Understanding China

[J20!]

Same argument could be applied to imperial japan then.

The Qing Dynasty began in 1644. The massacre of our people occurred round-about the same time as the Holocaust. Sure. Tell the Israeli's to stop mourning such horrors. yeah, I mean its just so long ago, it doesn't matter. I've been watching an EPL game, and when it started, they had a small dedication to those who lost their lives in WW1.

Stop being insensitive to serious issues. And you call us monsters.

 

[J20!]

Heaven behold!

I am sure you are not being serious.

LB was giving a general impression that was prevalent beyond the shores of China.

Now, it was a good start to prove that idea wrong, if you sincerely believe so. Please go ahead and do so.

Indeed, no country is perfect, but in every country, other than China, when things go wrong, they express their disagreement publically and openly and are not afraid if the media reports it to the world.

Now, does the same happen in China.

In China, as we see and understand, none protests openly incorrectness of their govt, and even if they do, it never comes out in the Chinese media in critical and analytical manner condemning the incorrect actions of the Govt.

Now, that is the difference between China and the world!

Yeah, fine, I see the error in my ways. We're all evil monsters who don't belong on this earth. LB is right. The Chinese race must be exterminated, maybe then you'll all be happy.

If all you Indians cant see the error in calling a whole race of people immoral, selfish and materialistic, there's nothing more I can say.

This thread doesn't seem to be INTERESTED in "Understanding China", just how evil China and its people are in India's eyes. I'm done. Smear Imperialist Japan/China all you want, I'm going to play with my baby daughter now.

 

[LurkerBaba]

Yeah, fine, I see the error in my ways. We're all evil monsters who don't belong on this earth. LB is right. The Chinese race must be exterminated, maybe then you'll all be happy.

If all you Indians cant see the error in calling a whole race of people immoral, selfish and materialistic, there's nothing more I can say.

This thread doesn't seem to be INTERESTED in "Understanding China", just how evil China and its people are in India's eyes. I'm done. Smear Imperialist Japan/China all you want, I'm going to play with my baby daughter now.

Im not sure why you're taking so much offence.

Let me make it clear, I admire materialism. Your response has been totally reactionary, how about you post some links about understanding Chinese culture?

 

[Ray]

You don't seem to care about National tragedies much. You'd probably make jokes about Hiroshima or the Holocaust too. Millions of people being killed is nothing to mock, its not "holier than thou" attitude, its respect for my brutally murdered countrymen.

And no, I don't remember Chinese leaders planning to massacre the Japanese, nor would they ever. If you disagree, provide evidence that proves the Chinese would commit genocide against the Japanese.

I am Chinese. All Chinese soldiers are "Chinese", men much like me. If they could massacre whole Japanese families and villages as you say, why couldn't I? Would you?

Of course, everyone is concerned about tragedies that happen around the world.

Take the Sichuan earthquake, the Pakistani earthquake and floods, Japanese nuclear accident consequent to the tsunami, Tibetans carrying on self immolation. Oh yes, we are concerned.

Japanese massacring you is a National Tragedy for you. It is a Tragedy for us. 1962 when the Chinese attacked India is a tragedy for us, but a gloating point for the Chinese. And yes, the Chinese planned this attack on India since obviously it could not be a knee jerk action because Chairman Mao was feeling bilious having over indulged himself at dinner the night previous!

The world is funny, what?

For Pete's sake, stop referring to long lost dynasties. So what, all those Chinese deserved their fate for what their ancestors did?

So, because they are long lost dynasties, you are absolved of any wrong doings?

Logic, what.

In other words, what has happened yesterday, has no bearing today.

So, why are so all so hot under the collar about the Japanese?

It happened, by your logic, long lost years ago!

Funny logic, what?

You remind me of a Hindi song's lyric:

Tera gam, gam
Mera gam, kahani?,
'
Tera khoon, khoon
aur mera khoon, pani?

Translated

Your sorrow is sorrow
My sorrow is a fairy take?

Your blood is blood
And my blood is water?

 

[Ray]

Yeah, fine, I see the error in my ways. We're all evil monsters who don't belong on this earth. LB is right. The Chinese race must be exterminated, maybe then you'll all be happy.

If all you Indians cant see the error in calling a whole race of people immoral, selfish and materialistic, there's nothing more I can say.

This thread doesn't seem to be INTERESTED in "Understanding China", just how evil China and its people are in India's eyes. I'm done. Smear Imperialist Japan/China all you want, I'm going to play with my baby daughter now.

Again you make a mistake.

No one is wanting to exterminate China.

One cannot exterminate an ant hill!

Try it!

 

[Ray]

The Qing Dynasty began in 1644. The massacre of our people occurred round-about the same time as the Holocaust. Sure. Tell the Israeli's to stop mourning such horrors. yeah, I mean its just so long ago, it doesn't matter. I've been watching an EPL game, and when it started, they had a small dedication to those who lost their lives in WW1.

Stop being insensitive to serious issues. And you call us monsters.

Let Israelis come to this forum and I am sure there would be many who will tell them what you want them to know.

It is the same think we are telling you the horrors in China.

Just the facts.

The unfortunate part is that sadly there is no poster from the Indian Foreign Service!

 

[Ray]

The Forbidden City


The Forbidden City was the Chinese imperial palace from the Ming Dynasty to the end of the Qing Dynasty. It is located in the middle of Beijing, China, and now houses the Palace Museum. For almost 500 years, it served as the home of emperors and their households, as well as the ceremonial and political center of Chinese government.

Built in 1406 to 1420, the complex consists of 980 buildings and covers 720,000 m2 (7,800,000 sq ft).[1] The palace complex exemplifies traditional Chinese palatial architecture,[2] and has influenced cultural and architectural developments in East Asia and elsewhere. The Forbidden City was declared a World Heritage Site in 1987,[2] and is listed by UNESCO as the largest collection of preserved ancient wooden structures in the world.

Since 1925, the Forbidden City has been under the charge of the Palace Museum, whose extensive collection of artwork and artifacts were built upon the imperial collections of the Ming and Qing dynasties. Part of the museum's former collection is now located in the National Palace Museum in Taipei. Both museums descend from the same institution, but were split after the Chinese Civil War.

Name
The Gate of Divine Might, the northern gate. The lower tablet reads "The Palace Museum" (故宫博物院)

The common English name, "the Forbidden City", is a translation of the Chinese name Zijin Cheng (Chinese: 紫禁城; pinyin: Zǐjinchéng; literally "Purple Forbidden City"). Another English name of similar origin is "Forbidden Palace".[3]

The name "Zijin Cheng" is a name with significance on many levels. Zi, or "Purple", refers to the North Star, which in ancient China was called the Ziwei Star, and in traditional Chinese astrology was the abode of the Celestial Emperor. The surrounding celestial region, the Ziwei Enclosure (Chinese: 紫微垣; pinyin: Zǐwēiyuán), was the realm of the Celestial Emperor and his family. The Forbidden City, as the residence of the terrestrial emperor, was its earthly counterpart. Jin, or "Forbidden", referred to the fact that no-one could enter or leave the palace without the emperor's permission. Cheng means a walled city.[4]

Today, the site is most commonly known in Chinese as Gùgōng (故宫), which means the "Former Palace".[5] The museum which is based in these buildings is known as the "Palace Museum" (Chinese: 故宫博物院; pinyin: Gùgōng Bówùyùan).

