days ago, it was released that two professors, claiming to receive their PhDs abroad, one from Columbia University and the other from Toronto University, lied about their experiences. One of them only visited Columbia University for one year, and the other listed papers published by a same-name professor at Yale on his CV. Degree fraud is no longer breaking news, returnees fibbed about oversea degrees before - some graduating from non-existent colleges, some upgrading the degrees they received. But this time, employers responded very quickly - one of them was removed from her tenure-position already, and the other is under investigation as well. Deep-mountain monks can't make their experiences up and fool people in the information era.


Counterfeits should be blamed on their dishonesty, but the motivation for their fraud roots in blind worship for diploma. Degrees do not always reflect people's capacity or talent (though you can take it as orthogonal to human's value), and far too much value is attached to it in China. Abroad degrees arouse people's curiosity about foreign lives, and admiration of "advanced education". But what really makes deep-mountain monks stand out in their peers is the experiences they gain from traveling and living abroad. Unfortunately these experiences cannot be reflected by indicators, which may explain why they resort to good degrees when trying to sell themselves in domestic job market. It's nice that now people are wary of blind worship for foreign degrees, and pay more attention to their capacity. If the information can be transparent enough that people know how to evaluate these returnees' capacity, and make it comparable to domestic graduates, the myths of deep-mountain monks will be broken as well.


The same principle applies to food. When I was in China, I had a fantasy for Western bakery and fast food (Fried chicken is really good), partly because of the "secret" recipe they had, partly because of their rarity. But since I came to the US, I started to realize these "deep-mountain monks" are actually wandering monks who appear every 10 miles along highways. Almost suddenly I lost my interests in these drunk food, and started to miss my old Chinese cuisine. This is what happened after all the illusion and fancy have gone, and I could fairly assess different types of food. 


I don't know if this solution can also address the myths of oversea returnees. But if people have more opportunities to travel abroad, or even live there for a few years, they probably will gain better understanding of these foreign monks, which in turn will discourage students abroad from lying on documentary stuff. Internet could also help with this: I found reviews and ratings on Honda dealership in the bay area very helpful with my auto purchase decision. Maybe one day, we can have a global rating system for each people, like what LinkedIn is trying to do in job markets, so that employers will have more comprehensive ideas of candidates, not only their degrees  and papers.

Studying Abroad

A PKU alumni reunion will be held in south bay this Saturday, with hundreds of people getting together, having barbecue and electing the new committee for the next two year. Since the founding the P.R.C, or maybe even earlier, Peking University and its rivalry Tsinghua University, have been sending their top students abroad, mostly the US, who has a reputation for offering generous scholarship. After graduation, many students chose to stay, and moved to coasts with abundant job opportunities. Tens of thousands of alumni settled down in San Francisco, New York and DC for during the past decades.

Most alumni in the bay area have science or engineering background, and moved to the silicon valley during its early days. They hold well-paid positions in large IT companies and live in houses with four bedrooms and swimming pools, - the lifestyle almost unaffordable in China. The rest of them major in finance or accounting, benefiting from the booming IT economy in the neighborhood. Beyond these, I can't recall any one with other majors. It's quite clear what kind of Chinese students can making a living in the US- technicians or data processors.

Job markets in turn affect students' choice of majors. For most Chinese students whose parents living on less than $5,000 per year, it's very tempting to get a job here. It's also easier to get a fellowship in science departments. This explains the high ratio of Chinese students in physics, biology and computer science, but not in history, psychology and public policy. Of course not every graduate can get a job in the US, most of them still go back. Thus there is a feedback effect. Students come to the US to learn science and finance, and then feeding back their home country with foreign tech skills and financial ideas (not so well in the US case.)

I'm sure high-tech and financial people are badly needed in an emerging economy like China. But it's frustrating to see returnee's majors are highly limited to these fields. Current hot spots - political reform, election, democracy and rule of law, though still a taboo in mainstream medias, do need experts to work on them. Overseas graduates who are exposed to new political regimes and culture are definitely an asset to domestic development. But in lack of incentives and financial supports, few students study in this field, and even fewer pursue jobs on public affairs, let alone the amount of final returnees.

Intentionally or not, Chinese government does not seem to encourage students to study democracy abroad. The biggest public sector - the central and local governments now only recruit people with working experiences, but oversea degrees are not respected. Once you're in the government, you probably have no motivation to study abroad, because the best graduate degree for promotion is the one from the party school of CCP. International organizations and NGOs, the main employers of policy students in most OECD countries, are in a moribund state in China. The combined result is that students are dissuaded from working on policy degrees abroad, unless your parents can guarantee your participation in political affairs in the future. But watch out, even if your parents are senior-level officials in central government, things may still happen, and you may get cut off from all sorts of political activities, wasting all your education in the end.

Studying abroad is not easy. It is ambivalent to choose majors for the state's sake or your own sake. Rational people, as economists always assume, will go for the later. This is not the Pareto Optimal for the society, but in lack of incentive mechanism, hardly any change can be expected.

DIY

The most recent Economist revealed how the "Angry Bird", the "number-one paid game on Chilean App Store" as I quoted, was developed. Its creator didn't have any background in programming, but used DIY-tools to embody his idea. Later I logged into the same website and downloaded the DIY software called GameSalad, and tried a few operations. It's not straightforward, but for programming amateurs, it's much better than those forbidding codes.

We are in an era when producers have learned how to pander to consumers in order to get a market share in the fierce competition. People used to learn DOS and the Five-stroke Chinese Input, which was viewed as a language specific to those "who know how to use computers." But soon DOS was replaced by windows, and  Five-stroke gave away to a more user-friendly Pinyin Input. By selection the most accessible programs remain in the market, and consumers - regardless of their age, gender, education - are able to use them easily. Let rookies have fun. The sharp-nosed GameSalad successfully lowers the barriers for people who have ideas for games but no tech background, and allows ordinary people to translate their ideas to reality.

