Thursday, October 02, 2008

All that Glitters is Not Gold

I have the whole week off work for “Golden Week,” which is more or less a week-long Chinese 4th of July, celebrating the founding of the PRC.

The country’s top leaders observed its 59th National Day by paying respects in Beijing yesterday to those who had sacrificed themselves to the founding of New China.

Led by President Hu Jintao, the leaders presented flowers before the Monument to the People’s Heroes at Tian’anmen Square, with 18 soldiers lifting the flower baskets to the base of the monument.

“The wreath-laying ceremony is a great way to honor the Chinese people’s indomitable spirit of struggle and self-sacrifice in the face of great challenges and difficulties,” said Gao Xinmin, a professor with the Party School of the Communist Party of China Central Committee.

Note mentioned was the inconvenient fact that all of the difficulties and struggles requiring self-sacrifice were caused entirely by the Communist Party.

“Without such spirit, Chinese people wouldn’t be able to make such remarkable progress and achievement,” Gao said.

Not to mention the “bullet in the back of the head” threat can also be a wonderful motivator.

This year marks the 30th anniversary of China’s reform and opening up…

Allow me to properly translate this into English.  “This year marks the 30th anniversary of the day that China realized that communism and Marxism were total failures, and that in order to keep their police state they were going to have to institute economic reforms.” Think I’m kidding?

Chang Aoxue, from rural Shanxi province, also joined the crowd, watching the flag-raising with her 2-year-old daughter.

“I came here together with my daughter to show my gratitude to the Party for encouraging the implementation of a policy that encourages the prosperity of the people, and to offer good wishes to the motherland,” Chang said.

Party, people, nation, policy, and prosperity.  Everything in one tidy little sentence.  For the past year I’ve said that the Chinese see no distinction between race, culture, and politics.  There you go.

Update: One final point:  2009 marks the 60th anniversary of the founding of the PRC.  It also marks the 20th anniversary of that little protest thingy.  I wonder which will get more media attention?