Lost on Planet China: One Man's Attempt to Understand the World's Most Mystifying Nation (15 page)

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O
ne of the interesting things about living in the United States is that you know, just know, can feel it in your bones, that you inhabit the beating heart of the world. This isn’t true, of course. (It’s actually in Tuvalu.) Nevertheless, we take it for granted that when we have our Super Bowls, 3 billion people around the world upend their work schedules and forgo sleep so that they, too, can watch. We assume that as we view the colossal fuck-up that is the life and times of Britney Spears, people abroad care as much as we do when the sad, bloated Mouseketeer decides to shave her head. We are told that when our economy sneezes, Canada, Europe, Asia, wherever, catches a cold. When we screw up, it’s the rest of the world we screw up. And when we triumph, the rest of the world stops to admire the great shining city on the hill. We are, we believe, the prime movers and the rest of the planet just rolls along on the ride that is America.

Which is why it’s so very interesting to be in China. Here, too, is a place that feels, knows in its bones, that it is the beating heart of the world. Indeed, there’s nothing subtle about its self-assurance. The Chinese word for China is Zhongguo, or Middle Kingdom, a name that implies that there is China and then there are the sticks. The great emperors of China spent much of their time ensuring that other countries kowtowed toward them, and when these dynastic emperors periodically retreated behind their walls, it certainly wasn’t because they were humbled by the outside world. Instead, it was because they couldn’t deign to be concerned about the unlucky barbarians living beyond their borders. It is perhaps unsurprising, then, that most Chinese regard the incursions and interventions of Western powers in the nineteenth century, and the chaos unleashed by the opium trade, as profoundly humiliating. Indeed, modern Chinese history can often be read as the story of its reaction to the West.

The Chinese, of course, as a people are immensely proud. As well they should be. Theirs is an ancient culture, and for much of the past 5,000 years, few civilizations could claim to be as advanced as the people living behind the Great Wall. In science, art, literature, and astronomy, and culminating in the wonder that is the steamed dumpling, the Chinese have contributed much to the betterment of humanity—at least when they felt like sharing, which, apparently, wasn’t very often. For many Chinese, who despite Mao’s best efforts to smash the old culture remain steeped in history, the tribulations of the past two hundred years, when Europe humbled it with its drug trade and Japan bloodied it with its occupation, are regarded as an anomaly. But now that the tumult of those years is behind them, and China is emerging to what many Chinese would regard as its rightful place atop the economic and geopolitical food chain, I’d begun to wonder how this pride, this nationalism, would manifest itself.

If you spend any time on an Internet message board frequented by Chinese, you’d know that this nationalism can often come across, to put it kindly, as a little prickly. Type in something relatively innocuous like
I’d like to find some dog food that isn’t flavored with pesticides. Any suggestions, gang?
And be prepared to be viciously flamed.
Do not criticize great country China!!!! China development very strong!!! We make you China bitch!!! We eat you!!! Sincerely, Henry Chen, Wuhan.

But it’s not merely on the Internet that one finds this prickliness. When Mattel was forced to recall millions of toys because of lead paint and safety concerns, the CEO of Mattel was compelled to very publicly apologize, or kowtow, to its leading Chinese supplier. True, there had been lead paint, but for one of the toys recalled, which had come with small magnetic balls that could do some severe damage to a child’s stomach, the problem had been a design flaw, which, technically, wasn’t the fault of the Chinese manufacturer. As parents around the world rummaged through their kids’ toy boxes, tossing out everything from Thomas the Tank Engine locomotives to Polly Pocket play sets, the Chinese seized on this design flaw and demanded an apology. Some might say that this is simply a reflection of the importance of preserving face in China. Perhaps, although I don’t think there is anything uniquely Chinese about the concept of face. In the Arab world, it would be called honor. In American culture, we’d call it respect.

But in truth, I wasn’t interested in face, honor, or respect. I was interested in nationalism, and for nationalism to really start galloping ahead, it needs an enemy. For a while, way back in the nineties (can we have that decade back, please?), it seemed likely that the United States would fulfill that role. Every year, when China’s trading status as a Most Favored Nation came up for renewal, members of Congress from both parties would loudly denounce religious oppression in China or the appalling work conditions of its factory workers or, with the Cold War still a fresh memory, the inconvenient fact that China was still Red China and confidently ignoring the bells of freedom ringing elsewhere in the world. And then they’d vote to grant China Most Favored Nation status. Business is business, of course. Nevertheless, these annual denunciations of China did little to engender soft and fuzzy feelings for the U.S. among the Chinese, except possibly among the religiously oppressed, exploited factory workers, and political dissidents. Then, during NATO’s bombing campaign against the Serbs, the U.S. very accidentally bombed the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade, killing three diplomats and injuring twenty. Oopsie, said the U.S. So sorry. We had the wrong map. Belgrade, Belgium, so hard to keep them straight.

The Chinese erupted. Hundreds of thousands took to the streets in dozens of cities throughout China. The American Embassy in Beijing was pelted with rocks and diplomats were forced into the bunker.
It was an accident. Honest.
No one in China believed this. How could the government of the United States, the last superpower still standing, be so inept? The protests continued. American flags were burned. And throughout China, Americans everywhere found themselves sewing Canadian flags on their backpacks. As the protesters raged, the government encouraged them onward, until finally, after the American Embassy’s windows had been shattered and the diplomats inside had been thoroughly terrified, and President Clinton had issued his twenty-fourth public apology and promised to wear a hair shirt and flog himself daily, the Chinese government called the protesters off. The point had been made.
Do not fuck with us.

