tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-62358064680891204762024-02-07T22:01:41.913+08:00Cultural Crossover: Basketball in ChinaTransplanted from Middle America to the Middle Kingdom, a Kansas-born journalist waxes on basketball, China and basketball in China.DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.comBlogger52125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-4116453375410849862011-02-19T18:13:00.004+08:002017-06-27T20:41:53.686+08:00And One:<div class="MsoNormal">
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<i>This post will bump <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/11/thanks-to-google-searches-about-jinan.html">the last post</a> off the top of the blog. But that is a good place to start if you are unfamiliar with this site, so check it out. </i></div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZwqvlRRle2OKDP0BsjNTqAo8jDNDyK29X4hXTUBhiDeawGmZUtMUcXpAxPF-aKcVrSQmh516fihCG5YQXgA9889py6NqIB0q7pKB9jPXRa_zsblM5x9eeHh44qZVwP9hr7YJE1T-qxE4/s1600/IMG_2150.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZwqvlRRle2OKDP0BsjNTqAo8jDNDyK29X4hXTUBhiDeawGmZUtMUcXpAxPF-aKcVrSQmh516fihCG5YQXgA9889py6NqIB0q7pKB9jPXRa_zsblM5x9eeHh44qZVwP9hr7YJE1T-qxE4/s400/IMG_2150.JPG" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Li Ball</b></td></tr>
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Li Ball was a main character on this blog, featured <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-24-new-court-ii.html">here</a>, among other places. We have emailed a little bit since I left China, and I sent him an email around Christmas time. The note I wrote to him was nothing special. Just a bunch of simple sentences saying something along the lines of, “Hey Li. I was playing basketball and thought about you and everyone else from the basketball courts. I hope you’re good….”<br />
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I did not expect much in response. Despite the fact that he was an email pin-pal, my relationship with Li did not feel all that substantial. Indeed, I had always lamented the fact that I wasn’t able to foster any truly meaningful relationships with basketball-playing Chinese people. Sure, there were guys who I played with regularly, guys who I was familiar with, even guys to whom I would later send emails. But no real <i>friends</i><span style="font-style: normal;">.</span> <br />
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This letter suggests otherwise: </div>
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<span style="font-size: 15pt;">Hello. It is my pleasure to have received your letter and I really share happiness with you when I knew you had returned to the U.S. and had celebrated Christmas with your family.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 15pt;">The period when we played basketball together is very nice. Your skill and attitude to basketball left us deep impression. We also feel proud that we have such a good friend as you.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 15pt;">Now we keep playing basketball every week. Sometimes we miss you and talk about you. We sincerely look forward to you coming back to China again, playing basketball together and being good friends.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 15pt;">I am busier in working than before and my office has been moved into a new building. There is a standard indoor basketball gym. If you come back to China, I will invite you to the new gym to play basketball. Every friend is fine, don’t worry about them. The biggest Chinese festival-Spring Festival is around the corner. Here I pay a New Year call and wish you a happy New Year.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 15pt;">Yours sincerely </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 15pt;">Li</span></div>
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Pretty cool, I think.DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-70725820442955006452010-11-13T18:38:00.034+08:002011-04-02T18:09:19.958+08:00Cultural Crossover: With a New Afterword<div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Thanks to Google searches about Jinan, Shandong Normal University and other similarly obscure topics, this blog continues to get seen. Some guy recently asked me to review his book about basketball’s different forms around the world; another asked me if I had any other blogs he could check out; another wanted to collaborate with me on a marketing campaign for basketball in China (he must have glazed over the part where I moved to Denmark...but still).</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">I have no disillusions about the traffic – it’s still paltry, even more so than it was when I was churning out 1,500-word treatises about hot water and stretching and the Chinese’s affinity for cigarettes. But one way or another, people continue to stumble across the site. And with that in mind, I want to have a proper epilogue, or at least something more substantial than the defeatist post that hitherto acted as the blog’s climax.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">I don’t have any groundbreaking cultural or anthropological pronouncements that I didn’t already detail in the blog’s heyday. But now that I’m in Denmark and have unfettered access to the Internet – including blogspot, which was blocked in China – I have been able to fix up and polish this summer’s posts. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">The biggest amendment: I have added a ton of pictures. The dearth of pictures on the site was a common grievance among readers. But in my defense, there are reasons besides laziness that forbade me from including photographic elements. You see, whenever I would publish a post from China, I had a three-minute window during which I could do the deed. The proxy that I used to get into blogspot, YouTubeProxy.org, allowed a frustratingly finite amount of time to play around before asking me to fork over my credit card into. So I couldn’t sit at my computer and tinker with photos, deciding where they should be placed, which ones to use, etc. I was on the clock from the moment I logged on. Besides that, the proxy had an inability to upload photos. YouTubeProxy allowed me to get in and publish text, but it wasn’t capable of handling photo uploads. These factors conspired to keep the layout barren, and this is something that (rightly) cropped up as a common criticism.</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEOUBJl3Y-IKNECDeyAMaCt4t__jbIM-JC8MwgU_jHEkHOmVWFmaNHomOYBAfNiQfaKUHKu0cbGdRekaAmWhi4h9V7Ya3tfkwgr2rtuwGXjnlHz-c4wgzyqrDkVRbMDTaSAZ-KNUDt2ak/s1600/IMG_2153.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5538992865641796994" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEOUBJl3Y-IKNECDeyAMaCt4t__jbIM-JC8MwgU_jHEkHOmVWFmaNHomOYBAfNiQfaKUHKu0cbGdRekaAmWhi4h9V7Ya3tfkwgr2rtuwGXjnlHz-c4wgzyqrDkVRbMDTaSAZ-KNUDt2ak/s400/IMG_2153.JPG" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 300px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 400px;" /></a></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Me at my favorite court. Along the baseline are a few basketball buddies, a baffled Chinese lady and my motor bike.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Now, though, there are photos, and there are a few posts that, not surprisingly, are duly enhanced with the addition of visual elements. In particular: </span></div><ul style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><li><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/crossed-over-ii_10.html">This post</a>, which details the popularity of basketball in China (evidenced by courts that sprout up in a series of bizarre places).</span></li>
</ul><ul style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><li><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-22-yao-erful-words-ii.html">This post</a> about Tracy McGrady’s sustained popularity in China, which – still going strong – has now officially outlasted McGrady’s knees and back.</span></li>
</ul><ul style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><li><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/up-fake-chinas-booming-fake-nba-market.html">This post</a>, which looks at China’s booming fake NBA merchandise market.</span> </li>
</ul><ul style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><li><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-17-schoolyard-ball-ii.html">This post</a>, which details the odd relationship that I had with the basketball-playing teenagers who lived in <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-17-schoolyard-ball-i.html">an apartment next door to mine.</a></span></li>
</ul><ul style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><li><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-11-say-what.html">This post</a>, which looks at some of the basketball slang that echoes throughout Jinanese courts.</span></li>
</ul><ul style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><li><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/april-6-ball-in-beijing.html">This post</a>, which chronicles the bizarre basketball experience I had while on vacation in Beijing. </span></li>
</ul><ul style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><li><span style="font-size: small;">And <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-24-new-court-ii.html">this post</a>, which holds a special place in my heart for it is the one that rehashes how I first stumbled across Li Ball’s Court and, unknowingly, stumbled into an interesting relationship with the dudes who played there – a relationship that, despite nagging language issues, ended up meaning quite a lot to me</span></li>
</ul><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">So yeah, these posts are all a lot cooler now that they aren’t merely diatribes, but diatribes with pictures to boot.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Also, instead of forcing people to blindly navigate this months-long China/basketball diary, I’d like to gently nudge you toward a handful of posts that – in addition to the ones just mentioned – stand apart, at least for me. If you like these, then you could probably derive some enjoyment, insight or at least time-killing entertainment from this blog.</span></div><ul style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><li><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/april-1-no-balling-just-brawling.html">This</a> is quite possibly the best thing written on the blog – at least according to the feedback I got from my small cohort of faithful readers – even though it has nothing to do with basketball. </span></li>
</ul><ul style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><li><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/los-suns-couldnt-rise-in-china.html">This</a> is a post about how the political protest so beautifully executed last summer by the Phoenix Suns could never happen in China.</span> </li>
</ul><ul style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><li><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/cba-crazy-andor-banished-association.html">This</a> is a look at some of the Americans who have landed in the CBA – the Crazy and/or Banished Association.</span></li>
</ul><ul style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><li><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/a">This</a> is an look at how American basketball players have a rep in China as being total ball-hogs – and how my buddy and I unwittingly slipped right into that stereotype. </span></li>
</ul><ul style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><li><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/06/some-like-it-hot.html">This</a> one is near and dear: The popularity of hot water in China (and how it changed me life).</span></li>
</ul><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">And finally, the coup de grâce: Some pics that didn’t fit cleanly into any other posts. So I’m just going to stick them here. With that, thank you for checking this out, and farewell!</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9yXu4x8obxItOMhRlxdDgen1UUAZbZ-TjkH4f5uF9vYvrK2j-6LLiptN-_B5SfzetDyMbk3pk9OydQE3IlSnVcBNYu5r2AZORWYdbIawfJM4ccIDsTCmNtZmsK6MmqxZn-PaE_ykhgJ4/s1600/IMG_2022.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5538982075752630162" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9yXu4x8obxItOMhRlxdDgen1UUAZbZ-TjkH4f5uF9vYvrK2j-6LLiptN-_B5SfzetDyMbk3pk9OydQE3IlSnVcBNYu5r2AZORWYdbIawfJM4ccIDsTCmNtZmsK6MmqxZn-PaE_ykhgJ4/s400/IMG_2022.JPG" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 300px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 400px;" /></a></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">This picture I took of a homeless guy wearing an NBA cap confirms two things: (1) The popularity of basketball in China, and (2) the eternal resting place of my soul.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhToCxwax4mOVLCcyVk97WFnrNVoePl5qfBDLCqlkrJlbSgSHHqn0xsYGfTR4TWqg6SucIkg19a86p4YMugvhtr06heGBlrZ2qKn6n0wWhOr_IzYPjm57eQpjKpoNc2ShiZhW2D6ABNv04/s1600/IMG_2011.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5539000272927351698" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhToCxwax4mOVLCcyVk97WFnrNVoePl5qfBDLCqlkrJlbSgSHHqn0xsYGfTR4TWqg6SucIkg19a86p4YMugvhtr06heGBlrZ2qKn6n0wWhOr_IzYPjm57eQpjKpoNc2ShiZhW2D6ABNv04/s400/IMG_2011.JPG" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 355px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 400px;" /></a></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">This was a scene from close to where I worked. It had a not insignificant role in stoking my curiosity about basketball in China.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjB9nLpirf1s1NKAlvqKQg24FdwLoL2PjOGKPGfoygCm5fZatTm2DDa9TbkJC9WT8gge2VCvyaPgiMWTygQ0v1rDI1-URY7wEra9TpFIndRbbtUGaxzXOeaJsiBHbDMUXjnBitfGnNlLAw/s1600/IMG_2033.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5538983799613732018" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjB9nLpirf1s1NKAlvqKQg24FdwLoL2PjOGKPGfoygCm5fZatTm2DDa9TbkJC9WT8gge2VCvyaPgiMWTygQ0v1rDI1-URY7wEra9TpFIndRbbtUGaxzXOeaJsiBHbDMUXjnBitfGnNlLAw/s400/IMG_2033.JPG" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 300px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 400px;" /></a></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Dingy courts, crappy balls and unsightly landscapes. Yep, this was basketball in Jinan.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHF5xZ8I4fd_pu8JnEv9_H-4DVGq-_RqAlF0xP6BijBNiJg8k3i2HlSfbqO8aMR9H_JKFP6_37b_xmaBi2-RTv4wRy-9lO5Pgn7HNhca42J3CZ2JVNG88ocGQgrut68OS-7J3J2rhJPTU/s1600/P4070139.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5538984378946070738" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHF5xZ8I4fd_pu8JnEv9_H-4DVGq-_RqAlF0xP6BijBNiJg8k3i2HlSfbqO8aMR9H_JKFP6_37b_xmaBi2-RTv4wRy-9lO5Pgn7HNhca42J3CZ2JVNG88ocGQgrut68OS-7J3J2rhJPTU/s400/P4070139.JPG" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 400px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 300px;" /></a></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">A photo taken in Beijing, this is apparently a tour for school-aged kids, who for some reason are all carrying basketballs.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAIUhoOUy-GARHIIegOkMh-yoMbF0cMnqyzVny443LbY-lG1OPqR9s2VhvRvASkQblm4dly-LyJu7WvLo7j6J9aEtdgY-F54Ck4JP8erPlnqRQEMdmIWACOE-QNqLzTQTiGwrd-p_iuWQ/s1600/P6060266.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5538998155317157666" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAIUhoOUy-GARHIIegOkMh-yoMbF0cMnqyzVny443LbY-lG1OPqR9s2VhvRvASkQblm4dly-LyJu7WvLo7j6J9aEtdgY-F54Ck4JP8erPlnqRQEMdmIWACOE-QNqLzTQTiGwrd-p_iuWQ/s400/P6060266.JPG" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 300px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 400px;" /></a></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Night ball during the summer.</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2TBd3DKTOasz_GAUUFTHO4STmJH7S-Vm1g2luql_qBkvq4DXbjWx5j_vpxokJoXyfUxReo1Q88SUcI28wO-X9ygJKlN6LP5-DoFd3DG-61o-o7krxhq6R1itg7UQFNQsYHm8_kvprwWc/s1600/P4270194.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5538985298704519170" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2TBd3DKTOasz_GAUUFTHO4STmJH7S-Vm1g2luql_qBkvq4DXbjWx5j_vpxokJoXyfUxReo1Q88SUcI28wO-X9ygJKlN6LP5-DoFd3DG-61o-o7krxhq6R1itg7UQFNQsYHm8_kvprwWc/s400/P4270194.JPG" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 300px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 400px;" /></a></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Hitler, bin Laden, Einstein, Kobe and Iverson.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwEWkRY70hj95QGLS8fm_t4LLU3pjJOxIroMDU6CWL1MjtT1ywOyasVOmcL1Zzy65gbgzMDEm9YJ1_tnFDdoxstumBUBX6zTztI_mI5PT1DbDZ8V4cM2fiRE42jMZR8UBAzYvLRpXr0JA/s1600/P4270191.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5538985799610665122" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwEWkRY70hj95QGLS8fm_t4LLU3pjJOxIroMDU6CWL1MjtT1ywOyasVOmcL1Zzy65gbgzMDEm9YJ1_tnFDdoxstumBUBX6zTztI_mI5PT1DbDZ8V4cM2fiRE42jMZR8UBAzYvLRpXr0JA/s400/P4270191.JPG" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 400px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 300px;" /></a></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Like I discussed <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/love-affair-with-love-affairs-kobe.html">here</a> and <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/06/kobe-bryant-is-chinas-michael-jordan.html">here</a>, Kobe is a big deal in China.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPPaZI2Z4L4viVscPn7VWdrEBayXD0Nk9DUUANVfFQkmqwkRByes4WLuqM8Hq08UMECvW08FFcRAbkPMwdVcTLSadghd6mpNxs3Ukl_DIJ5zb04sUWCx-N7TNxE0oFT2GM4w9xco4UOV8/s1600/IMG_2126.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5538986503653630082" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPPaZI2Z4L4viVscPn7VWdrEBayXD0Nk9DUUANVfFQkmqwkRByes4WLuqM8Hq08UMECvW08FFcRAbkPMwdVcTLSadghd6mpNxs3Ukl_DIJ5zb04sUWCx-N7TNxE0oFT2GM4w9xco4UOV8/s400/IMG_2126.JPG" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 400px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 300px;" /></a></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">I just think this is cool.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtIkbyn9K1gokxb4rI4_gGmZIwMEOSBzjox41SAnTGW5CwLOcc07m3f14dm3lcv5Ia7le5GB9gPvDeVKy9xVqGebA1BDbcpc2t1o7ZY0MkO-XhZxvfxS6-EHNPddGDks02oMmgzJnLDho/s1600/IMG_2130.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5538986768782727938" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtIkbyn9K1gokxb4rI4_gGmZIwMEOSBzjox41SAnTGW5CwLOcc07m3f14dm3lcv5Ia7le5GB9gPvDeVKy9xVqGebA1BDbcpc2t1o7ZY0MkO-XhZxvfxS6-EHNPddGDks02oMmgzJnLDho/s400/IMG_2130.JPG" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 400px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 300px;" /></a></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">The side of a box of milk.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgj8BjbTftQxucd6qaNGbF3Uyr-5rBrnJ6c2UNrgq5OsFfzL0bl-_oewkNhLPz01BcEIj4cWzcVJuQsHlY3-1oryDoZN2IW_qTZjx7qsdP7jgwfbx_wTvZuLhjnqrPYY3N5imwzYoUGiHY/s1600/IMG_2257.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5538992163230514130" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgj8BjbTftQxucd6qaNGbF3Uyr-5rBrnJ6c2UNrgq5OsFfzL0bl-_oewkNhLPz01BcEIj4cWzcVJuQsHlY3-1oryDoZN2IW_qTZjx7qsdP7jgwfbx_wTvZuLhjnqrPYY3N5imwzYoUGiHY/s400/IMG_2257.JPG" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 300px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 400px;" /></a></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span class="short_text" id="result_box" lang="zh-CN" style="font-size: small;"><span style="background-color: #e6ecf9; color: black;" title="">This will work as a closer...<br />
</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span class="short_text" id="result_box" lang="zh-CN"><span style="background-color: #e6ecf9; color: black;" title="">...再见</span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"></div>DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-864712294107123092010-07-26T18:40:00.001+08:002011-04-02T18:11:14.695+08:00How Do You Say "Reason" in Chinese?<div class="MsoNormal">For not having any sort of answer, I’ve thought an embarrassingly long time about the question, <i>What’s the difference between and excuse and a reason?</i> </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">My best guess is that it comes down to the recipient of the excuse/reason. What smacks of <i>excuse </i><span style="font-style: normal;">to one person may well strike the next person as a bona fide </span><i>reason</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. Take, for instance, the lengthy treatise that kicked off this blog – the <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010_04_04_archive.html">April 10 posts</a> detailing my post-graduate tour of underemployment and my subsequent move to China.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">Some people may read those posts and think…</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">Wow, this guy had some really tough luck. He graduated in the spring of 2008, about six months after the start of the recession. He had that internship right after he graduated, which seemed a good idea at the time, and then he hit the ground running in September ’08 looking for a job. Alas, September ’08 is when the stock market plummeted, and when things started looking bleak in every single sector of the economy, particularly in the journalism industry, which is where this guy – who was just a kid back then – wanted to work. On the heels of his past internships and his trio of journalistic awards, he damn near got a few jobs, but juuuust missed out. After more than a year of hitting his head against the job market wall, he decided that his best play was to move to China for a while, ride out the recession, and then hit the hump again in a year or two.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">Some other people, though, might read those April 10 posts and think...</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">What’s this guy bitching about? First off, he majored in philosophy, which is notorious for funneling people into the unemployment line. What’s more, he never diversified his journalistic expertise. He was too gung-ho about sports journalism, which is oversaturated as it is, and didn’t have the portfolio of clips to bust into the news or education or entertainment arenas of journalism, which don’t have quite as many wannabes and bloggers cluttering the market. And not only did he not diversify himself as a journalist, but he didn’t diversify himself as a job candidate. Not everyone gets to be a journalist. It’s a select crew, and anyone can tell you that it’s not a meritocracy: you have to have both skill and luck. And even if this guy has some skill – which is debatable – he was still pinning his employment hopes on an industry that required more than a little serendipity. If he was smart, he would have been putting out feelers in a million different fields and would have come to the conclusion that in the post-Great Recession job market, you can’t let your ideals run roughshod over your brains. Bottom line, he dug his own grave. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">The thing is, both responses are totally justifiable; neither can be proven right or wrong. While I would certainly tend to agree with the former of these two analyses, my dad might side with No. 2, and he would have any number of reasons to do so. That’s the bitch of this reason/excuse dichotomy: it’s all about perspective, and one’s perspective depends on a million different things, things which the person delivering said reason/excuse can’t control. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">Because of this, I don’t know how these ensuing words will be treated – that is, if they will smack of excuse, or if, on the other hand, people will look at them and see logic. Either way, here goes:</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">The reason (or excuse) for the recent dearth of activity at Cultural Crossover is language, and the fact that I don’t speak a lick of Chinese. Because I don’t speak Chinese, and because the original bent of this blog was to analyze basketball in China – and the people who play basketball in China – I don’t have much to write about. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">I don’t know how that will resonate. To those who think that’s an excuse, it probably sounds like am any other blogger, not someone who really deserves to put the word “writer” in his bio. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">This steady plunge in blog activity happens all the time. Someone starts a blog and tells all their friends and posts like a madman for a few weeks and is absolutely confident that they can build up a good following. Then, at about the two-month mark, as the good people at Google Analytics detail the ongoing lack of readership, the blogger gets discouraged and starts posting less…and less. Less posting, of course, isn’t good for readership, which sinks ever more, further dampening that once zealous zest that the blogger had about his or her cool new blog. (In the place of low readership, feel free to substitute old-fashioned laziness as the culprit for a cessation of posts.) </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">This is the excuse perspective. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">To those reason people out there, let me explain a little further. When I started this, I didn’t want it to be another China blog. There are a million blogs out there – many of which are damn good – that wax poetic about Chinese culture and Chinese news. A lot of these blogs are written by people who have lived in China for years, and who know a great deal more about this country’s history, politics, economy and culture. I don’t know all that much (or care all that much) about these things, and as such, I have no interest in trying to write about them. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">What I do know and care about, and what I wanted to write about, is basketball. And a stroll around any Chinese city will reveal beyond doubt that basketball is important to innumerable Chinese people. And you can’t have a basketball-loving country of 1.3 billion without there being a bottomless well of good stories about basketball.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">But while basketball’s importance in China is indisputable, I’ve still had a world of trouble writing about it. At the <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010_04_11_archive.html">outset of the blog</a>, I was writing a lot about the quirks I noticed in Chinese basketball – <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-3-not-keeping-score-learning_11.html">the score keeping</a>, <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-3-not-keeping-score-learning.html">the clothes</a>, <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-11-say-what.html">the lingo</a>, etc. These things were interesting to me, and they fueled some good posts. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">After a while, I felt like I had exhausted these different topics, and was forced to make an increasing number of forays into Chinese culture: I was mining basketball not to write about basketball, but instead using it as a springboard to write about other things. This method yielded what I felt to be a few solid posts as well, like <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-22-yao-erful-words-ii.html">this one</a> about Yao Ming and adidas, <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/los-suns-couldnt-rise-in-china.html">this one</a> about Los Suns and Chinese censorship, and <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/cba-crazy-andor-banished-association.html">this one</a> about the CBA and the American burnouts who end up playing pro ball in China. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">Eventually, though, the blog devolved into an ongoing dialogue about Chinese culture. I started writing about <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010_05_16_archive.html">smoking in China</a>, the <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010_05_23_archive.html">lack of left-handed people</a> people in China, how <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010_05_30_archive.html">people drink hot water in China</a>, and so on. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">These topics were vaguely interesting to me, but after a little while I realized that I wasn’t writing a basketball blog anymore. And that’s what I wanted to do here. This blog, after all, was inspired by the book <i>Heaven Is a Playground</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, a Rick Telander classic in which he spends a summer playing ball in the inner city and, in the process, unearths all these cool stories about the cultural significance of basketball and the people who play it. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">That is what I wanted to do, but for some reason I didn’t foresee language being as big of a problem as it has turned out to be. In hindsight, this seems extremely naïve of me: <i>Of course</i> not speaking the native language is going to be an issue. Maybe I thought that there would be more English speakers out there, or that my bilingual coworkers would be more willing to help me. I don’t know. But I know that I have never been able to have any sort of substantial interaction with the people I play basketball with, and as such, I’ve had very few substantial blog posts about my time on the courts of China. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">I came over here holding out little hope of learning the language, and even less of a desire to pore over flashcards and recite tones into a dictaphone to gauge my progress. I’m not defending this philosophy; it’s just the mindset I had when I arrived and the mindset that, for better or worse – mostly worse – I have stuck with all the while. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">Still, it’s an easy stance to justify; Chinese is utterly inaccessible to Westerners. Unlike good old Spanish, which I studied a bit in high school and college, there is nothing akin to a cognate. Oh, how I miss words like <i>enciclopedia</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. You can’t really mess up words like that. Here, though, nothing is so clear. In Spanish, for instance, the word for chimpanzee is </span><i>chimpancé</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. In Chinese, the word for chimpanzee is </span><span style="font-family: "Arial Unicode MS";">黑猩猩.</span> Fat chance.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"></div><div class="MsoNormal"></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">So that’s what happened to this blog. I know that I never had great readership, save on days when bigger and better China bloggers graciously shared some of their traffic with me and linked to posts that I had written. But this blog was never really about readership. It was about my quest too learn about basketball in China, even if I couldn’t speak the language. I fear now, though, that all I’ve learned is that you can’t learn much of anything if you can’t talk with the people you want to learn about. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">That’s my excuse, and I’m sticking to it. </div>DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-43769448530998372392010-07-07T16:24:00.006+08:002012-08-18T17:12:26.579+08:00Wasted Possession: Alcohol and Hangovers in China<div style="font-family: inherit;">
<span style="font-size: small;">As a high school sophomore, we had basketball practices every Saturday morning, bright and early at 8 a.m. But just because we practiced early in the morn didn’t mean we were diligently tucked away the night before. Sophomore year, after all, was when fake IDs started floating around, when kids got their licenses to drive, when we started treating the sentence, “Her parents are out of town,” with the same reverence a priest might treat a passage from the Good Book. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">The 8 a.m. start time was likely intended, at least in part, to thwart any Friday night shenanigans. But it didn’t. We still went out, still got drunk, still made silly choices and then paid for it in the morning. A lot of us would go in there with headaches on account of the alcohol, and would then proceed to give our coaches headaches on account of our crappy play.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">After one particularly sluggish practice, one of the assistant coaches had us circle up for a little heart-to-heart. Coach Smith, or Smitty, was more of a football coach than basketball coach. He was round through the trunk with buzzed blonde hair, the type of hair you’d see on a drill sergeant or offensive line coach (the latter was his gig in the fall).</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">“Guys,” he began, “I want to say something about drinking. I know what it’s like being in high school, alright? But you can’t drink on Friday nights and then come out here and think you can play, alright? And I know some of you are drinking. I can smell it out there the second you start running around.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">There was a lightheartedness to this warning, and after the “I can smell it” line we all gave a little chuckle. Despite the district’s militant policy on student athletes and alcohol, we could tell that Smitty wasn’t out to get us in</span><span style="font-size: small;"> trouble. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">But before he was finished, and before we could go home and crash, Smitty looked right at me and, in front of everyone, said, “Man, you just look like a drinker.” </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">I don’t know how exactly a 16-year-old can look like a drinker. Maybe it was because my hair was a little shaggy. Or maybe my eyes were droopy. Or maybe I was a culprit of the sweaty-booze smell Smitty had identified on the court. I don’t know. But as people laughed at Smitty’s observations, I smiled sheepishly and nodded; I was in no position to deny it. (In a Costanzian moment, I realized on the way home that I should have shot back, “Yeah, well you look like a drinker too!” Or at least something about the Jerk Store.)</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Anyway, the reason for this anecdote, beside the tenuous link it gives me to place the ensuing words on a basketball blog, is that I wanted to play basketball today. I really did. But it simply wasn’t going to happen. Yes, it was hot, but that’s not why I didn’t ball. And yes, with my pending move to Denmark, and the accompanying logistical headaches that go with it, I have a lot on my mind. But that’s not why I didn’t play, either. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">No, I didn’t play ball today because I got a little, uh, <i>torn </i></span><span style="font-size: small; font-style: normal;">last night. And when you tie one on in China, you’re bound to be aching – bad – the next day. Hangovers are of course an international phenomenon. But hangovers in China are a different beast. This is the country that boasts the world’s biggest population, the world’s biggest mountain and, by my estimation, the world’s biggest hangovers. Hangovers that unequivocally prohibit you from playing basketball.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">I have been drinking on-and-off since high school (just ask Smitty), which gives me about eight years of drinking experience. I had a Keystone Light phase as a youngster, a Colorado micro brew infatuation when I got to college, a Heineken thing when I studied in the Netherlands, and a longstanding love affair with Budweiser all the while. Oh, and in the months preceding my move to China, I had a little fling with whiskey. Throw in several boxes of Franzia, an ill-fated one-night stand with Long Island Ice Tea and a typically American 21<sup>st</sup> birthday, and I know what’s what with alcohol and alcohol’s side effects.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">I’m not a drunk, but I’ve <i>been</i></span><span style="font-size: small; font-style: normal;"> drunk. As such, I have a well-honed understanding and appreciation for hangovers. And I’m telling you, there is no hangover like a Chinese hangover. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">One explanation for Chinese hangovers being in a league of their own is that the contents of a bottle of Chinese beer (or booze) are all second-rate: the water, the hops, the wheat, the malt, etc. The Chinese simply don’t seem to pay as much heed to the quality of beer as, say, Americans or the Dutch. Even when I was snatching up every $11.99 30-pack of Keystone I could find as a 16-year-old, there was never a day where I felt as <i>poisoned</i></span><span style="font-size: small; font-style: normal;"> as I do after drinking Chinese beer. It would require some in-depth investigative journalism (and the ability to speak a lick of Chinese) to really unearth the quality of ingredients that go into your average Chinese beer, but it ain’t high. It’s the same principle, more or less, behind the fact that foreigners who come to China often have bouts of food poisoning and diarrhea: the stuff the people put into their bodies here isn’t quite up to snuff compared with what we’re used to. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Then there is a more disgusting (and troubling) explanation: the formaldehyde that is put in the beer. Yes, formaldehyde, the stuff they use to preserve dead bodies. <a href="http://www.beer-faq.com/">Beer-faq.com</a> tackled <a href="http://www.beer-faq.com/formaldehyde-beer/">this issue</a> back in 2007:</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i>First of all, why on earth would breweries knowingly use formaldehyde? As it turns out it is a very inexpensive clarifying agent that lightens the color of the beer and extends its shelf life. Although some Chinese breweries claim that they have discontinued the practice, there are a number of beers sold in China that are very cheap and low quality (intended to be affordable to the masses), and it has been stated that these lower quality brews still use formaldehyde to keep costs down.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i>So how widespread is the use of formaldehyde in Chinese beer? I found a few articles dating back to 2005, where a representative of the China Alcoholic Drinks Industry Association (CADIA) is quoted as saying that 95% of the domestic beer in China has formaldehyde. What was that? Did you say 95% of domestic beers in China have a known cancer causing agent in them? Not really making me want to drink a Chinese beer.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">One reason that Chinese beer is reputed to use formaldehyde is that <a href="http://www.united-nations-of-beer.com/chinese-snow-beer.html">the malt used</a> in Chinese beer is of such low quality that it could rot otherwise. Or maybe the formaldehyde is used to <a href="http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m3469/is_30_56/ai_n14924166/">help clean</a> the bottles and disinfect the beer of any diseases. Either way, it speaks to my first point, that the ingredients in Chinese beer are second-rate: If you have to use formaldehyde as a preservative and cleaning agent, it’s probably an inferior product to begin with.