The Gate of Divine Might, the northern gate. The lower tablet reads "The Palace Museum" (故宫博物院)

History

History of the Forbidden City

The site of the Forbidden City was situated on the Imperial City during the Mongol Yuan Dynasty. Upon the establishment of the Ming Dynasty, the Hongwu Emperor moved the capital from Beijing in the north to Nanjing in the south, and ordered that the Yuan palaces be burnt down. When his son Zhu Di became the Yongle Emperor, he moved the capital back to Beijing, and construction began in 1406 of what would become the Forbidden City.[4]

Construction lasted 15 years, and required more than a million workers.[6] Material used include whole logs of precious Phoebe zhennan wood (Chinese: 楠木; pinyin: nánmù) found in the jungles of south-western China, and large blocks of marble from quarries near Beijing.[7] The floors of major halls were paved with "golden bricks" (Chinese: 金砖; pinyin: jīnzhuān), specially baked paving bricks from Suzhou.[6]

From 1420 to 1644, the Forbidden City was the seat of the Ming Dynasty. In April 1644, it was captured by rebel forces led by Li Zicheng, who proclaimed himself emperor of the Shun Dynasty.[8] He soon fled before the combined armies of former Ming general Wu Sangui and Manchu forces, setting fire to parts of the Forbidden City in the process.[9] By October, the Manchus had achieved supremacy in northern China, and a ceremony was held at the Forbidden City to proclaim the young Shunzhi Emperor as ruler of all China under the Qing Dynasty.[10] The Qing rulers changed the names on some of the principal buildings, to emphasise "Harmony" rather than "Supremacy",[11] made the name plates bilingual (Chinese and Manchu),[12] and introduced Shamanist elements to the palace.[13]

In 1860, during the Second Opium War, Anglo-French forces took control of the Forbidden City and occupied it until the end of the war.[14] In 1900 Empress Dowager Cixi fled from the Forbidden City during the Boxer Rebellion, leaving it to be occupied by forces of the treaty powers until the following year.

After being the home of 24 emperors – 14 of the Ming Dynasty and 10 of the Qing Dynasty – the Forbidden City ceased being the political centre of China in 1912 with the abdication of Puyi, the last Emperor of China. Under an agreement with the new Republic of China government, Puyi remained in the Inner Court, while the Outer Court was given over to public use,[15] until he was evicted after a coup in 1924.[16] The Palace Museum was then established in the Forbidden City in 1925.[17] In 1933, the Japanese invasion of China forced the evacuation of the national treasures in the Forbidden City.[18] Part of the collection was returned at the end of World War II,[19] but the other part was evacuated to Taiwan in 1947 under orders by Chiang Kai-shek, whose Kuomintang was losing the Chinese Civil War. This relatively small but high quality collection was kept in storage until 1965, when it again became public, as the core of the National Palace Museum in Taipei.[20]

After the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949, some damage was done to the Forbidden City as the country was swept up in revolutionary zeal.[21] During the Cultural Revolution, however, further destruction was prevented when Premier Zhou Enlai sent an army battalion to guard the city.[22]

The Forbidden City was declared a World Heritage Site in 1987 by UNESCO as the "Imperial Palace of the Ming and Qing Dynasties",[23] due to its significant place in the development of Chinese architecture and culture. It is currently administered by the Palace Museum, which is carrying out a sixteen-year restoration project to repair and restore all buildings in the Forbidden City to their pre-1912 state.[24]

In recent years, the presence of commercial enterprises in the Forbidden City has become controversial.[25] A Starbucks store that opened in 2000 sparked objections and eventually closed on July 13, 2007.[26][27] Chinese media also took notice of a pair of souvenir shops that refused to admit Chinese citizens in order to price-gouge foreign customers in 2006.[28]

The Forbidden City as depicted in a traditional Ming Dynasty painting

The East Glorious Gate under renovation as part of the 16-year restoration process

Description

The Forbidden City, viewed from Jingshan Hill to the north

The Forbidden City is the world's largest surviving palace complex and covers 72 ha (178 acres). It is a rectangle 961 metres (3,153 ft) from north to south and 753 metres (2,470 ft) from east to west. It consists of 980 surviving buildings with 9,999 bays of rooms.[1] The Forbidden City was designed to be the centre of the ancient, walled city of Beijing. It is enclosed in a larger, walled area called the Imperial City. The Imperial City is, in turn, enclosed by the Inner City; to its south lies the Outer City.

The Forbidden City remains important in the civic scheme of Beijing. The central north-south axis remains the central axis of Beijing. This axis extends to the south through Tiananmen gate to Tiananmen Square, the ceremonial centre of the People's Republic of China, and on to Yongdingmen. To the north, it extends through Jingshan Hill to the Bell and Drum Towers.[29] This axis is not exactly aligned north-south, but is tilted by slightly more than two degrees. Researchers now believe that the axis was designed in the Yuan Dynasty to be aligned with Xanadu, the other capital of their empire.[30]

Walls and gates

The Meridian Gate, front entrance to the Forbidden City, with two protruding wings

he northwest corner tower

The Forbidden City is surrounded by a 7.9 metres (26 ft) high city wall[11] and a 6 metres (20 ft) deep by 52 metres (171 ft) wide moat. The walls are 8.62 metres (28.3 ft) wide at the base, tapering to 6.66 metres (21.9 ft) at the top.[31] These walls served as both defensive walls and retaining walls for the palace. They were constructed with a rammed earth core, and surfaced with three layers of specially baked bricks on both sides, with the interstices filled with mortar.[32]

At the four corners of the wall sit towers (E) with intricate roofs boasting 72 ridges, reproducing the Pavilion of Prince Teng and the Yellow Crane Pavilion as they appeared in Song Dynasty paintings.[32] These towers are the most visible parts of the palace to commoners outside the walls, and much folklore is attached to them. According to one legend, artisans could not put a corner tower back together after it was dismantled for renovations in the early Qing Dynasty, and it was only rebuilt after the intervention of carpenter-immortal Lu Ban.[11]

The wall is pierced by a gate on each side. At the southern end is the main Meridian Gate (A).[33] To the north is the Gate of Divine Might (B), which faces Jingshan Park. The east and west gates are called the "East Glorious Gate" (D) and "West Glorious Gate" (C). All gates in the Forbidden City are decorated with a nine-by-nine array of golden door nails, except for the East Glorious Gate, which has only eight rows.[34]

The Meridian Gate has two protruding wings forming three sides of a square (Wumen, or Meridian Gate, Square) before it.[35] The gate has five gateways. The central gateway is part of the Imperial Way, a stone flagged path that forms the central axis of the Forbidden City and the ancient city of Beijing itself, and leads all the way from the Gate of China in the south to Jingshan in the north. Only the Emperor may walk or ride on the Imperial Way, except for the Empress on the occasion of her wedding, and successful students after the Imperial Examination.[34]

 

[Ray]

Outer Court

Traditionally, the Forbidden City is divided into two parts. The Outer Court (外朝) or Front Court (前朝) includes the southern sections, and was used for ceremonial purposes. The Inner Court (内廷) or Back Palace (后宫) includes the northern sections, and was the residence of the Emperor and his family, and was used for day-to-day affairs of state. (The approximate dividing line shown as red dash in the plan above.) Generally, the Forbidden City has three vertical axes. The most important buildings are situated on the central north-south axis.[34]

Entering from the Meridian Gate, one encounters a large square, pierced by the meandering Inner Golden Water River, which is crossed by five bridges. Beyond the square stands the Gate of Supreme Harmony (F). Behind that is the Hall of Supreme Harmony Square.[36] A three-tiered white marble terrace rises from this square. Three halls stand on top of this terrace, the focus of the palace complex. From the south, these are the Hall of Supreme Harmony (太和殿), the Hall of Central Harmony (中和殿), and the Hall of Preserving Harmony (保和殿).[37]

