Push The Bus, We’re Going Backwards in Time

I saw passengers pushing a huge public bus today here in Beijing. It had nothing to do with the olympics or nationalism or the Sichuan earthquake, or any of that. The bus, like many here in Beijing, runs connected to an electric grid with wires strung across the city, was diverted because half the road was being repaved, and lost contact with the wires above. It had to be pushed to regain power, and its passengers were the only people available to do the work.

I recall my first visit to China in 1988, when the country had almost no cars, and the streets were so filled with bicycles that it was dangerous to cross the road since you would get hit by an errant bike rider. The buses then were all connected to electric grids in every town, more so than today, and every time I turned my head toward the sun, it was blocked by a sea of wires.

Today, there are fewer wires, but they are still there. China now has more money to buy gas for its fleet of buses, so more of them are modern and run on fuel, not electricity. The remaining electric powered buses, though, still ply the streets, and are occasionally a big headache, like the one that I saw today.

Electric buses in a day and age when gasoline is so expensive may seem like a brilliant, forward thinking idea. I suppose if the plan were well conceived, they would be. But, most in China date from the 1950s, and forward thinking wasn’t in the vocabulary then, or now really.

So, they’ve become a major headache. Streets now are being redirected, and repaved, but the electric grid lines can’t move, of course. Traffic is more intense now than ever, the roads more rocky than ever, and the buses frequently lose contact with the electric grid. So, the driver and the ticket collector stop traffic, get out from the bus, unhook safety strings that are connected to each of the two skyward pointing connectors to the electric grid, and from an angle 15 meters from the buss, use the ropes to guide the electric connectors back toward the electric grid in the sky.

There’s nothing you can do if you are in traffic behind an electric bus when this happens. There’s nothing you can do when you are on an electric bus when this happens, unless of course the bus really is redirected, and needs a push, like the one I saw yesterday. When that happens, assuming you are strong enough to walk, you know your job is to get off the bus, together with the other passengers, and push.

China Earthquake Coverage– Wow, A Big One!

The three of us were sitting on the tenth floor of a skyscraper in east Beijing when, 20 minutes ago, the ground 10 floors down started to shake. All three of us thought it was our lunch that was making us dizzy, until one person shouted, “Earthquake, Run!” and we all sprinted for the exit. This complex of four office buildings quickly filled with people leaving buildings.

CNN reported that the earthquake nearly 1,000 miles away, in central China (Sichuan province), and was a huge one, 7.5. It must have been pretty big for us to fill it this far away.

Why All Chinese Think The Same Thing (and how to brainwash people)

I grew up in the 1970s in a neighborhood in suburban Washington DC served by the Washington Post and Washington Star newspapers, which were competitors. Likewise, the Washington DC area had three television stations, NBC, CBS and ABC, and many competing radio stations. Cable and the internet would arrive for another 20 years.

I started thinking about this recently since I see the many changes occurring in China around me every day, and I wanted to reflect on how my own childhood neighborhood has changed. I also wanted to think through more why my US friends and I have different opinions on most things, including politics, yet remain close friends, while Chinese students throughout the world not only seem to have a single political viewpoint, but even worse threaten and mock other Chinese who disagree with the predominant opinion.

Regulation of the media in the USA falls within the purview of the Federal Communications Commission, which was created by the Communications Act of 1934. One of the purposes of the act was the ensure competition in media. The history of the act shows different senators at that time with different constituencies, but a general agreement that the US media needed to be available to everyone and include potential contradictory viewpoints.

So, forty years after the FCC was created, I grew up in an environment with multiple media outlets, each with its own, and often contradictory, opinions. This, in turn, helped create the culture I know: everyone with different opinions, yet friends nonetheless, and generally law abiding, even when they disagree with what our government was doing at any given time.

By contrast, the disaster that is China media has created precisely the opposite system, and the rabid, robotic, brainwashed Chinese students abroad are the product of that. The Chinese media doesn’t permit opposing points of view. The newspapers follow the government line, or get banned. There is one television company, CCTV. And, as a direct consequence everyone here has more or less the same viewpoint.

So, when Chinese students in Korea, Australia and other places show up by the thousands in support of their government’s viewpoint, it shouldn’t surprise anyone. If our own history had taken a horrible, twisted turn and permitted a monopolization of media, we would be acting in the same way.

Payday in China, Why Don’t You Pay Asshole?

Today is payday at Zhong Lun. I am glad to get the cash, since it pays my rent, but I am really here since this firm has a contract with me to pay me for business I am bring to the firm, and that isn’t happening.

China doesn’t have a functioning legal system, and that means that personal disputes are impossible to resolve, as with money I am owed by other partners here. The overall structure works, and I am paid a monthly salary. But, individual debts are not honored since there is no way enforce them.

Here is a conversation I had last week. I spent 4 weeks contacting venture capital firms in the USA that do business here in China, to invite them to meet with us. A big one agreed to visit us, through a contact I have in the USA, and I sent an email around the firm inviting partners to join this.

I expected a hearty reply, but instead received this:

Shanghai Partner: “Jeff, I have a friend who has worked at that [potential client] for a few years, so that should be considered my existing client.”

Me: “Have they already given you any business?”

Partner: “No, but that doesn’t matter. I already know these people.”

So, what is really happening here is this. You set up an agreement with Chinese. They interpret in a way that benefits them, even if it ignores work you have done, and money you need to survive. And you ultimately have no recourse.

It is the same story with Microsoft and US movie companies here. They spend a lot of money making and marketing their products. Then, Chinese copy them, and the system here prevents them from getting paid.

Good God, We Could’ve Ended Up Like China!

Americans and Europeans are disgusted and frightened about how the Han Chinese are acting, in regard to the Olympic torth, Tibet and just about every other issue in recent months because we would have done the very same if our collective history had taken a hellishly wrong turn 60 years ago, when Hitler, Mussolini and the Japanese lost WWII. Free countries are filled with people who speak without fear, and few things are more chilling than the horrid possibility that we would’ve lost that war, been conquered by a repressive government, and consequently acted like the automatons of China.

In a word, we are seeing China and the Chinese acting out our worst nightmare, and I believe it sickens us to think that could’ve been our fate. Free countries are filled with people with different and contradictory opinions, while repressive countries like the PRC are filled with a population that is raised to repeat the garbage that spews forth from their non-elected leaders.

Today, I am reading the Philip Roth novel “The Plot Against America,” (Vintage 2004), and the plot develops the scenario of FDR losing in 1940, at the end of his second term, to Charles Lindbergh, who was both an anti-Semite and a supporter of the fascist nations Germany, Italy and Japan. There are some common themes with the America that Roth saw resulting from a Lindbergh presidency and Chinese of today, including:

Unequal and repressive treatment of minorities. In the Roth book, Lindbergh’s ascent to the presidency gives free reign to anti-Semites in the USA. Jewish families are turned away from hotels, and insulted randomly, and the police won’t stand up for their rights. Here in the China, the non-Han have the same problem today. They are routinely turned down for jobs or licenses, and even passports, that Han can get, and nobody, especially the public security bureau, will help them out.

Self-censorship. In the Roth book, Jews are helpless to respond to ignorant anti-Semitic comments and actions by others, since the system won’t protect them, so they gradually either leave for Canada or hide the fact they are Jewish. In China, non-Han avoid problems in order to avoid confrontations with the government, and day to day communication is reduced to mind-numbing discussions about the weather, music and food.

Bad political decisions are explained away. In the Roth book, a Lindbergh presidency supports Hitler’s invasion of the USSR because, says President Lindbergh, “It prevents the spectacle of the growth of communism.” The worse reality, of course, if the fact that the USA aligns itself with a fascist power, but the real purpose is to justify the first steps of a Nazi- like government in Washington DC. That really is not much different than the Chinese support for repressive regimes in Burma, Sudan and now Zimbabwe, where they shipped armaments to President Mugabe, and then called it an “internal affair.” Nothing could be further from the truth.

I Repress You, Now Thank Me, Fool!