GameSalad is not the pioneer of its kind. DIY products have been popular for decades. You can easily buy artificial pearls and clay flowers on ebay and follow the tutorials on youtube if you want to make your own necklace; or get automobile parts from amazon and fix the headlights by yourself instead of sending cars to the overcharging auto maintenance. So far most DIY products are under the constraints of skills and expertise, and limit itself to the field of simple labors, like knitting, carving and drawing. In this sense, the GameSalad is absolutely a breakthrough as it turns profound programming into easy work as making salad. If one day, the current complicated machines can be divided into easy steps, people may want to DIY their own robots.

If we reflect how the international division and trade has been exploding ever since globalization taking place in early 19th century, it is very interesting to see the back flow of individual workshops. It is no longer efficiency or profits that people are seeking, but the sense of achievement and fun that they can get out of DIY. More importantly, it makes us feel unparalleled if we own some items "made by hand" and not sold in the market; and it also impresses our significant others with our delicacy and love. DIY emerges as needed, and provides a taste of uniqueness in the industrialized world.

In the field of arts, everyone needs to DIY. You create a painting with brushes and pigment, or write a book with pens and now laptop. Sure you can copy other people's paintings, but it doesn't make much sense except for practice's sake. (It will be worse if you copy a book or paper.) In this respect, DIY tools open the door to transforming line products into arts. People can be very creative when they acquire the tools to do so, and we could expect a booming age for innovation. Meanwhile, consumers may gain better understandings of their demand, and makes their daily essentials more personalized.

DIY to entertain oneself is different from marketizing his/her products. A concern about the sharp increases in DIY products, those marketized in particular, is the information asymmetry due to the lack of standardized production. Actually App Store already complained about too many apps hitting shelves everyday, which results in a increase in operating cost because of differences in quality and tastes. One man's meat is another man's poison. Products targeting at specific groups deserve a share in the market, but how to channel them to the right customers needs further exploration.

Another Sunny Day

No one could complain about the weather in the bay area. With a temperature ranging from 55F to 75F, it seldom surprises people with sweating summers or harsh winters. If you travel in the bay area in January and visit it again in June, you'll find the temperature amazingly similar: the average temperature in Jan 2011 was around 60F, which increased to 68F in June (source: http://www.wrh.noaa.gov.) You can hardly notice the changes. Every day is similar to the day before: pleasantly cool. It rains sometimes in the winter, but never chilly. All you need is a t-shirt, a windbreak and jeans for all year round - no skirt, no boots, no down jacket.

Nowadays we have air conditioners (ACs) which create a spring-like weather indoors, and sometimes we had the illusion that ACs can help us adapt to the weather. Even if we're living in desert, we can still have 75F summers - like in Las Vegas, as long as we stay in the casino, we can't really tell whether it's hot or cold, day or night. However, ACs are not real solutions. On contrary, they make us more fragile to the weather outside. Once we're used to the AC's accompany, the blazing sun outside looks even worse, which in return discourages us from going outdoors. This may partly explains why Las Vegas earns so much from its visitors - the longer you spend in casino, the less likely you're willing to leave.

This is exactly how I feel about the bay, where there must be an invisible AC which functions day and night without any noise, and keeps the temperature within the comfort zone. I always find sunny days much more delightful than gloomy ones, and it's a great treat to wake up with sunlight touching my face in the morning (or noon in my case.) As a result, I feel blue when it sprinkles, and complain about the heat when it reaches 80F. It's so easy to get spoiled in the bay area that I strongly missed this place when traveling. Marseilles is too hot, Geneva is too humid, Seattle rains too often and the east coastal cities are just unbearable. All the natural landscapes, historic sites and gourmet are much less attractive when you're sweating or wetting. Many people don't realize the importance of pleasant weather until they have really enjoyed it, and then they can't go back. I'm one of them. I never realized that I'd be so sensitive to weather. I have lived in cities who are notorious for its severe winters and mid-summers, I survived in tiny rooms without AC or fan. But now, I don't think I can do that any more.


It's sad to find myself under such a constraint of location while it's always said that young people should bravely explore the unknown world and travel all around. Nice weather also deprives me of special joys in midsummer. When I was in Beijing, where temperature can reach as high as 110F in July, my favorite dinner in summer was cold watermelon, which I believe is a master piece of God designed specially for scorching summer. Gang and I got a watermelon here a few weeks ago, but were still not able to finish it. It's not surprising that we both lacked the appetite for cold watermelon when the temperature was around 65F. Swimming seems less fun too. I used to go swimming at noon and find cool water very enjoyable during the heat of the day. Berkeley has swimming pools too, but much less attractive with its cool weather. People also complain about how boring the bay area can be because there is hardly any change of natural scenes in lack of the changes of seasons. Fall is probably a little different from the rest as the leaves are changing, but basically I can only tell the seasonal transition through calendars, dishes in restaurants and apparel discounts. 


All this said, I'm not leaving this place. Born and lived in places with distinct seasons for years, I now appreciate this gift of nature. 

Two hours before bed time

I suffered a lot from insomnia during my days at Princeton. There were tons of reasons for me not to sleep: I probably could review the readings for tomorrow's discussion, or ran a few more regressions to make sure the impact is significant, or watch a few episodes of the Simpsons as a reward to my hard-working day. Usually it took 2 hours for me to fall asleep after I decided to do so. These two hours, full of my struggle over whether to study a little bit more, or enjoy a real relax, have witnessed the end of my days. In the end, I just lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling and lamenting the loss of every precious minute.