The Hall of Supreme Harmony (G) is the largest, and rises some 30 metres (98 ft) above the level of the surrounding square. It is the ceremonial centre of imperial power, and the largest surviving wooden structure in China. It is nine bays wide and five bays deep, the numbers 9 and 5 being symbolically connected to the majesty of the Emperor.[38] Set into the ceiling at the centre of the hall is an intricate caisson decorated with a coiled dragon, from the mouth of which issues a chandelier-like set of metal balls, called the "Xuanyuan Mirror".[39] In the Ming Dynasty, the Emperor held court here to discuss affairs of state. During the Qing Dynasty, as Emperors held court far more frequently, a less ceremonious location was used instead, and the Hall of Supreme Harmony was only used for ceremonial purposes, such as coronations, investitures, and imperial weddings.[40]

The Hall of Central Harmony is a smaller, square hall, used by the Emperor to prepare and rest before and during ceremonies.[41] Behind it, the Hall of Preserving Harmony, was used for rehearsing ceremonies, and was also the site of the final stage of the Imperial examination.[42] All three halls feature imperial thrones, the largest and most elaborate one being that in the Hall of Supreme Harmony.[43]

At the centre of the ramps leading up to the terraces from the northern and southern sides are ceremonial ramps, part of the Imperial Way, featuring elaborate and symbolic bas-relief carvings. The northern ramp, behind the Hall of Preserving Harmony, is carved from a single piece of stone 16.57 metres (54.4 ft) long, 3.07 metres (10.1 ft) wide, and 1.7 metres (5.6 ft) thick. It weighs some 200 tonnes and is the largest such carving in China.[6] The southern ramp, in front of the Hall of Supreme Harmony, is even longer, but is made from two stone slabs joined together – the joint was ingeniously hidden using overlapping bas-relief carvings, and was only discovered when weathering widened the gap in the 20th century.[44]

In the south west and south east of the Outer Court are the halls of Military Eminence (H) and Literary Glory (J). The former was used at various times for the Emperor to receive ministers and hold court, and later housed the Palace's own printing house. The latter was used for ceremonial lectures by highly regarded Confucian scholars, and later became the office of the Grand Secretariat. A copy of the Siku Quanshu was stored there. To the north-east are the Southern Three Places (南三所) (K), which was the residence of the Crown Prince.[36]

The Hall of Supreme Harmony

The throne in the Hall of Preserving Harmony

The Hall of Central Harmony (foreground) and the Hall of Preserving Harmony



Traditionally, the Forbidden City is divided into two parts. The Outer Court (外朝) or Front Court (前朝) includes the southern sections, and was used for ceremonial purposes. The Inner Court (内廷) or Back Palace (后宫) includes the northern sections, and was the residence of the Emperor and his family, and was used for day-to-day affairs of state. (The approximate dividing line shown as red dash in the plan above.) Generally, the Forbidden City has three vertical axes. The most important buildings are situated on the central north-south axis.[34]

Entering from the Meridian Gate, one encounters a large square, pierced by the meandering Inner Golden Water River, which is crossed by five bridges. Beyond the square stands the Gate of Supreme Harmony (F). Behind that is the Hall of Supreme Harmony Square.[36] A three-tiered white marble terrace rises from this square. Three halls stand on top of this terrace, the focus of the palace complex. From the south, these are the Hall of Supreme Harmony (太和殿), the Hall of Central Harmony (中和殿), and the Hall of Preserving Harmony (保和殿).[37]

The Hall of Supreme Harmony (G) is the largest, and rises some 30 metres (98 ft) above the level of the surrounding square. It is the ceremonial centre of imperial power, and the largest surviving wooden structure in China. It is nine bays wide and five bays deep, the numbers 9 and 5 being symbolically connected to the majesty of the Emperor.[38] Set into the ceiling at the centre of the hall is an intricate caisson decorated with a coiled dragon, from the mouth of which issues a chandelier-like set of metal balls, called the "Xuanyuan Mirror".[39] In the Ming Dynasty, the Emperor held court here to discuss affairs of state. During the Qing Dynasty, as Emperors held court far more frequently, a less ceremonious location was used instead, and the Hall of Supreme Harmony was only used for ceremonial purposes, such as coronations, investitures, and imperial weddings.[40]

The Hall of Central Harmony is a smaller, square hall, used by the Emperor to prepare and rest before and during ceremonies.[41] Behind it, the Hall of Preserving Harmony, was used for rehearsing ceremonies, and was also the site of the final stage of the Imperial examination.[42] All three halls feature imperial thrones, the largest and most elaborate one being that in the Hall of Supreme Harmony.[43]

At the centre of the ramps leading up to the terraces from the northern and southern sides are ceremonial ramps, part of the Imperial Way, featuring elaborate and symbolic bas-relief carvings. The northern ramp, behind the Hall of Preserving Harmony, is carved from a single piece of stone 16.57 metres (54.4 ft) long, 3.07 metres (10.1 ft) wide, and 1.7 metres (5.6 ft) thick. It weighs some 200 tonnes and is the largest such carving in China.[6] The southern ramp, in front of the Hall of Supreme Harmony, is even longer, but is made from two stone slabs joined together – the joint was ingeniously hidden using overlapping bas-relief carvings, and was only discovered when weathering widened the gap in the 20th century.[44]

In the south west and south east of the Outer Court are the halls of Military Eminence (H) and Literary Glory (J). The former was used at various times for the Emperor to receive ministers and hold court, and later housed the Palace's own printing house. The latter was used for ceremonial lectures by highly regarded Confucian scholars, and later became the office of the Grand Secretariat. A copy of the Siku Quanshu was stored there. To the north-east are the Southern Three Places (南三所) (K), which was the residence of the Crown Prince.[36]

Inner Court

The Inner Court is separated from the Outer Court by an oblong courtyard lying orthogonal to the City's main axis. It was the home of the Emperor and his family. In the Qing Dynasty, the Emperor lived and worked almost exclusively in the Inner Court, with the Outer Court used only for ceremonial purposes.[45]

At the centre of the Inner Court is another set of three halls (L). From the south, these are the Palace of Heavenly Purity (乾清宮), Hall of Union, and the Palace of Earthly Tranquility. Smaller than the Outer Court halls, the three halls of the Inner Court were the official residences of the Emperor and the Empress. The Emperor, representing Yang and the Heavens, would occupy the Palace of Heavenly Purity. The Empress, representing Yin and the Earth, would occupy the Palace of Earthly Tranquility. In between them was the Hall of Union, where the Yin and Yang mixed to produce harmony.[46]

The Palace of Heavenly Purity is a double-eaved building, and set on a single-level white marble platform. It is connected to the Gate of Heavenly Purity to its south by a raised walkway. In the Ming Dynasty, it was the residence of the Emperor. However, beginning from the Yongzheng Emperor of the Qing Dynasty, the Emperor lived instead at the smaller Hall of Mental Cultivation (N) to the west, out of respect to the memory of the Kangxi Emperor.[11] The Palace of Heavenly Purity then became the Emperor's audience hall.[47] A caisson is set into the roof, featuring a coiled dragon. Above the throne hangs a tablet reading "Justice and Honour" (Chinese: 正大光明; pinyin: zhèngdàguāngmíng).[48]

The Palace of Earthly Tranquility (坤寧宮) is a double-eaved building, 9 bays wide and 3 bays deep. In the Ming Dynasty, it was the residence of the Empress. In the Qing Dynasty, large portions of the Palace were converted for Shamanist worship by the new Manchu rulers. From the reign of the Yongzheng Emperor, the Empress moved out of the Palace. However, two rooms in the Palace of Earthly Harmony were retained for use on the Emperor's wedding night.[49]

Between these two palaces is the Hall of Union, which is square in shape with a pyramidal roof. Stored here are the 25 Imperial Seals of the Qing Dynasty, as well as other ceremonial items.[50]

The Palace of Heavenly Purity

The throne in the Palace of Heavenly Purity

The Nine Dragons Screen in front of the Palace of Tranquil Longevity

Behind these three halls lies the Imperial Garden (M). Relatively small, and compact in design, the garden nevertheless contains several elaborate landscaping features.[51] To the north of the garden is the Gate of Divine Might, the north gate of the palace.