Three years later, a hot-dogging Chinese fighter pilot collided with an American spy plane above international waters just outside of China. The fighter pilot tumbled into the South China Sea and the stricken spy plane limped toward the nearest airfield, which, most inconveniently for a spy plane spying on China, was a military airfield on Hainan Island. What a bonus, thought the Chinese government as they pondered what to do with this high-tech surveillance plane that had been eavesdropping on electronic communications and phone calls in their country. Here were secrets to be deciphered. Technology to be reverse-engineered. Though they let the crew go after eleven days, they held on to the plane for another three months, and when they did finally return it to the U.S. they handed over a bill for a million dollars. See, the plane didn’t actually have permission to land in China. Thus the fine. But more important, the U.S. had delivered another propaganda gift, wrapped in a pretty bow. The Chinese insisted that the spy plane, a slow-moving, snub-nosed, propeller-driven EP-3E, had recklessly smashed into the fighter plane on purpose, a novel and exhilarating tactic for a prop plane to take when confronted by a missile-laden fighter jet. Nevertheless, that was the official line and newspapers in China reported it accordingly.
American Aggressor Downs Peace-Loving Chinese Aircraft in Chinese Territory. Chinese Plane Was Delivering Toy Bunnies to Orphans.

This was the first crisis faced by the newly elected President Bush. Diplomats burned the midnight oil. They sent telegrams to one another. Then they sent more telegrams. Experts in acronyms were called in to decipher the telegrams. What would the President do?

“We should invade China,” urged the Vice President. “We’ll be regarded as liberators and greeted with savory dumplings.”

“It’s a slam dunk,” agreed the Director of the CIA.

But President Bush ignored them. Instead, he did something he had never done before, something so painfully challenging that few thought him capable of it. With his fists clenched and his jaws trembling, he squinted in that squinty way he has and said,
Sorry.
It was the hardest thing he’d ever done.

Not good enough, said the Chinese government. How sorry are you?

More telegrams were sent. New acronyms were created. The President stayed up deep into the night, to 9
P.M.
even, and felt the weight of his awesome responsibilities.
How sorry was he?

Again he squinted into the middle distance, and with a steely resolve, declared that he was
very sorry.
It was the most trying day of his life, and he determined that never again, under any circumstances, would he ever say sorry again.

Since then, of course, relations between the U.S. and China, while not a high-fiving lovefest, have been remarkably cordial, all things considered. True, there are still articles in American newspapers detailing the political repression, torture, appalling work conditions, etc., etc., but no one gets on the floor of Congress today to denounce Red China. Similarly, in China, people are hardly reflexively anti-American. While technically not American, I do occasionally travel like one (Can I have French fries with that? And a fork too?). Not once, however, did I detect any ill will toward me because of my nationality. True, I did sense condescension, but that was simply because I was a
laowai,
and many Chinese believe that anyone with the misfortune to not be Chinese is inferior. The general attitude among the Chinese toward Americans is similar to that of a young, hotshot quarterback waiting for the tired, banged-up veteran to step aside so he can lead the team.

Still, while Americans might be pleased that nationalist rage is no longer pointed directly at them, it doesn’t mean that China doesn’t have an outlet to display some good, old-fashioned nationalist fervor. And the country that currently finds itself the target for this vehemence is Japan. It’s an anger that the Chinese government has learned to finely calibrate. On most days, newspapers will carry stories highlighting the villainy and treacherousness of the Japanese. Indeed, these anti-Japanese stories can appear in some surprising locations. Waiting in line for the cable car to see the Great Wall at Badaling? Bored? Looking for something to read while a hundred people cut in line in front of you? Well, the government has thoughtfully created a display highlighting Japanese wartime atrocities in the area. Now and then, such as when new history textbooks in Japan are issued sugarcoating the country’s role in World War II, the Chinese government will allow the country to erupt in righteous indignation, then backpedal furiously when the protests threaten to spiral out of control. When in 2005 Japan issued a textbook that referred to the Nanjing Massacre as a trifling “incident,” tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets. The Japanese Embassy in Beijing was besieged by rampaging mobs.
Japanese pigs come out!,
they hollered. Sushi restaurants were torched. And throughout China, Japanese people everywhere found themselves busily sewing Canadian flags on their backpacks.

The rage that the Chinese unleashed against Japan had become so unhinged that, finally, the government felt compelled to impose a media blackout. Nationalism, of course, is the trickiest of dragons to ride. The protests eventually burned out, but not before revealing that for the vast majority of people in China, Japan is enemy number one.

To learn a bit more, I thought I’d head toward Nanjing, which had been the capital of the Republic of China early in the twentieth century. It’s the war, of course—the long struggle of World War II—that lies at the root of anti-Japanese sentiment in China, and no place suffered more under Japanese occupation than Nanjing. During what came to be known in China as the War of Resistance Against Japan, more then 20 million Chinese soldiers and civilians lost their lives. In 1931, Japanese forces had seized a broad swath of land in the bitterly cold northeast of China and installed Puyi, the last emperor of China, as the puppet leader of what they called Manchukuo. China, lost in its own struggle among Nationalists, Communists, and assorted warlords that followed the collapse of the Qing Dynasty in 1912, could do little to resist. By 1937, in a quest for more resources to fuel its war machine, Japanese forces turned south toward Shanghai and Nanjing, where in the winter of 1937–1938 they committed one of history’s most unparalleled atrocities, brutally murdering upward of 300,000 civilians. Inexplicably, not even today has Japan managed to say sorry, much less very sorry.