Things got better when I was on vacation. No homework, no papers. I felt comfortable killing my time in fictions and games, and no more worries about new variables or spill over effects. Insomnia seemed to be away, though it was always immediately back after my return to campus. Plunging myself into hypothetical theories and too-good-to-be-true models, I was overwhelmed by all sorts of stuff, and my brain just got too excited to rest at night. I talked to a psychologist at school, who very nicely spent an hour with me, but wasn't very helpful indeed. Later I resorted to pod-casts and got quite obsessed with some radio dramas. Two hours are about half of the length of most dramas I was listening to, so the result was I always knew what happened in the first half, but lost consciousness soon after that, and never figured out what happened in the end.

Now I don't need to worry about jobs, but new pressure comes into existence. And insomnia seemed to relapse. I keep telling myself that I shouldn't be over worried, and things will work out. But you know if you don't move on, nothing will happen. So the quiet night becomes the best timing for me to think over the "move-on plan." During the first 30 minutes, all the routine reflections come to mind: what did I do today and what's missing; then I start to think about the plan for tomorrow, this is when all the crazy stuff come to my mind. After a while, I realize that I'm not gonna to remember all these by tomorrow, and soon start to struggle over whether I should get up and write all these done. Obviously I need a spreadsheet to figure out the cost and benefit of leaving the warm bed and grab a paper, and my little brain is not able to handle all these. Bang! An hour has passed. OK, enough random thoughts, I shouldn't be too ambitious, and be more realistic! Maybe four hours on work, two hours on reading and another two hours on games. But more details have to be though through the allocation of game time. My deliberation always ends in chaos and I finally fall of asleep out of exhaustion.

These two hours are always painful as it's filled with the guilt of wasting time on bed. But every trivial idea that I developed during this time is always deep in memory. I am so focused, and I could think well without any distraction, like laptop or i-phone. I still remember one night when I was tossing and turning, I got up and painted one of my favorite cartoons. And at another night, I thought through a outline of a term paper on bed, and then I realized I might be overloaded, and external pressures - no matter I realized it or not -  could crush myself. When people are challenging their limits and exploring potentials, it could be exciting. And insomnia is just an insignificant physical protest.

Authentic Food

How much are you willing to pay for authentic food? A rough estimate by Gang and I is somewhere between $10 - $20 for a course in a restaurant, but $100 - $120 for several home-made ones. The bay area in California provides an extra bonus for Chinese residents with its rich collection of Asian restaurants. Even so, authentic Chinese food is still luxury as most Chinese restaurants change their tastes more or less to attract customers from other culture. These changes, no matter how slight they are, can make a complete mess for a gourmet and prevent me from going there again. I remember reading a post from an online forum, which used a metaphor for some awful counterfeits, as I quoted: "like making twice-cooked pork without black bean sauce."


That explains why China Village ranks top on my list. Located in Albany, it successfully keeps authentic tastes from China, and reminds me of the food I had in Beijing. But not for long, it took a long break after a fire in the kitchen since March this year. I've been checking its opening date, which was postponed from June to July, then September and now October. My loyalty is wearing away during this endless waiting, and we started to look for alternatives nearby. We went to restaurants which claimed to cook the same cuisine, and ordered exactly the same dishes ranging from $10 to $20, but they had every flavor but the authentic one. After a few failed attempts, we realized that it's better to rely upon ourselves rather than relying upon some random chefs. But there are more challenges to cook Chinese food here than back in Beijing. The biggest problem with cooking "twice-cooked pork" is the lack of pork belly slices. As mentioned in my previous blog An Unpleasant Visitor, it takes a lot of efforts to slice pork belly chunks, and even high techs (here I mean meat slicers) are not very helpful. Later on we bought some bacon from Costco in hope that it could be a good replacement for pork slices. But bacon is different too. First it's smoked, even it's only mildly smoked, the taste is different if you chew it over; and more importantly, it doesn't have skin. How can we have authentic food with a part missing! Anyway, we finally resorted to the primitive and most exhausting way of cooking this dish in desperation, that is to buy a pork belly chunk from Ranch 99 and slice it by hand.


 When I was alone in Princeton, I didn't mind grabbing free sandwiches in the lower lobby and living on those cold breads and veggies for weeks. That's not because I got used to sandwiches but I was simply too lazy to cook for myself. Whenever I had chances to dine out, I'd always go for Chinese food, just like people with drug addiction need injections once in a while to relieve the pain. I'm glad I'm finally back to the bay area. I have stronger motivations to cook for two, with one of us very good at appreciating my cooking. I sort of free ride on my efforts, and get better food as well.


If there is anything that I miss in China, the authentic Chinese cuisine must be at the top of the list. A documentary on Chinese cuisine became very popular a few months ago, and people dubbed it as "the best propaganda ever." Authentic food can trigger people's memory of good old days: their childhood and family time. Though current Chinese food market is overwhelmed by insecure food like gutter oil and sugar-made honey, people are still obsessed with "mother's taste" or "the flavor of hometown". Living abroad for almost four years, I've only visited Beijing once. I tried several restaurants with my friends during the trip, and quite enjoyed the food there in spite of knowing it contains unhealthy additives and stale raw materials. I had no choice, they tasted so good.

What money can't buy? Nostalgic authentic food. I'm writing this blog with saliva filling in my mouth. It's time for another cup of coffee.

Beijing Beijing

So called "once-in-a-lifetime" rainstorms have too often visited Beijing recently. Landlocked in Northeast China, Beijing always surprises its residents with unpleasant ocean views in storm seasons. Since yesterday, Beijing - including the main city area and its satellite towns - was flooded again after a continuous torrential rain. Cars, buses and pedestrians were trapped on the road; lower floors and basement of apartment buildings were inundated and their residents became homeless; and manhole covers were washed away, leaving hundreds of holes scattered across streets. Some people were drowned in the basement - the only housing that they could afford in Beijing, some died in disaster relief, and some of other accidents. The death toll is still increasing.