Distributed to the east and west of the three main halls are a series of self-contained courtyards and minor palaces, where the Emperor's concubines and children lived.

Directly to the west is the Hall of Mental Cultivation (N). Originally a minor palace, this became the de facto residence and office of the Emperor starting from Yongzheng. In the last decades of the Qing Dynasty, empresses dowager, including Cixi, held court from the eastern partition of the hall. Located around the Hall of Mental Cultivation are the offices of the Grand Council and other key government bodies.[52]

The north-eastern section of the Inner Court is taken up by the Palace of Tranquil Longevity (寧壽宮) (O), a complex built by the Qianlong Emperor in anticipation of his retirement. It mirrors the set-up of the Forbidden City proper and features an "outer court", an "inner court", and gardens and temples. The entrance to the Palace of Tranquil Longevity is marked by a glazed-tile Nine Dragons Screen.[53] This section of the Forbidden City is being restored in a partnership between the Palace Museum and the World Monuments Fund, a long-term project expected to finish in 2017.

Religion

Religion was an important part of life for the imperial court. In the Qing Dynasty, the Palace of Earthly Harmony became a place of Manchu Shamanist ceremony. At the same time, the native Chinese Taoist religion continued to have an important role throughout the Ming and Qing dynasties. There were two Taoist shrines, one in the imperial garden and another in the central area of the Inner Court.[54]

Another prevalent form of religion in the Qing Dynasty palace was Buddhism. A number of temples and shrines were scattered throughout the Inner Court, including that of Tibetan Buddhism or Lamaism. Buddhist iconography also proliferated in the interior decorations of many buildings.[55] Of these, the Pavilion of the Rain of Flowers is one of the most important. It housed a large number of Buddhist statues, icons, and mandalas, placed in ritualistic arrangements.[56]

Surroundings

The Forbidden City is surrounded on three sides by imperial gardens. To the north is Jingshan Park, also known as Prospect Hill, an artificial hill created from the soil excavated to build the moat and from nearby lakes.[57]

To the west lies Zhongnanhai, a former garden centred on two connected lakes, which now serves as the central headquarters for the Communist Party of China and the State Council of the People's Republic of China. To the north-west lies Beihai Park, also centred on a lake connected to the southern two, and a popular park.

To the south of the Forbidden City were two important shrines – the Imperial Shrine of Family (Chinese: 太庙; pinyin: Tàimiào) and the Imperial Shrine of State (Chinese: 太社稷; pinyin: Tàishèjì), where the Emperor would venerate the spirits of his ancestors and the spirit of the nation, respectively. Today, these are the Beijing Labouring People's Cultural Hall[58] and Zhongshan Park (commemorating Sun Yat-sen) respectively.[59]

To the south, two nearly identical gatehouses stand along the main axis. They are the Upright Gate (Chinese: 端门; pinyin: Duānmén) and the more famous Tiananmen Gate, which is decorated with a portrait of Mao Zedong in the centre and two placards to the left and right: "Long Live the People's Republic of China" and "Long live the Great Unity of the World's Peoples". The Tiananmen Gate connects the Forbidden City precinct with the modern, symbolic centre of the Chinese state, Tiananmen Square.

While development is now tightly controlled in the vicinity of the Forbidden City, throughout the past century uncontrolled and sometimes politically motivated demolition and reconstruction has changed the character of the areas surrounding the Forbidden City. Since 2000, the Beijing municipal government has worked to evict governmental and military institutions occupying some historical buildings, and has established a park around the remaining parts of the Imperial City wall. In 2004, an ordinance relating to building height and planning restriction was renewed to establish the Imperial City area and the northern city area as a buffer zone for the Forbidden City.[60] In 2005, the Imperial City and Beihai (as an extension item to the Summer Palace) were included in the shortlist for the next World Heritage Site in Beijing.[61]

Beihai – the Bai Ta is in the distance

Symbolism

The design of the Forbidden City, from its overall layout to the smallest detail, was meticulously planned to reflect philosophical and religious principles, and above all to symbolise the majesty of Imperial power. Some noted examples of symbolic designs include:

Yellow is the color of the Emperor. Thus almost all roofs in the Forbidden City bear yellow glazed tiles. There are only two exceptions. The library at the Pavilion of Literary Profundity (文渊阁) had black tiles because black was associated with water, and thus fire-prevention. Similarly, the Crown Prince's residences have green tiles because green was associated with wood, and thus growth.[38]
The main halls of the Outer and Inner courts are all arranged in groups of three – the shape of the Qian triagram, representing Heaven. The residences of the Inner Court on the other hand are arranged in groups of six – the shape of the Kun triagram, representing the Earth.[11]
The sloping ridges of building roofs are decorated with a line of statuettes led by a man riding a phoenix and followed by an imperial dragon. The number of statuettes represents the status of the building – a minor building might have 3 or 5. The Hall of Supreme Harmony has 10, the only building in the country to be permitted this in Imperial times. As a result, its 10th statuette, called a "Hangshi", or "ranked tenth" (Chinese: 行十; pinyin: Hángshí),[50] is also unique in the Forbidden City.[62]
The layout of buildings follows ancient customs laid down in the Classic of Rites. Thus, ancestral temples are in front of the palace. Storage areas are placed in the front part of the palace complex, and residences in the back.[63]

Imperial roof decoration of highest status on the roof ridge of the Hall of Supreme Harmony

 

[Ray]

Collections

The collections of the Palace Museum are based on the Qing imperial collection. According to the results of a 1925 audit,[64] some 1.17 million items were stored in the Forbidden City. In addition, the imperial libraries housed one of the country's largest collections of ancient books and various documents, including government documents of the Ming and Qing dynasties.

From 1933, the threat of Japanese invasion forced the evacuation of the most important parts of the Museum's collection. After the end of World War II, this collection was returned to Nanjing. However, with the Communists' victory imminent in the Chinese Civil War, the Nationalist government decided to ship the pick of this collection to Taiwan. Of the 13,427 boxes of evacuated artifacts, 2,972 boxes are now housed in the National Palace Museum in Taipei. Almost ten thousand boxes were returned to Beijing, but 2,221 boxes remain today in storage under the charge of the Nanjing Museum.[20]

Two Qing Dynasty "blue porcelain" wares

After 1949, the Museum conducted a new audit as well as a thorough search of the Forbidden City, uncovering a number of important items. In addition, the government moved items from other museums around the country to replenish the Palace Museum's collection. It also purchased and received donations from the public.[65]

Today, there are over a million rare and valuable works of art in the permanent collection of the Palace Museum,[66][67] including paintings, pottery, inscribed wares, bronze wares, court documents, etc.[66] According to an inventory of the Museum's collection conducted between 2004 and 2010, the Palace Museum holds a total of 1,807,558 artifacts and includes 1,684,490 items designated as nationally protected "valuable cultural relics."[68]

Ceramic

The Palace Museum holds 340,000 pieces of ceramics and porcelain. These include imperial collections from the Tang Dynasty and the Song Dynasty, as well as pieces commissioned by the Palace, and, sometimes, by the Emperor personally. The Palace Museum holds about 320,000 pieces of porcelain from the imperial collection. The rest are almost all held in the National Palace Museum in Taipei and the Nanjing Museum.[69]

Paintings

The Palace Museum holds close to 50,000 paintings. Of these, more than 400 date from before the Yuan Dynasty (1271–1368). This is the largest such collection in China.[70] The collection is based on the palace collection in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. The personal interest of Emperors such as Qianlong meant that the palace held one of the most important collections of paintings in Chinese history. However, a significant portion of this collection was lost over the years. After his abdication, Puyi transferred paintings out of the palace, and many of these were subsequently lost or destroyed. In 1948, many of the works were moved to Taiwan. The collection has subsequently been replenished, through donations, purchases, and transfers from other museums.