I think it is one thing to pity the fate of Tibetans and other minorities here in China, and a completely separate thing to understand how completely subjugated these people really are. While thousands of indoctrinated Chinese students abroad throw and kick and spit at anyone in their own home country (!!!!) who speaks up in support of the Dalai Lama and others, few of us have ventured within China to see exactly what is happening. Well, let me suggest that some of you do, since China is a mostly open country, and a trip here to the interior of China can be revealing. I have spent the past two weeks traveling as a tourist in beautiful Xinjiang Province in western China, which has the humorous and misleading name “Uighyur Autonomous Region” and I would offer that the worst possible fate that awaits any human being on this earth is to be subjugated by Han Chinese like the people I’ve seen. Here’s why:

First, they put up statues of their own leaders, especially Chairman Mao, that make the local minority look ridiculous and weak. Here is the statue from Google Earth’s software in the main square of the city of Khotan, along the south Silk Road, for example. Can you see big, bad Chairman Mao looking down on the short, weak, scrawny Uighyur town hero?

Second, the put police stations and army barracks everywhere. When I ventured to the tiny village of Tashkurgan, half the village, which is populated mostly by Tadjiks, is composed of an enormous army barracks.

Next, they add a Han Chinese mayor and governor to make all important decisions.

They add checkpoints on all major highways where everyone has to repeatedly show their identification card.

Finally, they destroy the traditional architecture of the cities, and create heinously ugly Chinese buildings, that are as dysfunctional as the ancient ones they replaced.

Then, to make matters even worse, they indoctrinate the Han population so that most of the country believes you should be grateful for such changes that you, your parents and your ancestors could never have wanted in your worst nightmare.

Avoid Toilets At Your Chinese Hotel, Or You Will Pay

Hotels in China give some insight into how decisions are made here. Except in major cities, hotels across China are mostly still government owned, or run by companies whose main commerce has nothing to do with hotels. But, either because they have extra government subsidies or because they are desperate to find new income, many state owned companies here decide to open hotels.

I’m in the town of Turpan in western China, and most hotels here are state run. In fact, the nicest hotel in town in the Xinjiang Petroleum Hotel, which charges about US$80 a night.

The obvious problem with a government run hotel is that it is run by government employees, and needless to say government employees don’t like to work as hard as employees in the private sector, and it shows. Government hotels are invariably dirtier, have broken fixtures, and have staff that treat customers like, well, the government treats people.

Two days ago, in the nearby city of Kashgar on the ancient silk road, I found a government hotel on the edge of town, the Xinlong Hotel, that seemed decent enough. I paid about US$25 per night and the room included internet access. But, I wasn’t careful, and when I checked out the next day and the receptionist ordered the staff to check my room to see what I owed, she reported that a) I had replaced a clothing hanger with an original hanger, for which I would be charged about US$4, and b) the plastic toilet seat was broken, and I would be charged another US$8 for that.

Needless to say, I didn’t agree. But, I didn’t make progress with these people, and the staff, including two managers, removed the toilet seat to and brought it to the main reception as evidence of the fact it was broken. I couldn’t argue that it was broken, but I didn’t break it, and any hotel that spends just US$8 on plastic toilet seats for its best rooms can expect that they will be broken sometimes.

China Is Great… If You Are in Control

Zhong Lun Law Firm’s managing partner Zhang Xuebing placed me in a new office a few weeks ago that sits next to the two people who report directly to him, Diane the HR person and Adam the finance guy. If they want to further monitor what I am doing and saying, in addition to reading my emails like that already do, I hope they enjoy seeing me more often. But, the relocation has had another, unexpected benefit for me: I am able to listen to what Chinese people talk about all day long, and I think I am learning more about them than they are learning about me.

So, let me tell you what I’ve learned: the staff here spends nearly half their day discussing the thoughts and actions of big boss managing partner Zhang Xuebing. Here’s where it gets weird: they mention his name as often, and with the reverential annotation Lawyer Zhang, as priests talk about Jesus, or worshipping Muslims discuss Muhammad. It is further evidence in my mind about how Chinese deify their leaders, something that doesn’t come naturally to a westerner.

Zhang’s office, which is one floor down, provides some more clues about how this cult of personality is developing. Next to Zhang’s desk in his office is a photo of him surrounded by smiling school children, which is in pose nearly identical to the photo of Mao Zedong in the mid 1950s surrounded by visiting African students, and which was published to begin the propaganda of Mao as the leader of the developing world.

This “follow the leader” brain washing, or indoctrination, that occurs in China is a theme that keeps repeating itself, and makes no sense to westerners like myself. Just last week, when Chinese student Grace Wang at Duke University tried to mediate between Chinese students and pro-Tibet students, she was labeled a traitor. The International Herald Tribune wrote an editorial about the cost and potential problems of dealing with a people, like Chinese students in the USA, who are so indoctrinated that they are both unable to argue a contrary position or even to accept criticism of their own position.

I’ve spent this past week traveling as a tourist around China’s western Xinjiang province. This place is beautiful, and there are modern roads and Internet access everywhere. But, when I eat at local restaurants and take taxi rides, I’ve learned some uncomfortable truths about what’s happening here, too. This enormous region, larger than Texas and populated with mostly non-Han Chinese, has unequal rules for the different races.

The majority Uighur population here pay higher prices to get a passport than the Han Chinese. One taxi driver told me the price is 60,000 yuan, nearly US$8,000. No such fees are required by Han Chinese. And, the government rewards non-Han who marry Han Chinese with a 30,000 yuan payment, about US$4,500, and a house, in an effort to encourage Han population and integration here. When I learned about this, and thought about the stories of Chinese protests in support of their Olympics in other countries, I realized that I hadn’t seen many non-Chinese faces in the crowds of those protests, except perhaps for the ones supporting Tibet or opposing the Olympics.

I asked a local Han Chinese for his opinion about all of this. He has lived here for nearly 20 years. His replied by saying that it makes sense to keep the trouble making minorities in the country, to prevent them from damaging China’s reputation for the Olympic Games. This hardly seems like a harmonious society to me.

Money Before Death in China, I’m Scared

One of the cultural issues that cause me friction in China is the relentless focus that Chinese people have on making money, and the seeming inability to prioritize anything in life properly where money is involved. Today’s news has some examples of that, with the Chinese selling arms to Zimbabwe’s dictator Mugabe and labeling it an “internal matter,” as well as the PRC government’s support for the Chinese maker of tainted heparin, which killed about 80 people in the USA alone. But, for this to really hit home this selfish indifference needs to be something I not only read about but also see first-hand, and that happened today on an airplane flight I took in the western part of China. I can now state clearly that the Chinese are even more concerned with money than they are with life and death, and that is positively scary to me.

Here’s what happened: the plane I was on malfunctioned on an aborted takeoff, with an engine spewing smoke, and all the passengers could talk about as they left the plane was how this was causing havoc with their personal scheduling. There was no discussion of what happened, why it happened, or how fortunate we were to be alive.

I took a flight from the Xinjiang capital of Urumqi to Kashgar, and there was smoke in the cabin from the moment the plane left the gate. The plane staff ran quickly to check out the source of the smoke, reported it to the pilot, and the pilot parked the plane so ground crew could run out to the plane with a small handheld machine that they presumably used to check the engine, and declared it safe for flight. The stewardess, meanwhile, provided the typical Chinese explanation: “We have a small problem. It will be fixed soon.” I’d guess she didn’t ask what happened, either.

In any case, after about ten minutes of three ground crew checking the engine, the stewardess announced that the problem had been resolved, and we resumed our path to the runway. That’s where it got scary. The plane lurched forward with both engines running, the plane nose tipped up toward the air, then the nose came slamming down, the engines were cut off, and we rolled to the end of the runway, where the pilot waited for a lift back to the gate.

It was scary since the engine continued to puff smoke, after the ground crew cleared it, and also because the plane was actually halfway in the air when the pilot canceled the flight, fortunately. I had never been on a flight where the happened, in China or anywhere else, and it was obviously a last minute, good decision.

What happened next showed me how different the Chinese really are. In the USA, something dramatic like this would cause passengers to discuss the event, and the pilot to explain what happened. In China, none of this happened. The passengers didn’t discuss the event, and most whipped out their phones, and started complaining to friends and others that the flight would be delayed. Worse, when the alighted from the plane nearly half of them complained to the plane staff that they were going to be late, and wanted to know what the airline would do about it. Not one of the twenty people I heard who left the plane thanked the staff for their work, or expressed any relief at being alive.