Though not an expert in this field, I'd assume drainage systems are important in urban planning, specially for a metropolitan located in a monsoon region. When I was living in Beijing, I didn't get caught in floods, but there were always some pondings along streets after heavy rains. Sometimes I had to wear rain-boots to wade across those pondings and my dresses were always spotted with mud when cars rushed by. Raining days always got me down. But at least there was no casualties at that time (or not released by media.) Now the obsolete drainage system couldn't meet the challenges of more frequent and heavier rainstorms likely brought by climate change, and failed to function well. This flashy-looking city pays its price for disregarding fragile interior infrastructure.

Some people made fun of London, the 2012 Olympics host city, jeering at its upcoming open ceremony and claimed that London is embarrassing itself by hosting Olympics right after Beijing, who did a splendid job in squandering billions in 2008 for appearance's sake. Beijing did look glorious at that time with neon lights shining along streets at night, green belts surrounding the Olympic village and brand new subways running around. Now most stadiums built four years ago are closed to the public and overgrown with weeds due to the lack of maintenance. Some Olympic events, like baseball, cycling mountain bike and beach volleyball, are not popular in China. Their stadiums were hardly used since the end of Beijing Olympics. Some stadiums cost so much, like the "Bird Nest" and the Water Cube, famous as they are, couldn't cover their initial cost and maintenance fee by collecting tickets. Beijing Olympics Committee probably believed all this window dressing could earn Beijing face in the international community, and thus became a miserly provider of high-quality infrastructure in the unseen side - like the underground drainage system. Then we cheered for Olympics, and felt good about ourselves as the capital of the biggest emerging power. So we indulged the government to spend tax payers' money extravagantly and build all the face-saving projects. 


Misplaced government expenditure has disastrous result. Car owners, who finally bought a car after saving for years and winning a license lottery draw out of thousands of applicants, could do nothing but watching his own car submerged in the flood. Businessmen who are seeking fleeting commercial opportunities here, and families who have traveled thousands of miles to this city for reunion, were trapped in the Beijing Capital Airport for hours, accompanied by tens of thousands of anxious travelers. Employees have to spend more than three times of the normal commute time to reach home after a long day, let alone those migrant workers who can only afford a basement - they don't even have space to sleep over tonight. People are paying the cost of government incompetency in addition to their taxes.


Across the Pacific, California is sunny all year round and there may be no way to test the drainage system in San Francisco. I don't know how the Beijing Government will explain to the public about the flood, which may not even happen with better infrastructure. They will blame the weather for sure, and global warming probably, and honor some people for their bravery in saving people from the flood. But nothing will change until they reflect their habitual decision-making process, and remedy the faults done by them before.

Fujyoshi Literature

Inspired by a recent Master thesis at Peking University written by a "Fujyoshi" (腐女子 in Japanese, also known as BL fandom), I really want to write something about the development of Fujyoshi literature in China since the beginning of this century. Fujyoshi literature, always misunderstood as the homosexual literature, is slightly different from the latter in the sense that Fujyoshi originates from comics. As a subculture which seems to exist only on internet and cartoon stores, Fujyoshi literature was hardly accepted by the public ten years ago. But now it's no longer a taboo. Fujyoshi fictions and comics are published, and Fujyoshi micro-novels are very popular in micro-blogging (Weibo).


My initiation into Fujyoshi literature had its origin: I'm a big fan of Japanese comics ("mango" in Japanese"). By late 1990s, Japanese comics had already become so popular at home that many emerging cartoonists started to draw fan comics (同人志"doujinshi" in Japanese). They used major characters from popular comics, like Saint Seiya and Slamdunk, but drew new ones, most of which were love stories. As an aside, it is interesting to note that most popular comics at that time, many of which published by Shueishya (集英社) and Shogakukan (小学馆), were mainly blood comics. Thus there could be ten heroes but only one heroine in one comic book, thus putting a great limitation on matching new couples in love stories. Aestheticism soon swept Japanese fan comic world. Audience started to find out that heroes fall in love with each other, and heroines do not seem relevant to the story anymore in fan comics. Surprisingly, controversial as it was, this new literature became very popular. Their authors soon got long-term contracts with major comic publishers, and new words, like Fujyoshi, Tanbi (which means aestheticism) and BL (Boy's Love) were included in dictionaries.


Thus I came across homoerotic comics when I was reading a Saint Seiya's fan comic book one day. Shocked for a while, I soon was obsessed by the story, and found it quite amusing as it was different from any comic book I read before. In those days when people did not talk about homosexuality publicly, I kept this secret to myself, not daring to tell even the closest friends that I was reading something so weird. But obviously I was not alone. Other comic fans, inspired by similar comics, started to write and post their fan fictions on internet, which of course were mostly homosexual fictions. Later on, some authors started to create new characters instead of using those from cartoons after gaining popularity so that they could publish their works and make money from it. That was in 2004. 


The first generation of Fujyoshi literature was premature, and very uneven in quality. There was no regulations, ratings or reviews, and you could find anything from a romantic story to a erotica online. Very unfortunately the Fujyoshi literature was discredited by its spotty quality. It became very controversial, and in 2006, many Fujyoshi websites were shut down for spreading obscene contents. This was a turning point where inferior fictions were sifted out and splendid ones remained. In 2008, some Fujyoshi websites were open to registration again after the Olympics with better selections and more capable writers. I didn't keep track of their recent development, but did follow some authors occasionally when I was on vacation. The change in Fujyoshi is quite observable compared to ten years ago. As mentioned above, Fujyoshi fictions stemmed from comics. Thus early works had strong traces of Japanese comic culture, sometimes the characters were just too far from the real world. Now authors have better understanding of gay people in general, and have successfully described their anxieties for normal lives and struggles against discrimination in the society. When a book can arouse people's reflection on real life, it demonstrates its virtue.