Bronzeware

The Palace Museum's bronze collection dates from the early Shang Dynasty. Of the almost 10,000 pieces held, about 1,600 are inscribed items from the pre-Qin period (to 221 BC). A significant part of the collection is ceremonial bronzeware from the imperial court.[71]

Timepieces

The Palace Museum has one of the largest collections of mechanical timepieces of the 18th and 19th centuries in the world, with more than 1,000 pieces. The collection contains both Chinese- and foreign-made pieces. Chinese pieces came from the palace's own workshops, Guangzhou (Canton) and Suzhou (Suchow). Foreign pieces came from countries including Britain, France, Switzerland, the United States and Japan. Of these, the largest portion come from Britain.[72]

Jade

Jade has a unique place in Chinese culture.[73] The Museum's collection, mostly derived from the imperial collection, includes some 30,000 pieces. The pre-Yuan Dynasty part of the collection includes several pieces famed throughout history, as well as artifacts from more recent archaeological discoveries. The earliest pieces date from the Neolithic period. Ming Dynasty and Qing Dynasty pieces, on the other hand, include both items for palace use, as well as tribute items from around the Empire and beyond.[74]

Palace artefacts

In addition to works of art, a large proportion of the Museum's collection consists of the artefacts of the imperial court. This includes items used by the imperial family and the palace in daily life, as well as various ceremonial and bureaucratic items important to government administration. This comprehensive collection preserves the daily life and ceremonial protocols of the imperial era.[75]

A blue and white porcelain vase with cloud and dragon designs, marked with the word "Longevity", Jiajing period of Ming Dynasty

Equestrian painting of the Qianlong Emperor (r. 1735–1796) by Giuseppe Castiglione

The Jade Cabbage, formerly at the Forbidden City and now at the National Palace Museum, Taipei

Influence

Architecture

The Forbidden City, the culmination of the two-thousand-year development of classical Chinese and East Asian architecture, has been influential in the subsequent development of Chinese architecture, as well as providing inspiration for many modern constructions. Some specific examples include:

Emperor Gia Long of Vietnam built a palace and fortress in the 1800s. Its ruins are in Huế. In English it is called the "Imperial City". The name of the inner palace complex in Vietnamese is translated literally as "Purple Forbidden City", which is the same as the Chinese name for the Forbidden City in Beijing.

The 5th Avenue Theatre in Seattle, Washington was designed to incorporate elements of classical Chinese architecture and interior decoration. The ceiling of the auditorium features a dragon panel and chandelier reminiscent of the dragon caisson and Xuanyuan mirror found in the Forbidden City.[76]

Depiction in art, film, literature and popular culture

The Forbidden City has served as the scene to many works of fiction. In recent years, it has been depicted in films and television series. Some notable examples include:

The Forbidden City (1918), a fiction film about a Chinese emperor and an American.

The Last Emperor (1987), a biographical film about Puyi, was the first feature film ever authorised by the government of the People's Republic of China to be filmed in the Forbidden City.

Marco Polo a joint NBC and RAI TV miniseries broadcast in the early 1980s, was filmed inside the Forbidden City. Note, however, that the present Forbidden City did not exist in the Yuan Dynasty, when Marco Polo met Kublai Khan.

As performance venue

The Forbidden City has also served as a performance venue. However, its use for this purpose is strictly limited, due to the heavy impact of equipment and performance on the ancient structures. Almost all performances said to be "in the Forbidden City" are held outside the palace walls.

Giacomo Puccini's opera, Turandot, about the story of a Chinese princess, was performed at the Imperial Shrine just outside the Forbidden City for the first time in 1998.[77]

In 1988, the USA musician Marty Friedman composed a song inspired in Forbidden City, as part of the "Dragon Kiss" album.[78]

In 1997, Greek-born composer and keyboardist Yanni performed a live concert in front of the Forbidden City. The concert was recorded and later released as part of the "Tribute" album.[79]

In 2004, the French musician Jean Michel Jarre performed a live concert in front of the Forbidden City, accompanied by 260 musicians, as part of the "Year of France in China" festivities.[80]

A gilded lion in front of the Palace of Tranquil Longevity

Glazed building decoration

All info on The Forbidden Palace is from Wikipedia and is gratefully acknowledged.

 

[Ray]

The Hukou system (Family Registration and residency permit) and Danwei (work unit system) is of important to know about China.

However, with the advent of Capitalism in Communist China, there is a strain on these time system formula and reforms are being undertaken.

These systems indicate the psychology construct of China and it has both positive ramification on Statehood and the organising of their citizenry to respond favourably to the requirement of the State as also form the western point of view has the negativity, in that the people are 'controlled' to respond to the administration ease of the State with little say in organising their individual life and giving expression to their individual desires.

 

[Ray]

Hukou system
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A Hukou (simplified Chinese: 户口; traditional Chinese: 戶口; pinyin: hùkǒu) or huji (simplified Chinese: 户籍; traditional Chinese: 戶籍; pinyin: hùjí) refers to the system of 'class system' residency permits which dates back to ancient China, where household registration is required by law in People's Republic of China (China) and Republic of China (Taiwan).

A household registration record officially identifies a person as a resident of an area and includes identifying information such as name, parents, spouse, and date of birth.

A hukou can also refer to a family register in many contexts since the household registration record (simplified Chinese: 户籍誊本; traditional Chinese: 戶籍謄本; pinyin: hùjí téngběn) is issued per family, and usually includes the births, deaths, marriages, divorces, and moves, of all members in the family. A similar household registration system exists within the public administration structures of Japan (koseki), Vietnam (Hộ khẩu), and North Korea (Hoju). In South Korea the Hoju system was abolished on 1 January 2008.

Nomenclature

The formal name for the system is "huji." Within the huji system, a "hukou" is the registered residency status of a particular individual in this system. "Hukou" is more commonly used in everyday conversation. "Hukou" has been adopted by English-language audiences to refer to both the huji system and an individual's hukou.

History

Family registers were in existence in China as early as the Xia Dynasty (c. 2100 BCE - 1600 BCE). In the centuries which followed, the family register developed into an organization of families and clans for purposes of taxation, conscription and social control.[citation needed]

According to the Examination of Hukou in Wenxian Tongkao published in 1317, there was a minister for population management during the Zhou Dynasty named Simin (Chinese: 司民), who was responsible for recording births, deaths, emigrations and immigrations. The Rites of Zhou notes that three copies of documents were kept in different places. The administrative divisions in Zhou Dynasty were a function of the distance to the state capital. The top division nearest the capital was named Dubi (Chinese: 都鄙), top division in more distant areas were named Xiang (Chinese: 鄉) and Sui (Chinese: 遂). Families are organized under the Baojia system.