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Another factor contributing to hangovers is the alcohol content of the beer. Chinese beer invariably has a lower alcohol content than in America. For instance, a big 600-ml bottle of Tsingtao – which is the most common medium for the nation’s most common beer – has an alcohol content of 3.1 percent. Other beers hover around that same number; some dip below three percent, none exceed five.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">So, why would lower alcohol content make hangovers <i>worse</i></span><span style="font-size: small; font-style: normal;">? Well, to achieve the same effect of, say, five 12-ounce American beers, you’d have to drink something like five 20-ounce Chinese beers. Indeed, a 20-ounce bottle at 3.1 percent alcohol has almost exactly as much alcohol as a 12-ounce bottle at five percent, so you have to suck down 100 ounces of Chinese beer to equal 60 ounces of real beer – er, American beer. Thus, when you drink Chinese beer, you’re simply going to ingest more ounces of beer, if not more alcohol. Thus, you’re ingesting more ounces of Chinese water, Chinese malt, Chinese formaldehyde. It’s not the next-day alcohol lingering in your system that causes the vaunted Chinese hangover; it’s all that other crap. But hey, at least if I were to die of a hangover my body would be relatively well-preserved.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Then there is fake alcohol – that is, alcohol that is sold as one thing but, after a swig, is revealed to be something else entirely. This happens with both beer and hard alcohol. One of my co-workers, a 24-year-old from Maryland, has a good story about seeing Pabst Blue Ribbon on a supermarket shelf in China. He was a PBR man in college, and seeing the quintessentially American brew lining a supermarket shelf in Jinan, China, of all places, infused him with a sense of obligation: I have to pay my respects and drink a few.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">So that’s what he did – he drank a few, only a few. Yet despite his moderation he awoke the next day with the worst hangover of his life. This wasn’t an issue of drinking a lot (he had but a couple cans). And it wasn’t an issue of drinking a variety of booze (just Pabst). No, it was an issue of the “Pabst Blue Ribbon” being a far cry from the real Pabst Blue Ribbon that has helped broke college kids (and hip 20-somethings) stay buzzed since 1844. This Chinese Pabst was a knockoff that no doubt betrayed the lofty brewing standards set forth by Jacob and Frederick Pabst.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">(Another fake alcohol story, if you’ll indulge me. Two guys I know took an overnight train ride a few years back. There are a few different ways in which you can take an overnight train. One is what’s called a soft sleeper, which is a room that has four relatively nice beds and a door to shun the noise and cigarette smoke that invariably fills Chinese trains. Another is a hard sleeper, which is like a soft sleeper but sans the door and with six beds instead of four; it’s a little more crowded, but totally serviceable. If you can’t procure a bed, then you are stuck sitting. My friends were unlucky enough to get stuck sitting. To ease the pain of this 22-hour overnight train ride, these guys bought a bottle of Jack Daniel’s, but because of the putrid taste and immediate nausea, they realized that the Jack was not Jack, but rather one of <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/up-fake-chinas-booming-fake-nba-market.html">China’s innumerable fake products</a>. One of my friends was quickly reduced to a floppy mess, and was forced to plop his head down on the table separating himself and the two Chinese people sitting across from him. With his forehead planted on his forearm, and his mouth aligned with the edge of the table, he suddenly vomited the contents of his stomach – a deplorable combination of noodles and Jack Daniels – all over the shared floor. Shortly thereafter he passed out cold, and for the rest of trip there was an stark role reversal: With a puddle of this foreigner’s puke at their feet, the Chinese people were in the odd position of <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/06/sick-move-ii.html%22">being grossed out</a> by a foreigner.) </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">OK, how about some other perspectives on fake booze? <a href="http://www.shenzhenparty.com/content/got_problem_fake_alcohol_then_vent_your_anger_and_opinion_here">This blogger</a> from China rants about fake alcohol thus: </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i>This is a huge problem in mainland china, not only in Shenzhen, but from my experience i think the major area that its happening, is down here. I have been to places where when you open the bottle it burns your eyes it is so badly, obviously and sickeningly fake</i></span><span style="font-size: small; font-style: normal;">.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">And <a 73="" catid="11&subcatid=" href="http://factsanddetails.com/china.php?itemid=">this Web site reports</a>: </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i>The poor often drink fake alcohol. There have been many reports of deaths and people going blind attributed to this practice. Poisonous, fake liquor left 40 people dead in Shanxi province in 1998….<o:p></o:p><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i>Bootleg bottles are also a problem. In a three month period in 1998, 470 people were injured by exploding bottles, including 27 blinded by flying glass. The daughter of migrant workers was killed by glass shrapnel from a bootleg bottle of beer that exploded in Shanghai. The problem was blamed on inferior bottles and bottles that had been recycled too many times.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">And <a href="http://www.beijingboyce.com/2007/03/15/fake-booze-consumer-rights-bar-wrongs/">a blogger</a> who goes by Beijing Boyce wrote:</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i>I can live with poor service, poor location, poor ambience, even poorly made drinks, but what I can’t live with is bars that lie about their booze….<o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i>I’m not alone in these sentiments. Last week, I asked two dozen readers their thoughts about Beijing’s drinking scene (full results in tomorrow’s newsletter). One theme: people are cautious about the alcohol in this city’s bars. Some snippets:<o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i>“…we all know about fake alcohol and just how much Beijing bars love the stuff: the situation is so bad in some parts of town that I just flat out to refuse to drink anything that isn’t beer – you just don’t know what you’re getting (and it’s not just small hole in the walls either)….<o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i>“Generally, buy stuff in bottles. Especially if you can see the staff open the bottle in front of you – it minimizes the risks of being served god knows what.”</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">And finally, <a href="http://www.chinacsr.com/en/2006/05/08/455-beijing-wine-stores-selling-counterfeit-alcohol/">this 2007 report</a>:</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i>In a check conducted before the May holiday, the Beijing Municipal Department of Industry and Commerce found that over half of the businesses that claim to sell real cigarettes and wine were actually selling counterfeit wines.<o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i>The department checked about 400 businesses including peddlers at shopping malls, supermarkets and restaurants before the holiday.<o:p></o:p><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i>The authorities confiscated 3937 bottles of unqualified alcohol that covered almost all the best-selling brands across China. The Industry and Commerce department has put these enterprises on probation, pending further penalties.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">I think fake booze may have been a big part of the problem with my crippling hangover today. After indulging in a mix of beer and wine, a crew of foreign teachers headed to a dance club. This particular club – like many others across China – likes to have foreigners milling about, and they’ll go out of their way to lure foreigners by offering them (us) free booze. When we got the club last night, we were immediately shown a table and gifted a bottle of Eristoff Vodka. Eristoff is, in theory, a “premium” vodka distributed by Bacardi. According to <a href="http://www.citydrinking.co.uk/news/type/general/eristoff-new-premium-vodka-coming-to-uk">one England publication</a>, “ERISTOFF is a high quality premium vodka - made from 100% pure wheat, triple distilled and charcoal filtered for absolute purity. At 37.5% ABV Eristoff has an exceptionally pure, clean, dry flavour and can be drunk neat or with a wide selection of mixers.” Well, it wasn’t 100 percent anything but nasty. Even as far as vodka goes, it was rank and vile. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Of course, there is the possibility that I’m just getting a little old for this type of chicanery, for pre-drinking and going to clubs and tearing through bottles of vodka. I am now less than three weeks away from my 25<sup>th</sup> birthday. At some point, it seems like I’ll have to give up on forays deep into the a.m. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">So, that’s why I didn’t play ball today, and why I am not drinking tonight…or any night in the next several. Tomorrow there should be basketball. Now, though, I must retreat to ibuprofen, sprite and my bed. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-92078612064168581832010-07-05T16:41:00.001+08:002011-04-02T18:18:48.898+08:00Spurning Soccer For Basketball: An American Sports EpidemicJinan is subject to what meteorologists call “temperature inversions.” I can’t claim to completely understand what temperature inversions are, but <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://www.weatherquestions.com/What_is_a_temperature_inversion.htm">from what</a> I <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inversion_%28meteorology%29">have gathered</a>, a temperature inversion is an anomalous layer of air in the atmosphere that acts like a cap or lid, preventing normal weather meteorological occurrences from occurring. Hot air under the inversion can’t escape upward (which it usually does), and cooler air from above can’t trickle down to the ground (which it usually does). <br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">The best image I can conjure is the door of a sauna. Regardless of what may be going on in the area outside a sauna, the door acts as a barrier, thwarting any cool, dry air that may otherwise seep into the room. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">I’m quickly learning that, during the summer, Jinan is that sauna. The inversion to which Jinan is subject keeps the city’s bountiful heat, humidity and smog on the ground, allowing it to accumulate into a dizzying tonic that you can almost reach out and grab. Now, I’m from Kansas City, so I grew up with heat and humidity. But there is something different about the heat and humidity in Jinan, probably because it is infused with such a healthy dose of pollution and airborne crud. It’s hard to describe without having actually walked around in it. Just trust me that it’s gross, oppressive. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">Still, where there are basketball courts and free-time, I can’t help but want to hoop. So my buddy Jonathan, who you may remember from the <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/first-team-all-swindle-ii.html">swindle post</a>, and I decide to head over to Li Ball’s court at about 4:30. Maybe there will be people playing, and if not, oh well; we’ll play each other. The heat is a little less oppressive than it was a few hours earlier, but not much. After all, the inversion in the atmosphere does to ground-level heat what a tourniquet does to blood: it prevents it from going anywhere. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">We are sweating by the time I stop at a little shop to buy water three minutes into the walk there. I spurn the refrigerator and its cold water and instead buy four bottles of water that are the same tepid temperature of the little shop in which they were sitting. Jonathan, who seems to be almost annoyed by my affinity for warm and hot water, informs me that he has three bottles that, for the past three hours, have been cooling in his freezer. I shudder at the thought of feeling the sharp, prickly feeling of ice-cold water shocking my insides; I forgo my usual public health announcement that <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/06/some-like-it-hot.html">cold water causes cancer, while hot water prevents cancer (and even relieves stress!)</a>. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">After a lazy 10-minute walk we round the corner into the apartment complex which houses Li Ball’s court. As we make the turn, we realize that, like a pair of high schoolers didn’t bring No. 2s to the SATs, we didn’t bring a ball to the basketball court. And there is no one else playing, which means no balls anywhere. This is a distressing revelation, for it means that one (or both) of us will have to retrace our steps back to the apartment, and then once <i>again </i><span style="font-style: normal;">back to the court. It’s annoying on a practical level, and downright aggravating in light of the fact that sweat has already seeped through our shirts. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">At this moment I hear someone call my name from behind. It is no doubt a Chinese person, for the V is David is not pronounced like a V, but instead a W. There is no real V sound in Chinese, which insures that there is no real way for a Chinese person who didn’t major in English to ever say my name right. Take a moment to try to say David without even touching your top set of teeth to your lips; that’s how David sounds when a Chinese person says it. (This no V thing also seriously complicates teaching the number “5.” Invariably, it comes out sounding like “fi” with a W and three vowels tagged onto the end: fiwaue. At least when <i>my </i><span style="font-style: normal;">kids try it.)</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">The person who said my name is a regular at Li Ball’s court, someone, if memory serves, who has been there every single time I have. He is a totally normal looking man, probably about 40. Average height, decent looking, a full head of hair that is combed to the side. I have a rapport with this guy, so we exchange pleasantries the best we can for sharing a combined 48 words. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">I tell him that we do not have a ball: <i>Women meiyou qiu.</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> I learned each of these words on Jinan’s basketball courts: </span><i>women</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, or </span><i>we</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, I learned from people saying, “Our ball”; </span><i>meiyou</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, or </span><i>don’t have</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, I learned because people shout it when someone takes a stupid shot; </span><i>qui </i><span style="font-style: normal;">I learned because…well, that’s a no-brainer. The man nods understandingly and tells me that that is no problem. He either does not understand the quandary or knows where a ball is at the apartment complex. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">The latter is true. When we step foot on the court he points to the near baseline and seems to tell us to stay put. He then walks slowly to the other end of the court, the way you walk when it’s a million degrees outside. He mosies past the other baseline and opens what appears to be a closet on the ground floor of the apartment. Sure enough, he emerges with a ball and rolls it from about 50 feet away. It’s a strike, beelining to my feet as though guided by some invisible force. He waves and walks off; he’s not playing today.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">Jonathan and I play a few games of one-on-one before the heat-induced fatigue/laziness reduces us to just shooting around. Our unspoken conclusion seems to be that, with the weather the way it is, there really is no point to turning this into a rigorous exercise session; that could do more harm than good. So we just shoot around, sweat and chat. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">We spend a good bit of time talking about basketball, about his Celtics, about whether or not Tom Izzo would make a good NBA coach, about how Derrick Rose is going to be better than Dwyane Wade over the next five years but no pundits want to say it. Eventually, though, our conversation turns to soccer. We are in the throes of the world’s greatest sporting event, the World Cup, and soccer is on our minds. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">After a few minutes, I say something about soccer that is without a doubt true: I could have been better at soccer than any other sport, including basketball. Jonathan quickly and earnestly responds, “Yeah, me too.” </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">To me, this is pretty incredible: Two guys who embraced basketball over soccer, though they both acknowledge that they could have been better at soccer.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">My body is much more built for soccer than basketball, the sport which stole my heart and ultimately prevented me from ever cultivating my potential soccer talent. I am a hair under 5-11, which is hardly an ideal height for basketball, a sport which, more than any other, discriminates in the favor of vertical giants. What’s more, I am not a great jumper. I have the hops to shoot jump shots, but not to really soar the way that would be required if I were ever to become a truly formidable athlete on the basketball court. I’m also thick through the legs – mom used to call me “Thunder Thighs” – which seems to be a common denominator among <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://annyland.files.wordpress.com/2009/09/carlos_tevez.jpg">some</a> of <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://waynerooney.iconwow.com/waynerooney_3.jpg">the world’s</a> best footballers. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">Body aside, my ability to play soccer belied how much I cared about it. That is, I was always good in little league even though I never played or cared about the sport. Had I cared, who knows? The skills that are required of basketball – limitless energy, ability to understand passing angles, knowing how to play physically but not recklessly – made me a good soccer player when I played on rec teams all through grade school. But once middle school hit, and once I started devoting my weekends to basketball tournaments and trips to inner-city gyms in Kansas City, Mo., soccer was nixed from the mix. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">Jonathan’s story is not dissimilar. He played soccer all through grade school, but he never <i>really</i> devoted himself to the sport the way he did basketball. He is tall and strong and coordinated, and like me his build is more suited for the pitch than the court. (Importantly, he is tall only on a normal-person scale, not a basketball-player scale. He’s probably 6-3, which is the height of many quality guards. That is not, however, the height of quality forwards, which is what Jonathan always played growing up.) </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">So, here we have two fairly athletic 24-year-olds, each of whom played soccer, and played soccer pretty well, even though we never really cared about it. Alas, each of us spurned soccer in lieu of basketball, a sport that, per the physical abnormalities required to play it at an elite level, we couldn’t <i>really</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> thrive at. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">That’s not to say we wasted our time with basketball, or that we harbor regrets about our sport of choice, or that we aren’t good at basketball. I was, after all, invited to walk-on at my Div. II university on the strength of my buttery shooting touch, and I will always be good enough to get picked up when I played at random gyms because the ability to rain jump shots is a skill that even the tallest and springiest of basketball players don’t often possess. And while my basketball experiences with Jonathan are confined to the courts of China, I’m sure that he, too, will never have trouble playing pick-up ball because, even though he’s short by NBA standards, he’s no midget. An athletic six-foot-three guy, like a guy who can rain jump shots, will always be a commodity in non-competitive hoops.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">But the fact that we never devoted ourselves to soccer is a telling (and damning) testament to the sport’s place among American youth. Just think: The United States hosted the World Cup in 1994, when we were both impressionable eight-year-olds. We both watched that Cup (and all ensuing Cups) zealously, for while we ultimately didn’t choose soccer, we nonetheless appreciate and enjoy the game. Still, we couldn’t be bothered to dedicate ourselves to soccer: Despite the fact that so-so white athletes are the minute minority in the upper-reaches of the basketball world, we made the conscious choice of basketball over soccer. That is, we chose a sport (basketball) in which we were resigned to relative mediocrity over a sport (soccer) in which we had the physical tools to compete at a higher (if not elite) level. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">And this is what has always happened in America, and likely what will continue to happen, even with the endearing 2010 U.S. squad’s jaunt to the knockout round in this year’s World Cup. Kids rarely choose soccer, even if it makes sense for them to do so.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">As I watched the States’ final game again Ghana, I couldn’t help but imagine what it would have been like had, say, LeBron James opted for soccer. Every time Landon Donovan lofted a searching ball into the box – balls which invariably skirted across the tops of the U.S. players’ heads – I fantasized about LeBron soaring in to head one home. And while guys who, like LeBron, are 6-foot-8 don’t oft succeed at the highest levels of international soccer, you can’t convince me that he wouldn’t be a kick ass soccer player. He is a true physical anomaly, a never-before-seen mix of power, athleticism and coordination. Remember, <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://www.jockbio.com/Bios/James/James_bio.html">had a scholarship offer</a> to play wide receiver at Ohio State, even though he was the nation’s best high school basketball player. Someone who could have played at one of the top football universities in the nation but instead opted to become the first overall pick in the NBA Draft surely could have learned to play soccer, right? </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">It’s easy to envision a number of top-flight American athletes playing soccer. What if you put Tennessee Titans running back Chris Johnson out on the wing? Or the majestically coordinated Chris Paul in midfield? Had these guys been born in any other country in the world, they would have likely been trying to cultivate their immense physical attributes into soccer skills. Instead, they’re playing American sports. Which is exactly what Jonathan and I did.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">Look, I’m not saying that Jonathan and I would have been anything special at soccer. Could we have played in high school? Yes. Could we have played at a small-time university? Maybe. Could we have played in the World Cup? Certainly not. But even if we aren’t world-class caliber athletes, our story rings true across the country: Kids who knew full well that they were better suited for soccer <i>still </i><span style="font-style: normal;">chose to devote themselves to basketball. And are still devoting themselves to basketball. </span></div>DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-26462667800459873642010-06-30T12:03:00.000+08:002010-06-30T12:08:34.098+08:00Cultural Crossover Comment ChatOnline proxy servers are like a set of keys to a never-ending series of locks. They have allowed me to get on Facebook, check out Twitter and keep tabs on a variety of blogs, including some of my favorites like <a href=" http://markschinablog.blogspot.com">this</a> and <a href=" http://joeposnanski.com/JoeBlog/">this</a> and <a href=" http://joeposnanski.com/JoeBlog/">this</a>. These sits, of course, are otherwise inaccessible in China because of the expansive Great Fire Wall of China. <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">One thing that proxy servers can’t do, however, is allow me to post comments on my blog. (At least the proxies that I use.) There have been a number of comments that were insightful, and a few more that asked me specific questions or made specific criticisms. But I have never responded to any of these comments – not because I didn’t want to, but because I can’t. Don’t ask me why I can post articles but not leave comments. (Don’t ask, either, why a blog about basketball is blacklisted in China.) </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">So in light of the fact that people have left some comments on my blog, and in light of the fact that comment board banter is, at this time, impossible for me to engage in, I’d like to discuss some of the comments that have been left.<span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">This first one is from Cultural Crossover’s No. 1 commenter, Hopfrog. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>First off, your being a total wuss, more on that later…. <o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>You know how many success stories begin with “I was down to my last dollar....” or “I hocked everything we owned...”. Your going to sit on the sideline because of some debt? Yeah, a big arse chunk of debt, but are we talking about your dreams or just some job you think would be ‘neat’. It sounds to me like this is your dream man, and if thats the case, it shouldn’t even be a question. People that know you probably don’t want to tell you to go for it, and feel guilty if you don’t make it and become straddled with debt.<o:p></o:p></i></p> <span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>Sure, there is a point to be made that it is a different world now, but come on, who’s getting that job with SI or ESPN, the guy with talent and a NW journalism degree, or the guy with talent who really wrote some cool stuff on his blog!...<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--><br /></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>If its not really your dream, then please, don’t even think about doing it. But you clearly have the talent and if this is the one thing that you really want to do with your life, well, then....<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--><br /></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>Sack up!<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">This comment was in response to a three-part post that <a href=" http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/first-team-all-swindle-i.html">began</a> with my angst over graduate school and <a href=" http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/first-team-all-swindle-ii.html">ended with</a> a <a href=" http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/first-team-all-swindle-iii.html">lengthy discussion</a> about swindles in China. (By virtue of having been linked to my mega-China blogger <a href=" http://www.danwei.org/">Danwei</a>, I think these may be my most-read posts.)<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">At the time, I was mired in contemplation/anxiety about whether or not to attend Northwestern’s prestigious master’s in journalism program at the world-renowned Medill School of Journalism. Any frequenters of the blog, or anyone who read the <a href=" http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010_04_04_archive.html">biographical posts</a> at the outset of Cultural Crossover, knows about my journalistic ambitions. I want to be a sportswriter but, having graduated into the shitshow that was the 2008 U.S. Economy – and the coinciding implosion of American newspapers – I couldn’t find meaningful work to save my life. After some freelancing gigs, a too-long stint at a local library and a few heartbreakingly close sniffs at newspaper jobs, I became resigned to the fact that I may as well escape my parents house and go teach in China. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I never wanted to become a lifer in China, however, so I took the GRE right before I left and then applied to graduate schools during the bleak Jinan winter. Sending out applications endowed me with a moment of hope-inspired warmth before I would leave the post office and traipse down the smoggy and bone-chilling streets of Jinan. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I heard back in March that I was accepted to Northwestern’s journalism program among a few others. This was huge news for a wannabe journalist like me because Northwestern is simply THE program for journalism. (Sorry, Missouri. It’s true.) <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">The problem, though, is that the one-year NU program costs a comical $84,000. What’s more, they offered me only $12,000 in scholarships. Thus, to attend Northwestern, I would have to swallow $72,000 in debt (about $95,000 after interest, according to a financial advisor). <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Now, 72K isn’t a big deal in the world of law, or the world of medicine, or business. But journalism? Boy, that’s a gamble. So I shot out emails to a bunch of trusted confidants in the journalism biz, and not a one told me to jump at the opportunity. Instead, they all talked about (a) how a master’s degree could help me be a teacher, and (b) how a master’s wouldn’t guarantee a job in the industry, how it wouldn’t impress anyone. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">In that initial post, I surmised: <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;">So there it is – how it’s possible to have the best news of the year turn into the worst news. <i>Congratulations! You, the 24-year-old desperate to be a journalist, have been admitted to the best journalism school in the country (world?)! Now, here’s your piddly financial aid package. Go find $70,000 – psst…it’ll be more like $95,000 when all is said and done – and come on board!</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--><br /></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;">Part of me wonders if I am just being a wuss, if I need to bite the bullet and swallow the debt if this is really what I want to do. Another part of me wonders if that is a decision that could ruin the next 10 years of my life.<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Well, Hopfrog gave his opinion: That I was being a wuss. That if I really wanted to be a journalist – and wasn’t just paying lip service to the idea for dramatic effect – then it would be foolish (and wuss) of me not to go to Northwestern. And that’s fair. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">In the end, though, I decided not to heed Hopfrog’s advice, and punted on Northwestern. (Actually I deferred my enrollment, so I could, in theory, go there next year. But I will never, ever pay $70,000-plus for a degree that doesn’t guarantee me a job that I want, and there is no journalism degree, not even from Northwestern, that could insure a job.) </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Hopfrog makes valid points, but I don’t know that he has enough of a grasp on how bleak the U.S. journalism industry is right now. It’s worse than stagnant. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">If I were to go to Northwestern, I would finish up in August of 2011 and be $70,000 in the hole. Even supposing that the U.S. economy begins to right itself (hardly a surefire proposition), the journalism industry will still be turned on its head. Bloggers and fan sites and ESPN will own such a huge chunk of the industry that it just isn’t a good bet to think that a degree from Northwestern will be a ticket to a job. It doesn’t work like that <i>if there are no jobs</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Maybe I could find a job at a smaller paper, in a place like Lawrence, Kan., or Bloomington, Ind. – some college town or something similar. But those gigs pay in the $30,000 range, and if I were coughing up $9,500 a year to pay off loans, then I am basically working a $20,000 per year job. And maybe I could catch on with an online outlet, but the problem with online journalism at the moment – really, the systemic problem with the industry as a whole – is that online journalism isn’t generating any money.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">My prediction – and I want to get in print so I can have a good <i>I told you so!</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> to play with in the future – is that Northwestern (and every crazily expensive journalism school) is going to cut its prices DRASTICALLY in the next three years, five years max. My prediction is that the crop of kids going to Northwestern and Columbia and Missouri in 2010 will go down as one of the last ones to get duped into paying anywhere near</span><i> </i><span style="font-style: normal;">that much money for the chance to enjoy unemployment in a crumbling industry. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Think about it. Newspapers (and the journalism industry as a whole) really <a href=" http://newspaperlayoffs.com/">started to fall apart</a> in 2008. The group of kids that would have gone to graduate school for journalism in the fall of 2008 were already signed up by the time papers started sharing copy, by the time long-time writers began to get the axe, by the time that even the most qualified youngsters couldn’t get that first job (me among them). The 2009 crew knew what was happening, but when they were accepted in early ’09, they could have still deluded themselves into thinking that the economy and journalism industry would right itself in the next year or so. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Now this 2010 group, which like me was accepted into these schools in early 2010, will be at the mercy of the new face of journalism: Bloggers who are more on top of stories than anyone (but don’t make dick for money), a shrinking number of <a href=" http://espn.com/">outlets that occupy</a> a growing chunk of the market, newspapers and magazine that are paper thin, that are still shedding staff, that appear to accepting that theirs is a fate of less content and fewer writers.<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">So, that’s why I am not going to go to Northwestern. <i>Charging $84,000 for a one-year program in journalism, even if it comes with the Northwestern brand name, is tantamount to a money grab.</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> Northwestern and other schools could charge that much in years past under the guise that it would land kids a job in the industry. Well, not anymore. The industry that we knew is gone, and so are the jobs that warrant paying that much for a degree. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">This is one of the last years that people who are smart enough to get into the program will be foolish enough to not see the writing on the wall. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">What I’ll be doing instead of Northwestern is getting a Master’s degree in journalism from a well-reputed Danish university, starting this fall. I received a full tuition scholarship, and I am confident that I can cobble together enough money to pay for the living expenses in Denmark. I have absolutely no disillusions that a master’s degree from Denmark will be some invaluable asset when I graduate and try to get a job in the States. Indeed, employers may scoff at the idea of hiring someone who went to school in Europe. But then again, the chance to attend school in a country like Denmark and not pay a dime for tuition is cool unto itself. Cooler than being saddled with $10,000 of debt each year until I’m 36. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p style="text-align: center;" class="MsoNormal"><c>***</c><i><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>Just wanted to agree - White Men can't Jump really is a classic - for a basketball player who only got into the game (from the UK) at 16 in the mid-90s it showed what basketball could be. The other one I'd describe as a classic if “He got game”.<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--><br /></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>Never got into the stretching thing before the game though... even living in China.<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Doug made this comment on <a href=" http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/06/this-might-be-stretch-but.html">a post</a> that used the film (work of art, really) White Men Can’t Jump as a springboard to talk about stretching in China. You see, in White Men Can’t Jump, there is a great scene where the movie’s lone white man, named Billy Hoyle (played by Woody Harrelson), is stretching along the sidelines. He is mocked by the all-black cohort of players, including his future buddy and teammate, Sidney Dean (Wesley Snipes). “What’s this mother f&*% doing? Stretching?” </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Unlike Doug, I was never quite as into He Got Game. It does have some awesome scenes. But there are also aspects of it that are shamelessly superfluous, seemingly little more than a way for Spike Lee to make the film 30 to 45 minutes longer than it actually should be. Seriously, why does the dad of Jesus Shuttlesworth need to develop a love affair with a prostitute? Couldn’t he have just gotten a prostitute, and that could be that? That storyline goes nowhere, yet still Lee dedicates a not insignificant chunk of the movie to Papa Shuttlesworth’s courtship of a hooker, in the process forfeiting an incalculable number of chances to show Ray Allen jump shots. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Anyway, I still love the Chinese’s gratuitous stretching, and the fact that I can walk down the street flapping my arms or holding my hands high above my head and not get looked at like I’m some sort of freak. Strike that – in Jinan, anyone with white skin gets looked at like they’re a freak. But at least I’m not getting the raised eyebrow because I’m stretching. Just because I’m a white man (who, by the way, can’t jump). <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p style="text-align: center;" class="MsoNormal"><c>***</c><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>Interesting stats about lefties. Being one myself, I guess I never knew that only ~11% of us are that way. For what it is worth, four of my nine players on our youth basketball team were lefties. Three of them were guards. I think lefties have an advantage, especially in youth hoops because defenders just aren't used to guarding their strong hand.