Fujyoshi literature is still in its early stage, but people already started to study it. Some argue it roots in women's economic independence and dissatisfaction with this patriarchal society. Some argue it indicates the end to the once-blooming Japanese comics who is now seeking to survive through subcultures. I'm probably not happy with this men-privileged society, and I do value women's economic independence. What really makes me buy the ideas of the Fujyoshi literature is, that it introduces me to the hidden part of the world where men do not marry women, and helps me understand the unspeakable love which may not be understood by many people even today, but does exist, and should be respected. 

Mandarin

If you think you know something well, it's always the start of your ignorance. I was born in a Chinese family in China, both my parents are native Mandarin speakers. I talk to people in Mandarin, read in Mandarin (sometimes ancient Chinese), and write in Mandarin. This is the language that I was born with, I've never had even the slightest idea that it could look unfamiliar one day.

But very unfortunately it happened. Accompanied by laptops and now smart phones, the young generation started to dominate the internet since late 1990s. After suffering from the rigid and tedious Chinese taught in school for years, they created their own Mandarin, which was spread through internet immediately. This Mandarin, known as "internet Mandarin", is modern, concise but difficult to understand. For example, they use "thunder" to describe shocking stuffs, like "I'm thundered", "the entire event is thundering", etc. Another example is "Meng", whose original meaning is "sprout", now importing a new meaning from Japan which refers specifically to lovely young people or animals. If you're not closely connected to internet or this generation, it's easy to get confused when reading articles written by these "New-new People", or in their language, "Chao People."

A language keeps its vitality by absorbing new terms and expressions to keep up with the changes of the times. When bamboos and bronze were expensive, and carving technology was pre-historic, people used very concise terms to record stories. Their main objectives were to record the key issues without wasting precious bamboos or metals. That's why stories in "The Bamboo Annals" are so dry - people at that time couldn't afford rhetoric. When education wasn't a universal good and most people couldn't read, simple languages became popular. This explains why "A Tale of Three Kingdoms", "The Journey to the West" and "All Men Are Brothers" are so different from the fourth of its kind - "Dream of Red Mansion", the only one of the "Four Great Classical Novels" in China whose story was not based on folktales and thus not adapted by street storytellers. The former three have plainer and more understandable languages. Today, people need a quicker and easier way to transmit information. More importantly, they need a different language style to identify themselves from older generations. The Internet Mandarin starts to challenge the modern Chinese in
 use, and now even affects word choices in mainstream medias.

It's too early to make any judgmental comments on the new Mandarin. Some people blame it for disrupting the "real Mandarin". It is frustrating to find out I'm always out of date when away from China, and I need to check Chinese websites regularly to update my vocabulary, however I do believe this Internet Mandarin signals some positive changes in China. In 2008, internet users invented a new term "suicided" in response to an unexplained death of a whistleblower who reported local government's corruption and was claimed to "commit suicide" by the latter a few days later. But the entire issue was so against the common sense that people believed she was "suicided" by the government. Unfortunately no evidence has been found, and the murderer was not executed yet. But since then, people started to add "ed" to some verbs, expressing their discontent against the government: they are "represented" in the Congress, "becomed" rich in statistics, and "missinged" when they became dissidents. Similarly, people also added the term of "death" to other words to mock at another statement by a prison, which said one of their prisoners died of "Hide-and-Seek" - another preposterous story. "Hide-and-seek Death" soon became popular, and when other mysterious deaths in prison happened, people summarized them as "Bathing Death", "Push-ups Death". In comparison to the highly politicized Mandarin about forty years ago and gobbledygook in People's Daily, these new terms are much more lovely - even if we can't change the government now, at least we can mock at it.

I always wish I will be a cool grandma when I got old, who can talk to grandchildren in "their" languages. It's fun to learn the new changes in China through the small changes in the language. And thanks to the new tech, which again facilitates the growth of a new language.

Marriage

Gang and I are celebrating our fourth anniversary this Friday. Four years have passed since we registered in Beijing and changed marriage statuses on Facebook from "dating" to "married". Four-year is long enough to change a person's life. A student can become a professional, a junior professional can be promoted to a senior level, and newlyweds may walk around with baby strollers after four years. Sometimes the beginning is not a good predictor for the end: I was a civil servant four years ago, consulting for Chinese government in Beijing, but now a jobless new graduate across the Pacific. 


A lot happened in the last four years in our marriage too. Before we got married, Gang and I had a one-year long distance relationship when he was doing a master degree at Columbia Univ. He flew back to Beijing and stayed there for one month soon after we decided to get married. But it was a painful month. I started to realize the big difference between us, which was unobservable when we were thousands of miles away, but uncovered immediately when we moved together. No solution was found after endless talk, conversation and even quarrels. One month passed quickly, he left Beijing for California, leaving me to wonder how my marriage would be like. That was probably the most painful time since I got married. Things were getting better afterwards. Conflicts still happened, but were mostly well resolved. We no longer make same mistakes.


Everyone learns something from marriage. For new couples who haven't lived together before marriage, there are more to learn. Though some people are against premarital cohabitation, I find it a great idea. If you decide to live with someone for the rest of your life, it's better to check whether you guys are able to handle the problems in marriage before making the big decision. And the best way to do so is to live with him/her before marriage, called "trial marriage" in some places. I can't recall very well how we finally figured out a good way to compromise, but risks did exist that we might not find a good solution to marital problems. So a risk-averse person who is also serious about marriage may want to spend some premarital time together with his/her date.


Once you understand that people think quite differently, it's easier to handle marital problems. Just like I won't buy myself a camera costing thousands of bucks, Gang won't spend hundreds on purses: we have different indifference curves. Every time when I asked for Plan A but Gang wanted Plan B, Gang always got confused about why I insisted Plan A while Plan B was "obviously better/more reasonable". And I got upset because my husband didn't give up the stupid plan though it made me unhappy already - did he really love me?! We are not alone. A few days ago, I read an article about conflicts in marriage, and the reasons mentioned there are much more ridiculous. A couple divorced because they couldn't agree on where to squeeze the toothpaste tube- from the middle or the end? And another couple quarreled for years over how to make fried rice - fry eggs first or the rice? You see, there is no way to find out a "right" solution when there are two judges. In a marriage, as long as you are able to find a solution, it is a good solution.


