China Witness: Voices from a Silent Generation
What the Chinese Don't Eat
Sky Burial
The Good Women Of China: Hidden Voices
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Xie xie da jia —Thanks everyone
Qing Yuan-liang, Wo de Ying-yu hen Bu-hao – Forgive me about my poor English.
I would like to take this chance to thank YOU for sending email to my blog…in deed!
Dear Barrie:
Thanks for your warm heart to Chinese women and Chinese culture…I think the best organization to help your dream of teaching in China as is VSO, their website: http://www.vso.org.uk/volunteer/ Best wishes to your Chinese family
Dear Lise Simskar:
Yes, you can get my 5 books in Norwegian, I was in Oslo for ‘Message from an Unknown Chinese Mother’’ – Tapte Dotre’s publication in March this year…I will go back Norway in Sep again for a literary festival there…I hope my book would help you understand your roots culture more and better…and deliver a love to you and your Norway family from Chinese mothers…You can get my book details from my Norwegian publisher GYLDENDAL. Big hug and lots love!
Dear Carla:
Yes, I will go back your beautiful country Ba Xi again, might be next year 2011! I love to meet you in person and talk about our countries and women; we have so much in common! My Ba-Xi publisher Companhia Das Letras might help us to meet up…SO, see you soon! Thanks and regards
Dear Denise:
Yes, we could identify a lot from each other, between China and Brazil, poetically women’s life…I hope we could do sth for helping our sisters…one drop of water can help one tiny green…then we could make a beloved landscape. Thank YOU!
Dear British Born Squid:
I have to say, I love to learn where your idea came from about your unforgettable pen-name. …I agree with you that reading, sharing and thinking can help us to find out who we are and what we want from our life time… and also, no matter where we are, all of Chinese came from the same roots which has been ‘watered’ by over 5,000 years civilization… Thanks for your greeting and sharing!
Xie Xie, dear Allie!
I really believe any westerners, who can speak Mandarin, must be genius. As you know, there are about 18,000 Chinese characters survived from our long long history! 3773 for Chinese daily using, it is a lot, compare to your 26 letters! Please give my love to your baby daughter — bao bei nv er!
Nin Hao, dear Natasa Peisc!
I am sorry to say, Sky Burial hasn’t been published in Chinese… Thank YOU for your interesting!
Dear Sharon Beth Long:
Thank you for your reading my book and sending ‘Silen Tears A Journey of Hope and Change in a Chinese Orphanage’ by kay Bratt Although. I am sure I will learn loads from it. If it is not too late, you can send it to my office ‘Xinran, 9 ORME COURT, LONDON, W2 4RL, UK’. Kind regards
Dear Sharon:
Thanks for your sharing with me… and Chinese women! Do you think tears could ‘water’ our soul? I think so…because my writing comes from my deep heart where watered by my tears… again…and again…I can’t tell enough that how much those Chinese grandmothers and mothers have carried their children and China, this huge country, from human desert just 30 years ago…to today’s green world —they never even could have one nice meal, nor one beautiful cloth for themselves in their life time! It would be unfair, if none speaks for them…! Xie Xie Nin!
Qing Yuan-liang, Wo de Ying-yu hen Bu-hao – Forgive me about my poor English.
Xie xie da jia —Thanks everyone
各位朋友：
祝您虎年健康如愿！
每逢佳节倍思亲—
请允许我在此与您分享一些 — 亲情，乡情，友情，和心情－－－
1958年出生，1977年开始工作学习于军校，1989 至1997 先后在河南与江苏两台工作，采访主持兼策划，但从未加入政党，因为实在远离其标准。
旧日老友大多被时代和个性送入两个极端 — 做领导和坐牢—但都还是我的朋友， 因为我心中的好与坏不可能‘不黑即白’。
有过失败的婚姻，源于我不曾知道怎样做女人，自认是‘情铸’的，却以为流泪都是罪过。
祖父曾为英国通用电气工作了三十多年，一家老小在国内红黑两重天之间忽上忽下，终于，精疲力尽。于是，1997年移居英国，在更大的范围内寻找自己的半斤八两。
初识异国他乡是从清洁工、端盘子起步，之后在英语的挣扎中，兼职大学，录制BBC电视广播节目，直至2002年出书。至今六本书中， 五本为中文纪实，只因本人的英文连混饭都难，更无法令那些被采访的中国同胞在我的书中改说‘原味儿’的英文，但我相信翻译们已为我的平庸文笔润色不少，否则更是不堪入目。只有一本英国卫报专栏集出自‘欣然原创英语’，后被一位‘本土’朋友—伦大教授称为‘破天荒的英语读物’，意思是英语水平poor 得可怜！
