I can't believe how depressed all the Asian news sites and China blogs that deal in politics are making me feel.
You know, I go around the web a lot because I've always enjoyed it. Now it's frightening me.

Going to China this summer has been my plan for over a year now.
It's finally coming together, and all I see is that Chinese citizens are having a field day labeling their own traitors because they have the least radical positions.
Look at Jin Jing; from hero to traitor because she dared say that boycotting Carrefour would hurt the chinese who worked there.
This kind of thing makes me despair of China. Now, I know not everyone thinks that, thank God; but it seems all too common.
Chinese people are complaining that the West has distorted all the news this last month. Part of it is true.
What i'm complaining about is that the country I live in is being attacked. I just saw a photo of a taxi who had a sticker saying "no french people or dogs". Man, that's just like the anti-jew posters in the thirties. "no jews or dogs allowed". Charming.

All this because...? Because a bunch of nutters tried to grab a stupid torch. Does anyone stop to think that this might not be the opinion of the french people in their entirety?
Does anyone stop to think, hey wait, these protests have been happening all over the world, why are we having a go at France in priority?
Apparently no-one has remembered that France was the first Western country to recognize communist China in 1964.
Or is the population so convinced that a country must hold the same opinion, that they consider it to be the same here, and blame everyone for the protests?

I'm angry. I'm sad. And I'm disappointed. All those who are going on about how China's image has been tarnished should take a good, long look at themselves and see how they've tarnished China's image, to me in any case, in a way that no-one else could have done.

Yet I've been dreaming of going there for a while; one of my best friends at university is chinese; i study the language with a teacher, Ms L, who went there years and years ago and tells us stories of how she wore the mao suit, how she was chosen by the french government to go there at the time to reinforce ties and all that; someone who really loves China. The other teachers i have are Li Na, who is chinese; Mr C, who is half; and Mr D, who is also passionate about a country he's studied, written books about, translated books written by chinese authors.
With them as teachers, I don't think any of us could not long to go there; their enthusiasm is infectious.

I think chinese citizens should be reminded that in the west there are many people like this. That recognize the faults of China but love it anyway, and communicate this passion to others.

Back on Track

well, well, well.
Dear Leader gave a 90 minute speech on Tv last night, dissected in all newspapers and radios and shows today. A load of bullshit everyone is arguing over.
Apart from that, he's been sending envoys to China all week to defuse the situation. Grovel, grovel, grovel. And on the other hand, the mayor of Paris made the Dalai Lama and Hu Jia honorary citizens of the town.
What else? My holidays are over, British teachers went on strike for the first time in 21 years, an event that barely raises an eyebrow here, unless there a million or so. Which happens every two years, just about, because students join in to skive off school. We've all done it.
Oh, and according to Interpol, AL Qaeda wants to attack China during the Games.
And for some reason the media this week announced the death of 2 TV presenters who, actually, are still alive. It was quite entertaining. Now they're all scrambling for excuses and blaming it on internet.

Well, the usual mess, China calling for a boycott on french goods.
High school students protesting against the suppression of something like 8000 teacher jobs
Hunger riots erupting
And i need to find a way to be in Roissy on june 19th at eight am. with no trains before five, wchich makes them far too late. I hate trains.

One feels extremely stupid when depressed; personally, I get convinced that I am the stupidest being in creation (or nearly, i haven't got to the level of this Darwin Award nominee yet) and will never make anything of myself.
Point proven, of course, by my utter and total despondence and inability to do any work at all.
And then the brain (yes, mine has a life of its own, i have no control whatsoever over it) tends to go off into a whole set of paranoid fantasies, mainly that everyone else seems to know what to do with themselves and that I am particularly useless. And that my life is boring as hell. Which is also true, since being depressed I cannot be bothered to do anything.
I think i'd better go throw myself in a dustbin. This is pathetic.

Bloomberg's take on yesterday's events here
A good set of photos here

and of course there have been angry reactions from China, chinese officials, and chinese netizens. whoopee.

a ruined day

It's so sad.
Today the olympic flame was going through Paris; of course, it was a mess.
The flame was invisible, in the hands of the athletes surrounded by chinese policemen and french policemen. Invisible. And what you could hear was shouting, insults, people running from the police, fights.
There were some dignified protests; our representatives held up banners on the walls of the Assemblée Nationale (parliament) RSF (Reporters without borders) managed to hang their flag everywhere, from the Eiffel Tower to the Town Hall and Notre Dame.
It's such a shame. The passage of the flame is supposed to be a celebration, a party, a day to be proud of. Today's exhibition is enough to reduce anyone to tears.
And France's chinese immigrants are furious, of course.
And none of these incidents were seen by chinese viewers, although if the CCP wanted to rile up the people against the West, it would have been just too easy.
I was ashamed, and no-one could say i'm a fervent admirer of the CCP.
London yesterday was just as bad. I just don't see the point anymore.
I'm going to China for the first time this summer. Not during the games, of course, I'm not crazy, I'm just going to stay with a friend, and going to try to improve my chinese.
AT the moment China is not popular here.
I don't know if people are stupid, but they just don't seem to be able to dissociate a state and it's people. I've had the impression that people think I'm crazy because i want to study chinese, go to China, etcetera.
It seems so complicated for people to realise that we tend to act the same.
China and its people feel victimized by the west especially as information there isn't free; of course it stokes the country's nationalistic feelings.
It's the same everywhere.
Say anything bad about the US, you'll get a bunch of rednecks attacking you; say something bad about France, the french will get in a huff; etcetera, etcetera.
Human nature doesn't change much.
And I'm going to strangle Fred the next time he states that China is linked to Russia. For fuck's sake, the fool drives me nuts.