Chinese Follow Their Leaders, It Is Scary

I read today that about the continuing demonstrations against foreigners here in China. The articles I read had a few interesting points.

First, they noted that the protests had no clear organizer, and therefore they were probably organized by the government. That is scary, since free-thinking people in modern countries don’t march to the tune of their government’s orders.

Second, they said that the government is somehow guiding people in both how to protest and how to stop protesting. In fact, the article from the state run Xinhua news agency includes a quote from the paper’s editorial that reads, “As citizens, we have the responsibility to express our patriotic enthusiasm calmly and rationally and express patriotic aspiration in an orderly and legal manner.” That is doubly freaky since it seems that Chinese again can be manipulated by their government just like the Red Guards were so manipulated 30 years ago by Mao, and what followed was a mindless destruction of the country.

Third, they are getting violent about this. One article discussed Free Tibet protesters in Malaysia, and how they were confronted by Chinese students there. I thought about that for a few days, and realized that few topics in the USA would so excite Americans that a) no one dared disagree with the popular opinion, and b) we would participate in pro-USA demonstrations in other countries.

I think we are seeing a historically inevitable continuation of the factors that allowed China to descend into the hell of its Cultural Revolution, which was the most recent of many mass movements that China has experienced in modern history. I don’t think Chinese have the ability to analyze events for themselves, and are destined to be followers in every way as long as they listen to and march in stride with the whims of the current government.

Visit to West China, They Look Like Me and Speak Like Mao Here

I am spending this week traveling in Xinjiang, the western most province of China. The last time I visited was in 1992, after I graduated from university, and the whole place has changed. Here are some of the big differences:

a. Roads. There are real, modern roads and highways here suddenly. When I visited in 1992, a trip from Urumqi to Kashgar took two days, and was on a combination of a tiny asphalt road and mud/dirt road. What made the trip especially uncomfortable were the numerous broken bridges. Chinese bridges were previously built without much support, and collapsed so frequently that autos created loops around them, including a few that were treacherous. Now, the entire road system is new, the bridges are modern and sturdy, and travel time is much less.

b. Cities. I have visited two cities so far, and will visit more, and they are suddenly modern. Urumqi back them was a backwater, and though it is still a quiet town compared to Beijing, it now has restaurants and stores that make it almost charming. The second city I visited, a 200,000 outpost for the state oil company, was likewise suddenly a modern city. Indeed, the city of Karamaty was created to dig for oil in the nearby desert, but it is filled with identical looking apartment buildings, and plenty of restaurants, stores and great roads. What a difference.

c. Hotels. Here’s a quirk. Back in the days when more of the economy was state-run, hotels were both dirty and terrible, and disproportionately expensive. Foreigners back then had two choices, both bad. First, was paying international rates to stay in a state run hotel that barely deserved one star. The second was to stay in cramped hostels at inflated prices. Now, there are privately run hotels everywhere, many are just as nice as a 2 star US chain like Motel 6, and prices are lower. I’ve paid from US$25-40 per night so far at the hotels I’ve found, just walking off the street.

d. People. There are a lot more Han Chinese here than before. And, the local population, including many of the Turkish-type minority Wui and Muslim hui, speak native Chinese now. Previously, the younger generation here spoke only their own dialects, but they explained that schools instruct in both Chinese and their dialect, and use written Chinese for most books, so that’s changed, too.

I’m no fan of the PRC government, as this blog attests to, and I agree with with world opinion that sending the Chinese into west China and Tibet is wrong, but day to day most of the people I’m seeing here are living lives that are appreciably more comfortable than what they had 15 years ago when I last visited, and I’m guessing much better than what they can find in some, though not all, of the neighboring countries in central Asia.

With a Master Like This, Who Needs Enemies?

In the past 18 months, as I’ve worked at Zhong Lun and witnessed the scope of their fraud and incompetence, other blogs have argued that I am wrong, and that in fact this horror is all unique to Zhong Lun Law Firm. However, day to day I have seen two things at this firm that have convinced me that this incompetence goes deeper than that.

First, as I have shared in emails from the firm’s top partners, Zhong Lun’s dishonesty is equally distributed among the people who run the firm. Remember, this blog was created to make a record of how this firm’s top partners, including members of the management, like Wang Li Hua, Shirley Xu, Anthony Qiao and managing partner Zhang Xuebing, have engaged in fraud and dishonesty that would get them to disbarred if they were practicing law in the USA. Second, my own assistants, who are members of the China bar association, have proved to be so incompetent that I think they’d never pass a undergraduate class in the USA, without a cheat sheet.

I am reminded of this nearly every day as I review their work, but sometimes the reminder occurs in other forms. Today, as I visited a museum in the center of Xinjiang’s main city, which the Chinese now control and inundate with Han Chinese, I read a Chinese-made translation of how they have quietly improved the life of the local Hui minority, who previously lived here for centuries without someone breathing down their neck in Chinese. Here is a video and a translation of a sign on the museum’s wall– can you imagine anyone tolerating overlords like these, or at least entrusting them to write a contract for you? If not, can you then imagine what it is like to work at a law firm with the same people?

Here is what is written on the museum’s wall: “The whole industry will be covered with dust in case of wind in sunny days and the foot will be covered with mud in rainy or snowdy days, which described the city of urumqi in old days. With carpets in the businesses, minority people felt taking off boots inconvenient, barefooted producing pecuiliar smell, thus have invented such a doohicky, namely, have their Wellingtons coated with shallow rubber overshoes at the sole. When they come back home they just take off rubber overshoes and place then outdoors, and come in with clean Wellingtons, neither making carpet dirty nor producing peculiar smell, killing two birds with one stone.”

Beautiful Smile, Miss Attorney. Show Me The Steel Teeth.

Beautiful people everywhere are more successful, and that applies in a corrupt Chinese law firm like Zhong Lun, too. However, the difference is that in China, beauty only gets you into the gate, and to really make a lot of money you need beauty and connections.

ZHANG XUEBING: UGLY BUT POWERFUL

Nobody would accuse my law firm’s managing partner of winning his business because of his beauty. Zhang Xuebing is a politician, short and ugly, and with a deep voice and confidence of a winner.

HU RONGUI: KNOCKOUT LOOKS AND MEAN

But, the list that follows him on the website include people who look better than he does, and the most beautiful of all is Hu Rongui. Check out her photo above– she’s a knockout, eh fellows? She even looks better face to face, I want you to know.

Lawyer Hu has what it takes to succeed in China: a great smile, dimples, good skin, and she’s just plain sexy. And, frankly, that and the fact that her husband works for a government ministry where he has the power to approve, or disapprove, Japanese foreign investment makes her a powerful lady.

Indeed, I’ve learned that in a Chinese law firm, beauty only gets you so far. There are plenty of beautiful women here, I’m delighted to say. I mean, I’m single, love to practice speaking Chinese, and need something to do in the evenings. But the difference is that the beauties scattered around the firm in small desks are paid peanuts, usually about US$300 per month, and have no prospect of rising.

By contrast, beautiful lawyer Hu has already earned the mother load. She’s rich, and her sugar daddy husband holds the stamp of life if your Japanese company wants to put down some real estate roots in a suburb of Beijing.

I’ve learned this bit of inside information by teaching English to the firm’s young interns every day. Some work for her, and they complain: this lady is not only wicked, but ignorant wicked, the worst type of wicked. She’s yell at you for problems that didn’t exist, and then later realize that there was no reason to yell.

I didn’t really pick up on her scent until one day last week the firm’s management assigned her to be my watchdog. Specifically, they wanted to make sure that they have the contact information for each and every foreign client I serve. But, to be able to get that information, they needed to assign someone to me who is reliable and reasonably well-organized, and beautiful lawyer Hu is neither.

The first day we met, she looked up at my on a visit to my office, and said,

“You know, you are not a Chinese lawyer, so you need to make sure you bring Chinese lawyers to each of your client meetings.”
My instinctive reply was to add that, in fact, the Chinese lawyers at Zhong Lun that I’d worked with in the previous 18 months were less competent that a high school student back in Washington, DC, where I’m from. Instead, I said,

“Yes, lawyer Hu. That’s exactly what I’ll do.”