All that said, I always appreciate that Gang is here, as a part of my life, always understanding and supporting me.  We came to this world alone (except twins, triplets...), and not everyone is lucky enough to find the one he/she loves and feel beloved. When two people fall in love, they're probably not prepared for all the possible problems in their future marriage. But love helps people better handle these issues, though not always successfully. New couples should be blessed, not only for this big decision they've just made, but also for the long way ahead of them, which is filled with love and joy, but also decorated with bitterness and pain.

A Graduation Ceremony in Pennsylvania

Landscape on the East Coast is quite different from that on the West. Lived in New Jersey for two years, I had only been to Pennsylvania twice until I went to Lancaster for Siyu's graduation in May this year. The first time I went there was in Jan 2011 to Philly with Carol and Ashok. We finished most of our finals by then, but soon got bored because the last one was still a few days away. Then Carol proposed to “do something to get away from the campus". She drove us to Philly, we did a one-day trip together. I can't recall much from that day except the ice-cream Bassetts, rumor has which that Obama has visited it during his campaign. The second trip to Philly was for food only. An Ethiopian student Feker, took Leslie, Carol, Matt, Drew, Atsuko, Masa and me to her favorite Ethiopian restaurant there. We ordered a lot, and had some Pilly cheesecake for dessert later. 

These were all my memories of Pennsylvania before May. Then I got a phone call from my mom, "Siyu is graduating next week, she'd be thrilled if you can make it for her commencement." She said. I just finished my qualify exam at that time, and was looking for something fun. In the end, Gang and I rent a car from Enterprise, and drove two hours to Lancaster. Drivers in Pennsylvania are absolutely crazy! No one followed the speed limit. Our Japanese car was not very competitive in speeding, so we stayed in the right lane for most of the time, and finally made our way to Lancaster relatively slowly but successfully with the new red-framed GPS. We met Siyu and her parents, who are good friends with my mom. After a few greetings, Gang and I took Siyu's parents to visit a local Amish farm, and Siyu started to prepare for her graduation.

It was the first high school graduation I'd ever been to. The stadium was crowded with students, teachers,  families and friends. Students, all dressed in gowns, received their certificates from teachers one after the other. Siyu's mother couldn't help crying when Siyu received her certificate from the Dean. "She suffered a lot here", she whispered to me, "she left us when she's so little, and came to a country with different language and culture. We couldn't do anything for her."

Actually that's not true, They did a lot for her. Both Siyu's parents are very successful businessmen.They own a big company back in China which paid a tax of more than $15 million last year. Billionaires like them have no difficulties in affording Siyu's tuition and stipend in the last three years, which added up to around $180,000. Siyu might feel lonely in a strange country, but she is free from financial pressure, which is a big concern for most Chinese students in the US. In 2011, the annual income per capita for urban residents in China was CNY23,979 (US$3,763),  but only CNY6,977 (US$1,095) for rural residents. To supported their child studying in the US for three years, a typical Chinese urban family has to save all their 25-year's income without any consumption if no fellowship is provided.

The world is never fair, but it's still depressing to see talented children missing opportunities of receiving good education which could change their lives. I see how the gaps between different income groups are enlarged across generation by education; and how people's fate are, if not predetermined, at least largely shaped when they were born. What's worse, we could hardly expect these well-educated people to promote equality in China in the future though they're more likely than their domestic peers to be exposed to this idea. It is exactly the extremely imbalanced distribution of social wealth that makes it possible for their parents to accumulate large amount of money and for them to receive the best education in the world. The most reasonable choice for them is to take current advantages and lead best lives.

People are not born equal. But twenty years ago when unchecked privilege was not running so rampant, we still had hopes, which is dying out in today's China.

Warehouse Shopping

I think I need to write something for my favorite wholesale store in the United States. Gang and I have been its loyal (?) customers for more than three years and are still largely depending on it for our daily necessities, including toasts, soy-milk, vegetables, fruits, seafood, meat, snacks, desserts and even entertainment like movie tickets and restaurant coupons.

My first visit there was in 2009 right after my arrival in California. Lived in crowded metropolitan like Beijing for almost eight years, I was surprised at the sizable warehouse and incredibly huge packages - there is no way to shop in Costco without a car. People walked around with carts twice the size of normal ones, picking up coffee beans in 4lb-package and sugar in 10lb-package. Cheesecakes are served in 12-inch pans, and ribs are packed in 10-lb boxes. Even the smallest package of chocolate chips contain at least 30 of them. I pushed the carts around, as if shopping in the Country of Giants, and dragged the 50lb package of rice laboriously to my cart.


Once you're used to its size, Costco can be pretty addictive. The items are cheap. My favorite Elizabeth Arden facial cream, which costs $42 on its website and cosmetic stores, is priced at $26 for two in Costco. Calvin Klein's underwear and UGG's boots are about half price lower than in other stores. Other stuff, for example a 4lb package of dark red cherries cost only $3.99 in 2009 (though unfortunately inflated to $9.99 this year), and a package of 24 extra large eggs cost $3. Even Costco's gas is usually 10-30 cents lower per gallon. When my mother visited us in 2009, she bought dozens of fish oil from Costco for her friends and relatives at half the normal price. This year she traveled in New York, and complained to me that the same fish oil she got in groceries there were much more expensive. 


Cheap commodities are not provided at the cost of quality. Costco's seafood - clam, shrimp, salmon, crab and lobster - is so far the best I could get from groceries or wholesale stores. Food and fruit are always kept fresh and designers' clothes are sold at quite reasonable prices. No wonder it's always so difficult to find a parking spot during weekends.