Guan Zhong, Prime Minister of the Qi state 7th century BCE, imposed different taxation and conscription policies on different areas.[1] In addition, Guan Zhong also banned immigration, emigration, and separation of families without permission.[2] In the Book of Lord Shang, Shang Yang also described his policy restricting immigrations and emigrations.[3]

Xiao He, the first Chancellor of the Han Dynasty, added the chapter of Hu (Chinese: 户律) as one of the nine basic laws of Han (Chinese: 九章律), and established the Hukou system as the basis of tax revenue and conscription.

Household registration in China

Hukou certificate of P.R.C.

The Communist Party instigated a command economy when it came to power in 1949. In 1958, the Chinese government officially promulgated the family register system to control the movement of people between urban and rural areas. Individuals were broadly categorised as a "rural" or "urban" worker.[4] A worker seeking to move from the country to urban areas to take up non-agricultural work would have to apply through the relevant bureaucracies. The number of workers allowed to make such moves was tightly controlled. Migrant workers would require six passes to work in provinces other than their own.[5] People who worked outside their authorized domain or geographical area would not qualify for grain rations, employer-provided housing, or health care.[6] There were controls over education, employment, marriage and so on.[4]

Rationale

With its large rural population of poor farm workers, hukou limited mass migration from the land to the cities to ensure some structural stability. The hukou system was an instrument of the command economy. By regulating labour, it ensured an adequate supply of low cost workers to the plethora of state owned businesses.[7] Like the internal passports of the Soviet Union, the hukou system allowed the state to provide preferential treatment to industrial workers and intelligentsia who would be more likely to protest and even revolt during periods of unrest.[citation needed]

For some time, the Chinese Ministry of Public Security continued to justify the hukou system on public order grounds, and also provided demographic data for government central planning.[8]

The Hukou system has been justified by some scholars as increasing the stability of China by better monitoring of "targeted persons", people who are politically dubious by the Party's standards. This is still a significant function as of 2006.[9]

Enforcement

From around 1953 to 1976, Police would periodically round up those who were without valid residence permit, place them in detention centres and expel them from cities.[10]

Administration regulations issued in 1982 known as "custody and repatriation" authorized police to detain people, and "repatriate" them to their permanent residency location.

Although an individual is technically required to live in the area designated on his/her permit, in practice the system has largely broken down. After the Chinese economic reforms, it became possible for some to unofficially migrate and get a job without a valid permit. Economic reforms also created pressures to encourage migration from the interior to the coast. It also provided incentives for officials not to enforce regulations on migration.

Technology has made it easier to enforce the Hukou system as now the police force has a national database of official Hukou registrations. This was made possible by computerisation in the 1990s, as well as greater co-operation between the different regional police authorities.[9]

During the Great Leap Forward's famine

During the mass famine of the Great Leap Forward from 1958 to 1962, having an urban versus a rural hukou could mean the difference between life and death.[11] During this period, nearly all of the approximately 600 million rural hukou residents were collectivized into village communal farms, where their agricultural output - after state taxes - would be their only source of food. With institutionalized exaggeration of output figures by local Communist leaders and massive declines in production, state taxes during those years confiscated nearly all food in many rural communes, leading to mass starvation and the deaths of more than 30 million Chinese.[12]

The 100 million urban hukou residents, however, were fed by fixed food rations established by the central government, which declined to an average of 1500 calories per day at times but still allowed survival for almost all during the famine. An estimated 95% or higher of all deaths occurred among rural hukou holders. With the suppression of news internally, many city residents were not aware that mass deaths were occurring in the countryside at all, which was essential to preventing organized opposition to Mao's scheme.[13]

Many of the starving peasants tried to flee to the cities to beg for food, but tight security at entry points and through regular inspections of resident documents on the streets led to the deportation and subsequent death of most. In fact, it was only when rural family members of higher military officers, who were often isolated from the countryside in cities or bases, began dying from starvation that higher Communist officials began seriously worrying about the stability of the state, and eventually forced Mao to end the program. This was the most extreme demonstration of how much impact a different hukou could have in China, but significant interference in all aspects of life only began declining in the 1980s and 1990s.

Effect on rural workers

From around 1953 to 1976, the enforcement of non-portable rights associated with one's domicile created an underclass. Urban dwellers enjoyed a range of social, economic and cultural benefits while China's 800 million rural residents were treated as second-class citizens.[7] However, the ruling party made some concessions to rural workers to make life in rural areas "survivable... if not easy or pleasant".[14]

From 1978 to 2001, as China transitioned from state socialism to market capitalism, export-processing zones were created in city suburbs, where mostly female migrants[15] worked under conditions considered far below contemporary standards of western nations.[14] Restrictions placed on the mobility of migrant workers were pervasive,[5] and transient workers were forced to live a precarious existence in company dormitories or shanty towns, and suffered abusive consequences.[16]

The impact of the hukou system on migrant laborers became particularly onerous in the 1980s after hundreds of millions of them were forced out of state corporations and co-operatives.[5] Since the 1980s, an estimated 200 million Chinese live outside their officially-registered areas, with much less access to education and government services, and in several respects occupy a social and economic status similar to illegal immigrants.[7] The millions of peasants who have since quit the land remain stuck at the margins of urban society, and have been blamed for the rising crime and unemployment. Under pressure from their citizens, city governments impose discriminatory rules.[4] For example, the children of "Nong Min Gong - 农民工" (workers who come from counties) are not allowed to enter city schools with their parents, even now they have to live with their grandparents or uncles in order to go to their local hometown schools in counties. They are called home-staying children by Chinese governments. Chinese researchers reported that there are about 130 million home-staying children without parents year by year.[17]

Analogies to apartheid

The hukou system has been described as "China's apartheid".[18][19] The gradual relaxation of some of the more repressive aspects of the hukou system since the mid-1990s has further raised the need for this control system. This system represents a class system which is in direct conflict with the Communism system of China and undermines the authority of the CPC (Communist Party of China).[citation needed] However, as the hukou remains partially hereditary, the "substance of the social apartheid remains intact."[20]

Two areas differ from South Africa's apartheid system: Firstly, under a system called xia fang, or "sending down", individuals or groups of urban workers were sometimes re-classified as rural workers and banished to the countryside (at lower wages and benefits), often as a sentence for "bourgeois imperialist crimes" during the Cultural Revolution; by contrast, white workers in South Africa were never sent to work in Bantustans. Second, the ideology driving China's apartheid system was Maoism, not racism.[14] More significantly it is possible to move up from a rural to an urban hukou by obtaining a college degree and gaining employment with a corporation or the government.