So, that’s the starting point for my interaction with Lawyer Hu. She arrives at my desk, throws pointless orders at me, and I agree and then ignore her. God forbid she ever raise her voice to me, or yell at me. Worse yet, she might one day realize the only reason to speak with her is because she’s pleasant to look out, but intolerable to hear.

They Arrest Protesters, We Don’t. That’s Strange!

It seems the Chinese government is paying for the cost of busloading Chinese students throughout the Western part of the USA to protests in support of China, against Tibetan independence, and now in opposition to the visit of the Dalai Lama. Meanwhile, foreigners in China who dare join groups of more than two with banners that promote human rights or anything else that angers the government here get swarmed by 17 year old riot police, then sent out on the next plane to Seattle with a lifetime ban on China visits. What gives?

Am I the only one who sees this as completely unequal? I say we treat our Chinese guests like their country treats us when we visit them. Every protesting Chinese student should be swarmed by baton-wielding police and sent home. Lets give China lesson its first lesson in equal treatment.

Why Are You So Happy? I’m Not So Happy.

So, here I am in the land of happy harmony, where nobody ever complains, even while the rest of the world is tackling Olympic torch bearers three times a day. And, I decide on a nice, spring day to take walk, with my camera, and see all the happy people.

Let me show you the happy people in my photo diary for today, and at the very bottom I will show you one big reason why everyone is so happy (hint: if they aren’t happy in the land of happy harmony, they will collide head-on into a battalion of hard helmet, baton wielding, bicycle-riding, 17 year old riot police.)

Here’s what I see on my 30 minute walk around the neighborhood.

Happy dancers eating at a happily filled McDonalds with happy music playing in the background.

Then I walk past a….Happy Kodak print store that is filled with people printing out happy photos.

Then I walk past a…. Happy beauty shop employees, doing their happy morning stretch.

Then I walk past a… Happy old lady stretching.

Then I walk past a… Happy supermarket, filled with happy customers.

Then I walk past a… Happy bank, filled with happy people depositing money.

Then suddenly, 15 baton wielding, hard helmet, bicycle riding, 17 year old riot police ride past me…

Then, I walk past a second group of 17 year old riot police….

And now, I am not so happy, but I understand a little more why it is safer to be happy and non-complaining in the merry land of China.

Chinese Lawyers are Stupid, Don’t Trust Them

During these past two months at Zhong Lun Law Firm, I found a huge new client, Pfizer Pharmaceuticals, one of the world’s biggest companies, and endured the excitement of hard work resulting in actual business, and the disappointment associated with a complete loss of this business, caused by other lawyers here at this jungle.

My experience with Pfizer is an example of why at a Chinese law firm like Zhong Lun, you have two choices, and both are equally bad: you can cooperate with other Chinese attorneys, and whatever you produce together will be wrong; or you can turn work away since you know it is going to done incorrectly, then be criticized by management that is rabid for quick profits and has no regard for the quality of the work they produce. I did the latter, that is I turned down Pfizer work, and am glad I did because it was the only way I could live up to my ethical responsibilities as a lawyer.

I spent the first four months of my existence at this firm courting big US and European companies, and a few turned into real legal work, including Pfizer. Pfizer’s China lawyer, who I got to know, spent a few years working at the company’s US headquarters and had some experience working with US counsel.

One day, he approached me with a new assignment. He explained that Pfizer had a big problem: their name, Pfizer, was trademarked in China, but being used illegally, both in English and Chinese, by Chinese medicine companies, and Pfizer wanted a long term plan to enforce their rights.

Pfizer’s US based legal office instructed me to give them a few things to prepare for this assignment. They wanted a firm introduction, a brief list and biography of the different attorneys who would participate in this work, the anticiapted price, and a detailed plan of action.

When I received this request, I took my firm’s litigators out to lunch to learn about their experience with IP litigation, and to my dismay found out that they had absolutely none. But, what was remarkable was that their inexperience or ignorance of the subject matter didn’t prevent them from claiming knowledge of it, something I call “pretendism” in my other blog posts.

Specifically, the litigation department head said,

“Jeff, you need to learn how things work in China. It isn’t necessary to have experience with this work to succeed with a case. It is all about relationships with the courts.”

Well, that didn’t make me feel very comfortable, and I didnt believe her. The people who I worked with at firms in the USA were legitimately knowledgable, and often really experts, in their subject matter. These people were just novices, and incompetent novices at that.

The other leader of the group, however, sounded less believable.

Wang Jialu, who has since relocated ot Commerce Law Firm, said:

“Jeff, I am an expert in all litigation, and what I don’t know I can make believe I do.”

That just totally freaked me out, since he was the one attorney at the firm without a real law degree, and the person who had considered a career in acting, instead. This was not a particularly smart man.

Anyhow, as a first step, I wrote a background memo on the issue for Pfizer, careful not to give any legal opinions since I knew that every Chinese attorney at the firm, each desperately in need of more clients, would soon start complaining that as a foreigner I wasn’t allowed to do legal work. And I compiled information about each of the partners who would help with this assignment, and the work press.

Then, I started to speak with the partners to understand their specific plans for this work, and I quickly realized something: they had no idea how to handle this work, and had no real experience with IP work.

These people, in fact, didnt seem to understand the most basic information about trademarks and IP that I was taught in my law school classes. It was obvious that I was interacting with people who pretended to be lawyers, but at least insofar as lawyers n the US were concerned, were barely more educated that a first year undergraduate.

I also realized that if I passed this assignment to them, their ignorance would cause errors in the work process, that the work would not be done correctly, and that I would be blamed for choosing this group to do the work. So, I did what i was taught in law school. I told Pfizer to find another firm, and helped them find the firm.

A few weeks later, my firm’s managing partner called me to his office, and said he read my personal emails that told Pfizer to find another firm because my firm was incompetent to do the work. He said I would be fired if I ever did that again. My reply, of course, was that I did the right thing: Zhong Lun had nobody capable of doing this work, and the work would’ve been done incorrectly. I made the right decision.

Liberation Poetry

I spend so much time reading blogs these days that I no longer read normal books, and it sometimes occurs to me that I should. Today, that message was delivered in the form of a poetic analogy on another blog that links, by way of poet WH Auden, the recent events in Tibet with the Soviet invasion following Prague Spring in 1968. Here’s the beautiful poem quoted in that blog:

August 1968
W. H. Auden

The Ogre does what ogres can,
Deeds quite impossible for Man,
But one prize is beyond his reach,
The Ogre cannot master Speech:
About a subjugated plain,
Among its desperate and slain,
The Ogre stalks with hands on hips,
While drivel gushes from his lips.

Zhong Lun Law Firm Says: Don’t Ask Me To Pay You, Idiot! Contracts Are For Fools.

Many US law students are contacting me these days for advice about how to get a job and succeed while working at a Chinese Law Firm, like my law firm Zhong Lun. A few of them already work as interns in Chinese law firms. Here is my advice to this crowd based on my experience working here at Zhong Lun:

Good luck, buddy.
Dont assume that Chinese lawyers will help you, especially if they don’t pay you now. I find that they are mostly dishonest and completely inconsiderate of the well-being of others. If anything, my advice would be for you to make contact with another firm, then steal as much client info from your current firm as you can so you can have something useful to provide to the new firm.

I have now seen how Zhong Lun purposefully cheats people, including its own employees. The reason the firm does this is primarily since they want to make as much money as they can. But, that is not different than what foreign attorney are trying to do, but they don’t hurt people like Zhong Lun does.

The difference is that it is impossible to enforce a contract against Zhong Lun, especially if you are foreign employee or client. And, my experience working with Zhong Lun, as I’ve discussed in many entries in this blog, is that they are abusive, dishonest and sometimes dangerous when they are challenged to pay.

My first hint at the scope of the dishonesty at my firm occurred a few months ago when I invited the general counsel from Europe’s biggest pharmaceutical company to lunch, and invited some partners, including: Wang Lihua, Shirley Xu, Zhang Decai, Zeng Xi, and others to join us. I did this because my contact with Zhong Lun requires the firm to pay me for business that I bring to them, so I thought that it didn’t matter who ultimately received the business since I would ultimately be paid. But, the arrival of the guest caused a financial disaster I didn’t anticipate.