日常工作有三：
2004创建母爱桥—凭自己的有限之力，为各地的中国孩子们提供一些看中国书接受中国文化教育的机会。一滴水，不能浇树，但可救草儿。您也能帮助我们一把吗？
www.mothersbridge.org 多多感谢！
做一些西方媒体的文化顾问，宁愿被同胞指责‘苟同’，也不愿让西方随意涂改中国文化和中国人的本色，知道自己是‘亿牛一毛’之力，但不可熟视无睹！
写作，以沉默的词语呐喊我心中的挣扎，难道历史只属于那些权势和赢家？贫寒失败就没有话语权吗？不懂得痛苦的人能感悟解脱的真谛吗？今天的好与坏能诠释我们上两代人的付出和追求吗？
例如，历史的藏区不是今天流行的西藏，位置于藏南的西藏也不能代表十几个派系的藏民。去北藏，伴随一家世代游牧的藏人，与他们沉默不语地过几天，即便那些 三五步一拜，五体投地‘为生’的藏人都能让你感受到他们那惊天地泣鬼神的情感！
西方媒体宣传中的‘粉饰’确实令我尴尬，因我从未在辉煌中活过，所以，我无从知晓如何展示我根本不曾有的智慧和‘政绩’，我是一个在平庸中采集喜怒悲欢的人，在行走中与路边落叶的‘对话’常常是我思念亲朋之时。我宁愿坦诚相告老外们，我们中国也曾有过西方类似的贫困和灾难，可我们在学，在拼，在博！我也不愿在他们面前招摇，我们中国在四百万贫民和百分之75%没有受过十年教育的人口之上所构筑的强盛！我相信，无论你花多少钱和精力去粉饰面容，都不能掩盖背疼不眠、行走不便，如厕不爽所带来的愁容。然而，无奈的是：今天的社会和媒体，中西一样，不化妆就不敢‘出门’— 副词们敲骨吸髓般地吞噬着人们交流的空间，形容词们锦罗绸缎层层叠叠般地间隔着人们对动词的感受— 而名词们在谋杀人们对平凡的理解和敬重！
我以为，情不在多少，而在真假 — 真的，你能在夜间被它疼醒；假的，日历一翻页儿你就没感觉了。
谢您与我共享2010！好好活着，朋友们！
Dear MBL friends…s:
Xinnian yukuai 新年愉快 Happy New Year!
Hunian jiankang ruyuan
虎年健康如愿
Health, peace and joy in your Tiger Year!
As a MBL founder, I am so happy to share this moment with you –Happy Chinese New Year!
And I would like to tell you some good news as a 2010 gift to our MBLers…
MBL website has been reopened as www.mothersbridge.org.
MBL BX children centre will move to a new and bigger building this summer…
MBL trustee meeting will make next 5 years plan…soon.
We are going to restructure our volunteer teams for working on the following projects,
MBL’s 2010 green message is set up MBL4th library with Hao Ding Internet Bar’s support, it is locaded out site of Nanjing city. There are about 50,000 students from age 7 to 20’s has no place for their daily reading and activites.I hope you can help us to send it to your links —
To support MBL Children’s Libraries in China , please send picture books and images of daily life, culture and heritage from around the world to the following address. Thank you from all the young readers.
Mrs ZhuLi (MBL volunteer)
Room 605, Building 71, Rui-Jin North-village,
Baixia district, Nanjing, PR China 210016
Julie +86-139 0515 0047
Thank YOU for being MBLer and helping MBL!
Hunian jiankang ruyuan
虎年健康如愿
Health, peace and joy in your Tiger Year!
I came back from ‘G8 International Conference on Violence Against Women’ last night, 10th Sep 2009.
It was a great time for me to learn how this G8 works and how much others have done about the women movements….
The meeting was hosted by Italy, which holds this year’s G-8 presidency. It explored rape and domestic violence and included panels on genital mutilation, access to education and violence against young girls.
“Violence against women and children is an unacceptable violation and privation of human rights,” the declaration read. “Women are agents of peace.”
But, after the generations hard efforts, I could see people are still very very very careful when they talked about the women who were killed by the religions’ justice and some culture believes. It made me think a lot about our ‘civilized society’. As a part of civilization, how much have men been educated to understand and respect women?
It is not easy to be honest to our past.
I wish I could have had a chance to tell those women, who have been suffered from rape and domestic violence –‘you are victims, but not just being victims, your experience have made us think and teach us to change this world. We must thank you, the world can’t be civilized without protecting and respecting you.’
It is not the time for us to tell how great we are and how much we have done any more, it is time now for us to think how much we haven’t learn from our mistakes and how much we have to catch up before more girls die in our lifetime…
Anyhow, our life has been driven not only by cars and computers, but also by running time, greedy qualities…and lazy thinking…
Yes, let’s respect women, respect the world from our daily life…from one drop of water…
Have a good weekend – Zhou-Mo Yu-Kuai!
Dui-Bu-Qi, Wo Cuo Le – Sorry, I am wrong!