<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Jim V left this comment on “<a href=" http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/no-south-paws-in-far-east.html">No South Paws in the Far East</a>,” a post about how lefthandedness is discouraged in China and, by extension, how there are no lefty ball players. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I totally agree, Jim, that it throws off youngsters when they try to guard lefties. It’s a quirky thing to deal with. What’s also neat about lefty ballers is that they look downright <i>cool </i><span style="font-style: normal;">when they play basketball, or at least when they shoot. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a sweeter jump shot than former Missouri star (and therefore sworn nemesis) Kareem Rush, who had this buttery lefty stroke that, if flipped to the right, would probably just look like any old run-of-the-mill J. Other aesthetically pleasing left-handed shooters: 2010 Kansas Jayhawks freshman Xavier Henry; Milwaukee Bucks guard Michael Redd; former NBA guard and pothead Damon Stoudamire. No word on whether or not Jim V’s stroke is pure or not. </span></p> <p style="text-align: center;" class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p><div style="text-align: center;"> </div><p style="text-align: center;" class="MsoNormal"><c>***</c></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.25in;"><i>Michael Jacksson said...<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.25in;"><i>buy viagra<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.25in;"><i>viagra online<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.25in;"><i>generic Viagra<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Michael Jacksson left this on what was, in my mind, one of this blog’s better posts, “<a href=" http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/up-fake-chinas-booming-fake-nba-market.html">Up Fake: China’s Booming Fake NBA Market</a>”. The post dealt with the interesting topic of fake, or <i>jiade</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, goods in China, particularly the fake NBA stuff, which I seem to see every single day. Thanks for reading, Michael. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p style="text-align: center;" class="MsoNormal"><c>***</c><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>I have been loving your writing and particularly love that you are Suns fan. I caught the Spurs Suns game on Sunday morning where Dragic the Dragon played an amazing 4th quarter (talk about spindly!!) and where Barbosa really showed up. I don't know about Jinan, but here in Beijing I thought the Meng Niu ads with highlights were really cool... I mean the milk graphics and a milk BBall!! WTF?<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--><br /></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>But I hear you on the commentary.. I have been following to Suns here in China since I moved here from Phoenix in 1995 (yep, i was in Phoenix during Sir Charles and Thunder Dan's days!!) and have had lots of fun picking up Bball vocab to talk NBA with the Beijing taxi drivers.…<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Thanks, Tianrui. I appreciate it. I wrote <a href=" http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/basketball-and-breakfast.html">that post</a> before the Suns’ season was ended in sickening fashion by the Lakers. One can’t help but wonder if they would have won that Lakers series had Ron Artest not put in that buzzer-beater in Game 5. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I went nuts when Jason Richardson banked in that ridiculous three-pointer to tie the game. Of course, as luck would have it, Kobe Bryant – the best clutch jump shooter in the game – then proceeded to airball his game-winning attempt by five feet, and Artest squirted in there to get the rebound and put up that awkward, old-man lay-up. Killer way to go out, but then again, it’s a Steve Nash team, so it’s only fitting that there was a dastardly twist. With Nash, a loss is never just a loss.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">It’s just incredible to think about the various ways in which Steve Nash has been screwed over in the playoffs: Tim Donaghy fixing games in 2007, Tim Duncan’s hitting his first three-pointer of the season in 2008, Ron Artest playing the role of hero in 2010. I don’t feel too sorry for guys who get paid millions upon millions to play basketball, but if I did, I’d definitely feel for Steve. And now that Amare Stoudamire has opted out of his contract, and now that Jason Richardson and Grant Hill and Steve Nash are all a year older, it really is a shame he won’t win a title. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p style="text-align: center;" class="MsoNormal"><c>***</c></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>The slang in Beijing is mostly the same, </i><span style="font-family: "Arial Unicode MS";"><i>我靠</i></span><i> tends to be what I hear most often in terms of beifanghua.<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Jim wrote this on <a href=" http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-11-say-what.html">a post</a> dedicated to the different slang terms that I hear on the basketball court here in China. Even when I return to the States, I have every intention of shouting <i>Mea you!!! </i><span style="font-style: normal;">when someone takes a stupid shot. The term – which is prevalent on courts in China – means “don’t have,” and is pronounced more or less like mayo. People will think I’m talking about condiments. I give it a two percent change of catching on and becoming a nationwide phenomenon. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p style="text-align: center;" class="MsoNormal"><c>***</c><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>Have you thought about foregoing this blog and pitching this idea to a book publishing company?<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Jim V wrote this on <a href=" http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/crossed-over-ii_10.html">an early post</a> when I laid out what this blog was about. To be honest, yes, I have thought about trying to write a book about basketball in China. But my apathy toward learning this bizarre language will probably prevent such a thing from ever happening. Since you brought it up, though, I’m convinced that I should write a book about something, if not playing basketball in China. A book would be a way for me to write non-fiction and at the same time skirt the journalism industry, which, of course, doesn’t seem to have any interest in ever welcoming me aboard. I can mark you down for a copy, right?</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p style="text-align: center;" class="MsoNormal"><c>***</c></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i><span style=""> </span>Hi,<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i><span style=""> </span>Being a Bball nut also, I thoroughly enjoyed your post on the Chinese BBall experience.<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--><br /></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i><span style=""> </span>I guess Bball skills brings out the “macho man” in most of us and keeping score and dominating is affirmation of manhood.<o:p></o:p><br /></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i><br /></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>Maybe, the average Chinese Bballer is less “confrontational” or competitive in some of these situations since they know each other well ( and each others families ? ).<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--><br /></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>I know that when I played ping pong ( table tennis ) with skilled players , they didn’t try and beat me to death and make me cry. :)</i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i><br /></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>They were gracious and give up a few points here and there.<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.25in;"><span style=""> </span><i>Thanks, LA Guy<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">LA Guy has an interesting theory, which he discusses on an <a href=" http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-3-not-keeping-score-learning_11.html">early post</a> in which I express my bafflement at how Chinese players often don’t keep score. In the States, I’ve rarely played in games where people don’t keep score. There are any number of way in which score is kept. In HORSE we use letters; in five-on-five it’s generally the case that threes count as twos, and twos as ones; in “21” everyone seems to have their own nuanced scoring system. My experience in the States was that unless you’re playing by yourself, basketball is a competitive endeavor. Not so here.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p style="text-align: center;" class="MsoNormal"><c>***</c></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>I was in Orlando when we first got T Mac and he was going to be the guy that got us over the top. Of course, we heard that when we got Penny, and when we got Shaq, and what we really got was swept by the Rockets.<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>It was clear early on that T Mac wasn’t going to win any championships. For pretty much the same reasons that I don’t see Orlando doing squat with Vince Carter.<o:p></o:p><br /></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i><br /></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.25in 0.0001pt;"><i>My immediate guess for his popularity was for being a Rocket and your entry confirmed it. At least Shane Battier gives 100% and has become a defensive monster, he deserves to be popular somewhere. I’ll take a team player like that over the T Macs anyday….<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Hopfrog left this comment on <a href=" http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-22-yao-erful-words-ii.html">this post</a> – one of my favorites – which discussed the popularity of Tracy McGrady and then looked at why T-Mac is still popular here ever though he can hardly play anymore. The Cliff Notes on his popularity: Yao Ming and adidas.<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">That’s it for now. Thanks as always to everyone who reads this and comments. I appreciate it. Until next time…<o:p></o:p></p> <!--EndFragment-->DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-58400617151751460542010-06-26T06:23:00.000+08:002010-06-26T06:24:19.864+08:00A Sick Move, ILi Ball’s court, first introduced <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-24-new-court-i.html">here</a>, has become my go-to spot to play basketball here in Jinan. When I started this blog, I figured Shandong Normal University would be where most of my balling took place. That is, after all, where I first developed any sort of camaraderie with Chinese players, and where I thought I could establish myself as a regular with people who were more or less my own age.<br /><br />Indeed, I still make the trek over to SNU sometimes. But Li Ball’s court, which is right up the street, has supplanted it as my favorite place to play for reasons that transcend proximity (although in a city of millions with shoddy public transportation, and with a motor bike that is broken as often as it’s not, proximity does play a factor). The backboards at Li’s court are glass, the balls are always properly inflated (and won’t scrape the clouds like they often do at SNU), the court is perfectly flat. The flatness of a court, at home, would be a no-brainer – like saying an infield had dirt. But in China, where cracks and divots and cancerous lumps dot courts everywhere, having a flat court is a veritable luxury.<br /><br /><img src="http://i933.photobucket.com/albums/ad171/vrani/liballI.jpg" alt="li ball I" border="0" /><br />Li Ball is the one in the white shirt.<br /><br />And then there are the players themselves, starting with Li Ball, who I like to think of as the court’s Don Corleone. There he is, after the games have ended, welcoming the players over the base of the goal where he sits to cool down. “What is it?” he would say. “What can I do for you? You know I can’t say no on the day of a basketball game.”<br /><br />Even if Li doesn’t possess Corleone-type power, he is nonetheless the most prominent figure at the courts. He is the one who always calls me to play; he is the one who dictates the teams; and often times instead of playing he’ll instead stand attention along the sidelines, dishing out officiating decrees and announcing the score in a way that is never questioned. This is a welcome change from the games I used to play at my old stomping grounds, 24 Hours Fitness in Kansas City, Mo. There, berserk argument would erupt about the score at least once a week. There was of course bickering about foul call, which is to be expected. But the score is the one thing that is subject to the unbending edicts of mathematics, and even that would inspire incredulous shouting and cussing the likes of which never failed to make me laugh (and cringe) with exasperation. Sometimes when these arguments would flare up, I would just dip out in the hallway and get a drink of water while people bitched about the score. All too often, nothing was settled when I came back. Part of the problem was ego; part of the problem was that if a team lost, they could be sitting for up to 30 or 40 minutes. Thus, no one wanted to lose, even if it meant forgetting/flubbing the score in your favor.<br /><br />There is none of that hear, though. Li Ball is in control.<br /><br /><img src="http://i933.photobucket.com/albums/ad171/vrani/liballII.jpg" alt="li ball II" border="0" /><br />There even seems to be less smog when I play at this court.<br /><br />The other players are cool too. I have been introduced to them all, but for the life of me I can’t remember their names (save the short fat dude who introduced himself as Tom). I know their faces, though, and I have even run into a couple of them out on the streets of Jinan, never far from the courts themselves. They range in age from young (a handful of 20-somethings) to old (30 to 45). Before long I’ll join that second segment of the playing population, all those 30-plus year-olds who have lost their hops and have to increasingly rely on guile to get things done on the court. Thankfully, I’m not at the age yet. I still have a few ounces of athleticism floating around in my legs, though I know it will soon leak out. There are a few other guys who still possess my sprightliness, and I invariably end up guarding them. (Linguistic note: In America, defensive lingo is always a variation of the verb have. Something like, “I have this guy,” or, “I’ll get him,” or, “I got ball.” In China, the verb for playing defense it look or watch, as in, “You watch him,” which translates to “Ni kan ta.” – “You look him.”)<br /><br />Bottom line, the court is great, there are always games to be played, and everyone is nice – no <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/interview-request-ii.html">malicious elbows</a> to the head, no long stints sitting – even if you lose. As such, Li Ball is who I call if I want to play.DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-27337095721356052342010-06-26T06:21:00.002+08:002010-10-23T18:46:49.607+08:00A Sick Move, IIThere is, however, one big drawback to Li Ball’s court: It’s dirty as hell. This uncleanliness is hardly unique to Li’s court.; maybe it’s just more noticeable because there are few other defects. Today one of the regulars has taken a big broom – essentially a long wooden stick with a bunch of wispy bits of straw on the end – and is doing a<span style=""> </span>windshield-wiper motion along the baseline. In the process, he is sending plumes of dust into the air that force people to scatter out of the way. I don’t how much of an impact this has: Even with the housekeeping, whenever anyone takes a dribble, dust is displaced like water that has been struck with a rock. <o:p></o:p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Now, basketball is hardly a sanitary activity. Really, anytime a bunch of guys are clamoring to handle something (cards, video game controllers, etc.), it pretty much can’t be clean. I get that. But when you look at your hands after playing a few minutes of basketball in China…wow. It’s disgusting. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">And while it could well be true that dirt isn’t all that dirty, it’s not just dirt that makes China dirty. Which brings us to a larger point about China in general. Like Li’s court, it’s dirty as hell. The polluted air is what you hear about when people talk of how dirty China is, and that’s <a><span style=""> </span></a><a href="http://www.scientificblogging.com/graphics/beijing%20car%20pollution.jpeg">not an exaggeration</a>. But now that I’ve been here for 10 months, the smog’s not even what bothers me anymore. It’s the dirtiness, the <i>germiness</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I came to China a little on the OCD side about germs. But instead of curing me of my germ aversion, China has merely made me more sensitive to it. And there are any number of things that Chinese people do that are downright <i>gross</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. (Having now reread this post, I don’t know if there is any way for me to make this not sound discriminatory: </span><i>the Chinese do a lot of gross stuff</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. But at the same time, I don’t know if there is any way to dispute the claim that, by the American standards I grew up with, it’s not true. That’s not to say the Chinese are stupid or mean or savage or lesser. I’m just saying that they have some tendencies that would never fly in America – just like Americans have tendencies that wouldn’t fly in China. I know that I am speaking from an American viewpoint, not a privileged viewpoint. Heck, maybe America is just too sensitive to cleanliness. <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/health/27brod.html?_r=" scp="1&sq=" st="cse">This article</a> and <a hrer="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/29/magazine/29wwln-essay-t.html">this article</a> seem to hint at just that.)<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">You can’t walk one block on any remotely-populated street and not hear someone make a deep, guttural hacking sound – a telltale prelude to a huge loogy. Just yesterday I got off a train (I spent the last 10 days in Chengdu, hence the dearth of recent posts), and at the exit gate I looked down to see a pair of stringy, yellow-green clusters of <i>stuff </i><span style="font-style: normal;">that used to reside in the area between someone’s mouth and lungs. To be fair, at least this person cleared their throat </span><i>after</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> they got off the train, which is more than can be said for innumerable people who added that putrid, hacking noise to the soundtrack of the 30-hour train ride. And in a land of 300,000,000 smokers, I can assure this is a never ending soundtrack. The staircases at my school, where parents conglomerate to wait for their children, are another hotbed for spitting. Really, all of China is a <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/17/world/asia/17manners.html">hotbed for spitting</a>. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Then there is also the move where people blow their noses, but without a handkerchief or Kleenex. They just send the contents of their nose jutting toward the ground. When I was a kid we called this the “Texas Air Hanky.” The last time you saw it was either during a hockey game or on the streets of China. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">It is also not uncommon to see little (or big) piles of vomit resting at the base of a tree. If you have to puke then you have to puke; I get that. But I’ve seen more ground vomit in my eight months in China than I did in my 24 years in America. And I’ve been to a lot of bars in America. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">People are also apt to relieve themselves on sidewalks. “People” in this case could mean everyone from itty-bitty toddlers (who wear crotch-less pants for quick and painless popping-and-squatting) to old men (who know better but just don’t care). Quick story about public relief of the excretory system: my mom, dad and I came to visit my brother in China a few years back, and on a plane from Xian to Guilin, my dad was the odd man out on a seat, stuck sitting on the other side of the aisle from my brother, mom and I, who controlled our own three-seat section of the plane. Pa was wedged next to a little kid who was wearing the bottomless pants. (If you’re having trouble imagining what this looks like, just think if you cut a big oval-shaped hole in your jeans from the top of your zipper, through the legs, back around to the midway point of the seat. Or you could just <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%3C" ahref="http://theboglogger.blogspot.com/2008/03/bog-psychology.html">>look here</a>.) Well, this kid – seated about five-and-a-half inches from my dad – unloads his bowels then and there, right after takeoff. It gets on the mom a little bit, and while it didn’t actually <i>touch </i><span style="font-style: normal;">pa, he nonetheless got an eyeful of doodoo. It was a cultural experience he could never have had in a land where parents, you know, make their kids wear diapers. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">This may all seem like superficial stuff. OK, so there is spit on the ground. So there is a little puke tucked against the base of the occasional tree. So kids relieve themselves everywhere, but who has ever been successful telling a 14-month-old when and where to go? (Anyway, is having a bunch of soiled diapers <i>that</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> much cleaner than the occasional puddle?) <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">The thing is, it’s not all superficial. The eyesores are accompanied by a host of things are more than just eyesores. It really is dirty – and not just <i>dirt</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> dirty. It’s really dirty. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">There are, for instance, no soap dispensers in public restrooms, save nice restaurants. (Beijing and Shanghai pay a little more heed to soap, but like I’ve said, Jinan ain’t no Shanghai.) The bathrooms at our school feature puddles of piss, and soap dispensers with soap that’s so watered-down it surely houses more germs than it prevents. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">And it isn’t just our crummy school. It’s the country at large. There wasn’t a drop of soap on the train I got off yesterday. The people who handle the food you buy off the street don’t wear gloves on their hands – just a discernable layer of brownish crud that can’t possibly be clean. And those Texas Air Hankies don’t just happen on the street. The last time I went to McDonald’s someone was pulling the time-trusted maneuver in the sink <i>in the dining area</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Like so many of the things I talk about on this blog, the germiness of China is hard to quantify (heck, <i>germiness </i><span style="font-style: normal;">isn’t even a real word). How the Chinese are <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/06/some-like-it-hot.html">always drinking hot water</a>, how much the Chinese <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/06/this-might-be-stretch-but.html">like to stretch</a>, how much <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/up-fake-chinas-booming-fake-nba-market.html">counterfeit clothing</a> there is: these things are all observable, but not necessarily measurable. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">The same goes for the sanitation conditions. I haven’t the scientific prowess to conduct a study of the actual germiness of China – just the time and inclination to write about it and to make up words to describe it.<span style=""> </span><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">But even if I can’t convey in any sort of statistical way just how germy it is in China, I can rehash an event that beats home the sanitation issue. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">After a 24-hour trip that started in Kansas City, I landed in Beijing in early September. If you recall, early September was at the height of the H1N1 craze – that is, the Pig Flu craze – and people were all in a tizzy about it. Especially in China. <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE58717220090908">This article</a>, for instance, entitled “China faces grim situation as H1N1 escalates,” was published the very day I landed in China. The country took to quarantining people – like <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/2009/jul/12/opinion/oe-metzl12">this guy</a>, a professor from the University of Michigan, and <a href="http://www.wdsu.com/news/19683611/detail.html">this guy</a>, the mayor of a major U.S. city. If you rode on a plane with someone who turned out to be sick, you could be quarantined. If you coughed a little bit too much, you could be quarantined. If you looked extra fatigued, you could be quarantined. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">As another precaution, there was a rapid spread of what looked like little plastic handguns that, when stuck up to someone’s forehead, gave a quick temperature scan. One of these guns/thermometers was pressed against my forehead as I exited the plane in Beijing. I was a little bit nervous, because anything from the mildest of temperature abnormalities to a slight technical malfunction could have landed me in a Chinese quarantine, something I’d rather not see first-hand. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">By the grace of God, I waltzed through the sickness-detection chamber A-OK. (I was, after all, in fine health.) But after the lengthy flight and comp coffee, I needed to hit a bathroom when I got on the ground, so I headed for the nearest bathroom. It was just like an American airport bathroom – a cavernous room with urinal upon urinal against a teal-green wall. I relieved myself and, when I was heading out, beelined toward the sink to rinse up. The American equivalent to this WC would have had a bounty of soap and a hand sanitizer dispenser as well, just in case you’re too lazy to actually wash. (Even the Kansas City airport has hand sanitizer dispensers, so it can’t be that far-out of an addition. Like I said, I’ve always been a bit of a germophobe, so I notice these things.)<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Alas, there was no soap in the bathroom. So one moment I was getting my temperature taken, an obligatory procedure that could well have landed me in a quarantine because Chinese officials are paranoid (justified or not) about the spread of H1N1. The next moment, I am taking a leak in a bathroom<span style=""> </span>that doesn’t have any soap. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Li Ball’s court doesn’t have any soap either. <o:p></o:p></p> <!--EndFragment-->DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-64755994105077549642010-06-17T11:20:00.003+08:002010-06-26T06:33:30.478+08:00Kobe Bryant is China's Michael JordanBorn in 1985, I was a little bit too young, and a little bit too immature, to really appreciate Michael Jordan during his heyday. In fact, as Jordan was barreling toward his second three-peat, I specifically remember rooting against him for no other reason than I was <i>sick</i> of him. I was sick of him winning every year, of monopolizing the proceedings. I equated Jordan to a bully.<br /><br />I would later develop a regret complex over this unenlightened attitude.<br /><br />It’s not like Jordan was universally revered back then and I comprised the entire contingent of the Anti-Jordan Coalition. Indeed, he was regarded by many as a prick (he once punched a teammate in practice); he had a well-documented gambling streak (Google it); he reportedly cheated on his wife. Not all of his qualities were endearing, and not everyone liked him.<br /><br />But once I grew to really understand the kind of things that Jordan did on a basketball court, and the way in which he did them, I became, after the fact, a huge Jordan fan. Once I realized, for instance, that Jordan netted 37.1 points per game as a third-year pro – when he was 23 years-old – I became a Jordan fan. Once I realized that, two years later, Jordan averaged 32.5 points, 8.0 rebounds, 8.0 assists and 2.9 steals and shot nearly 54 percent from the floor, I became a Jordan fan. Once I realized that, en route to his first tile, Jordan’s Bulls didn’t just beat, but mercilessly <i>swept</i> their long-time nemesis Detroit Pistons – pounding them by 21 points on the road in the deciding Game 4 (Jordan had 29 points on 17 attempts) and prompting the Pistons to famously mope off the court without shaking the Bulls’ hands – I became a Jordan fan. Once I realized that, prior to the 1992 NBA Finals, the media were concocting a “Who is better – Jordan or Clyde Drexler?” storyline, and then Jordan went out and scored more than 35 points per game (including the shoulder-shrugging three-point exhibition in Game 1), I became a Jordan fan. Once I realized that Jordan scored 55 points at Madison Square Garden within five games of returning from his 21-month baseball hiatus, I became a Jordan fan. Once I wrapped my head around the absurdity of the Flu Game, or understood that, during the final two years of the second three-peat, the Bulls didn’t <i>really</i> have the best team in the league (or even the Eastern Conference), yet still won championships, I became a Jordan fan.<br /><br />If you’re a basketball fan, it’s hard not to be a Jordan fan. I’ve always been the former; it was a matter of time before I became the latter, too.<br /><br />(David Halberstam’s bio on Jordan called <span style="font-style: italic;">Playing For Keeps</span>, which I read over here, turned my affinity for Jordan into a downright reverence. It’s an insanely detailed book, and worth a read if you care at all about Jordan. Web sites like IsoHunt and BTJunkie also helped my Jordan love flourish. Those sites house downloadable files of some epic Jordan games. I don’t know if they’re available in America, seeing as they epitomize copyright infringement. But they have been immensely fun for me in China. I’ve been able to relive Jordan’s 63 points as a second-year pro in Boston, the Flu Game, the 45-point clincher in the second finals win over the Jazz…it’s all online.)<br /><br />It took a while, but I came around on Jordan. It’s just a shame that I was too young when it was happening live to really appreciate the phenomenon unfolding was going on. That this good-looking guy had become a basketball god and marketing gold mine in a way that has never been done before. It was unreal. I was just too young to realize it. And so was China.<br /><br />That’s why I’m convinced that Kobe Bryant is China’s Michael Jordan. Now, I refuse to get into the “Is Kobe Bryant the next Michael Jordan?” debate. To ask if anyone is the next Michael Jordan is a silly, fabricated question concocted by ESPN to give Michael Wilbon something to talk about. It’s just a stupid thing to ask, for no other reason than the environment in which Jordan played was so vastly different than the environment in which Kobe plays. Indeed, Jordan helped <i>create</i> the environment in which Kobe plays, what with the media frenzy and marketing opportunities and the expectation that a basketball player do much, much more than simply play basketball. Asking “Is so-and-so the next Jordan?” is like asking “Is so-and-so the next Seinfeld?” There will never be a next Seinfeld – just like there will never be a next Jordan – because Seinfeld changed the medium in which existed for every ensuing show in the history; it forever changed what it means to be a television comedy. Just like Jordan changed what it means to be a star basketball player.<br /><br />So, that’s not what I mean when I say Kobe Bryant is China’s Michael Jordan. What I mean is that, just as I was too young and immature to appreciate Jordan when he was Jordan, so, too, was China’s basketball community. Just think about the timelines of (a) Jordan and his insane career, (b) basketball’s burgeoning popularity in China, and (c) Kobe Bryant’s ascension into the upper stratosphere of basketball greats. (Just how high Bryant ascends of course depends on how this and the next three NBA Finals transpire. In Game 5 in Boston, Kobe was breathtaking, scoring 23 straight points for L.A. and hitting a different-area-code three-pointer that inspired the Celtics’ Paul Pierce to say, “I would say it was the toughest shot that I’ve ever seen somebody hit while I was on the court.” Of course, the Lakers still lost. Game 7 looms…)<br /><br />When it comes to the evolution of China’s infatuation with the NBA, 2002 was a watershed year. Yao Ming was the No. 1 pick in the NBA Draft in 2002, and it’s easy to argue that that’s really when basketball became huge in China. Sure, people were already playing basketball in China before that. In fact, <a hrer="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/crossed-over-ii_10.html">as I noted</a> in this blog’s infancy, China has been playing basketball as long as any nation outside of North America, and professional basketball in China dates back to 1956. Plus, it’s not like Yao Ming was just <i>born</i> an awesome basketball player; the basketball tools were in place in China to turn him into a talent worthy of being the No. 1 overall pick. After all, being a gigantic foreigner doesn’t automatically make you the No. 1 overall pick. Just ask Manute Bol, a 7-foot-7 Sudanese player who wasn’t drafted until the second round back in 1985. And his rather nondescript pro career – the highlight of which was a lone nomination to the NBA All-Defensive Second Team – is a testament to the fact that being a behemoth doesn’t mean everything. Indeed, Yao evolved into a quality player (and not just a giant), and that evolution took place in China (before 2002).<br /><br />Still, 2002 was a landmark. Never before had China paid so much attention to basketball or the NBA, because never before had the nation produced such a superstar. The seeds were laid on China for the explosion of basketball’s popularity, and Yao represented the budding of that popularity.<br /><br />Meanwhile, back in America, the seeds were being laid for Kobe’s popularity. Kobe averaged 25.2 points per game in 2001-02 to go along with 5.5 rebounds, 5.5 assists and 1.5 steals – and this was coming off of a season during which he averaged 28.5. Kobe could always jump through the roof; he did, after all, win the Slam Dunk contest as a 19-year-old rookie. But he also weighed about 120 pounds then. In 2002, however, he still had those youthful hops, which were now coupled with a grown man’s body. In other words, he had a lot of Jordan in him – long, lean, strong with extraterrestrial jumping ability. Indeed, 2002 is when Kobe’s star started to shine like never before. Jordan, on the other hand, was in the throes of his career, playing for the Washington Wizards in the awkward denouement of his career. His stats were still good – 22.5 points, 5.7 rebounds and 5.2 assists – but he was shooting 41.6 percent from the floor and averaging 22.1 shots per game to get those 22.5 points. And, more to the point, he wasn’t JORDAN anymore. He was a shot-a-lot guard who, while still productive, was but a shell of his former self. It’s hard to gripe about 22.5/5.7/5.2, but when you recall what Jordan was before he went to Washington, it just wasn’t the same.<br /><br />It wasn’t just Kobe’s stats that were good in 2002. He also won his third straight title. So, a month before Yao Ming was drafted as the No. 1 overall pick, Kobe Bryant was the most accessible star in the league. He was a champion, he was fluid and graceful, he was good-looking, he did things that no one else was doing, he was a lot like Jordan was. That’s not to say he is the next Jordan, or that he’s as good as Jordan. But the dunking and shooting and leaping and looks: he had some Jordan in him, even as a 23-year-old.<br /><br />That 2002 title would be the last championship that Kobe would win for several years, but it certainly wasn’t the climax of his career (or his off-court antics). And everything he did now that Yao was in the league would be heeded by the biggest basketball community on earth.<br /><br />In 2002-03, Kobe averaged an even 30 points per game (to go with 6.9 rebounds, 5.9 assists and 2.2 steals) before losing to San Antonio in the playoffs. After that season, Kobe was charged with sexual assault for his, uh, encounter with a 19-year-old Colorado woman. While this tainted Kobe’s image in many people’s eyes, <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/love-affair-with-love-affairs-kobe.html">I for one</a>* am sure that it turned Kobe into an even more iconic figure here than if it hadn’t happened. The Chinese, after all, have been known to have a mistress or two, so that Kobe was a superhuman basketball player and a lecher made him that much cooler.<br /><br />* <span style="font-style: italic;">Really, that post and this one are sister posts. If you are at all interested in Kobe Bryant's popularity in China (and the impact that his infidelity had on his popularity in China), check out that post as well.</span><br /><br />With his image as a bad boy now solidified, Kobe cruised along for the next couple seasons and then, in 2005-06, took it to a whole new level. That season he averaged 35.4 points per game, then most since Jordan average 37.1 back in 1987. It was also that season when Kobe had an astonishing 81 points in a single game. Kobe won the scoring title again the next season, averaging a cool 31.6 point to go with 5.7 rebounds and 5.4 assists. (Kobe sometimes takes flak for not being well-rounded, but the stats suggest an incredible all-around player. Since he turned 21, Kobe has averaged at least 5.2 rebounds and 4.9 assists in 10 of 11 seasons. I know he can be selfish, and I know that LeBron laughs at 5.2 rebounds and 4.9 assists – King James averaged 7.3 rebounds and 8.6 assists last season – but 5.2 and 4.9 are good peripheral stats.)<br /><br />The next season, 2008, Kobe made it back to the Finals, where his team lost to the Boston Celtics. In 2009, the Lakers won it all – Kobe’s fourth ring – and now they’re battling to do it again.<br /><br />Basically, since basketball became a true phenomenon in China – since, that is, Yao Ming became such a big deal 2002 – Kobe Bryant has been the best player for the longest period. Starting in 2002, Kobe has won two titles – maybe three, depending on how this Boston series transpires – and has been to three more finals. He has won the scoring title twice, scored 81 points, plus he had the most famous NBA-related affair of at least the last decade.<br /><br />If Kobe had this exact same résumé, but started it 10 years earlier – say, in 1992 – then he would never have achieved such popularity here because his greatest exploits would have fallen on deaf ears and blind eyes in China. Which is what appears to have happened to Jordan. It’s impossible to quantify exactly what Jordan means to Chinese basketball fans. But I can tell you, based on jersey sales and rhetoric and so on, that he is no Kobe. Even though he’s better than Kobe.