When each of of the invitees arrived at the restaurant, they competed with each to talk about themselves. When lunch ended, and the check arrived, nobody offered to pay their share of the meal, so I ended up paying, assuming that the issue would be resolved later.

Wrong. Six weeks later, nobody has offered to pay me, even the firm’s management. Wierder yet, the client has forwarded to me emails from three of the Zhong Lun attorneys that mock the others who went to lunch. Here’s one

“Dear [name of client withheld], I want to stay in touch with you and let you know that I am Zhong Lun’s only accredited litigator. The others who met you that day, including the foreign attorney, are not even allowed to practice Chinese law.”

Lesson #1: If you do business with Chinese lawyers, get them to pay cash when they eat.

Next, I started hiring foreign interns to help me with my work, and when they showed their competence after a few months and asked me to tell them how to turn the internship into a full time job, I learned a few things about their existence at my law firm. Here is a list:

a. Chinese interns get RMB 50 (US$ per day, while the foreigners, including many law students, get RMB 80 (US$11) per day. That’s barely enough to pay for transportation to and from work each day.
b. Each intern is required to bring his/her own computer to work, since Zhong Lun requires its partners to purchase their own computers for their staff, as I’ve discussed in a previous blog entry, when the IT guy bought fake Dell computers for me, and charged me real Dell computer prices. Asshole.
c. Interns don’t attend meetings, mostly because Chinese attorneys don’t like to have meetings with their colleagues.
d. Interns are not shared among attorneys, and to stay busy are assigned shit work. Specifically, two US interns working for Liu Chi, were told to spend their whole summer writing an article for him on sports law, since he was so desperate for new work that he thought, on a whim, that it might be worth trying to find new clients in that field. Wrong, Liu Chi.
e. Interns are required to get dressed up every day. Fortunately, they don’t have to wear the terrible, shiny black, pointed shoes that the Chinese employees wear.
f. Interns are never told about their future, or prospects for a real job with the firm, and this is purposeful to lead them on. The firm simply doesn’t answer their questions, but it has no history of hiring any interns. Diane, the HR director, wont ever give them an answer.

Lesson #2: An internship at a Chinese law firm means nothing and will not help you

Zhong Lun travels to the top Beijing law schools each year, and I travel with them, in an effort to recruit new, smart, young graduates. These nervous, hardworking, poor kids have a tough road ahead, and here’s what it looks like:

a. We hire about 1 out of 50 we interview, to do an internship.
b. The internship last 3 months, during which time they are paid RMB 50 per day, as mentioned above.
c. After the three month internship, we release 2 of 3, and keep one.
d. They are given a tiny desk, and have no chance of one day becoming a partner with the firm. The entire firm has nearly 60 partners, but only one of these partners was hired out of law school, worked for the firm and eventually became a partner. All other partners at Zhong Lun previously worked at other firms, and moved to Zhong Lun in a client grab.
e. Last, and equally threatening, is the problem that they confront when they leave Zhong Lun. As I’ve described, attorneys who leave don’t get paid their last few months wages or bonuses. Their contracts are not respected, and there’s nothing they can do to force the firm to pay them.

Lesson #3: An entry level job with a law firm is hard to get and will make your life miserable. And, you have no prospect of ever improving your status.

The big lesson here is that although US law firms are cut-throat, Chinese law firms like Zhong Lun are both cut through and dishonest. They have no concern for anyone’s well-being, don’t feel obligated to respect contracts they sign, and will abuse, mock, and threaten you if it means they can keep more money for themselves. If you are foreign law student and are thinking about working in this environment, you are going to have huge problems surviving.

Wait, Don’t Ask Why, Just Wait

Let’s play the “Why I like China, Why I don’t” game today, shall we? There are so many compelling reasons to love and loathe this place, that it makes sense to occasionally write them down.

First, a reason to love China. Here’ my collapsible bike.

I bought it for about US$100 new here, it is light, easy to ride, cuts my commute to about 5 minutes from 25 minutes, and best of all the guards at my office building permit me to bring it in, unlike normal bikes, which are required to be parked in a garage far away. My bike, made in China, is a reason to love China.

Now, let’s talk about what pisses me off: arbitrary new rules that don’t have a purpose and are occasionally severely enforced, but usually ignored. The new rule today is one I’ve discussed previously: the need to have a card to pass through an enormous housing area on the way to work. As I wrote in a previous blog entry, the evolution of the fence went something like this:
A. No fence, no problems for anyone.
B. Fences at other Beijing housing areas, and therefore a decision by management without consulting residents to put up a fence. As usual, there were no complaints, since Chinese don’t complain.
C. Over two years, people who have to enter and pass through the area have resorted to various methods, including:
a. Waiting until morning or evening.
b. Passing through the huge hole where cars come and go.
c. Sticking their pinky finger in the lock hole, at risk of snapping the finger off if the gate is moved.
d. Broken gates alternating with such severe enforcement of the gate rules that I’ve seen security guards tackle people passing through.
e.
Today, it has taken two new turns. First, in the past weeks, to resolve the “pinky solution,” management has stuffed all holes in the moving gates with duct tape. Second, we are in a (probably temporary) period of severe enforcement, and the new rules work something like this:
A. If you arrive at the outside of the gate without a card, a 14 year old security guard in camouflage army clothing and black patent shiny pointy shoes directs you to the 2 km dirt road that bypasses the city through an inconvenient route.
B. If you arrive from the inside trying to leave without a card, the same guard lets groups of 5-8 leave whenever someone with a card shows up, then quickly shuts the gate to require all newcomers to queue for the next card holder. So, there are intermittent groups of people waiting from the inside to get out, and nobody complains! Here are the photos… unbelievable.

Here’s the scene:

THIS MAN IS A PROPER CARD HOLDER

THIS GROUP OF 20 PEOPLE HAVE NO CARD AND CAN’T EXIT

NOW THEY ARE GETTING PISSED OFF SINCE THE GUARD HAS A CARD, ASSHOLE

BUT DON’T COMPLAIN ANYONE! IT DOES NO GOOD IN CHINA. FINALLY, RELEASE!!!

I Believe What I Believe, Because Because Because

The lead editorial in the Washington Post today is about how the USA and Europe were wrong to believe that countries like China and Russia would become more democratic as their economies prospered. I think a sub-lesson of what is happening here in the aftermath of the crackdown in Tibet is a repeat cultural phenomenon: the Chinese are again following blindly in the steps of ignorance, and rallying to the cause.

It is a curious situation in the eyes of the free world. Chinese, including educated, well-to-do Chinese, seem to follow blindly the government official line on all issues, including Tibet, Taiwan, nationalism, and Japan, and show barely any signs of independent analysis. In fact, there are some small signs, like a petition by Chinese intellectuals that the New York Times reported on yesterday, and dissidents like Hu Jia, but nothing large scale like the continued opposition that Russians mount against a pitiless autocrat of their own.

As a result, most westerners write off any reactions by Chinese to foreign criticism, as a pitiful site. Basically, the message is: “You are brainwashed, don’t even realize it, and therefore it isn’t worth wasting my time listing to your programmed replies.”

I see two curious points to this situation. First, it seems that the Chinese are repeating the errors they vowed never to repeat when they blindly followed Chairman Mao’s leadership into bad economic decisions. That was just 30 years ago, unfortunately, and it seems this circle will just keep repeating itself. They are following blindly again without debating things for themselves.

Second, they are switching back and forth between the violently anti-government beliefs that caused them to rise up in 1989 and resulted in the massacre in Tiananmen Square and the pro-government belief that they mutter like a bad tape recording today. The Tiananmen Square massacre occured less than 20 years ago, and a people who can be manipulated to switch allegiances so completely are a people who don’t have a clear idea about where they stand.

I went biking this week with a friend from South Africa who has lived for a few years in China, and he noted that like China, African countries have autocratic governments that tells people what to believe and do. But, he noted that Africans generally ignore what they are told, unlike the Chinese who blindly follow. So, Africa is chaotic, and China is less so.

So, there are differences from country to country, and it seems the reasons for this are mixed, but mostly, I think they are just cultural. Chinese are pre-programmed to follow their leader. But, they are also partly technological: it is very difficult for most Chinese to access information outside their government-controlled firewall, including newspapers in Hong Kong and Taiwan. And, they now have been subjected to years of artificial history about various issues like Tibet and Japan that has created for them a reason to be very nationalistic, although most Chinese aren’t really sure why they feel that way. This place is overdue for a generation of introspection.