Another advantage is its return policy: as long as you haven't consumed more than half of the commodities, you can always return it and get full refund. There was a time when I was obsessed with almonds and bought a 3lb package from Costco. But I wasn't fond of the too salty new flavor. I finished about a quarter of them, but didn't think I could finish the rest. I brought the leftovers to the counter and got fully refunded without even being asked for reasons. This is a very smart policy. I tried a lot of new things in Costco, because I knew I could always return them if I didn't enjoy the new experience. But Costco seldom disappointed me: I get used to most of them, and now they are part of my life.


But you may want to pay special attention to your weight if you decide to shop in Costco. Everything is doubled or tripled in their size, accordingly the calorie is doubled as well. The cheesecake I get there contains 16 servings with 400 calories each. It always takes weeks for me to finish. And the marginal utility can be so low in the end that I always make up my mind to stop buying it anymore when struggling with the last few pieces, though I immediately forget my determination when I see a new one. So watch out for your weight, it's not fun to get an extra 400 calories everyday continuously for two weeks!


Besides, you may feel guilty if the shopping is not well planned and you are not able to finish the food before they start to go bad. This won't be a concern for big families, but for a young couple with no children, I need to do some planning before we go: check what's left in the fridge, and think about what food I may cook in the next week. I once bought a 2.5-lb package of microwavable spinach at $3.7, but could only finish half of it before it started to rotten.


More demand is also created by bigger packages and it's hard for me to switch back to small packages once I'm used to Costco. When the "reference point"is changed, food packages in Safeway and Wholefoods do not seem big enough, even their club packages look like a supply for merely one meal. Now when I look back, I might have over consumed since I probably don't need that much: I'm still using the tin foil and Vaseline I bought three years ago. 


The bigger the better? Not the case. But it makes more economic sense to choose bigger packages if well planned. When I was on my way from Costco yesterday, will cherries, lobsters, chicken wings, Chocolate mousse and truffle in my trunk, I suddenly had a strong feeling that I'm back to my husband, and I could finally buy big packages for my family.

The Independence of Education

A recent article in The Economist July 15th argues that the independence for schools has worked in the last decade. It studied charter schools who are publicly funded, but largely independent of the local educational bureaucracies and the teachers' union, and concluded that these schools, controversial as they are, have been functioning very well in several states with "right" monitoring, regulation and safeguard. Similar result was found in Britain, whose "Free Schools", though too young to be judged, have improved the results of their GCSEs (the exams pupils take at 15 or 16) twice as fast as others. 


"Right" is a tricky word. People are always told that they'd get good results if they get the way right. But here the author made it quite clear that "right" means independence: the independence for schools to allocate regional educational resources efficiently by closing down the worst-performing ones, and the support from local governments which helps schools resist the pressures from teachers's union and protect the independent decisions of the schools, and of course the maintenance of self-discipline of local governments to stay away from inappropriate monitoring or regulation which undermines schools' independence. When the governments keep hands off education, market will get things right. Even though education does not provide identical products due to different teaching styles and textbooks, the results from different schools are still comparable by standards such as exam results and student ratings. In this sense, charter schools provide some ideas on how to improve public education, especially for the poor population.


On contrary, another report on university/tertiary education in China revealed that the number of Master candidates in China has doubled in the past decade but their employment rates after graduation are now lower than Bachelor's. The reporter argued that the low employment rate of this well educated population is due to a continuous enrollment expansion, which was not supported by any research but an arbitrary order from the government. I assume when the Ministry of Education made this regrettable decision, it could either be the result of an unrealistic expectation for the growing of labor market in China in the coming decade, or the result of rushing to complete some "political achievements" of certain ministerial leaders. Regardless of which motivation it is, this arrogant and ignorant decision costs thousands of hundreds of Chinese youth their time, efforts and the worst, their hope. When the economy is opening, with commodities and money flowing, my government is still trying to plan the labor supply. How desperately stupid!


Educators (I mean real educators, not those government officials who pretend to know education) understand what the market needs, and what education should be provided to students. But if schools and universities are not independent, and unable to decide its own curriculum, let alone its opening or chose-up, students are prevented from learning what they want, and teachers are not able to teach what they are good at. How ridiculous it is that in the world's second biggest economy, students in its top universities are still required to take courses on Mao Tse-tung Thoughts and Jiang Zemin's Three Representatives, whose only purpose it to keep them politically right. These are bad enough, I don't even want to bother talking about how much resource has been wasted in the erratic merging and splitting of universities and schools in the last half-century.

The M.P.A. program at Princeton, challenging as it is, did give me a flavor of independent education. Academia is independent of politics as professors make fun of political leaders, bankers, and even the public in the class, and so do we. Students are independent of the school as I was able to start a new course to my interests as long as I found a professor to teach it. Education is independent of ideologies as I was not obliged to take any course on "superiority of capitalism" to graduate (actually there is no such class). And the only non-independent thing is that the coursework is not independent of the real world, and I came across cases in which I could apply the skills acquired from the coursework. 


Enough complaints. I'm terribly sorry for Chinese students who are suffering from unnecessary suffers, me included. But you know, all men, good or evil, rarely treat their own children badly. So please take a quick look at where Chinese government officials and businessmen send their children for education, you'd understand what sort of education they really applaud and where is the best place for you to go as well.

The Voice of China

I was lying on the bed comfortably and drowsily this morning when I noticed Gang watching something in his laptop with great interest. I made a little noise. He took off his headphone, "You should check this out", he said as he pulled the headphone out of the laptop, "it's incredible!" I jumped out of the bed and trotted to the table. He was watching a singing competition called "The Voice of China". It's different from its peers in the sense that all the judges cannot see candidates until they decide to accept him/her as the apprentice. Judges are sitting in swiveling chairs with high backs. When the singer is singing on the stage, all four judges are sitting with their backs to the stage. Thus the only basis for their decision-making is the voice they can hear. As the singing goes on, some judges decide to turn around if they want to accept the singer to their teams. If several judges have turned around by the end of the singing, the singer can choose to join one of them.