Dear every friend here:
I have to be honest to you, I might be laziest blog writer in the world.
I came back from Brazil two weeks ago, BUT, blue sea surrounded Rio, coloured Paraty streets, up-down waved San Paulo…are still in front of me!
There is so much I love to tell you and share with you… I wish I could have had a fast typing skill ;}
Where should I start?
OK, before I went on the trip, I was warned by many westerners — never go out in the dark, never get on any public transports and never buy anything from the beach or little street…in Brazil…
Thanks to their kindness and care about me. I am sure these kind of problems could happened to any country which has the huge gap between rich and poor…BUT I believe that Brazilian life, just like Chinese, is improving, and most people want to change…at least, want to be remembered as a good man or a beautiful woman! Should these developing countries go on being painted by the old fade colour which used over twenty years ago?
I thought I had to learn some real life there on my foot except Paraty FLIP for my book events.
In Rio, I walked hours alone the beach in the dark, I bought cheese bread which is my favoured food in the world from a tiny street…I even took the public bus which none could speak one English word on it, but everyone tried to help me with their ‘’dancing body language’’…then the bus driver dropped me just in front of my hotel!
Oh, Paraty, what a town where were full of book hunters and history makers! Stories, stories, stories are not just in the books there; stories have been told everywhere you walked in and out in Paraty! One of the stories is about the play, it is based on my first book ‘’The Good Women of China’’ directed by Fabio Porchat. Strange language didn’t make any distance between the Brazilian actresses and my heart… I was totally pulled back into those Chinese women I interviewed long time ago and also kept in my deep memories…‘Tell me your story’ one local policeman asked me in his Brazilian-English when I was crying in a corner of one Paraty street after I watched the play.
I didn’t have time to experience in San Paulo, but I could see many very hard working people there from hotel staff, taxi drivers and Sunday morning delivers… all of these remind me about ‘’working generation’’ in Europe after World War Two.
I have no right to tell a whole image of Brazil by one trip, but I want to say, we, Chinese and Brazilian have had so much in common…family rooted society, fast modernized cities, and open minded people…
By the way, tell you one more story: when I was a little girl in a kindergarten, we were taught how colour a world map – China was red for sure, American was black, UK was sea blue, France was orange, Germany was gray…Brazil was green. Does it mean anything to you? It means a lot to my generation in China – how to see, or say, how to colour this world!
Qing Yuan-Liang Wo de Ying-Yu Hen Bu-Hao – Forgive me about my poor English
Yes, I am going to Brazil for my book tour there from 27th June to 10th July…
I have never been to that part of the world…
I am so so so excited…
I have been heavily editing on my new book since last month. It is about some secret Chinese mothers I met in China from 1989 to 2007, they all lost their baby daughters for different reasons. It will be published Chinese New Year 2010 by my publisher Random House as planned.
Again and again, my soul has been watered by my tears for those mothers…
I hope all of Chinese adopted daughters could hear their hidden voice from my writing, and help this world to get a better understanding between mothers and children.
Anyhow, as the second part of my questions on China after 14th May 2009 is here…
Chinese Population: 1,306,313,812 (July 2005 est.);
Population growth rate 0.58% (2005 est.);
Ethnic groups: Han Chinese 91.9%, Zhuang, Uygur, Hui, Yi, Tibetan, Miao, Manchu, Mongol, Buyi, Korean, and other nationalities 8.1%
· What’s the challenge to Chinese population?
· Is there an imbalance of sex and education by single child policy?
· How much the percentage of its population has been educated?
· How much between rich and poor? How many are poor as under the life line?
I would like to continue to sharing my thoughts about China with you here…I hope I could learn some answers of these questions from YOU!
Xiexie!
Qin-Wen, Nin Jia-Qi Qu-Nar? – Where will you go for your next holiday?
Chinese says, Xiang Yi Xiang, Zai Shuo – Think, before you speak.
I read an article by Mr Xiaokang Su about Tianan Men Movement in 1989 from BBC Chinese news on 2nd June. I think it is the best understanding of what it is.
If you can read in Chinese, here is
苏晓康：思想启蒙者的反思
《河殇》总撰稿人之一的苏晓康谈《河殇》与六四以及89天安门抗议运动的教训。http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/em/fr/-/chinese/simp/hi/newsid_8070000/newsid_8074000/8074054.stm
I totally agree with him –before people are able to choose their own education and career, freedom and democracy could be limited by the human living condition… played by the political parties… controlled by the ”mafia — God fathers”… and abused by the power greedy……!
Just think about, how many Chinese really have got chance and time to learn, to know what democracy is…by now? Even though some have read a lot in China…but the most translated books have been censored or ”’edited for a right voice”…or just misguided by the ‘’simplified translation”!
When we talk about any part of history, we have to let it back its time as what it was…with our enough knowledge of its background in the truth.