I Don’t Care If The Rules Are Not Fair. I Win.

My experience to date working at Zhong Lun has illustrated to me the extent to which Chinese companies, especially lawyers, will go to make money. Like other Chinese businesses (remember the Wahaha dispute), Zhong Lun ignores contracts and threatens people in an effort to make money. What is normal business in China is just plain illegal and ethical elsewhere in the world.

In December, there was a sudden flush of news stories about how China was suddenly adding new administrative rules that made the import of US medical products, which to date had been one niche that US firms had filled in a very unequal trade relationship, nearly impossible, despite China’s treaty obligations. China just added a few more inspections to the import process of these goods that made it nearly impossible for the US manufacturers to get their products onto the market here. Ultimately, the issue was resolved as a result of a high level US trade delegation visit to China.

But, the practice continues, and I can give an example. Every day on my way to work I pass three KFC’s and two McDonald’s. These two restaurants are dotted all across China for a simple reason: they are the only restaurants in China that are consistently clean with food that is consistently sanitary, if not necessarily nutritious. Yet, in recent weeks, each and every KFC and McDonald’s I’ve visited, near my house and in other parts of Beijing, have a sign posted in sign that prominently displays a B grade on an A (very clean) to D (dirty), scale that local inspectors apply to it.

Rating a “B”?

I ignored this mostly for the first few weeks I saw it, for good reason since it was sort of tucked behind a set of chairs, like furniture that is too important to trash after it has lost its luster. But, when I recently visited a state run restaurant, which was large but not nearly so clean as the KFC’s and McDonald’s, and saw that it displayed near its door a sign with an “A” rating, I realized what was going on. Then, later in the week, when I visited a real hole in wall restaurant elsewhere in the city, where there isn’t hot water or even a functioning door, and saw the same “B” that the KFC and McDonald’s displayed, my conclusion became even clearer. Here is what is happening:

Beijing is sending its restaurant inspectors around the city, perhaps in preparation for the Olympics and perhaps for reasons that nobody will ever know, and requiring each and every restaurant to display these terrible, useless signs. And, somewhere in the mad mix of politics, business and overlapping greed, someone has reached the same conclusion that the PRC government did when they slapped new restrictions on the US medical companies: if you add rules and make business sufficiently intolerable for the foreign companies, eventually they won’t be able to compete.

KFC is cleaner than any other Beijing restaurants.

And, they are right. There aren’t functioning courts here, and who is going to listen to your complaint? Is it necessary or possible even at each new hassle to raise the issue to the US Treasurer, and have him initiate talks to resolve things? Of course not. So, China moves forward in its relentless quest to screw the foreigner.

Wikipedia Freedom

I’ve had to struggle these past few days to figure out how to access wikipedia here in China, since I use it for my work and study. In the process, I’ve had a realization about why China seems to fear giving its people access to this wonderful resource, and it is different than the common explanation that it will allow people to learn things that they didn’t otherwise know.

Access to information is definitely one reason why China’s government doesn’t want its own people to use wikipedia. But, a second reason I believe is that wikipedia is a functioning model or expression of how freedom itself works. And, that is another reason to fear it.

Wikipedia is described as a system that works in practice, but not in theory. In other words, in theory it seems that a forum with so many participants, like wikipedia’s users, each with a nearly unrestricted rights to edit and delete and amend articles, is a recipe for complete chaos. People can pretty much say and do what they want. But the result, as we know from using wikipedia, is that its users, like people in a democratic country, generally organize themselves into decision making structures, and usually make good decisions.

Some people, in the USA and on wikipedia, say and do destructive things. And, these bad players cause Wikipedia and a democracy to struggle to right course. But in general in the end both are organized and their participants feel as though they are part of the process.

So, if you ask me why the government here restricts access to wikipedia, I’d answer that it is for the same reason that it doesn’t let people speak and read and write freely: they are afraid of creating chaos that, in fact, we have seen in other countries doesn’t occur.

You Are A Loser If You Support The Crackdown in Tibet

There were losers in World War II, like Philippe Pétain, who collaborated with the Nazi government. And there are LOSERS now, like blogger “A Modern Lei Feng,” who in his current entry blames this week’s massacre in Tibet on the Dalai Lama.

These people are spineless losers. Some, like Petain, eventually get their day in court and get thrown into the gallows. Others, like the western-educated author of the Lei Feng blog will be condemned to a life associating with pathetic, mindless people like himself who can’t think on their own, or distinguish between garbage that a thugocracy feeds them, and the complex truth that the rest of the world is trying to discover every day. Shame.

How Chinese Attorneys Avoid Paying US Taxes

Tax filing season in the USA is fast reaching its April 15 deadline, and I asked senior partner at my law firm (Zhong Lun Law firm) Shirley Xu today how she plans to file taxes. Shirley handles legal work for major US and European clients including Microsoft and the International Monetary Fund, and bills more than US$800,000 per year, and is married to UCLA law professor Randall Peerenboom, an expert in legal ethics and a US citizen (who has paid taxes his whole life). Here’s our conversation:

Me: “How are you paying your US taxes this year?”

Shirley: “Though my husband and child have US citizenship, I keep my Chinese citizenship so I don’t have to pay any US taxes.”

Me: “So, you mean that you pay only minimal Chinese taxes and no US taxes?”

Shirley: “Right.”

Me: “Won’t that make it harder for you to get US citizenship one day?”

Shirley: “No, since nobody knows.”

Well, Shirley, now people will know. Pay your taxes and tell your pathetic husband to start acting like a responsible American, and not a slimeball personal injury lawyer.

Brain Dead Conversations, I Just Need a Friend

My Chinese friend today went to work, on what is about the third day of a crackdown by the thugocracy in Lhasa, and told me that nobody at her very large company, which is staffed only by PRC nationals, discussed anything about what is happening in Tibet. I asked why, and she said she thinks nobody actually knows anything about what is happening there.

This is my segue way into a curious cultural phenomenon in China: foreigners don’t generally have Chinese friends, except for foreign males who date and marry Chinese women. And, here’s the reason why: Chinese only have access to minimal news, and as a result spend most of their time discussing money and love and sex. By contrast, these topics occupy a small part of what foreigners discuss.

I went to dinner last week with a group of Chinese who work with my friend in her company. Everyone was nice and intelligent, but I could tolerate conversation with them for only 30 minutes or so, since what was discussed never venturesd beyond the cost of things and mind numbing personal gossip.

In groups, Chinese don’t generally expresses opinions on political issues. In more private settings, I’ve discovered that Chinese don’t really know much of anything about what’s happening in the US presidential race, or what really happens anywhere, including their own country. In fact, the only thing they have opinions on are the opinions that are spoon fed to them by the thugocracy, such as:
1. Tibet and Taiwan is an integral part of China.
2. China is developing fast.
3. Life is good now, much better than before, and
4. Stupid gossip about film and music stars.

If you are looking for an excuse to get so bored out your mind that you are ready to shoot yourself in the head, my suggestion is to move to China and befriend some Chinese. At the very least, you’ll appreciate where you come from a bit more.

South Korea Orchestra Seats, Who’s Lookin’ at Who?

Following two weeks of feel good news about the NY Philharmonic’s journey to Pyongyang, I can write to report about how equally good it felt to be in South Korea listening to a South Korean’s orchestra. I don’t recall what was played, or much about the specifics of the performances, honesty, except that I had seats that I didn’t knew existed in a concert hall. I actually sat behind the orchestra facing most of the audience. I was right next to the musicians in the final row of the orchestra hall, and it was even better than sitting in the first row since my seat placed my at head level with the musicians. What a great night out! Here are some photos.

Ski China, Chaos in the Snow

We are at Wanlong Ski resort, the nicest ski resort anywhere near Beijing, and I write today to explain to you why skiing in China will always be better than skiing anywhere else in the world, albeit for the wrong reasons. Here’s a hint: any ski resort where you have to spend more time dealing with procedures to start skiing rather than actually skiing will always be deserted, and that’s true here, even on a day like today when it is snowing and the slopes are filled with powder snow.