It's the first singing competition ever in which candidates are not wearing heavy make-up or exaggerated dresses. They stand on the stage, in T-shirt and jeans, just like ordinary people, though you know they are different as soon as you hear their voices. Some judges are really surprised when they turn around and find out how the candidates look. There is a guy from a poorly educated village in Northeast China who sang an excellent English song, and a 23-year old girl with a lovely baby face who sang a grief love song. But the most surprising candidate is a blind lady from Taibei, who not only vividly imitated a classical song by Teresa Teng, but accompanied it with a keyboard. The program director offered close-up shots of judge's expression as they turned around, they were absolutely shocked.

Imported from "The Voice" in Holland, the "Voice of China" won a big success of its kind after its first show on TV. It conveys the idea that singers shouldn't be judged by their looks, but their voices. It also creates a fairer game rule in the sense that judges need to make decisions without knowing who the singer is. (Well if they're good enough to tell the singer only by listening to his/her voice, that's another story.) In addition, the "Voice of China" makes a good selection of the four judges, who are Chinese top pop stars with very diversified background and musical styles, but provide wonderful and humorous comments from different perspectives through their tacit interactions.

Recently TV producers realize that shows able to get ordinary people involved are more likely to receive high ratings. A few years ago, a dating show called "If You Are The One" became very popular, and attracted many young single people to try their luck there. But soon it became controversial because some of the guests' statements were not considered in line with the "Socialist mainstream values", and the authority required the producers to make revisions and have a professor from the Party School of the CCP Central Committee as the guest to make comments. The ratings of this show dropped immediately as it's no longer down to the earth, but a awkward mixture of communist propaganda and entertainment.


Thus I sincerely hope that "The Voice of China" can escape from the Big Brother's censorship and maintain the high quality in the following shows. As the internet sweeping the world, and TVs becoming less and less popular, it's rare to have good TV shows like this. It's always encouraging to have a sort of "Chinese dream" in which ordinaries become successful because of their talents and efforts.

Olympics Uniforms

Recently all the participating countries to the 2012 London Olympics presented their Olympics kits, including a set of suits for opening ceremony and several sportswear for award ceremonies and competitions. Athletes from hundreds of countries will get together in London, which makes the Olympics a best time to show the world the differences. This explains why designers always choose colors on national flags, and try to include state plants or animals on collars, cuffs or hem, like the giant tulips brooch for Dutch athletes, and kangaroo-shaped embroideries on their Australian counterparts' suits.

The strictly-limited choice of colors differentiates Olympics uniforms from most fashion designs. This could be a very challenging job especially when the colors are not so comparable, like red and green, or purple and yellow. However, fashion masters know how to use these colors wisely, and create an unparalleled beauty by putting contrast colors together. Please take a quick look on the right side. Most people probably won't wear navy blue and bright orange together (unless you are connected to Princeton,) but the orange coat and the blue dress that the third lady from the left is wearing match so well. The bright orange and the highly saturated blue make a perfect comparison, their owner shines like a star.

If you're not comfortable with intense usage of contrast colors, instead you may choose one of them as the main color, and use others as decoration. Ralph Lauren decided to dress American athletes in this safe but a little mediocre way. When I looked at these people standing in front of the Stars and Strips, I thought it's just another Ralph Lauren show. Quite satisfactory design and typical American style, everything is nice in absence of that beret from 1960s.

This is a little bit off the topic, but dear Mr. Reid, I fully agree with you that the US Olympic Committee is out of their minds and these made-in-China uniforms should be burned in piles immediately, which is exactly the right thing to do today! No trade, no foreign-made! Though most commodities would be much more expensive than today, but US textile industry will absolutely be saved, and people will happily work in textile workshops again. In the end, just a kind reminder: the US electronic, cosmetic, luxury, auto... and shipping industry may not be happy with your new law of closing international trade and excluding the US from a market of 1.4 billion potential consumers. But I'm sure you'll find a way to deal with that.

Back to uniforms. Now I will present you the kits of the Great Britain. Designed by Stella McCartney, it breaks down the Union flag and removes the redness from the flag to make it look "modern". Some internet users criticized her design and demanded to "get the red back", but she did a good job in defending herself, and won a lot of supports later on. I came across a small piece on the union flag's evolution earlier today. It looks like the red diagonal St. Patrick's cross represents Ireland, whose color can be hardly seen in UK uniforms. I think Stella is very lucky that she's not born in China. Just imagine, if we have some cute stuff representing Tibet on our Five-star flag, which is removed by the designer for beauty concerns, how Chinese "angry youth" will scold at this poor woman! What's worse, if the big brother is not happy, she'd be in real trouble.

Thus China has a very politically right Olympics kit, which however is a strong candidate for the Annual Worst Dressed Award. Red is my favorite color, and I love yellow too. But I've never expected them to be so ugly until I saw Chinese athletes presenting their uniforms. For those familiar with Chinese cuisine, there is one popular dish in China called tomato fried eggs, yummy and easy to cook. When that dish is served, the plate is filled with bright red and yellow, as you can imagine the color of eggs and tomatoes. Random mixture of these two colors makes the dish very tempting, but not the suits. If the designer (if there is any) don't have good controls over these two colors, try a more conservative way and be safe! It's also very funny that other countries decorate their uniforms with national flowers, while we decorated them with our national dishes. Anyway, the PRC Olympics kit is nothing but a tomato fried eggs with too many tomatoes.

I read somewhere a few days ago that the buttons on these uniforms are 24K gold. I also want to express my deepest sorrow for these buttons, you guys really deserve better than this.