Some China-based scholars claim that though the Hukou system is discriminatory, it is not significantly different than the passport system keeping people from developing countries from resettling in the West; other than the people being China born citizens.[9]

Reform

Reforming the residency system has been a very controversial topic within the PRC. Although the system in operation was widely regarded within the PRC as unfair and inhumane, there were fears that liberalization would result in a massive influx to the cities which would stress already strained government services beyond the breaking point, and result in further economic loss to rural areas, rising social unrest and crime.[7]

On the other hand, there has been recognition for some time that hukou is an impediment to economic development.[4] China's accession to the World Trade Organisation has forced it to embrace this reform to liberalise the movement of labour, speeding up its economic reform.[21]

The system has undergone further relaxation since the mid 1990s. The first relaxation allowed rural residents to buy a temporary urban residency permit, meaning they could work legally; fees for these decreased gradually to a fairly affordable level. The discrimination against rural women has been alleviated from 1998, when hukou became inheritable through either the father's or the mother's line.[20]

From 2001 onwards, hukou controls were weakened. In 2003, after the uproar surrounding the death of Sun Zhigang alarmed the authorities, the laws on Custody and repatriation were repealed;[20] by 2004 the Chinese Ministry of Agriculture estimated that over 100 million people registered as "rural" were working in cities.[14]

Chan and Buckingham's (2008) article, "Is China Abolishing its Hukou System," argues that previous reforms have not fundamentally changed the hukou system. Instead, reforms have only decentralized hukou control to local governments. The contemporary hukou system remains potent and continues to serve as one of the key institutions perpetuating China's rural-urban disparity.

The system is currently only partially enforced, and it has been argued that the system will have to be further relaxed in order to increase availability of skilled workers to industries.[22]

Household registration in Taiwan

When Taiwan was under Japanese rule from 1895 to 1945, the Japanese government maintained the same system of household registration (koseki) as they did in other parts of the Empire of Japan. This system of household registration, with minor changes, has been continued. Records concerning native Taiwanese are fairly complete. Records of mainlanders date back to the date they first applied for registration with the local household registration office, and are based on information provided by the applicant.

While all ROC nationals, including overseas Chinese with no connection to Taiwan, can apply for a ROC passport, proper household registration is required for obtaining a ROC ID Card, which is often used as proof of citizenship, such as in national elections, and an ID number is needed to open bank accounts. Unlike in China, residency can be easily changed with the local authorities and household registration does not serve as a tool to limit a resident's movements within Taiwan.

Special administrative regions

Hukou is not employed in the special administrative regions of Hong Kong and Macau, though identification cards are mandatory for residents there.

 

[Ray]

Work unit or danwei
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A work unit or danwei (simplified Chinese: 单位; traditional Chinese: 單位; pinyin: dān wèi) is the name given to a place of employment in the People's Republic of China. While the term danwei remains in use today it is more properly used to refer to a place of employment during the period when the Chinese economy was still more heavily socialist or when used in the context of one of state-owned enterprises.

Prior to Deng Xiaoping's economic reforms a work unit acted as the first step of a multi-tiered hierarchy linking each individual with the central Communist Party infrastructure. Work units were the principal method of implementing party policy. Also workers were bound to their work unit for life. Each danwei created their own housing, child care, schools, clinics, shops, services, post offices, etc.

The influence of a work unit on the life of an individual was substantial and permission had to be obtained from the work units before undertaking everyday events such as travel, marriage, or having children. Amongst other things, the work unit assigned individuals living quarters and provided them with food, which was eaten in centralized canteens. The danwei system was crucial to the implementation of the one child policy as the reproductive behavior of workers could be monitored through the danwei system. Workers not complying with policy could have their pay docked, incentives withheld or living conditions downgraded.

The increasing liberalization of China's economy led to state owned enterprises being put into competition with private enterprise and, increasingly, foreign Multinational corporations. The iron rice bowl, the ideal of a job for every worker, continued to prevent work units from dismissing workers while private enterprises were able to cherry pick the best workers. The decision by the central and provincial governments to offer tax and financial incentives to foreign investors in order to encourage them to invest in China led to further difficulties for the danwei system as the state run enterprises were increasingly unable to compete.

At the same time the role of the work unit has changed as China has moved from a socialist ideology to "Socialism with Chinese characteristics". By 2000 much of the work unit's power had been removed. In 2003, for example, it became possible to marry or divorce someone without needing authorization from ones' work unit.

 

[Ray]

For those who wish to read more of life in China there is this book by Jung Chang titled Wild Swans (Three Daughters of China).

Jung Chang was born in Yibin, Sichuan Province of China in 1952.

She was a Red Guard at the age of 14 and then worked as a peasant, a 'barefoot doctor', a steel worker, and an electrician before becoming an English Language student and, later, an assistant lecturer at the Sichuan University

She is the first person from Communist China to receive a doctorate from a British University.

The book Wild Swans is a family history that spans a century, recounting the lives of three female generations in China, by Chinese writer Jung Chang. First published in 1991, Wild Swans contains the biographies of her grandmother and her mother, then finally her own autobiography. The book won two awards: the 1992 NCR Book Award and the 1993 British Book of the Year. The book has been translated into 30 languages and sold over 10 million copies.

Synopsis

Chang's Grandmother's story

The book starts by relating the biography of Chang's grandmother (Yu-fang). From the age of two, she had bound feet. As the family was relatively poor, her father schemed to have her taken as a concubine to a high-ranking warlord General, in order to gain status, which was hugely important in terms of quality of life. After a wedding ceremony to the General, who already had a wife and many concubines, the young girl was left alone in a wealthy household with servants, and did not see her "husband" again for six years. Despite her luxurious surroundings, life was tense as she feared the servants and the wife of the General would report rumors or outright lies to him.

After his six year absence, the General made a brief conjugal visit to his concubine, during which a daughter, Chang's mother, was conceived. During the child's infancy, Chang's grandmother put off persistent requests for her to be brought to the General's main household, until he became very ill and it was no longer a request. Chang's grandmother had no choice but to comply. During her visit to the household, the General was dying. The general had no male heir, and Chang's mother was very important to the family. Realizing that the General's wife would have complete control over her life and her child's, when he would die, Chang's grandmother fled with her baby to her parents' home, sending false word to her husband's family that the child had died. With his last words, the General unexpectedly proclaimed her free at age twenty-four. Eventually she married a much older doctor (Dr. Xia) with whom she and her daughter, Chang's mother, made a home in Jinzhou, Manchuria.

Chang's Mother's story

The book now moves to the story of Chang's mother (Bao Qin/De-hong), who at the age of fifteen, began working for the Communist Party of China and Mao Zedong's Red Army. As the Revolution progressed, her work for the party helped her rise through the ranks. She met the man who would become Chang's father (Wang Yu/Shou-yu), a high-ranking officer. The couple were soon married but Communist Party dictates meant they were not allowed to spend much time together. Eventually, the couple were transferred to Yibin, Chang's father's hometown. It was a long and arduous trek. Chang's mother traveled on foot because of her rank, while her father rode in a Jeep. He was not aware that Chang's mother was pregnant. After arrival at Nanjing, Chang's mother undertook gruelling military training. After the strain of the training coupled with the journey, she suffered a miscarriage. Chang's father swore to never again be inattentive to his wife's needs.

In the following years Chang's mother gave birth to Jung and four other children. The focus of the book now shifts again to cover Jung's own autobiography.

Chang's story

The Cultural Revolution started when Chang was a teenager. Chang willingly joined the Red Guards though she recoiled from some of their brutal actions. As Mao's personality cult grew, life became more difficult and dangerous. Chang's parents were labeled as capitalist roaders and made subjects of public struggle meetings and torture. Chang recalls that her father deteriorated physically and mentally, until his eventual death. Her father's treatment prompted Chang's previous doubts about Mao to come to the fore. Like thousands of other young people, Chang was sent down to the countryside for education and thought reform by the peasants, a difficult, harsh and pointless experience. At the end of the Cultural Revolution Chang returned home and worked hard to gain a place at university. Not long after she succeeded, Mao died. The whole nation was shocked in mourning, though Chang writes that: "People had been acting for so long they confused it with their true feelings. I wondered how many of the tears were genuine". Chang said that she felt exhilarated by Mao's death.