My real point is one that I’ve discussed repeatedly. Chinese people in general are not raised in environments that encourage cooperation, and don’t know how to cooperate at work.

Here are the details. Eight of us drove about five hours from Beijing, and we did this in a group because this ski resort offers groups of 10 or more a 20% discount, and we originally had a group of 10. We arrived here around noon, and from noon until the time the slopes closed at 5pm, I spent about three hours dealing with procedures involved in buying a lift ticket and renting equipment, and only two hours skiing.

We are mostly foreigners, and we realized and expected this since this chaos we see everywhere in China, but each time it happens it is a surprise anew to us. Chinese, of course, don’t complain and can’t understand why anyone would really care if they waste their time this way. Here are the details:

First, Ill give you some of the rules of the resort: to qualify for a discount, they require a group of ten or more to notify them in advance. We of course showed up with 8 people, and to get the discount we considered two options, and I now regret we didn’t just pay the full amount.

The first option was to find two other people at resort who were registering at same time to increase our group to ten people, and together get the discount.

The second option was a weird one. We discovered that we could apply for a VIP membership card that offers a 15% discount, but I didn’t understand what that really meant, or what it entailed.

Option 2 seemed the best and here’s how it works. Incredibly, the ski resort has a separate counter with forms and 3 employees that issue membership cards to anyone who asks for them. I don’t know why they would have such a thing, but it probably has something to do with the nonstop Chinese desire to play the system and get a deal.  I learned that to get a VIP card and a 15% discount, the following occured:

i. I had to fill out a long form in duplicate
ii. I had to show them my passport
iii. The employees had to confirm my written information on the form, cross check it with my passport, then enter it one by one into computer.

I did this, and it took 30 minutes to get my plastic VIP card. We went to use it, and at the registration area we found two other people we knew who wanted to do the group discount with us, so we chose instead to go that route. But, that entailed more rules, among them:

i. advance notification that group was coming–we did that.

ii. issuance of rental cards, which were credit card type plastic cards, to retrieve and return everything rented. However, they issued 5 cards to 8 of us, and rental equipment was allocated in different quantities on different cards. So, one card had one locker key, one pair of rental pants, and two pairs of skis. But the person with that card didn’t know it, so she took her locker, pants, one set of skis and left. But one person was left behind unable to present a card to get a pair of skis.

iii. Same with other cards. So, when 6 of 8 people got their equipment and left, two of us were left behind with cards that didnt include permission to get boots or skis.

The result was that we had to spend another 30 minutes paying for another set of boots and skis, and had to get written permission to get a full refund later when they confirmed that we didn’t use the original skis and boots. Chinese hate refunds, so everyone knows in China that you do everything possible to avoid a situation where you need to get a refund.
Next, though everything we rented was entered into computers, all the amounts were written long hand then calculated with a cheap calculator, since the computer system that recorded what was rented was unable to compile a list of multiple cards, and issue a receipt.

Then, I had to leave my passport with them, and i can only hope they filed it away in a safe place where they can find it, pay the full amount with a credit card, pay a deposit, then hand sign ten receipts, plus a credit card receipt. I dont know what was on the 10 receipts.

All of this took 90 minutes. There were few lines, because few people can tolerate wasting a day this way.

Two hours, later, since I wasted two hours on this stupidity already, when we had to return items after a half day of skiing, the situation was equally bad. They required return of items only by people carrying the corresponding card. So since I was back at the ski lodge early and my card included multiple sets of pants, boots and skis, I could return mine, but had to wait for everyone else to return, then figure out which person had to use my card to return their items, and who was returning with their own card. When we returned things, they issued us another, tiny, receipt, which had to be returned to the main cashier to get a return of my deposit and passport. So, i had to wait 60 minutes for everyone to return, then coordinate with each which items they were returning with each of their own cards.

Here is my conclusion: almost nobody will go skiing in China, so come enjoy the empty slopes.

Zhong Lun Law Firm, Corruption Continues

I apologize once again for not giving more updates on my battle with Zhong Lun Law Firm. It has been more than one year since I left that zoo, and they still have not paid me. I continue to post correspondence with them on this blog, in part since they have threatened me repeatedly and also because they continue to operate without proper licensing.

This year, I will finally begin litigation against them in the USA, and in the interim will post my correspondence, since your emails indicate that there is a lot of interest in figuring out how to deal with dishonest Chinese companies, like Zhong Lun.

Here’s the latest:

Date February 16, 2008
From Jeff Brauer, jeffbrauer@gmail.com
To Shirley Xu, Zhang Xuebing, Managing Partner, Zhonglun Law Firm
Subject Jeff has not been paid, assholes

American lawyers do not accept bullshit lies from losers like you. You owe me money you s*$t f@#ks. I will take every legal action and nothing illegal to get money owe me. Don’t forget about it and don’t spend my money you stupid s#%t losers.

F@$k you assholes.

Jeff Brauer

Beijing Bombs and Terrorists, and a Glass of Whiskey

Here’s the scene: I’m with a friend in a tiny Syrian restaurant in the middle of Beijing, run by Arabs who offer a backgammon board to anyone who cares to play. And, its 9pm on the first night of Chinese New Year, so outside everywhere in Beijing is the same booms and bangs, non stop for hours, that most of us have ever seen only in “The Terminator” movies.

The two guys sitting at the small table, there are only six, across from me are Arabs, and for some reason are speaking in English, since I wouldn’t understand Arabic.

My neighborhood during the Chinese New Year

First guy: “Ahmed, I can’t take it! I hate Chinese new year This is what it was like in Beirut in our civil war and when we fought Israel, and the bombs and guns made us crazy. I’m scared. All my friends are scared. We can’t sleep or eat”

      

Second guy: “I know it. It is the same sounds as war. The Chinese love it, but I don’t. I even got hit by flying paper shrapnel when I was walking by someone setting off one of those things.

        

Then, I focused on my backgammon again, since we were playing for money. I did hear, however, that their conversation took a turn, unrelated to the Chinese New Year:

“I wanted to join Hammas,” the first guy said. “But, they wouldn’t accept me.”

Then, I completely refocused on backgammon. And, in case you want to know, I even slipped a bottle of Chinese whiskey in with me, though the restaurant followed Muslim customs and didn’t sell any alcohol. A glass of that wiped away the pops, bangs and booms in the background, helped me to ignore that I was sitting across from a guy who, in another place and time, would either be my friend or enemy, and just focused on trying to get the chips off the board and make some money off my friend, one game at a time.

How to Finger China and Get The Gate Open

I have decided to write again about a bottleneck and breakthrough situation here in China, this time about the new gates and locks and disaster created for my five minute walk to work. This is a phenomenon of a thugocracy, where new rules are constantly created, which creates new problems, but nobody has a way to complain and resolve such problems. In democracies people complain. In a thugocracy like China, you put up with it, then find a way around it.

About two years ago, when I switched offices and started walking to work, just a five minute commute that begins in the apartment complex where I live, crosses over railroad tracks, then enters and leaves a neighboring, I quickly encountered a problem. The neighboring community was building a fence around itself, for no apparent purpose, and erecting all sorts of gates and locks and fences.

The first sign that there were going to be major problems was when I arrived one morning at a newly erected gated entrance to the area I had already passed before. There were suddenly three teenage guards in long, police like overcoats, checking everyone’s id, and requiring people to swipe a card to get in. I talked with them.

“What is going on here?” I asked.

“We have new rules here now. You need a magnetic card issued only to residents of this community to enter”

“But, I shop and get my hair cut inside.” I told them. I didn’t want to confuse the issue with an explanation of why I commute there.

They required me, like the other 50 people suddenly stopped on their way to and from tasks, to figure out the telephone number of the business or people we know within the community, which I certainly didn’t have, call them, and get an escort.

Absurd. Two weeks later, however, the situation changed, and the guards instead of requiring people to get an escort, instead had a series of paper entrance permits, and a log book for each. When I arrived, I asked:

“What is this?”

“If you want to enter, you need to fill out the log book and entrance permit, and carry the permit while you are inside. There is no longer a need to call someone to escort you inside.”

That worked for about 10 hours, until later that evening they ran out of entrance permits. Then, they just started denying everyone entrance, or just started letting everyone in.

