This morning I attended a ceremony on the campus of Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT). The ceremony was to celebrate the 65th anniversay of the founding of BIT, one of China’s major universities of science and technology. Many former and current goverment leaders in China are graduates of this university, so they pulled out all […]
Collective Punishment, Chinese Style
This is something I wrote a year ago, but it’s still a good read: I live in a private housing development on the west side of Beijing. Private housing developments are a relatively new phenomenon in this "socialist" country, but they are beginning to sprout up around town (like weeds, actually, and with funny names, […]
The Great Mooncake Exchange
Today is Zhong Qiu Jie, (lit. Mid-Autumn Festival) in China. In colloquial terms, it’s called the Moon Festival, because it’s celebration coincides with the full moon. Much like Thanksgiving in American culture, Moon Festival is a time when people want to gather with their family members. If that isn’t possible, then people gather with classmates, […]
The Mountains are Out!
Most of the time, ‘beautiful” is not a word commonly used to describe the city of Beijing, my adopted home. It’s overcrowded. The architecture is out of control– ranging from Stalinist to classical Chinese, and often to some variations of the two. The traffic is terrible, and the sky is normally varying shades of grey […]
Reminder of Other Site
Just a quick reminder that entries posted prior to August 31 can be found at the following address: http://www.outside-in.blog-city.com My blog was there until I got trapped behind the Great Firewall of China. If you are outside of China, then there will be no problem accessing it. if you are in China, then you must […]
A Strange Phone Conversation
My cell phone rang this afteroon. I didn’t recognize the number. The conversation went like this: Hello. Is this Joann? Yes. I’m (Chinese name). My English name is Kitty. Do I know you? Yes, I’m from the Institute of Technology. Where did you meet? Are you Joann? Yes. Do you live with (Chinese name)? No. […]