<br /><br />Maybe someday the Chinese, like I, will realize that Jordan is actually the greatest. But it hasn’t happened yet.DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-46635346697352728312010-06-08T12:50:00.004+08:002010-06-08T13:15:14.564+08:00Is it In You? Well, It's In ChinaFood can be something of an issue in China. It’s not that the food here is bad. On the contrary, there are a slue of dishes that I love, even if I can hardly say their names. But eating Chinese food every day can be wearying. It’d be like going out to eat Chinese food every day of the week in the States. I can’t imagine anyone wanting to do that. When you live in China, though, that’s basically what you’re doing. That’s why, just as I used to go to Chinese restaurants in America for a break from the domestic diet, I often go to restaurants that boast foreign food cuisine in China for a break from the domestic diet. <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">There is a pizza place in particular that has become a staple of my diet. I found it almost by accident, which, unless someone took you there, is the only way you could find it. It is located on a street that looks like any old street in Jinan. To the left of the restaurant is a karaoke bar and clothing store; to the right is an alley and a lady selling a variety of snacks and drinks out of her mobile store, which is little more than a wide, non-functioning refrigerator with wheels. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Most restaurants that boast foreign food in China are descript – that is, they are designed and marketed in such a way that you know they aren’t your run of the mill, rice-and-whatever restaurant. KFC, for instance, which is huge here in China, always boast huge cutouts of Colonel Sanders smiling invitingly at would-be customers down on the street. McDonald’s, also huge here, flaunts those golden arches at least as much as they do back home. And Pizza Hut – which price-wise is nothing less than fine dining in Jinan – has two locations here, each of which are encased by flashy walls of windows looking in, and table after table of affluent customers looking out. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Indeed, if a restaurant has foreign food on the menu, then a restaurant is something of a novelty (at least in Jinan). And if your restaurant is a novelty, then there is a good chance that you will let passersby know that your restaurant is a novelty by advertising, and advertising loudly. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">But this restaurant doesn’t do that. Nope, it’s just slipped onto Any Street, with a nondescript green door acting as the gateway into an awesome (and reasonably priced) dining experience. They have pasta and French Fries and, above all, a variety of pizzas. All-veggie pizzas. All-meat pizzas. All-cheese pizza. And, my personal fave, The Hot One, which is decked with spices and peppers and all sorts of other goodness that you could expect from a legitimate pizzeria. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">What makes this place all the more endearing is that the whole scene looks like a pizza joint from any college town in America. When you open the door, there is a 25-foot-long strip of the wood floor cutting down the middle of the narrow interior, leading to another door – this one with the top half cut out – that leads to the kitchen. On either side of that walkway are tables. The first six are tables with chairs; the ones closest to the kitchen are booths. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">After my girlfriend and I eat our pizzas and play Scrabble for like two hours, she indulges me in a trip to a nearby basketball court. It’s 9:45 and dark, but these particular courts, which we stumbled upon last week, house basketball well into the night. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><c><img src="http://i933.photobucket.com/albums/ad171/vrani/nighttimeballinjinanii.jpg" alt="night ii" border="0" /></c><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">It’s a bizarre scene, unlike anything I’ve seen in America. There are maybe 20 courts, each partially lit by varying levels of light radiating from the streetlamps on the adjacent street. The courts are situated on the edge of a university campus, and the players who are shooting around tonight reflect that demographic. Guys (and one girl) from the ages about 18-20 are beating balls into the ground across a swath of land that spans about three-fourths the area of a football field. There are so many players, and so many balls, that it sounds like the basketball camps held at my old high school, where a few hundreds kids would squeeze into the high school gym and frantically run drills with the omniscient <i>thwack </i><span style="font-style: normal;">of the balls resonating throughout the fieldhouse. Of course, there is no field house here. But the acoustics are such – what with the sprawl of concrete – that it is a veritable echo chamber, like a series of loudspeakers surround the area and are pumping in nonstop </span><i>thwacks</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Tonight I am just snooping around, opting not to play on account of the nine-inch pizza and three beers occupying my stomach. But I do survey the scene with intrigue. It is kind of eerie, the way everything looks and sounds. You can make out where the people are, but the light is so faint on some of the courts that people are merely silhouettes, the noise of the ball revealing as much as anything you can actually see. You can tell that shots are getting lofted rimward, but with no nets, the only way to decipher between a make and a miss is to listen for the metallic clank of the rim. If there is a thud, they missed. No thud equals a make. Or an airball. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><c><img src="http://i933.photobucket.com/albums/ad171/vrani/nighttimeballinjinanI.jpg" alt="night ball i" border="0" /></c><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Luckily there are some things more discernable than makes and misses. Like, say, the plethora of sports drinks lining the sidelines. Unlike myself, the kids playing ball tonight have opted against beer, and are instead imbibing in bottles of Gatorade, which are sold – along with ice cream, candy and cigarettes – at a kiosk near the entrance. Seeing these bottles of Gatorade is nothing new, for Gatorade has, <a href=http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-22-yao-erful-words-ii.html">like adidas</a> and the aforementioned KFC, made a concerted push into the Chinese market. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">And the success of this push – and it has indeed been successful – is no doubt linked to Gatorade’s strategic marriage to basketball. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">The ubiquity of Gatorade bottles now, in June of 2010, can be linked to a marketing move made back in March of 2007. It was back in ’07 that Gatorade expanded its relationship with the NBA, which itself was increasing its popularity march around the globe, in an effort to tap into Asian markets, China in particular. <a href="http://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/article/54745">From the Sports Business Journal</a>:</p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><a><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></a></p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><a><i>[Gatorade], which has been an NBA sponsor since 1984, becomes the 17th company to partner with the NBA in China….</i></a></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><br /><a><i><o:p></o:p></i></a></p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><a><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></a></p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><a><i>“The NBA is growing internationally, and it makes sense to do it together,” said Gatorade’s Jeff Urban, who officially assumes his new role with the company as its senior vice president of sports marketing on April 1.</i></a></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><br /><a><i><o:p></o:p></i></a></p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><a><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></a></p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><a><i>Gatorade’s expanded deal comes as the NBA targets aggressive growth in China leading up to the 2008 Beijing Olympics. The league is expected to play preseason games in China in October and is working to attract private investors to create a separate NBA China entity to further develop its international business.</i></a></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><br /><a><i><o:p></o:p></i></a></p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><a><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></a></p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><a><i>Gatorade currently sells products in China but until now has never directly partnered with the NBA in those efforts.</i></a></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><br /><a><i><o:p></o:p></i></a></p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><a><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></a></p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><a><i>The company is a sponsor of USA Basketball, which is marketed by the NBA. Last summer, Gatorade featured Miami Heat star Dwyane Wade on bottles of Gatorade sold in China when the men’s USA Basketball team played two exhibition games in Guangzhou leading up to the FIBA World Championships in Japan.</i></a></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><br /><a><i><o:p></o:p></i></a></p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><a><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></a></p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><a><i>“We had a relationship with Gatorade in Hong Kong five years ago, but this is the first time they have partnered with us in China,” [an NBA official] said. “They were a major partner in USA Basketball and they had a ton of activation around the games in Guangzhou. That helped make their decision easy as they looked to do more with us in China.”</i></a></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><br /><a><i><o:p></o:p></i></a></p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><a><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></a></p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><a><i>Gatorade also will activate on the grassroots level with the NBA in China by partnering with the league in the NBA’s Jam Van touring promotion that begins this month with visits to 24 cities in that country.<o:p></o:p></i></a></p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--><a> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></a></p><a> </a><p class="MsoNormal"><a href="http://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/article/110632">And from the Sports Business Daily</a>: </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><i>Gatorade has expanded its NBA marketing partnership to include China for the first time as part of a multi-year renewal….<br /></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><br /><i><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><i>Gatorade, the official sports drink of the NBA, WNBA and NBA D-League, is also continuing to work with the NBA on a weekly basketball reality show called “NBA Zhi Zao” (“Made in the NBA”), which airs on 43 channels in China… </i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">The move appears to have paid dividends. Not only is Gatorade the drink of choice the courts tonight, but also over at Shandong Normal, where Wang, the Refreshment Man, peddles Gatorade side-by-side with his water. And along with cigarettes, the <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/hes-on-fire-smoking-and-basketball-in.html">chain-smoking dudes</a> from that other university were indulging in bottles of Gatorade between games. (It’s unclear if Gatorade’s physiological properties can outweigh the effects of a pack of cigarettes, but that seemed to be what they were trying to figure out.) </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">And it’s not just basketball courts. You can find a bottle of Gatorade at any street shop (of which there are an infinite amount), and the sports drinks section at supermarkets are invariably huge. At least some of this boom is the result of Gatorade’s 2007 partnership with the NBA, a move that was in no way haphazard. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">While PepsiCo, which owns Gatorade, has already invested heavily in China, and while anecdotal evidence (such as Gatorade-lined basketball courts) suggests that PepsiCo products like “G” are already going strong here, the company recently announced plans to pour even more money into the Chinese market. <a href="http://www.crainsnewyork.com/article/20100521/FREE/100529974">From the Associated Press</a>: </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><i>PepsiCo Inc. said Friday that it plans to invest an additional $2.5 billion in China in the next three years on new plants and research facilities as the food and beverage maker builds up its presence in the growing market.</i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><br /><i><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><i>The company made the announcement in a news release Friday from Shanghai, site of the Shanghai Expo, where PepsiCo is a sponsor of the USA Pavilion. That planned spending is in addition to the $1 billion investment it announced in 2008 and plans to complete this year….</i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><br /><i><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><i>Money from PepsiCo's additional investment in China will be used to open 10 to 12 new manufacturing plants, create a new research and development center, open five new farms for potatoes and oats and to build its brands.</i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><br /><i><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><i>The company will research and develop new products just for the Asian market. It already offers drinks inspired by traditional Chinese medicine and Lay's potato chips in flavors tailored just to the market, including cool cucumber and crispy prawn.</i><span style="font-style: normal;">*</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><br /><span style="font-style: normal;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 1in 0.0001pt 0.5in;"><i>"We are building expertise and infrastructure now so that we can have a strong, sustainable manufacturing and agricultural base to serve the diverse and growing needs of consumers across China," Chief Executive Indra Nooyi said.<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">* <i>I can attest that these are as nasty as they sound. <o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">On an editorial note (do I need to specify that on a blog?), it is impressive what PepsiCo has done in China. PepsiCo not only owns Gatorade, but also some other successful enterprises in China. As I mentioned earlier, KFC and Pizza Hut are both big-time chains in China, and each is owned by PepsiCo (or, more accurately, by Yum! Brands, which was spawned by PepsiCo to handle the company’s restaurants). </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">It’s not at all uncommon for kids in class, when game time rolls around, to blurt out “Team KFC!” when I ask what they want their team name to be. Moreover, each of the three Jinan branches of my school have KFCs within walking distance; one of the schools has <i>two </i><span style="font-style: normal;">KFCs within walking distance. And Pizza Hut is nothing less than fine dining in Jinan. I have only eaten there once, but on that one occasion I dropped more than 100 yuan for dinner. Convert it back to dollars, and it’s about the same that you’d pay back home. Anytime you convert something from yuan to dollars and it’s the same as you’d pay back home, you know that you’re spending a pretty penny for whatever it is that you happen to be buying. Tropicana juice and Doritos brand chips are also staples in Jinanese stores, and both of them are also owned by PepsiCo. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">And tonight at least, PepsiCo also owns the sidelines. </p> <!--EndFragment-->DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-19932303121154660122010-06-07T13:13:00.002+08:002010-06-07T13:25:18.892+08:00This Might Be a Stretch, But...As the warm water begins to replenish my body – much more quickly and efficiently than cold water ever could – I am reminded of a scene from the 1992 classic “White Men Can’t Jump.” Calling it a <i>classic</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> may seem foolish to some, but to basketball fans, especially basketball fans who, like I, saw that movie at an impressionable young age, it’s not a stretch.</span><br /><br />The movie boasts some quality basketball scenes, plus it’s freaking funny. To boot, “White Men Can’t Jump” also deftly deals with the black-white divide in basketball, a phenomenon that’s painfully obvious but nary discussed. Whites can dig the movie because the main white character, Billy Hoyle, ultimately has his day in the basketball sun. And blacks, in part, may be drawn to it because the movie’s main black character, Sidney Dean, poignantly unleashes all of the white stereotypes. Plus he can ball.<br /><br />Hoyle (and whites in general) is portrayed as naïve and, per skin color, out of place playing basketball. Plus his name is <i>Billy Hoyle</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, which is such a perfect name for a white guy playing inner-city basketball (at least on par in the annals of all-time fictional hoops names with Jimmy Chitwood). </span><i>Billy Hoyle</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> must have either struck the writers in a split second, or was concocted only after hours and hours of deliberation. That is, </span><i>Billy Hoyle </i><span style="font-style: normal;">is the product of either instantaneous genius or painstaking contemplation. It’s too good to be anything else.</span><br /><br />Meanwhile, Dean (and blacks in general) is portrayed as needlessly flashy on the basketball court and something of a prick in real life. (“It’s hard work being this good!”…“I don’t mean to brag, but I’m the greatest!”…“Billy, you either smoke, or you get smoked. And you got smoked.”)<br /><p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Hoyle articulates a sentiment that has crossed many a white minds when he delivers one of the movie’s more memorable quotes – memorable for its bluntness and resonance with basketball players, if not its poetic properties: “A black man would rather look good and lose than look bad and win.”</p><p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">The goofy title, goofier clothes and unbroken stream of profanity may, to the lay basketball fan, give the movie a flippant feel, like it’s just some cuss-filled comedy starring Wesley Snipes and Woody Harrelson, who between them have been in such hard-hitters as Kingpin and Passenger 57.* But White Men Can’t Jump is more than your run of the mill laugher. In fact, nearly 20 years later and thousands of miles away, here in early June, 2010, on the courts of Jinan, China, “White Men Can’t Jump” still has relevance.<br /></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">* <i><i>In fact, Snipes’ movie portfolio has devolved big-time last few years. He was in seven straight films from 2005 to 2008 that were straight-to-video. I guess you take the money where you can get it after you get <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wesley_Snipes"><i>hit with tax fraud charges</i></a><i> and are <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%3C/i"><span style="font-style: normal;"></span></a><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,352370,00.html"><i>forced to cut</i></a><i> multi-million-dollar checks to the federal government.</i></i></i></i></p><p class="MsoNormal">Let me reset a scene from the movie. Billy stunned Sidney when the two played for money, and soon thereafter Sidney decides that they should team up for a little hustle. Sidney makes his way to a local court, where Billy is going to meet him, so the duo can dupe some people for money. They don’t have an elaborate scheme for how to work their hustle. Instead, they’re simply going to take advantage of the one thing Billy has that no one else does: white skin. After he has talked a sufficient amount of trash and ruffled a sufficient number of feathers, Sidney declares, “Five-hundred dollars! And you can pick anybody out here. Anybody!” His opponents are enticed. They can choose Sidney’s partner. It’s like they are the captains, but instead of picking the best players, they will simply pick, based on looks, the worst one they can spot. </p><p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">The target of Sidney’s hustle, a guy named Raymond, scours the on-lookers, trying to find the person who looks least likely to pose a threat in a game that will result in someone pocketing $500. Raymond’s buddy then says, “Hey Raymond, look at the chump, man,” and points at Billy Hoyle, who mosied onto the sidelines while Sidney was busy laying the seeds of this game. “Give him the chump!” </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Now, why is Billy such a chump? Well, there is of course the fact that he’s white and has entered an all-black court. There’s that. But there is also the fact that he’s stretching. And despite the physical rigors of basketball – and the coinciding usefulness of a good pre-game stretch – stretching in basketball, in America, isn’t as common as one may think. It is, however, exceedingly common in China, which is why I’m thinking about “White Men Can’t Jump.” (By the way, I am white and can’t jump.)</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I have always been a big stretcher. I have back problems, which, along with my current addiction to massages, has prompted me to engage in some serious stretching. There is one stretch in particular, designed for the groin muscle, that is incredibly useful but totally awkward. I stumbled upon it when I was shelving videos at my library job and ended up taking home how-to DVD on yoga. (I worked at a library? Better believe it. Just part of the post-college employment fiasco that has landed me in China in the first place.) </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">To pull off this stretch, you plant one foot out in front of your body – say, your left foot – with toes facing forward. You bend that knee, and then plant your opposite foot, the right foot, behind you, parallel to the other foot but with the toes perpendicular to the first set of podiatric digits. So, at this point your left foot is in front of you, toes forward, and your right foot is behind you, toes running east-west, so to speak. Your body and face are of course facing the same direction as your back set of toes. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Next, you plant the coinciding hand of your front foot – in this case, the left hand – inside of the front foot, lean forward, and place that elbow against the inside front knee. You then torque your body with that front elbow, trying to swivel your hips around as much as you can. The resulting pull on one’s groin muscle – the groin of the front leg – is incredible. For added leverage, it helps to do the stretch close to a wall. Then, as you torque your body with the elbow of that planted hand, you can grasp at the wall with your <i>other</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> hand and yank a little bit more. It’s a killer stretch. (Describing it, however, may be beyond my literary acumen, so please don’t hurt yourself.)<br /><br />As good as this stretch may be, though, it’s hopelessly awkward. Think about it. Your legs are stretched wide, and your feet are facing opposite directions. You are twisting your body with whatever force you can muster from your elbow, which is buried on the inside of your leg. And if, like me, you are looking for a little extra </span><i>oomph</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, you are grasping at the nearest wall to corkscrew yourself even further. I used to do this stretch at the 96.5-percent-black gym I played at in the months after college, and I’d get more than a few stares. Just like people were starting at Billy Hoyle. Come to thin of it, this stretch may have been one reason that one particular player at my old gym took to calling me Billy Hoyle. I think he meant it is as an insult, but I of course took it as a compliment.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">(It’s been my experience that stretching is a little more common among whites – and not just Billy Hoyle. My intramural basketball team used to get our stretch on before every game, even indulging one another in some partner stretches. Our favorite was one where two people sit down with their legs stretched in front of them, toes pointing toward the sky. You then press your feet against one another’s, and reach out and grab the other guy’s hands. One person then yanks the other forward – wait, maybe yank isn’t the best word to use when describing this…how about pulls. That’s a little better. Anyway, one person <i>pulls</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> the other, and then the visa-versa. I’ve never seen anyone doing this besides my old IM team, but the point is that whites, in my estimation, are a little less abashed about stretching than blacks.)</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">But whites are nothing compared to the Chinese, for the Chinese possess a zest for stretching that I had never seen before. This is, after all, a country that is known for massages, and it’s the nation which spawned Tai Chi, so the harmony and sanctity of one’s skeletal structure is treated with more reverence here – at least historically – than in pretty much any country in the world. (That is to say nothing of how they <a href="https://youtubeproxy.org/redirect.aspx/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/hes-on-fire-smoking-and-basketball-in.html">treat their lungs</a>.) </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">You can see this affinity for stretching everywhere. Often times people will wave and flap their arms while they walk down the street, treating the sidewalk like a hitter may treat an on-deck circle. It’s also common to see Chinese people plop a foot upon a railing or wall and use it as a sort of stretching device. And then there are the ubiquitous <a ref="culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/april-6-ball-in-beijing.html">exercise stations</a> that line sidewalks all over this city and others throughout China. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Not surprinisngly, this stretching frenzy manifests on basketball courts, which serve as yet another venue in which the Chinese get their stretch on. On this day, there are any number of stretches going on at Shandong Normal U. There is the old standard where you stand with your legs spreads wide and lean forward to touch the ground. There are the arm flaps that are so wildly popular here. And there is one that my friend from America, who had chronic knee problems, used to do where you place your fingertips on your kneecap and gently move it around, almost swirling it, like your ACL is a rubber band that you’re are trying to give a few extra centimeters of elasticity. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <span style=";font-family:";font-size:12pt;" >As is <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/06/some-like-it-hot.html">the case with the warm water</a>, I have wholeheartedly embraced this facet of Chinese culture. Like I said earlier, I have back problems, and I have for years been doing the types of quick, quirky stretches that people do here – the exaggerated shoulder shrugs, touching my toes, lunging and twisting and rubbing. I don’t know if this means I have a kindled spirit here, but maybe some kindled skeletons.</span><!--EndFragment--><br /><br />ALSO: I appreciate comments on this blog, but one of the many annoyances of publishing a blog from China is that I am apparently unable to leave comments. I do not know what is up with that; I do not know, for instance, why I can (sometimes) sign in and publish a post but cannot leave a comment. I have tried multiple proxies, and none allow me to comment. I do not want to seem like an ingrate by not responding, or like I do not care, or have not noticed; I am not, I do, and I have. I just have not yet figured out how to leave comments. I am glad that you have, though, so please continue to!<br /><i><i><i><span style=""> </span><o:p></o:p></i></i></i><p></p><i><i> </i></i><p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--><i><i> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></i></p><i><i></i></i><i><i><span style="font-style: italic;"></span><o:p></o:p></i></i><i><i> <!--EndFragment--> </i></i>DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-79285548352046569362010-06-02T16:47:00.005+08:002011-06-17T23:33:28.977+08:00Some Like It Hot -- Water, That IsThe first thing I see when I get to Shandong Normal University is a troop of students wearing black caps and gowns. They are snapping photos of one another with those glowing, <i>We Just Graduated!</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> smiles. It reminds me of my own graduation a couple years back. I reckon it’s a commonly held sentiment, but the weeks right before and right after graduation are unforgettable for all the right reasons. These students (or ex-students) are smack-dab in the middle of that two-week stretch, and it’s fun to see.</span> <br />
<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
I roar past them on my embarrassingly loud bike, leaving a trail of pungent, almost sour white smoke in my stead. I would love to see the carbon footprint of my motor bike, which is as loud as a racecar but as weak as the 240 yuan piece of junk it is. It burns oil and gas like a Chevy Suburban, and I fear that I will eventually be treated to a dastardly karmic payback – retribution for the oodles of crap I pumped into the air during my year in China. At the very least, I am doing a number on my respiratory system, as well as the lungs of any poor sap who happens to be behind me on the road. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
The bike doesn’t have a key, so when I park it next to the courts, I don’t turn it off so much as it just kind of winds down, groans and eventually goes to sleep. It’s like a computer that hasn’t been used for a few minutes, seemingly programmed to recognize when its work it over and react accordingly. Miraculously, it usually starts again when its rest is over. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
I traverse the ten feet to the gate, surveying the sparse action on the courts. It’s dead. There is one four-on-four game going, one three-on-three contest and then a few people just sitting around. I make a note of this desolateness and approach a guy who is sitting by himself at the base of a goal. He is resting in the shade with his legs stretched out and his back parked against the green metal pole that loops from the backboard into the ground. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
I ask him if I can use his ball by saying, “Keyi bu keyi?” which literally means, “Can no can?” I don’t know if this is proper way to make the inquiry, but he seems to understand and lofts the ball into my waiting hands. I shoot plant-footed 8-footers for a few minutes and then lace up my kicks to take some earnest jump shots. It’s annoying, but I can’t help but think about Kobe Bryant as I’m shooting. The jump-shooting display he put on in the Lakers’ Western Conference-clinching win in Phoenix the other day was otherworldly, stuck in my mind like a great line may get planted in a poet’s mind. <span style="font-style: normal;">I hate Kobe, but when it comes to shooters jumpers, he is probably the best person on the planet to emulate. He is the Hemingway of jump shots: Hemingway was a drunk and by all accounts not a very nice person; Kobe is a pompous, lecherous prick. But my god, they are both good. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
Sneakers snugly tightened, I do my best Kobe impersonation, shooting awkward, twisting jump shots just like he does. It strikes me that I’m 24 years-old and still fantasizing that I am a real basketball player, but I keep on going. I shoot by myself for a while before a few other guys who are about 20 years-old join me. We shoot lazily, and I notice that I am instinctively giving them their change when they hit a shot. <a href="https://youtubeproxy.org/redirect.aspx/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-17-schoolyard-ball-ii.html">As I’ve written</a> in the past, the concept of giving someone their change is lost on Chinese players, but, just like it’s ingrained in me to pretend that I’m a famous player when I shoot around, it’s ingrained in me to give dudes their change. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
After a few minutes, Wang, the Refreshment Man, hits the scene. He rolls up in what can best be described as a flatbed bike. There is one wheel out in front, like a normal bike, and not one, but two wheels in back, supporting a four-by-four deck. You see these flatbed bikes all over China. Sometimes people load them with recyclable trash; sometimes they’re rolling around with mini-kegs being delivered to a restaurant; sometimes there are people chilling back there. Befitting of his title of Refreshment Man, Wang is hauling a few hundred water bottles, packaged up in cases of 24. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
Since we’re not playing a game, and are instead <i>still</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> just shooting around, I grab a buck and waltz over. He spots me as he’s unloading the cases and says, “OK!” Wang is about 50, probably 5-foot-6, and appears to be kind of doughy, like you wouldn’t get much resistance if you gave him a little poke. He is generally wearing a smile, as he is today. I respond with an </span><i>OK! </i><span style="font-style: normal;">of my own and ask him for a water. He snares a bottle from his limitless bounty and hands it to me. I thank him in Chinese, to which he replies, “OK!” I turn back to the court and take a hardy gulp, and into my mouth rushes a quenching dose of crisp, clean, hot water. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
Back home I would have scoffed at the idea of drinking warm water, especially while playing ball. At the gym that my friends and I most frequented in Kansas City, we used to have a specific water fountain that we’d head to between games. We passed three different fountains on the way to this magic fountain because its supply of H2O seemed to be about 15 degrees cooler than everywhere else. It was one of two fountains set into a wall down the hall from the courts, and there were times when my friends and I would patiently wait in line for this fountain while its twin fountain four inches away sat unused. But again, the colder the better. (I have a theory that, when there are two water fountains side by side, the one that is lower is always colder. Just drink for thought…) </div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
Here, though, there aren’t water fountains. Nor, for that matter, is there cold water. It is one of the things that struck me as odd when I first arrived. But the Chinese are convinced that it’s good for health to drink warm water, and I’ve wholeheartedly bought in. (The Chinese are convinced of other things, as well, that I don’t subscribe to, like that walking backwards is good for your brain. It’s not unusual to see people walking backwards on sidewalks in the early morning. The Chinese are also huge fans of open windows. Even in the dead of winter, I would often walk into my classrooms only to see that my students had thrown the window wide open. As it was explained to me, Chinese people think it’s really bad to have the air in a room stagnate, so they open windows to get things circulating – even if it’s like 25 degrees outside. It’s unclear to me whether or not they think it’s unhealthy to sit in a freezing room. I haven’t, and won’t, buy into that one, nor will you ever find me walking backward.) </div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
But the warm water? I’m hooked, as are the other 1.3 billion people who live here. And whether or not you think they’re legitimate, there are reasons behind the warm water obsession. As a blogger for the Global Times <a href="https://youtubeproxy.org/redirect.aspx/%20http://life.globaltimes.cn/expat/2009-07/451604.html">put it</a>:</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.5in 0.0001pt;"><br />
<span style="font-style: italic;">The abundance of hot water in China is also connected to Chinese medicine. It is better, according to Eastern wisdom, to drink hot water for the sake of digestion, and overall health. Water with ice in it can take longer for the stomach to digest since the body first has to expend energy to heat the water up to body temperature.</span><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
<a href="https://youtubeproxy.org/redirect.aspx/%20http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/175518/how_drinking_hot_water_can_detoxify.html">Others take it</a> even further: </div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0.5in 0.0001pt;"><br />
<span style="font-style: italic;">Some evidence suggests that by drinking hot water, we remove built up deposits in our nervous system. These deposits are responsible for creating negative thoughts and emotions. By removing these build ups, we can help to purify our thoughts and put us in a better emotional state. Drinking hot water can also actually purify the toxins out of your body….</span><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
And <a href="https://youtubeproxy.org/redirect.aspx/%20http://www.healthoma.com/a-glass-of-hot-water-after-meals-reduces-cancer-risk/">others take it</a> even further: </div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-style: italic; margin: 0in 0.5in 0.0001pt;"><br />
Cold water can also in extreme circumstances lead to heart attacks. As we have our meals enzymes and acid secretions start and this process sort of warms up the body. Drinking cold water is like attacking the body with an exactly opposite temperature. Not only does the whole procedure of digestion gets interrupted or slows down, the body can also react in the form of a heart attack. It does not always come after a pain in the right arm or pain in the chest…</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
That’s not all…</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-style: italic; margin: 0in 0.5in 0.0001pt;"><br />
Drinking hot water after meals reduces cancer risk. Let me explain how. Drinking cold water will solidify the oil part of the food we have eaten. This will slow down the digestion process. And when this sludge reacts with the digestive enzymes and acids, it will break down and will start getting absorbed by the intestine faster than the solid food. This lines the intestine. The consequence is that this will turn into fats and lead to cancer. Therefore it is best to drink hot soup or warm water after a meal.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
Hot water has even been used as a legal alibi. A suspected thief died in February while being detained by authorities. The family was suspicious of the cause of death, but the <a href="https://youtubeproxy.org/redirect.aspx/%20http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2010-02/26/content_9509511.htm">police officers insisted</a> that he “died suddenly while drinking hot water.” <o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