Now, it has been about two years of this silliness, and I’ve seen the continuing evolution of the system. The area management sometimes has guards there, sometimes doesn’t, sometimes fixes broken gates, sometimes lets the gates stand broken for weeks on end. Today I saw the horrible sight of guards running down some random guy who, like nearly everyone else, just slipped under or around the gate. They tackled him, as everyone else continued to do the same thing.

On days that I can’t find a guard, or the gate is permanently broken, or the guard himself doesn’t have a magnetic card (I assume the cards are long forgotten, and everyone except the gates themselves have been informed, since they don’t open without the magnetic card), I learned that if you stick your pinky finger into the lock hole of the gate then you can quickly open the lock. So, while guards sit idle, gates sit broken, there’s a steady stream of us who have simply lost patience with this stupidity and line up, one after the next, poking our pinky in a dark, cold, metal hole twice a day, just to be able to get to work.

China Cries Out About Darfur: “Let Us Make Money!”

At the core of the problems I’ve had with my law firm, Zhong Lun law firm, is the identical problem that the world is now having in repeatedly and in every shape and form with China as a whole. Simply put, many of us are realizing that Chinese businesses often try to do whatever is possible to make money, regardless of what its contractual obligations are or what is morally wrong or right, since nobody can hold them accountable. Many of my previous blog entries are about how the firm I work for, Zhong Lun, ignores its contractual obligations to me, with the result that I have to now sue them in US courts to get paid. The management at Zhong Lun was being greedy, and ignores moral responsibility for its actions.

Today’s China Daily has an article that helps explain this dispassionate, greedy, and what seems to me seemingly inhumane way that Chinese interact with the world. The front page article in this government run newspaper notes that US movie producer and director Stephen Spielberg has withdrawn from his role as an adviser to the PRC government for the Olympics because China continues to make money in Darfur, while the rest of the world protests this humanitarian crisis. Spielberg thinks that what they are doing is wrong.

The article provides an explanation, written from the perspective of China’s leaders, about how the country balances its goal of development and enriching itself versus its moral responsibilities to deal with a humanitarian crisis. It reads:

“Western exploitation of the Olympics to pressure China [on the Darfur issue] immediately provoked much disgust among ordinary Chinese. In ordinary Chinese eyes, it is totally ridiculous to place the Darfur issue, so many thousands of kilometers away, on China’s shoulders.”

The point the article seems to make is that while US and European firms, like Nike, are forced daily to deal with a constant barrage of criticism generated by the free press in their own countries, any criticism directed at China for equally or more egregious government sponsored actions, and on a much larger scale, is somehow wrong. The reference to “ordinary Chinese” is weird, since the Chinese press is too shackled to criticize their own government, and the only people who would notice and not get arrested for discussing it would be westerners and foreign newspapers.

If there is any doubt about whether China is anywhere near being accepted into a world community as an equal member, I believe that here is further evidence that that day is a long time coming.

Unfinished Business in Beijing

The first time I took the Beijing subway, I was confused by the appearance of the place. It is functional, trains run regularly, but it has an unfinished appearance, like someone should just spend a few more dollars and a few more hours to fix the many little problems, like cracked tiles and unpainted doors.

In time, I’ve realized that the Beijing subway’s idiosyncrasies have nothing to do with the people who maintain the subway, but are rather a cultural phenomenon. Chinese people are seemingly content, in most situations, with what is functional, and often don’t strive to make things perfect, even if there isn’t too much extra work involved. The “good enough” rule seems to apply here.

It happens frequently, but whenever I see examples of it I recall a few incidents personal to me. One I pass every day on my way to work. The new Beijing Television Center Tower, which cost plenty of money and was no doubt designed by some very high end architects, has an entrance that is so run-down and unfinished that it looks absurd. I thought initially that they had just not yet completed construction on this place, but I now realize that they seem to have concluded that a run-down entrance is just as functional as a much nicer, finished entrance.

Beautiful New Beijing Television Tower

But, why is the entrance so run down?

   

Another example I wrote about in a previous blog entry. When working at my law firm, my long-time associate attorney would regularly do work that was incomplete, then not understand why I couldn’t accept it. Specifically, when clients required us to gather all facts for writing a legal opinion, she’d hand my work with an incomplete collection of facts duly gathered, then expect me to accept the work.

Here’s another. I went recently to the new National Performance Theater in Beijing, the extravagant, expensive, egg-shaped performance center across from Tiananmen Square. It is truly beautiful inside. From a distance, as you enter, it looks like something that would be built in New York as the crowning glory of the city’s entertainment industry. But, if you start poking around, beneath the beauty of expensive lights and high ceilings, it is curious to find that the Chinese themselves obviously retained designed control of the bathrooms, and they are dirty, unpleasant, and like most Chinese bathrooms nearly dysfunctional, but OK if you just have to pass through, just like the subways.

Freezing and Unable to Work? It’s the Law! Stop Complaining.

A lesson from living in China is that life here makes President Reagan look like a sage when he argued that everyone would be better off if the government just got off of our backs and let us live our own life. I’m now in Jiangxi Province, where God in the form of the stupid moron Chairman Mao long ago imposed a longstanding law that absolutely nobody south of the Yangtze River, which includes half the population of China, has heating in their apartment, and I want to tell you something: people who freeze from November to April can only sleep and eat, and are completely unable to work.

Now, I’ll grant one thing. Sometimes Chinese government rules and laws are necessary. I’ll give you two examples. First, as the Wall Street Journal discussed in an article in late 2007, the PRC government got active in forcing Chinese airlines to adhere to rules and safety requirements, and a dismal safety record improved quickly and nearly completely.

Fireworks everywhere!

Second, China imposes nearly no restrictions on the very dangerous fireworks industry, and every Chinese kid and adult explodes these things, including some with enormous power, nonstop for nearly two weeks during the Chinese New Year. To give some sense of the size of this industry, here are some photos that I took today during a trip to a small monastery. Note that the 100 foot-long entrance to the monastery is filled nearly three feet deep with the paper remnants of fireworks that visitors have been buying and exploding in the 24 hours since the Chinese New Year yesterday. I bought one, for about US$5, and when I set it off, using a cigarette lighter without a safety strip, it exploded non-stop for about a minute with non-stop pops louder than a machine gun. People get hurt in China using these things, and there’s clearly a role her for the government to step in to prevent unnecessary injuries, regardless of fun and tradition.

THREE FEET OF FIREWORK ASHES!

These are two examples where the government’s intervention are helpful. Now I’m going to give you a glaring example of how the PRC government hurts China. The law here in China thanks to the great Moron Mao is, incredibly, that all housing south of the Yangtze River that divides the country’s north and south are not allowed to install heating. According to articles I’ve read, this jackass in 1948 drew an arbitrary line across the country’s middle, which is roughly where they Yangtze River runs its route, and decided that despite the fact that much of this area gets regular snowfall and endures sub-zero temperatures from November until March, no heating is allowed. This is almost the same method that I’m learning by reading a biography of Joseph Stalin that Russia once used to deal with its perceived enemies: Stalin drew circles around regions that were inhabited by the country’s various ethnic groups and decided, after a short snack and before heading to bed, that they would all be exterminated. Horrible!

I’m now staying with friends in a major city without heating, and there are some consequences to freezing. First, houses inside and out are the same temperature, so you see your breath freeze in every room and feel no “cold shock” when you leave the front door, since it is the same temperature as inside. Second, the only time that anyone is warm is when they are eating. Third, residents offer the sad apology that although they don’t have heat they do have air conditioninh, since all air conditioners, I’ve learned, are able to produce warm air, too, albeit at a price that sends everyone’s electricity bills through the roof. And, finally, it makes it impossible to get out of bed, and do any work in the house, or at buildings, so nobody does anything productive for the entire winter here.

I’m not referring to villages, or small townships, either. Every city, and there are thousands, south of the Yangtze River in the whole country has no heat. I had a live-in maid a couple years ago who explained that her parents spent six months of the year, from November until May, just sleeping and eating, and doing no work. I didn’t understand how anyone could waste such a major part of their lives. Now, I do.

FOR SALE TO KIDS AND EVERYONE!
And, for me, the big lesson is Reagan’s legacy: generally speaking, everyone everywhere, including Americans and Chinese people, are all better off when the government just leaves us alone.