Just one question on Tianan Men 1989 –How much today’s China could be better in democracy IF former prime minster Ziyang Zhao is still in the state leadership? Why he lost in 1989?
Today’s comfortable life has made us become too lazy to think and to dig the truth…or, at least to question the truth of our past.
We must not ‘water’ our belief and glory by others’ blood, both of Chinese students and Chinese soldiers in 1989!
Wo Men Bu-Neng Jian-Hua Li-Shi. We must not simplify history.
Xie-Xie Yu Wo Yi-Qi Si-Kao – Thanks for sharing a mind with me.
I have kept telling people that what I have experienced in China, whether in terms of place, the times, the environment or the situation, can only be representative of a minuscule proportion, like a drop of water cannot be used to explain the ocean, but only a spoon of tea or a bowl of soup.
Since I published China Witness last year, I have heard so many ‘wa—‘ and ‘what?!’ about today’s China …from the people I met on my book tours in Australia, New Zealand, America, Canada, Norway….and UK
In fact, I am a part of these words about my roots culture and today’s China. I have made some questions for myself; I am willing to spend my life time to get their answers. Would you like to share it with me?
If so, here is the first part of my questions:
People’s Republic of China, based on UN map, locates at Eastern Asia, bordering the East China Sea, Korea Bay, Yellow Sea, and South China Sea, between North Korea and Vietnam…9,596,960 sq km; land: 9,326,410 sq km; water: 270,550 sq km; mostly mountains, high plateaus, deserts in west; plains, deltas, and hills in east; lowest point: Turpan Pendi -154 m; highest point: Mount Everest 8,850 m; world’s fourth largest country (after Russia, Canada, and US); Mount Everest on the border with Nepal is the world’s tallest peak.
· How much China culture and believes have been rooted by its geography?
· How much the mountains, ocean, and deserts have infected it’s culture?
· How much its neighbours have influenced it’s self-centre believes in those main historical comparison (Tibetan, Russia, South East Asia)?
· How Chinese’s image of the world have been built up and limited by 3 silk roads, Opium War, and speeding ‘open policy’?
Zhong-Guo You Gao-Shan he Da-Hai – China has mountains and sea
Hai-zi, Wo Ai Ni! – My child, I love you!
Dear All, I would like to share a mother’s feeling with you today, if you don’t mind.
Dear Panpan, my loved son:
I can’t help thinking about you since yesterday – UK Mother’s Day, when you came back and cooked such a ‘impressed’ lunch as your gift for me. I am really surprised by your cooking — the beauty of your food displayed, the delicious taste you made, and how much care about me you showed.
Above all, I must tell you, I am so touched by your love to your mum — you know how to release your mum’s mind by showing me your improved life skill one by one since you went to university in 2007. As being a mother, we hold the worries all the time when our children start their own lives and flying into a free sky, as Chinese says… from your clothes, food, bed, until your study, activities and your friends… Children’s safe and health is a part of any mother’s daily life… It lasts to their last second in their lives!
I want to thank YOU for helping me to let you be free and independent. I wish we could have had a ‘Son’s/Daughter’s Day’, so that I could have shared my love and proud with many other sons’ mothers…
I want to say sorry to you as well, because I had mentioned many times to others before – I wished I could have had a daughter, I had thought that a girl might understand mother in a better way… By now, I know I am wrong! I have the best son in the world!
Love to you – my life’s ‘Power House’ – my loved Panpan
Xie-xie Mu Qin Jie – Thanks to mother’s day!
Wo Juede Hen Teng – I felt very painful!
This morning, my friend Tantan-Niang emailed me with a forward attachment – subject is ‘Do you know the most popular restaurant in Beijing?’ There are fifteen photos about this restaurant in the attachment.
Here is my reply to Tantan-Niang:
Yes, I have been there. The restaurant is called ‘Red Star’. It is for you to ‘experience The Culture Revolution as a fun’.
I was so shocked and painful by this ‘Culture Revolution fun’…my body was shaking when they shouted and repeated those killing slogans!!!
You would know why I felt like that, if you have read my book ‘The Good Women of China’, you would see what ‘The Culture Revolution’ means to my life.
After more than 40 years, I still couldn’t walk out from my painful memory of my ten years childhood during The Culture Revolution …
I can’t believe that my suffered childhood could be ”gamed” with such happiness!
Is it possible for anyone in this world to play War killings as a fun? How could someone play Jews were gassed in Auschwitz as a fun? Or, how could someone play Gaza children were killed in early this year as a fun?
I am sure I am not only the one lost by this fun…
No pain, no gain…what young Chinese could gain from this Culture Revolution if they can’t feel any pain from it?
What might be happened to a plant if it is cut off from its roots…? I think human is living in the same way as the plants…or any other lives…
Wei Shenme – Why?