I don’t necessarily buy in to these more far-flung reasons for drinking warm water – that it can reduce stress and help thwart cancer. But I do think there is credence to the suggestion that cold water is harder for your body to process because your body must warm it up in order to “use” it. It’s admittedly odd, but even on a day like today, the first day of June with the sun blaring, I don’t want cold water. If Wang had had a bucket filled with ice, and slipped bottles of water in there to make them cold, I would have grabbed one of the non-iced bottle that – like the one he gave me – had been baked by the sun. I’m done with cold water. </div>DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-22414975048596707972010-06-01T07:57:00.003+08:002010-06-01T11:44:52.964+08:00Kicking It at a Soccer GameI have made no bones about how easy my job is. In fact, the disparaging remarks I’ve made about the shameful ease of my professional life could warrant its own label on the right side of this blog. The tag could be, “My job: the void in my soul,” or maybe, “Idiot’s guide to playing games with six-year-olds.”<br /><br /> <p class="MsoNormal">Nonetheless, Sundays kick my ass. I teach from 8:00 to 5:15 each Saturday, and then turn around and clock an 8:00-to-7:00 shift on Sunday. Even if you’re just dicking around with kiddos and concocting variations of basketball and bowling that can be played in the confines of a hot, cramped classroom, working 11 straight hours will drain you. Sure, it’s not the same fatigue that a physicist has after a long day of crunching numbers, or the fatigue that a college student has after churning out a trio of final exams in one week. But still, Sundays are brutal. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">But somehow, I summon the energy at the end of day today, Sunday, to join some co-workers for a professional soccer match here in Jinan. Jinan is home to Shandong’s team in the Chinese Super League, which is China’s (bastardized) equivalent to the English Premiership or the German Bundesliga. Founded in 2004, the CSL has 16 teams. Shandong won the whole thing in 2008 and 2006, and last season the squad finished fourth. So we have a decent side to support. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">I get off work at 7:00, hop on my bike and take a 10 minute jaunt over to Shandong<span style=""> </span>Provincial Stadium, which I’ve driven past but never been inside. With the setting sun as the backdrop, I can see the stadium from at least a half-mile away. I can’t tell if it is an abomination or an interesting bit of architecture. It is shaped like an oval and dwarfed by four massive banks of lights jutting inward, like they used to stand upright but have since been slanted by a microburst. Built in 1988, it has some vague, fleeting sense of communism. Every inch of it is gray, and the flashing neon lights that dot the upper perimeter don’t hide the fact that the structure itself is utterly devoid of color – and life. It’s like they went out of their to build it in such a way that no one could possibly have any opinion about it, good or bad.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">I don’t know if they’re going to sell beer inside, so I stop and buy four cans of Tsingtao at a nearby supermarket. (Interestingly, Tsingtao cans have more alcohol than the bottles – 4.3 percent to 3.1 percent.) I park my ride at a nearby intersection, which has turned into a quasi-parking lot, and pay the overseer one yuan for her trouble. She is probably 65 years-old and walks with a noticeable limp. As I’m locking up my bike, she keeps on pointing to my basket, which holds an old, falling-apart pair of shoes (which act as my brakes). I reckon that she is telling me that she’s not responsible if the shoes get stolen, but if someone steals those things, they probably need them more than I do. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">I weave my way through the throngs of people hocking tickets. It’s not entirely clear whether they are sanctioned ticket vendors or scalpers, and I don’t have the linguistic chops to figure that out. One of these vendors/scalpers is literally standing at the window for the <i>actual</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> ticket office when I get there. He points to a map of the stadium as he tries to coax me into paying 200 yuan for a ticket that is apparently worth 300 yuan. But I have no intention of paying even 200, especially when my objective is to simply get in and find my friends who are already inside (they don’t have to work until 7, like I). I pay 30 yuan for a ticket and walk over to the line to get in. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">In an exchange that is 40 percent speaking and 60 percent pointing, I ask a security guard if it’s cool for me to take some beers into the venue. I have little doubt that it’s allowed because, after all, you can take beer almost anywhere in China (or at least Jinan). You can B.Y.O.B. at restaurants, and no one will think twice if you are walking down the street with a brew or even if you hop on a bus toting some suds. Not that it’s <i>common </i><span style="font-style: normal;">to see people traipsing around with beer, but it’s certainly not a huge deal. This phenomenon of unmitigated drinking prompted one of my co-workers’ friends to opine, after a visit to China, that people in China are freer than people in America. In the case of alcohol, it’s probably true. (In the case of the media, Internet and a semblance of a democratic legal process, it’s probably not true.). </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">Alas, the security guard delivers the bad news that you can’t bring your own beer, and I am left with a slight conundrum: should I down these four beers as quickly as I can and miss the first several minutes of the game (which has just begun), or should I part with the booze in exchange for catching all the action. That’s when I remember that it’s soccer, not basketball, and as such there IS no action. (Mandatory dis on soccer for being boring, check). I trade 12 minutes of game time for the four beers, <i>then</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> I go in. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">Once in, I set out to find my buddy Toby. Working against me are the facts that I have no idea where he is, that this is a 40,000-seat stadium and that I’m slightly buzzed. Working in my favor is the fact that Toby is a 6-5 black dude, and in China, 6-5 black dudes are about as common as teetotalers at Mardi Gras. It takes me all of three or four minutes to spot Toby, who is sitting just about parallel with the end line on the west side of the stadium. I join him and his Chinese girlfriend for the remainder of the first half, which thoroughly dispels my notion about soccer being devoid of action. In the 30 minutes that I catch, there are three goals (two by Jinan), and two more shots clank off the crossbar. In addition, there are a pair of sizeable scuffles – big enough to prompt guys to enter the fray from the bench and for the ref to give guys yellow cards. It’s actually pretty exciting. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">The fans also add to the entertainment. Now, the place is still empty – there are probably 12,00 people. But the fans who <i>are</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> in attendance are doing a hell of a job making it feel lively. Part of that zest manifests in timely, knowledgeable cheering. And part of it comes in the form of venomous chants directed at the other team’s fans. That venom may be due to the fact that the opponent was from Hunan, and according to Toby’s girlfriend, Hunan doesn’t have the best reputation in China. I don’t have any proof of Hunan’s shady underbelly – and neither does she. But when it comes to vilifying and discriminating against people for nothing more than their place of birth, you can argue that rumors and perception are (at least) as important as the facts. With disdain in her voice, Toby’s girl says that Hunan is known for criminals, and that it is the epicenter or China’s <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/up-fake-chinas-booming-fake-nba-market.html">vast fake clothing</a> market. Again, I don’t know if this girl was spitting facts or B.S., but she took them to be fact, and that’s what’s pertinent here. The hatred being spewed toward the Hunan fans backed up the idea that Hunan is indeed loathed, at least by people from Shandong. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">The Hunan cheering section, which is off to the left as I look at the field, is small. There are probably 200 people wearing Hunan jerseys, waving Hunan flags, and chanting Hunan chants in a sectioned-off nook of the stadium behind the north goal. There are nearly as many security guards sitting in that section as there were fans, to either prevent or protect. The Shandong fans are shouting and pointing quite a bit during the first half, especially when the little scuffles broke out, but that disdain only intensifies after the break. Hunan quickly knots the score at two apiece, and this seems to galvanize their supporters. They are boisterous as ever, and when Shandong makes a few substitutions, the Hunan fans start up a chant that, according to Toby’s girlfriend, was something to the effect of, “You switch one c*^t for another c*^t!” There are all sorts of other things being chanted and yelled, but Toby’s girlfriend can’t quite make it out. Suffice it to say that they aren’t well-wishes. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">As for the actual soccer, it’s not that great. Even I can tell that there are a lot of flubbed chances. There is one play in particular where the Hunan defender falls flat on his ass, allowing a Shandong player to race unabated up the sideline with the ball. Somehow, despite being handed a golden opportunity, the team doesn’t so much as get off a shot. And then there is another play by Hunan where they have a free kick from about 25 yards out. One player taps the ball to his right, directly in the path of a streaking teammate who is all geared up to smash the ball goalward. Well, he smashes it all right – about 20 feet over the crossbar. He was roundly applauded and mocked by the crowd, but truth be told, he is no worse than any of Shandong’s players.*</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">* <i>Quick note: as is the case with professional basketball in China, professional soccer teams are allowed only a few foreigners. Shandong’s foreigners are Fred Benson (Netherlands), Siniša Radanović (Serbia) and Carlos Santos de Jesus (from Brazil, by way of Croatia), and Roda Antar (born in Freetown, Sierra Leone). None of them appear to be any good.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">After the game, I say goodbye to my friends and walk along the sidewalk toward the intersection housing my bike. As I walk, I notice a throng of Shandong fans conglomerating on the north side of the stadium. They are yelling with great hostility, but when I look at the stadium to see who they are yelling at, I see no one. The crowd and the yelling swell, and the tangible sense of hostility intrigues me to the point where leaving is out of the question. I join the throng, unable to deduce what’s going but hopelessly curious nonetheless. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">Eventually people in the crowd take to throwing water bottles at the stadium. The stadium has two tiers, and they are launching them at the upper tier. I immediately feel bad for whatever poor sucker(s) is standing on the concourse up there, but upon inspection, there is no one standing there. It’s just an empty concourse and a 10-foot-wide entryway into the a section of seats. Yet the Shandong fans keep chucking, bottle after bottle. A roar goes up when one of the bottles finds its way into the entryway; that’s where they are aiming. More and more bottles are launched at that entryway. At this point it becomes like that scene from Independence Day where all of the planes take aim at the alien spacecraft – that entryway is the spacecraft, the people are the planes, the bottles the missiles. I still can’t tell what’s going on though, but the bottles keep flying. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">Finally, I conjure up an image of the stadium in my head and realize that this entryway – which is labeled with a giant “7” – must be just about where the Hunan fans’ section was. Yeah, that’s about right: I was sitting along the end line, to the west, and then I exited and walked around the north end of the stadium, which is where I am now. The Hunan section was to my left as I watched the game – to the north, that is – and now there are hundreds of people standing around the northern concourse, more than a few of them hurling water bottles at the entrance into the section of seating that must have been at least close to the Hunan sheering section. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">The cops eventually break up the bottle-throwing party and I gladly head home. It would have been fun to see what transpired had the Shandong fans been allowed to persist, but at the same time I’m pretty tired. It is, after all, Sunday. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">Should anyone have read this and expected it would at some point turn to basketball, I promise we’ll get back to hoops soon…</p> <!--EndFragment-->DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-3823808458237729652010-05-26T20:36:00.006+08:002013-07-31T13:44:14.128+08:00No South Paws in the Far East<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
There are any number of things that induce giggle-fits from the young’uns I teach. For instance, they invariably get a kick out of it when I stroll into class with coffee, which is a relatively recent addition to China’s beverage market (but a long-standing staple of my diet). And there is a virtual riot whenever we play a game and one of the teams’ point totals lands on 250, or “er bai wu.” In China, <i>er bai wu </i><span style="font-style: normal;">is akin to an insult, derived (apparently) from ancient China when strings of currency were always lumped 500 at a time. Therefore, if you are </span><i>er bai wu</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, you are essentially half a person. It’d be like calling someone an idiot.</span><br />
<br />
Another teacher, who happens to be left-handed, told me that her left-handedness is nothing less than a point of amazement in her classrooms. When she wrote her name on the board on the first day of the term, the kids in each of her classes flipped. At first she didn’t understand what was so funny. Was it her handwriting? Was there something stuck to the back of her pants? But when she asked, she was told that it was simply the fact that she’s left-handed. Because in China, there aren’t lefties.<br />
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Well, that’s only partially true. Genetically speaking, there are indeed lefties. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left-handedness" ref="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left-handedness">Roughly 11 percent</a> of human beings are left-handed, whether they’re born in China or America or Cambodia or wherever. Thus, there are roughly 130 million people here who are technically left-handed. But if a child has a physical preference toward being left-handed, then <a href="https://aniscartujo.com/webproxy/redirect.aspx/%20http://www.china.org.cn/english/LivinginChina/243637.htm">they are trained</a> from a young age to spurn that tendency and use their right hand, which, in China, is the right hand to use.<br />
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<o:p></o:p><a href="https://aniscartujo.com/webproxy/redirect.aspx/%20http://benross.net/wordpress/">The blogger Ben Ross</a> rehashed a conversation that he had with a Chinese-born gentleman who had moved to America.<br />
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<i>…When the conversation turned to culture shock, I asked him what he thought was the strangest thing he saw when he first came to the US.<o:p></o:p></i></div>
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<i>“Left handed people,” he replied without any hesitation. <o:p></o:p></i></div>
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<i>“You don’t have left-handed people in China?” I inquired, making sure I hadn’t mistranslated his words.<o:p></o:p></i></div>
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<i>“Nope, I had never seen anybody write with their left hand until I came to the US” he said.<o:p></o:p></i></div>
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<i>“How is that possible?” I asked, “Isn’t that genetic?”<o:p></o:p></i></div>
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<i>“Maybe so, but in China kids are all taught to write with their right hands. If they pick up a pencil with their left hand, the teacher will put it in their right. It’s really just a matter of practicality. In the US, you have left-handed desks, left-handed guitars, and all sorts of other left-handed devices, but in China we have none of the sort. It works out better that way I think, no need to manufacture two different kinds of something when only one is necessary.”</i></div>
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<a href="https://aniscartujo.com/webproxy/redirect.aspx/%20http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left-handedness#Handwriting%3Co:p"> </a><br />
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His story <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left-handedness#Handwriting">is corroborated</a> by Wikipedia:</div>
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<i>In ancient China, the left has been the “bad” side. The adjective "left" (Chinese character: </i><span style="font-family: ";"><i>左</i></span><i>, Mandarin: zuǒ) means “improper” or “out of accord”. For instance, the phrase “left path” (</i><span style="font-family: ";"><i>左道</i></span><i>, Mandarin: zuǒdao) stands for illegal or immoral means. The character for “left”, </i><span style="font-family: ";"><i>左</i></span><i> depicts a left hand attending to work. In contrast, the character for “right”, </i><span style="font-family: ";"><i>右</i></span><i> (Mandarin: yòu) depicts a right hand in relation to the mouth, suggesting the act of eating.</i></div>
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One more anecdote, from the <a href="https://aniscartujo.com/webproxy/redirect.aspx/%20http://china-economics-blog.blogspot.com/2008/01/no-left-handed-chinese.html">China Economics Blog</a>:</div>
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<i>One game that some colleagues and I play when undertaking 3 hour exam invigilations in the UK is to count the number of left handed students. When there are 100 students you usually end up with around 10%. This has been fairly consistent over the years.<o:p></o:p></i></div>
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<i>Imagine my surprise therefore to hear that there are no left handed people in China.<o:p></o:p></i></div>
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Of course, there is nary a better manifestation of one’s preferred hand than the jump shot. After all, the jump shot – or at least the act of shooting, be it a free throw or set shot – is basketball’s intrinsic act. There is nothing like it in any other sport, and you can only do it with your strong hand. There are a lot of things in sports that you can do with either hand. In football, you can (and should<span style="font-style: normal;">) tote the ball with both hands, and on defense, tackling is a full-body endeavor. In baseball, many players can switch hit. And save moments when players wind up for slap shots, I can’t tell </span><i>what’s</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> going in hockey. Sure, you can do things with both hands in basketball, like dribbling and passing. But you can’t shoot a jumper with both hands. </span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small; font-style: italic;">Like most of the
Chinese, I play with my right hand. Unlike the Chinese, I sport Zack
Greinke T-shirt jerseys and Florida State basketball shorts. </span></td></tr>
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I’m thinking about handedness while I watch Game 4 of the Western Conference semis between the Lakers and Suns. Of the 10 starters, there is one lefty, Lakers point guard Derek Fisher, who has a ceiling-scraping jump shot that flies so high out of his left hand that it seems there is no way it could possibly find the net. (All too often, it does.) Thus, the starting lineups are reflective of the general population – exactly 10 percent are left-handed.</div>
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The percentage is exceeded, however, when the backups spell the starters. Off the Lakers bench comes Lamar Odom, a lefty, and the Suns send left-handed Yugoslavian Goran Dragic in for Steve Nash. All told, 19 players play in Game 4, and three of them – or about 16 percent – are left-handed. </div>
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Nineteen is a pretty small sample size, though, so let’s look at the <i>Eastern </i><span style="font-style: normal;">Conference Finals as well. In Game 4 of the dud series between Orlando and Boston, not one of the 20 players who took the court was left-handed – or, none of them </span><i>played </i><span style="font-style: normal;">left-handed. One of them, though, Dwight Howard, was actually born left-handed. <a href="https://aniscartujo.com/webproxy/redirect.aspx/%20http://www.dwighthoward.com/blog/2010/02/03/the-story-behind-my-left-hand/">From his Web site</a>:</span></div>
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<i>A lot of people don’t know it, but when I was growing up I was totally left-handed. I wrote left-handed, held a fork left-handed and shot the ball left-handed.<o:p></o:p></i></div>
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<i>But when I was in the eighth grade I tried to dunk on a guy and he undercut me and I landed on my left hand and broke my left wrist. After that, I taught myself to write with my right hand, eat right-handed and shoot the basketball with my right hand.</i><span style="font-style: normal;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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(Unfortunately for Orlando, he never figured out how to shoot a free throw with his right hand; he’s a 59.9 percent career free throw shooter. He missed five free throws in each of the first two games of the Boston series, and the Magic lost by three in each game.) <o:p></o:p></div>
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If you include Howard as a lefty, then four of the 39 players who played in each series’ respective Game 4s were left-handed. That’s 10.25 percent, or almost exactly the same percentage as the general population. I reckon that this percentage holds up on courts all over America. I can’t say for sure because I was never scrapping for things to blog about in America (and therefore never studying which hand people were using to loft shots at the goal). But I think one out of 10 seems about right. I know my intramural team in college had one lefty. I know that the gym I used to frequent in Kansas City boasted the occasional lefty, and I know that the Kansas Jayhawks had one lefty last season (Xavier Henry). I never kept tabs on this back in States, but I would say that, as is the case in the NBA playoffs, about 10 percent of U.S. ballers I played with were left-handed. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-size: small;">This kid in Beijing shot right-handed, even if he shot on monkey bars and not a basket.</span></i></td></tr>
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I want to keep tabs this afternoon, however, so I set out for a little anthropological study. I dart over to Shandong Normal at about 4:30, fighting rush hour traffic on my crummy little motor bike all the while. It takes little more than a single taxi ride in China to realize that drivers here are crazy, at least crazy in sense that they operate with inches the way drivers in the States operate with feet. If you planted an American driver behind the wheel in a Chinese city (myself included), they’d get in a wreck within minutes. Conversely, if you put a Chinese driver in American suburb, they might go crazy because there isn’t <i>enough</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> traffic. I knew that traffic here was bonkers the moment I left the Beijing airport. But until I got my motor bike, I didn’t realize exactly how crazy it was; now it is up-close. And because my bike doesn’t really have breaks – I keep an old pair of shoes in the basket and an angel on my shoulder – it’s all the more precarious. If this blog ever suddenly ceases, Chinese traffic may be the culprit.</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>The girls play right-handed, too.</i></span></td></tr>
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Anyway, I make it to Shandong Normal easily enough. There is a huge gaggle of people watching a women’s basketball game being held on one of the courts nearest the front gate. I have never seen women play full-court games in China, let alone witnessed an all-girl duel with spectators lining the sidelines making all sorts of noise, so this is unusual. (There will likely be a post devoted to women’s basketball at a future date…) But I’m not worried about the sex of the players, just the hand they’re using to shoot. And which one was it? Right, right, right. There are a few of them who are savvy with their left-handed dribble, but no one is <i>shooting </i><span style="font-style: normal;">left-handed. </span></div>
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I then move on to the other courts, occupied by guys, to take in some half-court four-on-four games. I mosey around for about 25 minutes – not trying to get into a game, not seeking out English speakers, just watching for those hands. Over the course of my nearly half-hour of watching jump shots, I see <i>one </i><span style="font-style: normal;">guy shoot left-handed. One. I don’t know exactly many people I saw shoot, but I know that, between the ladies and the guys, I saw at least 50 or 60 people heave shots, and one was left-handed. Definitely not 10 or 11 percent. </span></div>
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After I do my highly unscientific research at Shandong Normal, I ride back home to play with a friend who recently got back from a jaunt to Qingdao. We walk to the courts that we share with our annoying co-habitants from the boarding school, passing a pair of four-on-four games. (There are no lefties.)<br />
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Within moments, a hoard of kids comes over and asks us to play. We begrudgingly comply, and proceed to play our own four-on-four games. This adds eight more people to the sample size, and no one is left-handed. That makes it close to 60 or 70 different people who I have seen launch shots today, and only one is left-handed. There <i>must </i><span style="font-style: normal;">be more left-handed people than this one guy.</span></div>
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I’ll keep an eye out for more lefties in the future, but the early returns are that there aren’t a lot of lefties. But hey, that’s all right. <o:p></o:p></div>
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DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-76154865342041014762010-05-25T07:05:00.012+08:002012-02-14T16:02:58.922+08:00Up Fake: China’s Booming Fake NBA Market<div style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: left;">Today I wake up at 6:45, drink some coffee that makes me yearn for Starbucks, write for a different Web site and sit down to watch the Suns and the Lakers play Game 3 of the Western Conference Finals.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">The Suns fended off L.A. behind 17 points and 15 assists from Steve Nash, making the series 2-1 and, with Boston already up 3-0 on Orlando, sparing the NBA the ominous possibility of dual sweeps in the Eastern and Western Conference Finals (on the heels, no less, of sweeps in three of the four conference semis).<br />
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After that, I text Li Ball and ask if he and the gang are going to play any ball today. <i>Five o’clock</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, he texts back. I write until five and bike over to the courts. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-style: normal;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">We shoot around for a bit and I hop in the first game. No one is keeping score, but after about 20 minutes the hoard of players waiting to play goes from zero to six, and scorekeeping is invoked to regulate playing time. There are a variety of players waiting – a young guy who couldn’t have been older than 20, a few old guys built like houses, a 30-something who, from the smell of things, had been drinking prior to his arrival. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">And then there was one dude wearing a Minnesota Timberwolves jersey. He caught my eye for a few reasons. First, you don’t often see Minnesota Timberwolves jerseys here. Cleveland and Boston and definitely the Lakers, but not Minnesota. They don’t have any transcendent stars (sorry, Kevin Love), it isn’t a major city (just ask Ricky Rubio), and they were horrible last season (15-67 horrible, lost-their-last-seven-games horrible). <o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">The other reason I notice this guy’s Timberwolves jersey is because it doesn’t say Timberwolves. It says “Tim erwolves,” with a gap where the <span style="font-style: italic;">B</span> should have been. That there is either a typo or the thing is falling apart suggests one thing: the jersey is, in Chinese parlance, <i>jiade</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. Fake. <br />
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<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i>Jiade </i><span style="font-style: normal;">clothes in China are everywhere. At the end of my shopping expedition today I was toting a “Ralph Lauren” shirt and a pair of “adidas” soccer jerseys. Those quotation marks are necessary, because while the tag says one thing, you are no doubt buying another. The Polo shirt, for instance, ran me a total of 39 yuan (less than $6). You can’t buy Ralph Lauren shirts for $6. The jerseys were a steal too. Here is one of the ones I bought, the Spanish national team road kit.<br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal">It came equipped with adidas tags, and it has that bright yellow adidas emblem right below the neck. Heck, it even says “climacool” on it, signifying that it is part of adidas’ high-priced <i>climacool </i><span style="font-style: normal;">line of technologically advanced sports gear. It looks and feels real. Trust me, though, it’s not adidas; it’s </span><i>jiade</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. Proof? It cost me 60 yuan. In the real world, <a 3635104="" href="https://youtubeproxy.org/redirect.aspx/%20http://www.shopadidas.com/product/index.jsp?productId=">it costs</a> $70 USD, or roughly eight times what I bought it for.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">China’s fake-clothing (and fake-everything) industry has been reported ad nauseum. Reuters wrote <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE5151FW20090206">this article</a> about counterfeit items – including DVDs that hit the shelves before movies hit the theatres – well over a year ago. The <i>Seattle Times</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> wrote </span><a href="http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2002782434_chinapiracy12.html">this two-parter</a> in 2006, as George W. Bush was preparing to land in China to deliver a “stern message to Chinese officials about the need to crack down on knockoffs of U.S. products” and pound home the assertion that “90 percent of all intellectual property in China is pirated.” <a href="http://www.hemmy.net/2007/04/29/chinese-fake-brands/">This photo gallery</a> was posted in 2007, showing how a traveler to China can find authentic “Paradi” clothing, “PenesamiG” batteries, and even “Sccoby” shirts (if you like the timeless comic strip Peanuts). And one of my favorites: someone posted <a 20090407115008aai8o2p="" href="http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=">this query</a> on Yahoo! Answers, asking, “Where can I find fake clothes in Shanghai?” One of the respondents simply answered, “everywhere”.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">(On a personal note…a while back I bought every single episode of Seinfeld, The Simpsons, South Park and The West Wing from a <i>jiade</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> DVD market. The total cost ran me about 50 yuan, or less than $8. That bounty would have cost me close to a few </span><i>thousand </i><span style="font-style: normal;">dollars in America. Just think: at the time, The Simpsons had 17 seasons, and if you went to Best Buy or some other outlet, it’d be $40 per season. The Simpsons alone, therefore, would have cost me right about $700. South Park had at least a dozen seasons; that’d be $450 worth of discs. Seinfeld had nine seasons, or about $350, and the West Wing had seven season, or about $300. Add it up, and we’re talking about a lot of money. And still I got it all </span><i>for eight bucks</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. Sure, the Chinese versions of these DVDs don’t have director commentaries, and they aren’t as sharp visually. But we’re not talking about watching Avatar or the Super Bowl. We’re talking about The Simpsons and Seinfeld. Hi-def isn’t important. Plus the </span><i>jiade</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> discs come complete with funny attempts at English like PALY AL instead of PLAY ALL, or DIC NE instead of DISC ONE.) <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">So yeah, China’s counterfeit industries – from clothing to DVDs to electronic goods – is and has been booming. And that boom has been chronicled for years. <o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">But the one sub-sect of the <i>jiade</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> industry that is especially interesting to me (and pertinent to this blog) is the NBA basketball merchandise: shoes, jerseys and T-shirts, not to mention the NBA itself and its most prized commodity, the players. You can find all sorts of basketball stuff in China that is egregiously counterfeit. I’ll let the pictures do the talking.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal">This is a Kobe Bryant shirt that I saw in Yangshuo. It looks normal enough, right? Well, there’s one problem. Bryant and adidas, which supposedly produced the shirt, parted ways in 2002. This shirt, therefore, is an infringement on Kobe’s current contract with Nike. Or it <i>would be </i><span style="font-style: normal;">an infringement if it were the least bit real. (The NBA logo is thrown in just to make sure the maximum number of entities are being had.)</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
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<center><img src="http://s933.photobucket.com/albums/ad171/vrani/adidassockswlebron.jpg" /><o:p></o:p></center><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal">Like that Bryant shirt, these socks look pretty legit. The packaging is adorned by the NBA’s best young player, LeBron James, and those Nike and adidas logos look pretty darn real. Therein lies the problem: Nike <i>and</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> adidas…sharing identical packaging…and sharing the same player. Not likely. As with Bryant, LeBron inked a bajillion dollar deal with Nike, a deal which prohibits his likeness from being used by adidas to sell products. Of course, this isn’t adidas’ doing. (Quick note on LeBron’s contract with Nike. It was a seven-year deal completed in May of 2003 when LeBron was 18 years-old, and it was worth $90 million. Not only was LeBron 18, but he was more than a month away from even </span><i>being drafted</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. I still find that unthinkable. All of it. Especially the fact he was 18.)</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
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<center><img src="http://s933.photobucket.com/albums/ad171/vrani/sauconysock.jpg" /></center><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal">Notice anything wrong here? Nike packaging for a pair of socks that aren’t Nike. The logo resembles <a href="https://youtubeproxy.org/redirect.aspx/%20http://www.saucony.com/store/SiteController/saucony/home">that of Saucony</a>, but I really can’t be sure. Whatever it is, it isn’t Nike.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
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<center><img src="http://s933.photobucket.com/albums/ad171/vrani/Kobesface.jpg" /><o:p></o:p></center><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal">Here’s Kobe Bryant’s mug being used to sell some unlicensed merchandise.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
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<center><img src="http://s933.photobucket.com/albums/ad171/vrani/nbawhore.jpg" /><o:p></o:p></center><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal">The NBA is getting ripped off in all of these pictures because both its logo and players are being strewn about products that aren’t legitimate. But this one is especially egregious. Notice that there are three different companies, side by side, whoring out the NBA logo. Jerry West would be ticked.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
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<center><img src="http://s933.photobucket.com/albums/ad171/vrani/lakersjersey.jpg" /><o:p></o:p></center><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal">Not only does this guy bear a striking resemblance to Frederick Sykes, but he is wearing some <i>jiade</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> clothing as well. If you <a 1421546="" href="https://youtubeproxy.org/redirect.aspx/%20http://store.nba.com/shop/index.jsp?categoryId=">go here</a>, you’ll see that all L.A. Lakers gear is manufactured by adidas, even lame T-shirts that say stuff like “Where The Black Mamba Strikes.” I say we put Dr. Richard Kimble on the case.<br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal">I just can’t believe that the NBA or the Chicago Bulls would sanction this abomination: a quasi-cowboy hat with a huge Bull on it. Everyone who won all those Bulls championships – Jordan and Pippen and Jackson and the crew – is still alive. But when one of them dies, he will roll over in his grave because of this.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal">Finally, the Mother Lode. An entire wall lined with fake jerseys. Here we have, from left to right, LeBron, Carmelo, KG, Kobe, Derrick Rose and, cut off because the cameraman is a hack, an old Allen Iverson 76ers jersey. Unlike that previous pic of the Lakers jersey that had no brand logo, these <i>jiade</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> jersey are adorned by adidas’ three stripes. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Alas, they’re all fake. They sell for 150 yuan, or about $22. Online, adidas sells these for $79.99. And it’s not like adidas is philanthropic in China and simply hooks up the citizenry. I’ve bought two pairs of adidas shoes here – real shoes, from a real adidas outlet store – and the conversion is exactly one-to-one. For instance, the Derrick Rose basketball kicks I bought last November were about 700 yuan, or a hair over $100. That’s precisely what they would be back home.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">I’m not interested in philosophizing about the morality of counterfeit NBA gear (or counterfeit anything). You can argue (quite successfully) whatever point you want. On the one hand, sure, it’s ripping people off. It’s screwing Kobe and LeBron and the NBA out of royalties that, legally, should be theirs. In that sense, it is immoral. But at the same time, it’s hard to feel too sorry for these multimillionaires missing out on a slice of their jersey sales, jerseys that are priced through the roof because these guys likely wouldn’t have signed their respective deals for anything less than the GDP-sized sums they did. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Plus, these products are good for the Chinese economy. People have jobs making this bogus merchandise, and regular Chinese citizens – most of whom aren’t rich enough to pay $80 USD for a shirt – can rock their favorite gear. From that <i>Seattle Times </i><span style="font-style: normal;">article: <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-style: normal;"><br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i>Counterfeiting has become deeply entrenched in China's economy as a source of income for both small-time hawkers and powerful local tycoons. With millions of jobs dependent on the counterfeit trade, many in China think cracking down would mainly benefit foreign companies.</i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">I’m in no position to pass judgment; I’m not an innocent bystander. Indeed, I own my own slice of China’s vast fake basketball clothing market: a Larry Bird 1992 All-Star Game jersey that my brother bought me two years ago. With a huge star adorning the chest and a hefty dose of early-90s font, it is the epitome of Old School, and I love it. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">I used to get such a kick out of seeing the look of dudes’ faces when I strolled into an all-black gym wearing this Larry Bird jersey. I’m not imposing physically (at all), so the perception was far more “dorky” than “savvy.” I usually played pretty well in it though, channeling my inner Bird and deriving the magical residue that was surely imbued into that jersey, even if it was <i>jiade</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div>DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-36831625158814640342010-05-21T10:12:00.001+08:002010-05-26T19:48:36.046+08:00He's on Fire! Smoking and Basketball in China<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-style: italic;">For the most part, you can bet that someone will grab one of three things when one game ends in America: a phone, a drink or a ball. Here, people light up, sucking down cigarettes instead of gulping down water.</span><br /></div><br />I receive a text today at about noon from my buddy Brince. Brince and I met through a mutual friend, and not once have we done anything besides playing basketball. Sure, we’ve been in taxis together on the way to the courts, and we’ve gotten something to eat after we played, but basketball has been the catalyst for each and every interaction that we’ve ever had. That’s not to say that all of our conversations are mundane rants about the NBA. Come to think of it, we’ve actually talked about some pretty heady stuff considering that basketball is the crux of our friendship. But the fact remains, basketball is the crux of our friendship. <p class="MsoNormal">Brince is 27 years-old. He came to Jinan on a six-month teaching contract. That was about four years ago now. When his contract expired and it came time to ask himself what he wanted to do next, he simply couldn’t spurn the lifestyle that he was living. It was an easy decision to rationalize. He works at a university – not a private school like myself – and logs about 12 hours a week, and during the summers he works at a basketball camp that his buddy started. So he has his summers off (save playing some basketball) and he makes a nice salary by working 12 hours a week. More than a few people would have trouble opting out of that for a 9-5. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">His text asks if I want to play basketball. It’s one of those days were it’d be hard not to play basketball. The weather is ideal, there’s little breeze, and hell, even the pollution is complying: it’s the first day in a long while where you’d actually have to use your hand as a visor if you were<span style=""> </span>to look skyward. There is generally a smoggy tint between Jinan and the sun that knocks its intensity down about five shades. But not today. Today it’s blue skies. Plus, with the NBA playoffs in full tilt, I simply have basketball on my mind. There is other stuff that I could be doing, like figuring out my life in light of the <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/first-team-all-swindle-i.html">Northwestern debacle</a>; reconciling the fact that I want to get into journalism even though there are no journalism jobs; deliberating my next move when it comes to re-signing with my current employer or figure out something else to do with my life. Practical considerations abound, stuff that I <i>really </i><span style="font-style: normal;">need to figure out, but I still can’t help but think it would be a sin not to play. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I eagerly text Brince back that I do indeed want to play, and that I could probably coax my buddy Jonathan into playing as well. Brince calls about an hour later to make sure that we still want to play (we do), and we arrange a place to meet. I suggest Shandong Normal University, where I’ve played with Brince before. “Nah, man,” he says. “I want some competition!” Apparently there is better competition at a different university, and that’s where we’ll play. I couldn’t care less what the venue is. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">We get to the university and the competition seems about the same. There is one guy who is exceptionally athletic but can’t hit a shot to save his life. Brince knows him from previous encounters, and says to Jonathan and I, “He’s a tennis player. That’s his love.” I can easily see him darting from side to side on a tennis court, sending balls back whence they came with a ferocity and grace that only a freak athlete like this guy would have. Luckily for us, he’s not that good at basketball. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">Brince, Jonathan and I add a Chinese player to our team and begin to play. We lose our first game, sit for about 10 minutes, and then reel off a string of four straight wins. The party doesn’t last forever – the tennis player eventually dooms us – and we retreat to a nearby kiosk to buy some water. Upon our return, I see something that I have become almost immune to: The guys waiting to play in the next game – who have just lost but, because there are four teams cycling through, will have to wait for a few minutes – are smoking cigarettes. They’re getting ready to take the court by sucking down cancer sticks. Nuts.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Between games in the States, people check their phones for missed calls or texts. They scurry off to the water fountain to steal a drink. They shoot around or stretch or sit down and chat. These rituals pervade courts the country over. There are surely variations on these rituals. Maybe people in North Dakota run inside to down some hot chocolate instead of ice water. In L.A., maybe people check for emails on the BlackBerries instead of texts on their phones. But for the most part, you can bet that someone will grab one of three things when one game ends and the next one has yet to begin: a phone, a drink or a ball.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Here, people light up, sucking down cigarettes instead of gulping down water. It’s crazy by American standards, but if you remember this is China, then 18- to 30-year-old men smoking cigarettes isn’t a stunner. <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">China, after all, <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/5271376/Chinese-ordered-to-smoke-more-to-boost-economy.html">has an estimated</a>* 300-350 million smokers. There are more smokers here than there are <i>people </i><span style="font-style: normal;">in the United States. Moreover, it’s somewhat uncommon to see women smoke. Some do, sure, but there is still a seemingly hardened taboo about women smoking, especially in public. You just don’t see it. Thus, the vast majority of those 300-350 million smokers are men. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">* <i>Quick note about that link, from the Telegraph in London. I used it because it had the 350 million smokers stat, but the article itself is about a province in China where citizens were forced to smoke local cigarettes in an effort to bolster the province’s tobacco market. “Three ‘non-compliant’ cigarette butts were discovered by the ‘cigarette marketing consolidate team’ which informed the teacher he had violated the related civil servants ‘cigarette usage rule’ After some negotiation the school was spared a fine, but subjected to ‘public criticism” for ‘undisciplined practices’.” That the government was forcing its citizens to smoke a certain variety of cigarette suggest that there isn’t a great deal of anti-tobacco rhetoric coming from Beijing.<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal">As the numbers suggest, smoking culture is just different in China than in the U.S. For the past few years, from about 2006 to 2009, there was a seismic shift in smoking laws and regulations in the States. During my tenure in college – 2004 to 2008 – the numbers of places you could smoke shrunk and shrunk. During those years I was going to school in Colorado and spending my summer and winter breaks in Kansas City, and I know everything changed in Colorado, Kansas and Missouri during my college years. As a non-smoker myself, I watched the evolution of smoking laws with glee. First restaurants banned smoking. Then bars in Kansas. Then bars in Colorado. Then bars in Missouri, which my smoking friends had viewed as a refuge from the oppressive non-smoking types lording over the other side of the Kansas-Missouri state line. In a way, it still seems bizarre that you can’t smoke in bars. Philosophically, I’m opposed to that: since when are bars designated as healthy venues? Practically, though, I’m all for it. I’d just as soon not be surrounded by smoke. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">Well, it’s different here. You can smoke pretty much anywhere. You can smoke in restaurants; parents and teachers alike light up every day in the stairwells at my school; you can buy cigarettes at newsstands, restaurants, anywhere. It’s a little different in Beijing, where the 2008 Summer Olympics prompted the city to take some anti-smoking strides that resulted in smoking being outlawed in some restaurants and common areas like train stations. Still, though, it’s nothing like the States. Smoking is allowed and accepted almost anywhere – including basketball courts. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">People smoke here like it’s not bad for you, which, according to my parents, is how people used to smoke in the States in the ’50s and ’60s. But just because people are unabashed about smoking doesn’t make it healthy. Oxford University and Cornell University conducted a corroborative study, <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/216998.stm">discussed here</a> by the BBC, looking at smoking and smoking deaths in China. The hypothesis of the study: smoking may eventually kill <i>one-third </i><span style="font-style: normal;">of all young Chinese males if the trends continue unabated. According to the study, China has the largest number of smoking-related fatalities in the world. That may seem like a no-brainer considering the population numbers, but the study says that China’s smoking issues transcend the population numbers: “Surveys showed two-thirds of Chinese people think smoking does little or no harm, 60% think it does not cause lung cancer and 96% do not know that it causes heart disease,” the BBC reported said, adding, “Because of a sharp increase in cigarette sales in the last 30 years, around 2,000 people a day are currently dying of smoking in China. By 2050, the researchers expect this number could rise to 8,000 a day – some three million people a year.”</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">And just as men dominate the basketball demographic, so, too, do they dominate the smoking demographic. <a href="https://aniscartujo.com/webproxy/redirect.aspx/%20http://www.themedguru.com/articles/worlds_3_out_of_10_cigarettes_smoked_in_china-732125.html">According to themedguru.com</a>, “Out of every 100 men, 67 smoke, a higher percentage than anywhere else in the world apart from Yemen and Djibouti.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">There are also an estimated 300 million basketball players in China, and I can tell you first-hand, there is overlap between the smokers and ballers. At first I was shocked by the marriage of smoking and basketball. Basketball courts, after all, are a refuge of running around and sweating and cardiovascular exercise. It is, basically, antithetical to smoking. Just like a smoking ban at a bar – which is a refuge for alcohol and chance encounters with the opposite sex – is a haven for habits that don’t fly in the outside world. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Brince, Jonathan and I end up playing for a few hours. We outlast at least four different Chinese dudes who were acting as our fourth man – maybe because we weren’t smoking – and by the time we call it a day we’re satiated. My life is still in disorder on several practical fronts, but there was simply no way that I was getting through the day without playing basketball. On the bright side, at least I don’t smoke cigarettes.</p> <!--EndFragment-->DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-17477955890386614422010-05-17T19:24:00.002+08:002010-05-23T06:26:05.960+08:00A Love Affair with Love Affairs: Kobe Bryant in China<!--[endif]--><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-style: italic;">And that’s why Kobe Bryant might be so popular here, because (a) He plays basketball really well, and (b) He has, like so many Chinese people, cheated on his spouse.</span><br /></div><br />Commercial breaks are one of the (only) redeeming qualities about NBA broadcasts in China. When broadcasts back home cut to close-ups of the McDonald’s breakfast menu, or of a female bartender mocking a guy for not ordering a Miller Lite, broadcasts in China usually cut to highlight reels. I’ll take highlights any day over some floozy claiming that Miller Lite is an enlightened beer choice. <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">One of the would-be commercial breaks that was cooked up for the playoffs, and which plays sporadically during every Los Angeles Lakers game, is a <a href="http://www.blogger.com/www.youtube.com/watch?v=" ev_gc1q4mlg="">lengthy homage</a> to Kobe Bryant – two-plus minutes of nothing but Kobe. As if that weren’t ridiculous enough, Michael Jackson’s “Heal the World” plays in the background. That’s right: Kobe Bryant is going to heal the world – or maybe he already has. It’s hard to tell.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">The first time Jackson hits the chorus…<i>Heal the world, make it a better place</i><span style="font-style: normal;">…there’s Kobe hitting game-winning shots against Miami, then Milwaukee, then Sacramento.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">…<i>For you and for me and the entire human race</i><span style="font-style: normal;">…<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">There’s Kobe raining on Denver in last season’s Western Conference semifinals, and Magic Johnson being so roused by Bryant’s brilliance that he gives him a standing ovation. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i>…There are people dying. If you care enough for the living, make a better place for you and for me…<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">The clip is utterly ridiculous if you have even the vaguest notion of what the lyrics to this song mean. The song is about, you know, saving the world, and Bryant is a basketball player – and not a particularly likeable or philanthropic basketball player at that. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Whatever the clip is supposed to insinuate about Bryant, it speaks to his popularity in China. And Brant’s popularity in China is undeniable. MSNBC.com writer Mike Celizic, who covered the 2008 Beijing Olympics, began <a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26264453/">an article</a> about China’s obsession with Kobe thus: “It would be an insult to say that Chinese basketball fans treat Kobe Bryant like a god. And Kobe would be the insulted one.” And <i>Denver Post </i><span style="font-style: normal;">writer Mark Kiszla, also covering the 2008 Games, </span><a href="http://www.denverpost.com/sports/ci_10195227">wrote that</a> “Kobe Bryant is bigger in China than the Great Wall.” <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">His Lakers jersey has <a href="http://www.nba.com/news/kobepopularjersey_080812.html">for years</a> been the <a href="http://www.slamonline.com/online/nba/2009/10/most-popular-nba-jerseys-in-china/">most popular in the nation</a>. And yesterday, during a mid-class break, one of my friends’ students literally wrote “Kobe Bryant” in huge letters on the board. In smaller letters, between <i>Kobe</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> and </span><i>Bryant</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, he wrote, </span><i>Heal the world.</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> “You got to see this,” my friend, a Bostonian, told me. I walked into the glass, took one glance at the board and turned to the 17-year-old who penned it. “Heal the world?!” I said, exasperated. He nodded and pulled out his phone, which had as its background a picture of Kobe Bryant. It’s no surprise that the kid was wearing a purple Bryant jersey. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Why, though? Why is Bryant so outlandishly popular? Sure, he’s one of the best players out there, and he’s won championships, and girls think he’s a good-looking guy. These are surely all factors in Bryant’s popularity. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">But I am intrigued with a different hypothesis, one posed by my Bostonian co-worker: <span style="font-style: italic;">Bryant’s history of having extramarital affairs may actually enhance his popularity in China.</span> Because if you do a little research on infidelity in China, you realize that while Americans may have cringed at Bryant cheating on his wife, more than a few Chinese guys probably just nodded. And then went out to buy a Bryant jersey.<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">If you don’t remember, Kobe was accused of sexual assault in 2003 by a 19-year-old Colorado woman. The charges were ultimately dropped, but they nonetheless prompted a teary-eyed press conference at which Bryant admitted that he cheated on his wife. In 2004, a <a href="http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2004/magazine/09/14/kobe0920/index.html">police report</a> was leaked that contained further confessions from Bryant: he had slept with more women than just his 19-year-old accuser.<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">The Chinese can relate to extramarital affairs. <a href="http://www.china.org.cn/culture/2008-10/17/content_16629146.htm">A <i>China Daily</i></a><span style="font-style: normal;"><a href="http://www.china.org.cn/culture/2008-10/17/content_16629146.htm"> article</a> published in October of 2008 – two months after Bryant became the de facto king of China during the Olympics – discussed the popularity of the Chinese movie “Painted Skin,” which has a plot revolving around a man, Wang Sheng, who must decide whether to stick with his loyal wife or leave for his lover. A Beijing newspaper posted an online survey asking their readers, “If you were Wang Sheng, who would be your choice?” According to the article, there were about 1,100 people who responded, and less than half said that they would choose the wife (the good-husband option). More than 30 percent said that they would like for have both women (the Kobe Bryant option). Forty-five percent of those surveyed said that affairs were “quite common” among couples they knew.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">“The survey, by some degree, revealed people’s real attitudes toward extramarital affairs,” Zhou Xiaopeng, a consultant with the China Marriage Society, is quoted saying.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSPEK36711520070907">This article</a> from Reuters asserts, “‘Second wives’ are common among government officials and businessmen in China.” And <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/2005/nov/22/business/fi-mistress22">this article</a> from the <i>Los Angeles Times</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, about an official<span style=""> </span>named Li who was busted for having four mistresses, says: <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i>Li’s transgressions were minor compared with those of other public officials. A top prosecutor in Henan province, for example, was recently stripped of his post and Communist Party membership after investigators alleged that he embezzled $2 million to support his lavish lifestyle -- and seven mistresses….<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i>So common is the practice [of having mistresses] that it has spawned an industry of private detectives snooping on cheating husbands and their paramours.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Tiger Woods poses another interesting facet of the affairs-in-China topic. <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/executive-style/luxury/tag-tiger-and-timepieces-20100217-ob1r.html">This article</a> from a Sydney-based newspaper discusses how, while companies are increasingly skeptical of Woods’ image and his ability to market their products, Tag Heuer, a luxury watch maker, has taken a nuanced, country-by-country approach to handling Woods. Guess which country hasn’t seen a decrease in Woods exposure?<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i>“Very quickly we have taken sides,” [CEO Jean-Christophe] Babin said. “We stay with him but, as he wants more privacy and as he won't play for a while, in the countries where the issue is quite sensitive we won't use him much.”<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i>Consequently, in the US, Woods's image has been removed from the company's advertising. However, it remains on the Tag Heuer website and, in China, use of it has been increased.<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Peter Hessler succinctly discusses affairs in China in his book <i>Oracle Bones</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. In this scene, he rehashes tales from one of his former students, Emily, who herself was courted by a married man. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i>During dinner, Emily regales me with stories about the factory owners. One of her boss’s colleagues was a Chinese-American who, after recently arriving from San Francisco on business, had gone to Emily’s office, faxed his wife a love letter, and then immediately gone out and hired a prostitute. Emily’s own boss was always leering at the young women in his factory, and most of his friends were the same. In a nearby plant, another Taiwanese owner had become so distracted by his two Sichuanese mistresses that his company had gone bankrupt. <o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">This stuff happens a lot here. And while it isn’t necessarily accepted, it’s still common, and a basketball player who himself has (or at least had) a penchant for mistresses is something that Chinese men can relate to.<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Like so many unattractive aspects of Chinese cultural – be it poverty or joblessness or the number of deaths in an earthquake – quality statistics on extramarital affairs are hard to come by. Sure, there are online surveys; Tag Heuer has upped its use of Tiger Woods in China when other companies have washed his lecherous face from their ads; Hessler’s student obviously experience China’s love affair with love affairs first hand. But there is at least anecdotal evidence to suggest that affairs in China are, if not more prevalent than in the States, then at least viewed differently, almost like it is an inherent part of society as opposed to a nary-discussed secret that people do their best to ignore. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">And that’s why Kobe Bryant might be so popular here, because (a) He plays basketball really well, and (b) He has, like so many Chinese people, cheated on his spouse.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I’ll admit that this could very well be a specious claim; maybe Bryant is popular for more predictable reasons. Like that his string of three straight NBA titles culminated the same year that Yao Ming entered the league. Or that he plays in one of the biggest and most recognizable cities in America. Personally, though, I think that 19-year-old in Colorado<o:p></o:p> helped solidify Kobe’s god-like status in China.<br /></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">In his article on Bryant’s popularity in China, the Kiszla wrote, “Sure, the man can hoop. But he’s not exactly the finest example of American virtue. So why does China go absolutely gaga for Kobe?” Maybe Kiszla missed the point. Maybe Kobe’s not popular despite his marital transgressions, but because of them. <o:p></o:p></p> <!--EndFragment-->DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-78816364460179398312010-05-13T10:07:00.001+08:002010-10-23T18:07:45.024+08:00Over Construction<div style="text-align: center; font-style: italic;">Every now and then, the deafening machines churned in unison, forming a percussive sound not unlike a drum-line playing between snaps at a college football game. The rest of the time they just sound like a pair of jackhammers. </div><p style="text-align: center;" class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I shoot a text message to Li, who you may remember from this post entitles “A New Court.” In my phone, Li is saved as “Li Ball,” not to be mistaken for Li Bin, a fat-Buddha look-alike who I met at a nearby restaurant the other day and who insisted I take his number even though he speaks about eight words of English. According to Wikipedia, Li is one of the three most common surnames in Mainland China, along with Wang and Zhang. There is one Wang in my phone, who I met on playing ball in late February. Of the four Chinese people who I have in my phonebook – and who are listed under their Chinese names – two are named Li and one is Wang. The other is Lin.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">It’s been a few weeks since I played ball with Li and his friends on that uncannily nice court. Sure, <i>uncannily nice </i><span style="font-style: normal;">is a relative term – the rim was a little low and the court was dustier than an old photo album. After each dribble you can see a tan-colored cloud creep up like water that has been displaced by a rock. It will linger, float for a moment, and then find a new resting spot amid Jinan’s limitless housing options for dust.</span> Still, it’s the best court I’ve played on in Jinan. Noticing the devolution in what I consider a good court has convinced me that when I get back to the States and step on an indoor court with wood floors and a nice ball, it’ll be like someone just handed a major league slugger a metal bat. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Li was adamant when we first met that he wanted to foster a friendship – at least a basketball friendship. He told me that they played on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and that he wanted me to join them in the future. So last night, a Wednesday, I shot him a text. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i>Hello Li! This is [anonymous blogger]. I played basketball with you last month. I want to play with you again. When do you play?<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">That’s not the verbiage I would have used had I been texting someone back home; probably would have left out the “play with you” part and dazzled the last sentence up to at least a third-grade level. But Li’s English was a little spotty – better than about 99 percent of the people in Jinan, but spotty. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">He responded that he was sorry to have not contacted me sooner, but that he had been out of town for the past 10 days for a taekwondo competition. He then said that he would be playing the next day and that I should come by. They were starting, he said, at four o’clock. So today, Thursday, as I’m lazily getting dressed at four o’clock, Li gives me a call.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">“Hello, [anonymous blogger].”</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">“Li! How are you?”</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">“Yes, are you playing basketball?” I can hear basketballs pattering in the background.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">“Yes, yes. I am sorry I’m late. I will be there in five or 10 minutes.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">“You’ll be here in five minutes?”</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">“Yes, five minutes.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKtsENhooIlJLWvqQb1Ssn4JbWBT9yOCFnvOTBtRUhZOzhixAMRwUYBzxewHAY_CNPInanYwvCc_p5gYmKHepTzThtnHaACGy7PoLBW6EfWetLMTXMcTNnMW3ieaQeqQVKwzDJ7T1Yz0w/s1600/P8030357.JPG"><img style="float: right; margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKtsENhooIlJLWvqQb1Ssn4JbWBT9yOCFnvOTBtRUhZOzhixAMRwUYBzxewHAY_CNPInanYwvCc_p5gYmKHepTzThtnHaACGy7PoLBW6EfWetLMTXMcTNnMW3ieaQeqQVKwzDJ7T1Yz0w/s320/P8030357.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5531180921274326258" border="0" /></a>I change in a rush, throw on my increasingly nasty basketball shoes, race outside and fire up my recently-purchased motor bike. (I will, for now at least, resist the urge to rant<span style=""> </span>about the motor bike. This picture of me with my baby outside of a hot-pot restaurant will have to suffice. She's pretty, isn't she?)</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">On the three-minute ride to the court – it would have been about a 15 minute walk – I think about how I first met Li. After all, I hadn’t set out to play at Li’s apartment complex the day of our inaugural game. Instead, I was heading for a nearby university, a university that I never found. The culprit for my not finding the university was the fact that my directions were: <i>Look for the construction</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. And telling someone to look for the construction in China is like telling someone to look for the barbeque grill at a Kansas City Chiefs tailgate. The constant noise, the oppressive pollution, the ever-growing economy – construction is at least partly responsible for all of it. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">The construction-fueled metamorphosis in Jinan – and across China – is constant, moving at a pace that easily laps the changing of the seasons. More often than trees shed leaves and leaves change colors, streets shed occupants and store fronts change facades. Every week buildings and restaurants and stores disappear, and every week buildings and restaurant and stores appear in their stead. All of this stuff, of course, must be constructed.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">When people think of construction in China, the first image they conjure is probably that of a huge factory churning out plumes of smoke and soot, or maybe of a crane-dotted skyline. Those aren’t off-base images of industry in China. If I mosey four minutes up the nearest main road, I am afforded a view of a pair of enormous smoke stacks in the distance puffing out egregious amounts of smoke and god-knows-what. And I don’t even need to so much as turn the corner to see a crane; they’re across the street. Such scenes pervade China, and a great deal of China’s much-publicized pollution issues are indeed tied to factories with mountain-sized smokestacks and large-scale construction mandating a fleet of cranes. (Jinan, by the way, is no slouch when it comes to pollution. <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://www.asianoffbeat.com/default.asp?Display=" 856="">This site</a>, for one, ranks Jinan the 11<sup>th</sup> most polluted city in the world. If we focus and pollute like we’re capable of polluting, I’m sure we could break the Top 10!) <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">But China’s burgeoning economy isn’t fueled simply by its industrial factories and crane-requiring mega-projects. Small-scale construction reigns. <a href="http://www.blogger.com/%20http://www.buildnet.cn/zhanwang/xuyan_en.shtml">From Buildnet.cn</a>:</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i>With large scale stimulus plan[s], enormous investment in the infrastructure construction, and with the support of the aggressive fiscal and financial polices, the fixed asset investment increased by over 30% in 2009, and GDP 8.3% in China, meeting the GDP growth rate of 8% set by the authorities for 2009.<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><i>In light of these, the Chinese construction industry continues its fast growth, which helped make the Chinese construction market the most active one in the world, and brings enormous business opportunities for companies, domestic and abroad.<o:p></o:p></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">These construction markets are active indeed, and proof is easy to come by. The front gate of my apartment – which doubles as the front gate for the neighboring school – is eyed by a security guard who mans the post like a sentry. When I arrived in Jinan last September, the finishing touches were just being put on a little hut for the three-man rotation of guardsmen, who take turns at the entryway. Well, in December they tore down that hut and built him a new one; in March they tore down <i>that</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> hut and built him a </span><i>new</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> one. Three little outposts for the guards, all within the span of about eight months. The road that leads pasts the guard was also recently repaved – for the second time since my arrival.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Construction abounds beyond that gate as well. The main road was for weeks lined with gargantuan concrete cylinders, presumably some sort of underground piping, along with the behemoth equipment required to move such piping – huge yellow, mud-caked monsters that wouldn’t register a bump if anything from a ball to a person happened to get pinned under their tracks. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">That same road used to house a popular bus for us foreign teachers – the old 103. Fortuitously, the 103 route happened to go past both of the schools at which my coworkers and I worked. Alas, its route has since been altered because the path is being ripped to shreds…by construction. And the bus that we’ve been relegated to instead – the 102 – goes past a true construction abomination: a<span style=""> </span>blocks-long stretch of cranes and dust and screeching metal and a cohort of workers. The construction orgy is taking place behind big billboards designed to disguise the carnage with elaborate mockups of what the construction is ultimately supposed to resemble. According to those billboards, it will one day be the site of a slew of shops and restaurants ands swank apartments. Right now, it’s dust and metals and workers. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">It’s hard to quantify the construction; I have no good statistics. But I’m telling you, it never stops. Last night I went to bed at 11 to the groan of two jackhammers that were ripping up a nearby lot. (The lot, by the way, was paved about three months ago.) Every now and then, the deafening machines churned in unison, forming a percussive sound not unlike a drum-line playing between snaps at a college football game. The rest of the time they just sound like a pair of jackhammers. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">You can’t escape construction here, yet that was my landmark for the university – <i>Look for the construction.</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> I missed it, of course, and ended up finding Li Ball instead.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I’m not looking for the construction today. No, I’m looking for that one-way street – manned by a security guard just like the one at out apartment – that runs along Li’s basketball court. I get there at about 10 past four, and they are already playing. I park my bike along the fence sitting 10 feet east of the court; the court itself runs east-west. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">A lush-red China flag is blowing authoritatively out of bounds, along the left sideline at halfcourt. Call me un-American, but I’ve taken a liking to the Chinese flag. It’s simple, stately – blood red with five gold stars. In China, red is synonymous with luck and happiness, and there is something to be said for a flag that pays homage intangible things like luck and happiness and not just government and history. Of course, red is also the color of communism, and I’m not so hot on the suppression of free speech and all the other things that the China flag represents. This site, after all, can’t be viewed (or authored) from China without the aid of proxy servers. Still, there are worse things to have as scenery than that powerful Chinese flag. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Though I am the ninth guy, they immediately invite to play. I feel awkward destroying the symmetry of the game like this, but they don’t seem to care that the teams aren’t matched. Plus one guy leaves after about five minutes, so my presence doesn’t hurt. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">As with the last time I played here, I find myself ambivalent about the score. Keeping score was of paramount concern for me in the U.S., whether I was playing at a gym, with friends, wherever. But playing ball in China has had an erosive effect (or is it a healing effect?) on my concern with keeping score. The games we play are to 10; five is the norm at Shandong Normal University, but with no one waiting on the sidelines, playing longer games is fine. Li is invariably the authority when it comes to the score. That would have been me back home.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Nothing all that noteworthy happens on the court. At one point I hit back-to-back turnaround fadeaways – a shot that would be nearly impossible on the SNU hoops – that prompt a chorus of <i>Hao Chiu!</i><span style="font-style: normal;">s. Beyond that, nothing too great. Li tells me after we finish that he is again going out of town – more taekwondo – and that there might not be games here for a couple weeks. This solidified my previous suspicion that Li is something of a ringleader on these courts, that his organizational presence is required to make sure things run properly. If that is indeed the case, then I seem to have gotten in good with the head honcho. </span></p> <!--EndFragment-->DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-72980348166184788562010-05-11T20:11:00.010+08:002011-07-20T21:13:09.471+08:00CBA: The Crazy and/or Banished Association<div style="text-align: left;">I feel a little guilty taking vacations. After all, when you work three days a week and get paid a comfortable (and largely undeserved) sum of money, what is a vacation actually a break from? Twenty-hour work weeks? Three days on, four days off? Eating out every night? In a lot of ways, when you teach English in China, your whole life is a vacation.<br />
<br />
But as<b> </b>guilty<b> </b><span style="font-weight: normal;">as I sometimes feel about traveling, I’d likely feel a twinge of remorse for <i>not </i></span>traveling. I am in an exotic, foreign country, and trains and cheap flights make every corner of this monster accessible. And then there are holidays like the recent May Holiday, or Labor Day, when my school was closed and I had a full 11 days off.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">I couldn’t pass on a chance to travel over the May Holiday. But in an attempt to justify it, I still had this blog in the back of my mind. That’s why, when I saw the CBA final on TV, I felt compulsed to watch it and, later, to write about it.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">The best-of-seven series was between the Xinjiang Flying Tigers and the Guangdong Southern Tigers. It was Guangdong’s eighth consecutive trip to the finals, and, on the strength of a 4-1 series victory, the sixth title that the Southern Tigers have claimed in the past seven years. Not even the Chicago Bulls of yesteryear pulled off the six-out-of-seven titles feat, so the Southern Tigers are indeed a juggernaut.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">(That this game was between the Tigers and the Tigers inspired a quick study of the different CBA team nicknames. Of the 17 total teams, three are named the Tigers; the third is from Jilin. Other nicknames include the Ducks, Leopards, Dragons, Dinosaurs, Lions, Sharks, Whirlwinds, DoubleStar and Rockets. For a moment these names struck me as utterly ridiculous, but then I thought about some NBA names: Magic, Thunder, Knicks, Heat, Suns, Jazz, Lakers [which, when written in Chinese characters, translates to “Lake People”]. So I’ll give a pass to the Dinosaurs and Ducks and Whirlwinds because, really, NBA names are pretty goofy too.)</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">But what was most interesting to me watching that decisive Game 5 were the foreign players on Guangdong’s championship team: Smush Parker and David Harrison. I remembered both of these players from the States, but until I did a little homework, I had no idea about the crazy routes that landed them in China.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">David Harrison<b> </b><span style="font-weight: normal;">was a star at the University of Colorado from 2002-04. Kansas fans like myself will remember the seven-footer for exchanging words with former KU All-American Drew Gooden during a 2002 game in Boulder. Following the game, Harrison, then a freshman, said that the Jayhawks would “get theirs” when the teams played again in Lawrence; Colorado lost the rematch 103-73. (Harrison conceded that KU fans “really don’t like me.” We did, however, like playing his team.)</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-weight: normal;"> <br />
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<div class="MsoNormal">KU storylines aside, Harrison, a top 15 national recruit, was a heck of a player in college. As a freshman in 2002, he averaged 13.9 points, 7 rebounds, 1.3 blocks and shot 63.8 percent from the floor. His sophomore season he again averaged 13.9 points, but upped his rebounds to 8.3 and blocks to 3.3, and led the Buffaloes to a rare NCAA Tournament appearance. He blew up as a junior with 17.1 points, 8.8 rebounds, 63.1 percent field goal shooting and 2.9 blocks – he became the all-time leading shot blocker at CU. His efforts earned him All-Big 12 honors, and he opted to forego his senior season and enter the Draft. He was chosen No. 29 overall by the Indiana Pacers in 2004. That’s when things went terribly wrong for Harrison.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Now, Harrison was a bit of a hothead before he got to Indiana. Just look at what Denver Post writer Christ Dempsey wrote about Harrison: </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i> <br />
</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i>Not only was the giant a top-notch recruit, he was intriguing. He was outspoken. He played with fury. But he also partied relentlessly, never quite reaching the promise predicted for him. Emotion was his calling card, and it often got him in trouble.</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><br />
<i><o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i> <o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i>He argued with opposing fans, most notably with blue-clad Kansas supporters at Allen Fieldhouse in Lawrence.</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><br />
<i><o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i> <o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i>He openly questioned CU coach Ricardo Patton's authority.</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><br />
<i><o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal">So yeah, Harrison had it in him to be brash and maybe ever a bit reckless. But it certainly didn’t help getting drafted by the Pacers in 2004. Think of the nuts on that squad: Ron Artest, Jamaal Tinsley, Stephen Jackson. There has been no team in recent history with as thuggish a persona as that 2004-05 Pacers team (not even the Jailblazers). And for a player like Harrison – who was teetering between ultra-talented big man and massive waste of talent – there couldn’t have been a worse fit.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">People know about Ron Artest. He was at the epicenter of the famous Pistons-Pacers brawl after he charged into the stands to try to maim the guy who threw beer at him. Throwing beer at someone is lame, but so is retaliating against the wrong person – which Artest did. Other interesting Artest tidbits:</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal"></div><div class="MsoNormal">* Told the Sporting News that he used to drink Hennessy during halftime of games</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">* Applied for a job at Circuit City to get the employee discount<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">* Asked for a month off to start the 2004-05 season because he was exhausted from promoting an R&B album produced by his label</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">* Destroyed a television camera at Madison Square Garden<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">* Had his dog confiscated by authorities for lack of proper care<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">* Arrested for domestic abuse<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">* Served 10 days in jail for domestic abuse</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">This was the best player, the leader of that Pacers team.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Then there was Jamaal Tinsley, whose rap sheet is almost as ridiculous as Artest’s. I’ll let David Aldrich, writing for NBA.com, rehash Tinsley’s off-court career:<span style="font-style: italic;"> <br />
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</style> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i>In October, 2006, just after the start of training camp, Tinsley and several teammates were at a strip club when an altercation occurred, which led to then-teammate Stephen Jackson being hit by a car outside the club – and firing a gun into the air several times. Tinsley wasn't disciplined by the team (the league suspended Jackson for seven games the following season).<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i> <br />
</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i>In February, 2007, Tinsley and then-teammate Marquis Daniels were involved in a fight at a local bar that led to a felony charge of intimidation being filed against Tinsley, along with misdemeanor counts of battery, disorderly conduct and intimidation. The charges were dropped in March 2008, after an agreement was reached where Tinsley and Daniels agreed to perform 32 hours of community service and stay out of trouble for two years.<o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i> <br />
</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i>However, during that interim period, Tinsley was involved in another incident, this one even more serious.</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><i> <br />
</i></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><style>
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</style><span style="font-family: "; font-size: 12pt;"><i>In December, 2007, Tinsley and members of his entourage were shot at in a high-speed chase through the streets of Indianapolis in which Tinsley was the apparant [sic] target of a robbery. Cars followed Tinsley's party out of a local club and followed them for several blocks, into a gas station, and to a local hotel, where one of the passengers in one of the cars opened fire, striking the Pacers' </i></span> <i>equipment manager in both elbows. (He was treated and released at a local hospital.)</i> <br />
<i><o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
How sullied was Tinsley's reputation? Well, the Pacers had tried to trade him in 2008 but couldn’t find any takers. Thus, during the 2008-09 season, they ended up paying him millions upon millions of dollars – not to play, but to stay away from the team. He was still technically under contract, but was nonetheless such a cancer that the Pacers chose to swallow the money rather than let him be around the team. Must be a great guy.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">And Stephen Jackson – who was just mentioned as having fired a gun outside of a club and being a key component in the Pistons brawl – rounds out the Pacers 2004-05 roster. Jackson is so hot-headed that he got himself ejected from playoff games (yes, plural) in 2007, but that is minuscule compared to the rest of his transgressions.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">This is the mess into which Harrison was welcomed when he left Colorado.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">“He had the craziest group of characters assembled on one team,” Harrison’s brother, D.J., who also played at CU, told the <i>Denver Post</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. “There was nowhere to hide on that team.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-style: normal;"> <br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal">It goes without saying that Harrison didn’t flourish with the thuggery surrounding him. He was hit with a misdemeanor assault charge for his role in the brawl in Auburn Hills, and subsequently sentenced to one year of probation. Things weren’t going well on the court either. For three years, Harrison averaged fewer minutes each season than he had the last, from 17.7 minutes as a rookie in 2004-05, to 15.4 to 7.9. His point totals followed the same downward plunge.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">According to Dempsey, it was after his third season – when Harrison averaged 7.9 minutes and 3.0 points – that Harrison fell into a habit of heavy marijuana use. “I didn’t really have friends anymore,” Harrison told Dempsey. “I stayed in my house, and I smoked pot. That's what I did. I didn’t want to leave the house. I literally feared for my life sometimes there [in Indianapolis].</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">“That’s what I created in my mind. I didn’t understand that those things may or may not happen to me. And if they do, I have no control over it anyway. So why am I sitting around worrying about it?”</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
<i><o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal">In January, 2008, Harrison failed a random drug test and, as a result, was suspended for five games by the NBA. He was suspended again, by the Pacers, after a March tirade in the locker room. Not surprisingly, he wasn’t offered a contact extension by Indiana after the ’08 season. No NBA teams wanted him, so he headed to China to play for the Ducks. During the 2008-09 season, he averaged 42.2 minutes and 21 points. Then, he went back to the States to try to convince a team to pick him up. None did.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">“Skill-wise, there’s no question David should be in this league,” Larry Bird is quoted saying in the <i>Denver Post </i><span style="font-style: normal;">article. “It’s just the other little things that’s keeping him out. Your reputation is everything. . . . As a player, I know what he can do.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-style: normal;"> <br />
</span></div><div class="MsoNormal">“It’s just that he’s got to prove to people that he's going to put all of that other stuff aside and take this job seriously.”</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">If it’s any consolation, he’s tearing it up in China. This season, with Guangdong, he averaged 16.7 points, 8.8 rebounds and shot 70.4 percent from the floor. And now he has a medal to show for it. (The players got medals, not rings, and during the award ceremony a 60-second snippet of Queen’s “We Are the Champions” played in a mind-numbing loop.) </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Pretty bizarre career.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Then there’s Harrison’s teammate, Smush Parker. For me, Parker is synonymous with the Los Angeles Lakers, where he started for two seasons from 2005 to 2007. This was a down period for the Lakers but that wasn’t necessarily Parker’s fault. After all, Kobe Bryant was in “Trying to show the world how great I am” mode for each of these seasons. For instance, in the last month of the 2007 season, with the team hovering around .500, Bryant had point totals of: 65, 50, 60, 50, 43 (in five consecutive games!!!), 53, 50, 50. In a 17-game stretch, Kobe netted at least 43 points eight times – and 50 points seven times. It wasn’t, however, a winning formula; they didn’t make it past the first round of playoffs either season with Parker running the point. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">In 2005-06, Parker had a totally serviceable two-to-one assist-to-turnover ratio, plus he averaged 1.7 steals per game and hit nearly 37 percent of his three-points. In his two season, Parker averaged 11.7 and 11.1 points with almost identical assist numbers; he was a statistically competent point guard. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">So why was Parker shown the door? Well, in 2007 the Lakers signed Derek Fisher, and with 2006 Draft pick Jordan Farmar revealing himself to be at least serviceable, there was no need for a third point guard in Parker. Thus released from LA, he signed a two-year, $4.6 million contract with the Miami Heat. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Then things got pretty ugly. A 41-year-old female parking lot attendant said that Parker needed to pay a $12 valet charge to get his keys back. Parker said that he had already paid and, having “lost it,” grabbed the woman’s arm in order to get his keys. After news of the altercation broke, the Heat deactivated Parker.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
<i><o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal">Parker ended up playing a total of just nine games for the Heat – averaging 20 minutes, four points and 1.7 assists – before being waived and later singed by the Los Angeles Clippers toward the end of the season. During his second stint in L.A., he played 19 games with numbers similar to his numbers <span style="font-weight: normal;">in Miami – that is, not good. The next season, 2008-09, he tried out for the Denver Nuggets but was cut before the season began. After playing in the </span>NBDL<span style="font-weight: normal;"> for a few months, it was off to China.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">Like Harrison, Parker was a stud this season in the CBA – and apparently didn’t get into any tiffs over valet fees. On the year, he averaged 18.7 points per game to go along with 6.2 rebounds, 5.7 assists and 3.1 steals. Pretty nasty numbers – good enough to be named to the Asia-Basket.com All-CBA team, along with four other foreigners (Charles Gaines, Stephon Marbury, Bateer Mengke and Stromile Swift). </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">I promise that this is almost over. But, before I sign off, a quick look at the two foreigners for Xinjiang, Guangdong’s opponent in the finals: Myron Allen and Charles Gaines. Allen played college ball at North Dakota but, after it was found that he played a few minutes in a quasi-professional league for the Fargo-Moorhead Beez, the NCAA said that he was forbidden from playing college hoops anymore; he’d lost his amateur status. That was in 2003. Afterward, he bounced around the NBDL for a bit and ended up here.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">Gaines, who played ball at Southern Mississippi, has played professionally in Turkey, France, Israel and even briefly for the San Antonio Spurs. He was booted from his Israeli team after repeated violations of team policies; sounded like the guy liked to party. He was signed ever-so-briefly by the Spurs, who quickly released him. Sticking with the “American ballers in China are a little flaky” theme, Gaines slapped a Chinese player on Guangdong’s team during the finals, earning him a two-game suspension.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
<o:p></o:p> <o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">One wonders if things could have been different for Harrison and Parker. What if Harrison had gotten drafted by another team? What if Harrison ended up in, say, Utah or San Antonio? After all, Stephen Jackson kept it together in San Antonio. Maybe the combo of a veteran coach and a quieter city could have kept Harrison in line like it did Jackson. And what if the Lakers hadn’t drafted Farmar in 2006? Then, even if Derek Fisher came to town, Parker may have still had a spot on the team (and a even-tempered veteran to groom him). </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal">Then again, maybe these guys were doomed regardless of circumstances. Harrison proved to be a headcase before he was even drafted. Sure, it didn’t help that he was surrounded my misfits in Indianapolis, but there is pot and fighting to be had anywhere, not just in Indianapolis. And who knows about Parker. A millionaire who will quibble with a parking lot attendant over $12 probably doesn’t have the soundest psyche to begin with. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br />
<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">As circuitous as they were, these guys’ paths landed them in China. Those paths, of course, are lined with legal issues and drug problems and bad reputations. And now, a CBA title.</div>DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-84500667650375996992010-05-08T20:58:00.004+08:002010-05-08T21:10:54.682+08:00First-Team All-Swindle, I<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-style: italic;">There is a catch, though. A huge, almost-six-digit catch. You see (sigh), the one-year Medill Master’s program costs (gulp) $84,000 (tear).</span><br /></div><br />I recently received news that, in my mind, confirms two things beyond any doubt:<br /><br />(1) I have the chops to be a real journalist, not just a nary-read blogger<br />(2) God or the cosmos or whatever it is that controls the world seems to have condemned me to a life of teaching English and blogging<br /><br />(You can skip this bit of bio and get to the basketball-in-China stuff by going to <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/05/first-team-all-swindle-ii.html">Part II</a>…)<br /><br />In the middle of March, I learned that I was admitted into Northwestern’s prestigious Medill Master’s in Journalism program. There are few better programs in the country – or at least few programs with Northwestern’s reputation (it’s hard to tell sometimes what’s more important). The list of big-time sports journalists to go through the Medill school is staggering: Michael Wilbon of ESPN and the <span style="font-style: italic;">Washington Post</span>; J.A. Adande of the <span style="font-style: italic;">Los Angeles Times</span> and ESPN; Kevin Blackistone of the <span style="font-style: italic;">Dallas Morning News</span>; Mike Greenberg of ESPN; Jon Heyman of <span style="font-style: italic;">Sports Illustrated</span>; Brent Musberger of ABC and ESPN; Adam Schefter of ESPN; yadda, yadda, yadda. The list goes on. Basically, if you’re a sports fan, there is a decent chance that you have ingested coverage from a Northwestern alum in the past week. And for me, an aspiring sports writer who is stuck in a far corner of the world, going to Northwestern would be a way to insure that I never find myself scavenging the basketball courts of Jinan, China, in an attempt to find things to write about.<br /><br />There is a catch, though. A huge, almost-six-digit catch. You see (sigh), the one-year Medill Master’s program costs (gulp) $84,000 (tear). I knew that when I applied, but the number was so outrageous that I kind of shrugged it off: Sure, they may list the price at $84,000, but there is no way they can honestly expect people to pay that. Get in and get scholarships, I thought.<br /><br />The instant I got accepted, I went to a local computer store and printed out the necessary paperwork to procure some financial aid – a 2009 1040 Form, the NU financial aid application, a letter explaining that, you know, I’ve been working in China and have no money. I shot it off in the mail and, six days later, called the Northwestern financial aid folks to make sure they received everything they needed to award me financial aid. They assured me they had, and for the first time since the summer of 2008, a sense of having everything in order washed over me: I’d teach through the summer, go back in August, head up to Northwestern in plenty of time for the Sept. 20 start date. Yeah, there were logistical concerns – I needed a place to live, I would probably need to buy a new camera, etc. But for the most part, I was set. I was going to the best journalism school in the country, and afterward, I’d (finally) be on my way to procuring a job. Like, a real job.<br /><br />But then I saw the financial aid package Northwestern offered me, and the ray of sun that had been following me around for the past month turned to a dark, dark cloud. Of that $84,000 total, Northwestern offered me only $12,000 in grants and scholarships; the rest of it was loans. It doesn’t take an egghead to do the math on that: I’d have to swallow $72,000 in loans. And really, it’s more than that. With the help of a financial adviser, I crunched the numbers and figured out that I’d have to pay about $790 per month for 10 years to repay that debt. Because of interest, that comes out to about $94,000 over 10 years. If this were law school or medical school or an avenue into some high-paying industry, I wouldn’t blink at $72,000 worth of debt. But this is journalism, where even good jobs don’t pay <span style="font-style: italic;">that</span> much. If I paid $790 per month, that’s roughly $9,500 per year, and I have no idea when I will have a job where $9,500 isn’t at least one-fourth of my annual salary – even with a degree from Northwestern. I’d gladly take on $30,000, maybe even $40,000 worth of debt. But $72,000? My god.<br /><br />I sent out a dozen emails to various contacts I have in the journalism biz – editors, writers, friends. I asked them, basically, if it was worth it: Is taking on gobs of debt to go to Northwestern at least going to insure that I have a place in the industry. Without fail, their answers were tepid. (Well, except last one here, which basically says it would be a gargantuan waste of money.)<br /><br />*<span style="font-style: italic;"> If the writing market isn't there, there's always teaching. I would think that getting a grad degree would set you up on that front!…</span><br /><br />* <span style="font-style: italic;">But does it really HELP you? Depends on what tangible evidence you can show prospective employers when you’re done with school besides a line on your resume. At the rare times I’ve gotten to hire, the work that’s been done always speaks volumes louder than the school you went to or the grades you got, and the journalism experience OUTSIDE the classroom usually proves to be the most valuable. If you want to be a reporter, what you really need are good, recent clips reflecting varied internships and experience at multiple professional organizations….</span><br /><br />* <span style="font-style: italic;">I have a master's in Creative Writing. I acquired it through scholarships and teaching assistantships and avoided debt. The discipline of graduate school is good for you. And congrats on getting into such a respected school. But would I recommend taking on a big debt for that degree in journalism?</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">The honest answer is that I – [anonymous person] – would not. I love in fact that good journalists don't need the advanced degrees. But it would give you the option to teach. Or a better chance at teaching. Which is a good fallback….</span><br /><br />* <span style="font-style: italic;">That's a really, really tough call. I am not big [on] debt (who is, right?). But that is a great school with a sterling reputation and a lot of contacts…. It's also amazing to me how many people (including my wife) have the option to teach journalism if they need tom, as long as they have a master's degree. And having a master's from such a great school could be beneficial in a lot of way….</span><br /><br />* <span style="font-style: italic;">If this is what you really want to do, then Northwestern or any other master's program is a waste. A master's won't really impress anyone in this business. If you're hoping to teach, that might be a different story. Someone else might have better information on that. But as far as being a reporter or editor, no. A master's won't help you get or keep a job and the debt you're talking about would just be a huge burden for absolutely no benefit. If anything, this business is going to less formal education….</span><br /><br />Of course, I don’t want to teach. That’s kind of the whole point of me going back to school (so I can quit teaching) and this blog (so I can divert my mind from teaching). I know teaching English here is different than teaching, say, high school journalism back home. But still, I don’t like teaching. I don’t have the patience to teach. I want to be a journalist.<br /><br />But unless something drastic happens in the next week – like, say, I fall into $70,000 – I simply don’t see how I can justify it.<br /><br />So there it is – how it’s possible to have the best news of the year turn into the worst news. <span style="font-style: italic;">Congratulations! You, the 24-year-old desperate to be a journalist, have been admitted to the best journalism school in the country (world?)! Now, here’s your piddly financial aid package. Go find $70,000 – psst…it’ll be more like $95,000 when all is said and done – and come on board! </span><br /><br />Part of me wonders if I am just being a wuss, if I need to bite the bullet and swallow the debt if this is really what I want to do. Another part of me wonders if that is a decision that could ruin the next 10 years of my life.DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-22921803080377704832010-05-08T20:54:00.001+08:002010-05-08T21:03:49.968+08:00First-Team All-Swindle, II<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-style: italic;">When Jonathan asks about particular players, Goel nods knowingly and – in a feat that many US basketball fans couldn’t achieve – proceeds to list their numbers. </span><br /></div><br />I write for a few hours and then watch basketball to round out the morning. There is a 9:30 a.m. tip between the Spurs and Mavericks, but before the game starts there are highlights reels galore – the Top 10 Blocks of the Year, the Top 10 Buzzer Beaters of the Year, etc. Then there is a Jason Kidd commercial in which he’s advertising his Peak brand shoes. Kidd is one of the handful of U.S. players – along with Shane Battier and Ron Artest, to name a few – to have been signed to deal with Peak. The commercial is hokey – there are tight shots of Kidd trying to get around his defender while he says something in English about how, on the court, “You are your own worst enemy.” Then, after he makes a move around the defender, the opponent is revealed to be…Jason Kidd! Artsy, huh?<br /><br />Other NBA-on-TV notes:<br /><br />• There was no game yesterday* because there was an all-day commemoration of the earthquake victims last week.<br /><br />*<i> This was originally written on April 21.</i><br /><br />• During the Mavericks-Spurs game, Dirk Nowitzki receives a curious technical foul. I never figure out why he was T’ed up because, alas, the announcers are speaking Chinese.<br /><br />• At one point Caron Butler is shooting two free throws during a Mavericks run. After he cans the first shot, he turns to the home crowd and waves his arms to rile them. I’ve never seen anything like it: someone about to shoot a free throw who is nonetheless imploring the crowd to make noise. They oblige; Butler hits the free throw.<br /><br />• The Spurs really annoy me.<br /><br />After a few hours of watching the NBA playoffs, it’s off to SNU, where hopefully I can allay my heart-pounding anxiety over graduate school, jobs and my life in general. I immediately start talking to a Chinese guy who I meet on the sidelines named Goel. He is wiry, probably about 20 years-old, and wearing a button-down flannel shirt and jeans. He ends up playing with my buddy Jonathan and I, and after we lose a game, Jonathan takes to asking Goel some questions.<br /><br />Jonathan was born in Boston – and likes to let people know that he was born in Boston – and with the NBA Playoffs now underway, he has been particularly enamored with his Celtics. So Jonathan sets out to test (a) Goel’s English, (b) his NBA knowledge, and (c) whether or not he likes the Celtics.<br /><br />Well, Goel doesn’t only speak English, and doesn’t only know about the NBA, but also likes the Celtics. When Jonathan asks about particular players, Goel nods knowingly and – in a feat that many US basketball fans couldn’t achieve – proceeds to list their numbers.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Rondo?</span> “Yes. Very good. Number nine.” <span style="font-style: italic;">Allen?</span> “Ah...Twenty.”<span style="font-style: italic;"> Garnett?</span> “Yes. Number five. He was the best until he injured. His knee is...freak.” Seeing as Goel was at a university and playing basketball, it’s no stunner that he knows a bit of English and knows a bit of basketball. But to list off players’ numbers? That’s above and beyond. Thing is, he wasn’t done waxing eloquent about the NBA.<br /><br />Once Jonathan finishes his masturbatory line of questioning about the Celtics, I ask Goel about my favorite player, Steve Nash, who plays for the Phoenix Suns. Nash’s list of endearing qualities abound. First off, he’s a joy to watch. Watching him is like those days in high school when teachers would flip on a movie: a true reprieve from the sometimes overwhelming monotony of the NBA. He is the point guard of the highest-scoring team in the NBA, and as such it’s his responsibility to orchestrate and moderate a breakneck pace the entire game. He does this as well as anyone ever has, and in 2010, at age 36, became the became the oldest player in history to lead the league in assists. In addition, he is a 6-2 point guard who happens to have the efficiency of a power forward – this season, for instance, he shot 50.7 percent from the field. That was better than any guard in the league save Rajon Rondo (<span style="font-style: italic;">Number nine!</span>), who shot 50.8 percent...but took less than one-third as many three-pointers as Nash...and scored three points less per game.<br /><br />What’s more, Nash just doesn’t look the part of a big-time basketball player. And I’ve stepped into enough all-black gyms – and been immediately written off because of my appearance – to have a special appreciation for someone who thrives in the face of stereotypes. I even spent the summer of 2005 being called “Steve Nash” at a local gym because, like Nash, I had long, shaggy hair, and because, like Nash, I was one of the rare white dudes playing.<br /><br />The Suns were being broadcast on Chinese television one morning last month, and, because Nash was on, I made my girlfriend watch for a little while. “Him?” she asked almost incredulously. “<span style="font-style: italic;">He</span> is your favorite player?! He’s so...spindly.” That’s not the word I would have used, but it’s an apt one nonetheless. Nash is indeed spindly, which, in my mind, makes him that much more likeable. The point guard position is getting more and more freakish – guys like Derrick Rose (who is a hoss) and Deron Williams (who is built like a running back) and John Wall (who one pundit described as having “extraterrestrial athleticism”). Point guards are getting bigger and stronger and, more than anything, younger. Yet here’s little old Steve Nash – literally, he’s little and old – still producing outlandish numbers and eye-pleasing basketball. (One more Nash tidbit: During the 2003 All-Star weekend – a couple months after the US had invaded Iraq – Nash addressed the media wearing a shirt that said, “Shoot baskets, not people.” Love it.)<br /><br />Turns out Goel is impressed with Nash, too. “Nash is amazing,” he says. “He is – how many years? He is 32 years-old? And he is still incredible.” Nash is actually 36, but who’s keeping track. “A player who is very old and is still good like Nash is amazing.” Touché, Goel. Touché.<br /><br />Goel rounds out his impressive interview with Jonathan and myself when he nails the final question: Who is the best? A lot of people in China will say Kobe Bryant. An increasing amount will say LeBron James. And there is still a segment of the population that will say Tracy McGrady (more on that <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-22-yao-erful-words-ii.html">here</a>). But Goel displays an appreciation for history – and an understanding of the game – when he answers.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Who is the best player?</span> Jonathan asks. To which Goel – like it was a moronic question – blurts out, “Jordan! Of course Jordan!”<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">***<br /></div><br />Goel, Jonathan and I are joined by another foreign teacher named John (who was introduced <a href="http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-31-chucking-foreigners.html">here</a>). John has a husky build and, it turns out, a bit of a mean streak on the court. Jonathan and I had spent the previous hour building a repoire with the Chinese players in attendance, but that <span style="font-style: italic;">guan xi</span> is washed away in John’s first game. He plays with an intensity that is foreign to these courts, at least this court on this day. He uses his elbows to get rebounds. He refuses to accept other players’ foul calls. At one point, while being guarded tightly by someone on the other team, he thrusts the ball into the guy to clear space – shoving him, basically, with the ball. Yeah, John was getting fouled, but such an unabashed display is still uncommon. The thought that he was in the wrong never crosses John’s mind.<br /><br />I’ve played in games here at Shandong Normal University where John would have fit right in. A lot of dudes here do seem to relish getting after it and playing with a fire (Cliché Alert! Cliché Alert!). Those games, though, are usually closer to the entrance, closer to Court No. 1. That seems to be the epicenter of competition, and the further you get from No. 1, the more laid back it gets, like the concentric rings of a dart board where the bull’s-eye is Court No. 1.<br /><br />Right now, we’re about four courts away; the competitive residue doesn’t stretch to these parts. And while Jonathan and I are both competitive, we have the wherewithal to see that today, here, things are amicable and not intense. We were keeping score, but we were also laughing. There were fouls being committed, but they were also being called and acknowledged. There were people chasing down rebounds, but very few of them came with elbows attached – until John arrived. Jonathan and I cringe at the way John is playing and hope that he realizes we aren’t playing our district rival on a Friday night. He never does.<br /><br />Even with John’s, uh, zest, our team’s winning streak ends at two. Thus, Jonathan, John, Goel and myself walk over to the sidelines. My eyes are trained on the pile of bags, clothes and water bottles sitting at the base of the hoop. My backpack sits there, next to Jonathan’s, a water bottle resting invitingly atop each bag. We guzzle down some water and give that deep, quenched, post-drink exhale. Goel, though, can’t find his water – or his bag. He looks around like someone who is late for work and can’t find his keys. He peels back shirts and backpacks. He looks all along the sideline, and then looks again in all the spots he just looked. Nothing.<br /><br />“What’s wrong?” Jonathan asks.<br /><br />“My bag. It is not here.” <span style="font-style: italic;">What’s in it?</span> “My money, my ID card, and my phone.”<br /><br />He continues to look and John asks if he wants to call his phone. (Don’t think John’s a bad guy. Just competitive.) Goel gratefully says yes and calls his phone. The thief answers, and we listen to Goel speak in Chinese, trying to decipher what is going on by reading Goel’s face.<br /><br />He hangs up and says that the guy who answered wants 200 yuan. Goel is to meet him later, with 200 bucks, and then he will get his things back. We extend our honest condolences – really, if could have been our stuff that got jacked – but Goel doesn’t seem too upset about it. He’s taking it in stride.<br /><br />Goel says that he will need to call the guy back in a few minutes and asks if it’s OK if he uses John’s phone. John doesn’t hesitate – of course he could use it. Goel makes another call and I sit down next to Jonathan, on his left, while Goel paces back and forth a few feet away. Quietly, I say to Jonathan, “Feels like a swindle.”<br /><br />“What do you mean?”<br /><br />“Just seems a little weird, doesn’t it? His bag is gone but he doesn’t seem to care. Now he needs to pay a guy 200 bucks, but he doesn’t have his wallet. I give it five minutes until he asks us for 200 yuan.” I can’t tell whether or not Jonathan agrees with my cynical conspiracy theory. But he at least thinks it’s interesting. “I never thought about that,” he says, shaking his head and smirking just slightly.<br /><br />My suspicions pique when Goel says to John, “Can I take your phone?” John is more than compliant. “Thanks! I’ll be back in five minutes.” Goel then jogs out of the entrance, past Court No. 1. Upon exiting the gate, his jog turns to a sprint. I think – but don’t say – <span style="font-style: italic;">There goes your phone, John.</span>DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-43251133485043568292010-05-08T20:49:00.000+08:002010-05-08T20:53:33.220+08:00First-Team All-Swindle, III<div style="text-align: center; font-style: italic;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">“You got tea-scammed?” she asked excitedly, as though it were part of the experience of going to Shanghai. And then it hit me</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;"> – </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">I was scammed. </span><!--EndFragment--><br /></div><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;"><br />My cynicism regarding Chinese swindles isn’t natural. It has been learned – the hard way. The first time I was swindled in China was in 2007, when my brother and I went to Urumuqi, the capital of Xinjiang Province. On the bus from the airport to our hotel, we were befriended by a guy who spoke pretty good English. We chatted for a while and, when we were about 15 minutes from the hotel, he tossed us a sales pitch about his tour group, Turpan Happy Tours. We could pay 400 yuan for an all-inclusive package that included trips to a series of things that my brother and I wanted to see anyway. We would ride camels and go to a grape farm and peer into ancient caves and do other things unique to the Urumuqi area; this guy’s taxi-driver friend would provide the transport. Sounded good.<o:p></o:p></span> <p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">The dude came to the hotel with us. Inside the hotel was a huge poster featuring package-deals that included many of the same sights that this guy was offering. The major difference was that those tours were considerably more expensive. Thus, we agreed to terms: four-hundred yuan; sites A, B, C, D and E; his friend would drive; 8 a.m. tomorrow morning. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">Come 8 a.m., his friend rolled up in a nice taxi – even had leather seats. We would first go to the furthest destination, where camels and caves awaited. Well, instead of getting on a camel straight-away, which is what we were anticipating, we were first asked to pay. “No,” my brother said in his broken but serviceable Chinese. “We already paid.” No we hadn’t, they said. “Yes, we gave 400 yuan to this guy,” at which point we showed then the Turpan Happy Tour card. <o:p></o:p> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">Turned out the 400 yuan wasn’t all that inclusive. This wasn’t what we were led to believe, of course. The Happy Tour was to include transportation <i>and</i></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;"> admission to all these sites. Not so. Thus, we ended up being nickel-and-dimed all day. Money for the camels. Money to enter the caves. Money to traipse around the grape farm. Money here, there and everywhere. The Turpan Happy Tour turned into a Turpan Crappy Tour. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">More recently, I was swindled last fall in Shanghai. While walking around the city center, a nice-looking group of four approached me to chat. They were all Chinese and said that they were on vacation. They’d just gone to an art museum, and they were now on their way to get tea. They invited me to join them, but I declined. The woman who spoke the best English persisted. “Please,” she said. “You need to experience a Chinese tea ceremony. You seem so nice!” <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;"> <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">I had other things on the docket, so I again said thanks but no thanks. Afterward, though, I felt a twinge of remorse. Maybe I should have gone, I thought. I mean, it probably would have been cool – experiencing a Chinese tea ceremony (whatever that was) with a bunch of Chinese people. It was a missed opportunity. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">Luckily, though, about four hours later I was again approached to have tea. A pair of guys shot the breeze with me for about two minutes and then casually said, “Well, my cousin and I are going to have tea now. Have you ever been to a Chinese tea ceremony?” No! “Would you like to come?” Yes! I didn’t hesitate; I wasn’t going to miss another chance to experience a Chinese tea ceremony (whatever that was) with some Chinese people. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">The sanctity of the ceremony was offset by the fact that it was held on an upper floor of a shopping center, that you had to walk past a series of clothing stores and manicurists to get there, and that the hostess of the occasion was wearing jeans. Whatever, I thought. Just Westernization.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">The three of us sat down opposite the jean-clad hostess, who explained the prices. It would cost 39 yuan per person just to be there, and then 49 yuan for each variety of tea we drank. I was a little taken aback by the prices; it seemed insanely overpriced. But, then again, we were in Shanghai, and things are expensive in Shanghai. Plus, I was on vacation. What the hell! <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">There was a hokey explanation for what each tea was supposed to do – this one is good for your breathing; this one is good for men. After about 15 minutes and two different teas, the bill came to 137 yuan per person. I gave one of the guys 150 yuan, and he left the room with the hostess. The third guy didn’t pay anything, but explained while we were alone that his cousin was spotting him. I got my 13 yuan back and felt good as I left. I may have foolishly forewent a cultural experience when I passed on tea this morning, but at least I made up for it. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">That night I met my friend, who was teaching in Shanghai, for dinner. She asked what all I did today. I told her that I went to an English language bookstore – can’t find those in Jinan – walked around the Bund, etc., etc. Shanghai stuff, basically. “Oh, and I went this tea ceremony thing.”<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">“You got tea-scammed?” she asked excitedly, as though it were part of the experience of going to Shanghai. And then it hit me. Yes, I was scammed. One-hundred thirty-seven yuan for a few sips of tea and 15 minutes of sitting in an annex buried atop a mall, presided over by some bimbo wearing jeans and paid for by an invisible exchange that took place outside the room? Scammed, indeed. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">I have friends who have been scammed, as well. And heck, maybe there are other times when I’ve been scammed and I didn’t even realize it. Basically, scamming in China is not uncommon. And when Goel disappeared and informed us that he needed 200 yuan, it reeked of a scam. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;">Jonathan, John and I continue to play basketball. John’s intensity never relinquishes, and our squad rarely loses. Eventually, though, we tire of playing and decide </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">it’s </span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;">time to head out. Jonathan and I stuff our money and phones into our pockets, noticing that John</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">’s</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;"> phone is still nowhere to be found. Nor was Goel. I then give my phone to John to call his phone to see what was going on. Goel answers and says that he</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">’d </span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;">be about five minutes. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;">The three of us slowly walk over to the entrance and sit down next to Court No. 1, waiting for Goel. The people playing there invite us to join them, but we are played out. Five minutes passes and Goel is nowhere to be found; my swindle theory is looking stronger and stronger. <o:p></o:p> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;">Then a cop car rolls up. Goel hops out of the backseat and jogs over to John to give him his phone. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">“</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;">Sorry!</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">”</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;"> He says. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">“</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;">Sorry I was gone a long time!</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">”</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;"> John earnestly isn</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">’t</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;"> upset and tells Goel not to worry about it. Jonathan asks what happened.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;"> “</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;">I called them to meet and give them the 200 yuan, but they said that they wanted more money. So I called the police.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">”</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;"> He punctuates this last sentence by pointing to the police car. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">“</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;">Sorry again,</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">”</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;"> Goel says to John. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">“</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;">It</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">’s</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;"> no problem,</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">”</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;"> John assures him. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">“</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;">Good luck getting your stuff back.</span><span style="color: black;" lang="ZH-CN">”</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;" lang="ZH-CN"> </span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;">I don</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;">’t</span><span style="font-family: Calibri; color: black;"> know if Goel ever did get his things back. I do know, however, that he wasn't swindling us or trying to trick us. Nonetheless, I successfully tricked myself. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: black;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <!--EndFragment-->DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-67570564318306300802010-05-06T20:43:00.003+08:002010-05-26T07:57:08.076+08:00Los Suns Couldn't Rise in China<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-style: italic;">This hullabaloo wouldn’t happen in China for a multitude of reasons. For one, Chinese journalists have as their Editor-in-Chief the Chinese government.</span><br /></div><br />Nothing too unusual about this morning’s NBA playoffs broadcast. The Suns-Spurs game was aired on CSPN – China’s all-sports equivalent to ESPN – and presided over by a pair of commentators/analysts who were waxing on the game from thousands of miles and 10 times zones away.<br /><br />As tempting as it is to rant about the Suns, my favorite NBA team, I’ll stick to the point and not get sidetracked on how awesome Steve Nash is, or how tortured the Suns’ recent history has been – especially against the Spurs. After all, the best Suns team in recent memory, the 2007 squad, was ousted by the Spurs in the playoffs in no small part because later-jailed NBA official Tim Donaghy famously and brutally <a href="http://www.blogger.com/www.youtube.com/watch?v=fvkKdXLwt0U">fixed Game 3</a>. I won’t talk about any of that stuff. Promise.<br /><br />Instead, what struck me about this morning’s game was the idea of Phoenix’s “Los Suns” jerseys happening in China. The idea of a blatant political statement being made…on (inter)national television…highlighting and criticizing a governmental decision…and it being allowed to happen!<br /><br />And not only allowed to happen, but even admiringly referenced by the president. Obama, after all, <a href="http://blogs.abcnews.com/nightlinedailyline/2010/05/pro-sports-any-place-for-political-debate.html">addressed a crowd</a> Wednesday by saying, “I know that a lot of you would rather be watching tonight’s game – the Spurs versus Los Suns from Phoenix.”<br /><br />The Chinese parallel would be something like Xinjiang’s CBA team wanting to wear alternate jerseys in a show of support for the region’s <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4482048.stm">reportedly-repressed</a> Uighur population; the CBA allowing (and supporting) it; President Hu Jintao taking a moment to make a quip about to the press; the story getting huge media play.<br /><br />This wouldn’t – <span style="font-style: italic;">couldn’t</span> – happen in China.<br /><br />A quick background on the Los Suns thing. Arizona recently passed legislation mandating that immigrants carry documentation at all times proving that they are in the country legally. The legislation also permits law enforcement officials – “when practicable” – to ask for said documentation at any time, from anyone.<br /><br />The aim of the law, according to Republican Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, is to help identify and prosecute illegal immigrants. Brewer added that it was “another tool for our state to use as we work to solve a crisis we did not create and the federal government has refused to fix.” It is the most stringent such law in the United States.<br /><br />Not everyone is for it, however. Obama, for instance, said that <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/24/us/politics/24immig.html">the legislation threatens</a> “to undermine basic notions of fairness that we cherish as Americans, as well as the trust between police and our communities that is so crucial to keeping us safe.” A statement from the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund said that the law could spur “a spiral of pervasive fear, community distrust, increased crime and costly litigation, with nationwide repercussions.” And Los Angeles Cardinal Roger M. Mahony went so far as to say the demand for immigration documents was akin to “Nazism.”<br /><br />And it’s not just politicians and Mexican groups and religious figures who are against the law. The Suns are against it too, and that’s why they were wearing jerseys that said “Los Suns” – to protest the law and show solidarity with Arizona’s large Mexican population.<br /><br />The Suns have been unabashed about their displeasure with the law. The team’s owner, Robert Sarver, <a href="http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/blog/ball_dont_lie/post/Suns-will-wear-Los-Suns-unis-to-honor-Phoenix-?urn=nba,238682">said the other day</a>, “The frustration with the federal government’s failure to deal with the issue of illegal immigration resulted in passage of a flawed state law. However intended, the result of passing the law is that our basic principles of equal rights and protection under the law are being called into ….”<br /><br />And after Tuesday’s practice, Steve Nash said, “I think the law is very misguided. I think it’s, unfortunately, to the detriment of our society and our civil liberties. I think it's very important for us to stand up for things we believe in. As a team and as an organization, we have a lot of love and support for all of our fans. The league is very multicultural. We have players from all over the world, and our Latino community here is very strong and important to us.”<br /><br />Such public displays of political discontent – and media coverage of that discontent – would simply not happen in China. Period.<br /><br />There are no direct analogies to this Phoenix Suns scenario. The Chinese government has a tight handle on these things – protests, and the manner in which protests are portrayed by the media. Media in China, after all, are controlled (or at least heavily censored) by the government. So even if there were an unabashed attempt to protest a governmental decision, say, like the Phoenix Suns did, it would only become news if the government <span style="font-style: italic;">allowed</span> it to become news. And that’s only if it were allowed to happen – which it probably wouldn’t be.<br /><br />For instance, foreign protesters who <a href="http://www.studentsforafreetibet.org/article.php?id=1026">unfurled a pro-Tibet flag</a> in 2008 were arrested, jailed and then expelled from the country. Later, <a href="http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article3537785.ece">China closed Mount Everest</a> as a preventative measure to thwart any more protests.<br /><br />In his book <span style="font-style: italic;">Oracle Bones</span>, author Peter Hessler writes about a religious anniversary – a day rife with protest potential – that he witnessed in Tiananmen Square in 2000:<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">…a small man directly in front of us drops into lotus position. Shouts, commands, people running: a half-dozen plainclothes cops. By the time they force the man to his feet, a van is already speeding toward us from a far corner of the Square…they carry him into the van. Sheets have been tied over the windows so nobody can see inside….</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">I wander off the Square for a few minutes, and when I return, a middle-aged woman tries to unfurl a banner in front of the flagpole. A plainclothes man tackles her hard…. </span><br /><br />So, it’s hard to protest in the first place. And if people do manage to sneak in a protest, then the media coverage is tightly governed. For example, when <a href="http://www1.voanews.com/english/news/a-13-2008-03-26-voa13-66808757.html">all the Tibet stuff</a> was going on in 2008, foreign journalists were simply banned from entering the region. The only people chronicling the stories, therefore, were Chinese journalists, and Chinese journalists have as their Editor-in-Chief the Chinese government. Once foreign journalists <span style="font-style: italic;">were</span> allowed to enter Tibet, the protests had been subdued and journalists were escorted around by Chinese authorities. In addition, in 2009, which marked the 50th anniversary of a Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule, reporters were <a href="http://blogs.afp.com/?post/2009/03/12/Open-China-Dont-Tibet-on-it-Tough-time-for-foreign-reporters-covering-Tibet">expelled</a> not only from Tibet, but from neighboring regions as well.<br /><br />And <a href="http://waronyou.com/topics/police-disperse-student-protest-in-china/">this article</a> discusses a 2009 student protest during which “Hundreds of students from the city of Nanjing in Jiangsu Province clashed with local government security.” The article adds, “The incident was not reported in China’s national media.”<br /><br />Now, I understand that a basketball team wearing contentious jerseys is different than Tibetan freedom and violent, hundreds-strong protests. But the crux of my point is that the Chinese government monitors both its citizens and the news in a way that the U.S. government doesn’t. China prevents things like Los Suns from happening, and controls vehemently how things like Los Suns can be covered if they <span style="font-style: italic;">do</span> happen (which, again, is not likely).<br /><br />Yet the media in America doesn’t shy away from controversy, nor did it shy away from the Suns’ dissenting message. After Wednesday’s game, ESPN.com’s front page simply said, “Los Winners.” Under that were links not only to the game recap, but also to an article discussing the political import of the jerseys – entitled <a href="http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/playoffs/2010/columns/story?columnist=adande_ja&page=Sarver-100504">“Suns’ Statement”</a> – as well as a link to a copy of the governor’s <a href="http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/commentary/news/story?page=brewer/100505">post-game statement</a>.<br /><br />The governor said, among other things, “By now, sports fans everywhere have heard something about the passage of Senate Bill 1070, a measure I signed into law.” And sports fans everywhere have heard about it because of the hubbub created by Los Suns.<br /><br />There’s more. The <a href="http://scores.espn.go.com/nba/recap?gameId=300505021">Associated Press recap</a> of the game began, “The Phoenix Suns took a stand, and a 2-0 lead in the Western Conference semifinals.” The article – which, mind you, was a game story – went on to say:<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">The [immigration] bill has drawn criticism from civil rights groups and others, including President Barack Obama, who called it “misguided.”…</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">“The team stood up for that part of our community because I think that's the side of this bill that could open the door to racial profiling and racism,” Nash said. “and I</span>’<span style="font-style: italic;">m talking about American citizens who are Latino. Their quality of life and freedoms could change because of this bill.”</span><br /><br />CNN.com’s “U.S.” section on its front page had a link reading, “NBA team joins immigration fight.” The <span style="font-style: italic;">New York Times</span>’ Web site declared, “‘Los Suns’ Join Protest, Then Stop the Spurs.” Even FoxNews.com covered the story. The notoriously right-wing outlet titled its article, “Little Reaction to Jersey Protest.” (That that headline ran on the site’s front page, however, suggests that it may be a bigger deal than they’re letting on.)<br /><br />This hullabaloo wouldn’t happen in China for a multitude of reasons. First off, the team almost certainly wouldn’t have been allowed to wear the jerseys. Moreover, the president definitely wouldn’t have given legs to the story by talking about the jerseys in front of a gaggle of reporters. And, maybe most importantly, the media wouldn’t be allowed to wax on and on – and print dissenting voices – like the U. S. press has done.<br /><br />This post is not meant to be anti-China; I am not anti-China. Nor is this meant to be a treatise on how wonderful the United States government and media are; I have serious misgivings about each of those institutions. Nor is this meant to read like a sermon on how American basketball has yet again entered into the political sphere. For in reality, it’s not at all commonplace in the States to have basketball teams – or, for that matter, any team at any level – taking political stands. Indeed, that’s one of the reasons that the Suns’ foray into politics garnered so much attention.<br /><br />I’m do not want to sound imperial here, or come off as though I think America and its sports teams are untainted beacons of pure democracy and pure freedom. Heck, many believe the law that the Suns were protesting is itself an indicator of the contentious freedom that some Americans – especially ones with brown skin – face every day.<br /><br />What I am saying: I’d bet the house that this not only wouldn’t, but <span style="font-style: italic;">couldn’t </span>happen in China. That, and <span style="font-style: italic;">Viva Los Suns!!! </span>DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-42729773073825777162010-05-05T13:56:00.001+08:002010-05-05T14:01:45.317+08:00Basketball and Breakfast<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-style: italic;">This broadcast captures none of that electricity – it’s sterile, muted. The crowd noise sounds like it’s leaking out of someone’s headphones who’s sitting a row in front of you on an airplane.</span><span style="font-weight: normal; font-style: italic;"></span><br /></div><br />Hubie Brown is nowhere to be found. Neither is Mike Tirico or Charles Barkley. Kenny Smith, Bill Walton, Kevin Harlan – no, no, no. The NBA Playoffs have finally begun, and they’re even being broadcast live, but none of my favorite announcers or talking heads are on TV. Their familiar, almost soothing voices – which are intertwined with the NBA playoffs the same way that organs and choirs are intertwined with church – have been muted by the thousands of miles that sit between them and myself.<span style=""> </span> <p class="MsoNormal">Hubie and Sir Charles and the rest have been replaced by a pair of Chinese dudes sitting behind laptop computers in a studio. These guys are sitting on either side of a drab grey desk with a television screen looming on the wall behind them. There are a pair of miniature, hand-sized Larry O’Brien Trophies resting on the desk, and on the near side of each computer is a “Peak” brand logo, which looks like more of less like a white triangle set atop an ugly red backdrop. Peak has invested heavily in the NBA, signing Shane Battier, Ron Artest and Jason Kidd to shoe deals, so it’s no shock that Peak is smattering its logo on the laptops during an NBA broadcast. That Peak logo also shares airtime on the TV behind the gentlemen; when the screen doesn’t have the Cleveland Cavaliers and Chicago Bulls emblems, it has that Peak triangle. It’s like a billboard with alternating facades. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">The playoffs are under way, and this morning’s the Bulls-Cavs game* is being broadcast live from back in the States, from back in time. China is 12 hours ahead of Eastern Standard Time, so last night’s 8 p.m. EST tip-off (broadcast on TNT) is an 8 a.m. tip-off here (broadcast on CCTV5). That these games are on speaks to basketball’s popularity in China: there are enough people who will tune in to watch, even though it’s an 8 a.m. tip. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">* <i>This was originally written on April 20.</i></p> <p class="MsoNormal">This CCTV5 broadcast is a bizarre way to watch hoops. The two guys sitting behind their computers double as the in-studio analysts and the play-by-play announcers. They aren’t actually at the game, a fact revealed by the muffled sound of the Cleveland crowd. It’s not like the <i>real </i><span style="font-style: normal;">broadcast, where a series of strategically placed microphones pick up the crowd noise and on-court noise, mixing it beautifully with the play-by-play and color commentary to form the final product – a product with everything from players’ groans to the net’s </span><i>swoosh</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> to the crowd’s discontent/euphoria. Instances when commentators raise their voices to speak over the bedlam engulfing the arena are among my favorite moments in sports – the struggle between the crowd and the announcer, when you can feel that things are electric inside the arena. There are no such instances today. (Ron Franklin’s three-hour battle with the crowd during the 1997 LSU-Florida football game in Baton Rouge is one of the reasons I ended up wanting to get into sports. Video highlights of that game are on YouTube, but I can't go there.)</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">After a stop in action, the scroll at the bottom of the screen sets the scene by giving the location, the name of the venue, the names of the refs, and the name of the lead announcer: Marv Albert. I chuckle and wish that it were Marv Albert. I have no idea what these announcers are saying. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">This broadcast captures none of that electricity – it’s sterile, muted. The crowd noise sounds like it’s leaking out of someone’s headphones who’s sitting a row in front of you on an airplane.<span style="font-weight: normal;"> Even calling it crowd noise is an exaggeration. I later read the AP recap of the Cavs-Bulls game, which says, “James scored 40 points – 15 in a tour-de-force fourth quarter – as the Cavaliers, fueled by a rabid home crowd that booed every move by Noah, maintained home-court advantage…” I had no idea that Noah was getting booed or that the crowd was rabid. I could have guessed either fact, but there was nothing in the audio of the broadcast that made it clear. Come to think of it, I could probably get more out of simply hearing the crowd – no commentary – than listening to these guys blabbering from a few thousand miles away. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">All I pick up are the occasional “Hao chiu!” or “Mae you!”, terms that were discussed at length back in the <a href="https://aniscartujo.com/webproxy/redirect.aspx/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-11-say-what.html">“Say What?” post</a> from April 16. Other than that, they could be saying anything. At times, I fantasize that Hubie Brown is making the call: “OK, so if you’re the Bulls, you live with Varejao taking that shot, OK? He’s an energy guy, he doesn’t shoot a high percentage from there, you let him shoot that and if he makes it (chuckle), well, then kudos to him.” I don’t care if he’s old and says “OK” to begin and end every other sentence. Brown’s a legend in my book.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">As bastardized as this broadcast is, there is one redeeming quality about it and other Chinese NBA broadcasts that I’ve seen. Often times instead of commercials, they’ll show highlights. A few months ago I was watching a Lakers game, and each time the broadcast cut to commercials in the States, it would cut to a pre-made highlight reel of Kobe Bryant doing crazy dunks of yesteryear, hitting buzzer beaters, pumping his fist, etc. I’m not huge on Kobe, but give me highlights of him hitting miracle shots or defying gravity any day over tired television commercials. During this Chicago-Cleveland game, each would-be commercial break is instead highlights from earlier in the game. There’s Derrick Rose hitting a jumper…there’s LeBron hitting a fadeaway (why is Kirk Hinrich guarding him?)…there’s Antawn Jamison on the baseline. It’s a pretty cool way to pass the commercial breaks.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">LeBron ends up carrying the Cavs to victory, but as much as I admire LeBron’s exploits – tonight he had 40, eight and eight – I just can’t like the Cavs. The thing that bugs me most about them is that they are so hodgepodge. It seems like all of their guys save LeBron have been rented in a furious attempt to win a title and coax LeBron into staying. Look at their starting lineup this morning – er, last night. It’s LeBron, who’s been with the team since he was drafted in 2003. Outside of him, it’s Shaquille O’Neal, Jamison, Mo Williams and Anthony Parker. Only Williams has been with the team for more than one season – and he’s been there for only two. O’Neal and Jamison have a <i>combined</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> 78 games with Cleveland, less than one season between the two of them. Sure, the Cavs bring a few guys off the bench who have been around for years, but it just strikes me as lame that Cleveland’s roster is compiled of non-Cleveland players. It looks like the strategy could land them a title this year; that doesn’t make it cool.</span> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Anyway, enough about Cleveland. When the game ends, the first commercial – and they do eventually start playing commercials – is an adidas ad featuring Dwight Howard, Rose, Tim Duncan, Kevin Garnett and…Tracy McGrady. I won’t rant too much about China’s infatuation with McGrady – did plenty of that <a href="https://aniscartujo.com/webproxy/redirect.aspx/%20http://culturalcrossover.blogspot.com/2010/04/march-22-yao-erful-words-ii.html">here</a> – but seeing him today is extra interesting because last week he floated the idea of retirement if his faulty knee doesn’t get better this off-season. “If it don’t happen this summer, I’ll ride off into the sunset,” McGrady said on April 15, adding, “I can’t see myself coming back playing the way I'm playing right now. I just don't see it happening.” I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if he’s still popular here even after he retires. </p> <!--EndFragment-->DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6235806468089120476.post-66914822029883687362010-05-04T20:56:00.003+08:002010-05-05T22:10:31.736+08:00Interview Request, I<div style="text-align: center; font-style: italic;">I loved telling stories and I loved writing and, more than anything, I loved editing the stories I’d written – kind of like a person with O.C.D. loves washing their hands. The interviewing still made me shudder.<br /></div><br />I used to treat interviews the way George Constanza would treat a phone call to a woman. George, if you aren’t familiar, was hopelessly devoid of confidence. Thus, he liked to make notes before he called a woman so, if the conversation hit a lull, he would have some fodder to call upon. That was me trying to do an interview: I’d make a tedious outline of how I thought the interview should transpire in case I started stammering. I was always afraid that things would go south – a fear that was justified by numerous awkward, clammy-handed interviews.<br /><br />A few years back, I hated nothing more than doing interviews. It’s not exaggerated hyperbole to say that I lost sleep over interviews. I literally did lose sleep over interviews. If there were some way to do journalism without doing interviews, I would have been all over it.<br /><br />The first really good story I wrote, about my high school’s drunk-and-later-suspended cheerleading team, wasn’t all that great at first. The scoop was that 15 of the school’s 17 varsity cheerleaders were getting wasted at one of the girls’ houses, and that girl’s mom got ticked and then called the school to report the transgressions. All the girls got suspended for the season, and it was a big deal in our high school.<br /><br />Well, the original draft that I turned into my high school editor, Dianne, didn’t have an interview with the mom. I was too freaked out. I talked with the athletic director and some of the cheerleaders and the school district’s Director of Something-or-Other. The mom, though? No way.<br /><br />I forked over a print-out of that first draft to Dianne, knowing that the mom’s absence was a huge flaw. I was like a kid handing a report card to his parents with a big fat F, hoping that the parents don’t notice.<br /><br />Dianne did notice. “The story is fine,” she said. “But you really need to talk with the mother.” I knew this was true, but I didn’t want to accept it. Finally, though, I grew a pair and interviewed the mother; that interview made the story 10 times richer than it was originally. <br /><br />My aversion to interviews carried over to college. The first time I interviewed our college’s basketball coach I was freaked out; the first time I interviewed University of Colorado’s hoops coach I was even more freaked; the first time I interviewed a CU player, I probably sounded like that bumbling kid trying to explain the F on his report card. I loved telling stories and I loved writing and, more than anything, I loved editing the stories I’d written – kind of like a person with O.C.D. loves washing their hands. The interviewing still made me shudder.<br /><br />But after a while, slowly, I started enjoying interviews. There was a cumulative effect – the more people I interviewed, the more relaxed I got. The more relaxed I got, the better I got. The better I got, the more relaxed I got. Eventually, the anxiety was removed from the process once I realized that, hey, all you’re really doing is talking. If you’re confident in your ability to hold a conversation, then you should be confident in your ability to give an interview.<br /><br />I officially conquered my interviewing phobia while freelancing a University of Missouri-Kansas City basketball game for the Kansas City Star. That night, the Big 12 football championship was being played at Arrowhead stadium, in Kansas City, and the Star was strapped for writers. My number was called.<br /><br />After the game I was summoned to the interview room. There was one other person in the room, UMKC’s sports information director, and we waited patiently for players and coaches to file inI was slouched in a folding chair with my digital voice recorder in hand. And when Dane Brumagin – UMKC’s top player – and the coach waltzed in, I couldn’t have been more lax.<br /><br />In theory, it was probably the most nervous I ever should have been heading into an interview session. It was, after all, Division I basketball; the story was for the KC Star; I was on a tight deadline. Plus, with the room devoid of other reporters, I couldn’t rely on anyone to ask questions for me. I had to fish for quotes all by myself, without the cloak of anonymity. But I was ice-water cool.<br /><br />My story, “UMKC moves in, gets the win,” started thus:<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">UMKC must have realized that the dark blue line about 20 feet from the basket doesn’t mean “Do Not Cross.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">After launching 39 three-pointers in their last outing – compared to just 26 shots from inside the arc – the Kangaroos dared cross into the Land of Two. They might just try it again after a 70-62 win against Indiana-Purdue Fort Wayne at Municipal Auditorium Saturday night.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">“Our first couple games we averaged over 30 threes a game,” said UMKC coach Matt Brown. “We shot half as many three against Wichita State and we win, half as many threes against Bradley and we win. There’s a correlation there: less threes, you win games.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">The Roos, 4-6, 1-1 in the Summit League, missed 25 long balls in their previous game against Oakland, an 84-78 loss, and had pumped up a total of 65 threes in their last two contests.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">At least for a night, UMKC decided to ditch the three-pointer-each-minute strategy and opt for a more two-pointed attack.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Led by Dane Brumagin’s game-high 28 points, UMKC shot just 21 threes against IPFW, 3-5, 0-2. Brumagin, who came in averaging 16.4 points per game, was a perfect nine-for-nine from the free throw line.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">“I think we made a point to get to the foul line and attack,” Brumagin said. “That way we were able to get some free throws and less three-pointers today.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">“It’s one of those things that goes game to game. If guys are feeling it then they might string off a few, but tonight we were just having success getting the ball inside.”</span><br /><br />As I transcribed those post-game quotes from Brumagin and Brown, I remember thinking how chilled out I seemed. And why not? Why be nervous about talking to UMKC’s best played when I’ve interviewed CU’s best player? Why get sweaty-palmed about UMKC’s coach when I’ve interviewed a former NBA coach? It was after that UMKC game when I realized that interviewing wasn’t simply not annoying. It was fun.<br /><br />But now, in China, interviews are even more laborious than they were with that mom back in high school. Just with one big difference: It’s not that I’m scared that the conversation won’t be fruitful or that I’ll flub questions. Over here, I simply can’t ask questions.DDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16817335734627760137noreply@blogger.com0