At university Chang studied English. After her graduation and a stint as an assistant lecturer, she won a scholarship to study in England and left for her new home. She still lives in England today and visits mainland China on occasion to see her family and friends there, with permission from Chinese authorities.


I have read the book and have a copy.

It is a socio historical book spanning three generations of ever changing political scene of China.

It is a fabulous book and very moving.

The book is banned in China.

 

[Ray]

Another book I liked was Pallavi Aiyar's, Smoke and Mirrors: An Experience of China.

This book gives the current changing face of China.

Here is a book review from India

Pallavi Aiyar's book, a combination of memoirs, journalistic reportage, and travelogue, is valuable for two reasons. Firstly, there is a great dearth in India of writing on China. As these two countries have the largest populations in the world, as well as being geographical neighbours with ancient civilisations and tense relations over the past half a century, this is a highly untenable situation. Although a number of Indians have focused on China's foreign and defence policies – and in recent years on its economic prowess – few have spent enough time in the country to reflect intelligently on aspects of life there. Vikram Seth, the celebrated Indian writer and poet, is one of the few to have done so. His 1982 book, From Heaven Lake: Travels Through Sinkiang and Tibet, gave a fascinating account of China at the start of the 1980s. Seth did not confine his observations to Tibet and Xinjiang as suggested by the title, but provided vignettes of China as it was then, from a liberal Indian perspective. Aiyar's book, published nearly three decades later, may have drawn some inspiration from Seth's example. In fact, Aiyar admits to having been interested in Seth's work since her teens.

Secondly, Aiyar's book provides a highly sensitive look at China; she is circumspect in her remarks on all that economic development has wrought there, particularly on religious rights and human rights in general, and on the rhythm of daily life as she perceived it. She acknowledges at the end that her book is full of considerations "on the one hand" juxtaposed with those "on the other," but it is in fact this nuanced treatment, her caution and hesitation to arrive at pat judgments, that gives her book weight. She constantly compares China with India, sparing neither their abject failings. Her scrupulous attention to considering every issue from many angles precludes categorical conclusions.

Aiyar tackles one question at length: "If I could choose, would I rather be born Indian or Chinese?" (p. 243), and her preliminary conclusion is uncannily similar to that of Seth nearly three decades1 ago and of Aravind Adiga, a prize-winning author, in 2008.2 She says ""¦were I to be able to ensure being born even moderately well-off, I would probably plump for India over China. "¦ On the other hand, were I to be born poor, I would take my chances in authoritarian China, where despite lacking a vote, the likelihood of my being decently fed, clothed and housed [is] considerably higher. Most crucially, China would present me with relatively greater opportunities for upward social mobility." But the argument hardly ends there for Aiyar. Indians can use their vote to hold up infrastructure projects that entail wanton destruction of their habitats, but the Chinese regime is "adept at disabling the capacity of disaffected peoples to organize, thus depriving them of the influence of numbers that could pressure government policy"¦" (p. 244). And yet, the right to vote in India "did not necessarily or even usually translate into better governance." Voters periodically throw out governments, but that achieves little. Thus, while the Chinese regime "derived its legitimacy from delivering growth, in India a government derived its legitimacy simply from its having been voted in" (p. 255). This is an example of the many chains of argument and counter-argument with which the book is laced.

Perhaps the book's piece de resistance consists of Aiyar's reflections on China's attitude towards religion and towards Tibet, which she visited, travelling on the first train from Beijing to Lhasa, on 1 July 2006. She is scathing in her observations on the Chinese regime's unimaginative stranglehold on Muslims and Tibetan Buddhists and its fear of diversity. In these chapters, she feels less compelled to compare India unfavourably with China. Although mindful of the growth of Hindu fanaticism and events such as the destruction of a mosque in northern India in 1992, the massacre of Sikhs in 1984 after the assassination of prime minister Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards, and the anti-Muslim pogrom in Gujarat state in 2002, she takes a dim view of the Chinese regime's emphasis on "harmony" manifested by an all-enveloping repression against religious practitioners and ethnic minorities. Unlike China, India accepts its diversity and affords greater leeway for its minorities. In a discussion of the neglect of north-eastern India and its peoples, she says: "India had not provided the Nagas, Mizos and others in the (north-eastern) region with the broad roads or tourism dollars that China ensured for its border provinces but New Delhi did provide something else: cultural freedom" (p. 234).

Aiyar acknowledges that many of the "stories," as she calls them, in this collection began as reports she wrote for one of India's better-quality newspapers, The Hindu. Under its current editor, N. Ram, the English-language newspaper has become trenchantly pro-Beijing. This meant Aiyar's reports in The Hindu had to keep to a narrow ledge, avoiding overt criticism of China while conveying an accurate picture of what she saw and heard. Amazingly, she pulled off the feat with credit, even winning an Indian prize for political reporting.3 A campaigning group, Friends of Tibet, initially failed to appreciate the quality of Aiyar's reporting, the care with which she walked the tightrope in presenting a dispassionate account of what she saw in China and Tibet while ensuring that her writing would get past her editor's pro-China blinkers. They criticised her on their website,4 but have since privately apologised to her.

The book contains lively accounts of life in one of Beijing's remaining hutongs, where the author found comfortable lodgings and observed the changes wrought by developments linked to the Beijing Olympics. She deals at length with the widespread destruction going on around the capital, with ordinary citizens unable to resist the bulldozers. (A gritty and detailed account of the process is available in the excellent book by Michael Meyer devoted to the subject.)

Aiyar compares what she observes with her experience of India, the feeling of egalitarianism and "dignity of labour" in China contrasted with the class and caste divisions of India, the place of education, and the status of women. She is particularly astute in her observations on the condition of women, their presence in the workforce and their status in Chinese society. Needless to say, India fares extremely poorly in its treatment of women. She prefers Beijing, "where a woman could ride a bus or even drive a bus without having to tune out the constant staring and whispering of the dozens of sex-starved youth that swarmed around the Indian capital's streets"¦" (p. 242). Not only the youth, she might have added. Men of all ages in New Delhi subject women riding public buses or those waiting for transport on the roadside to intense unwarranted scrutiny. It is hazardous for women to travel alone late in the evening. In Beijing on the other hand, women rarely receive much unwelcome attention and travel fearlessly at the dead of night in most parts of the city.

Some pages of the book betray their origins as dispatches meant for specific newspapers, with their penchant for adjectives and "colour." Occasionally, some statements and figures that ought to have been footnoted are not, and the book's index is insufficient. However, this in no way detracts from the value of the book, which deserves to be read widely in India and China. (It would also be rewarding to revisit Vikram Seth's classic.) It is to be hoped that there will be more such writers and journalists from not only India but also other parts of South Asia, as well as from the Middle East, Central Asia, Africa, and Latin America, bringing their perspectives to bear on the study of the world's most populous country. There is, as Aiyar has noted elsewhere, room for a lot of other views on China.

 

[Ray]

I would appreciate our Chinese friends to help us out to understand all this!

To include about the Dynasties of long ago and as of today.

Educate us.

Don't obfuscate or go tangential and start J'accuse!!

 

[ace009]

It is extremely informative about Chinese history - however, I am sorry to see a lot of ethnic/ racial stereotyping and prejudice from fellow Indians.
I would request my countrymen to stay above racism and refrain from ethnic slurs.
I appreciate Ray's efforts ...

 

[asianobserve]

Calling us equals to Imperial Japan ( which by the way was guilty of GENOCIDE against the CHINESE people) and the USSR was baseless and insulting. Which small countries have we abused? China has been trying to resolve disputes with small countries diplomatically. Have we sent gunboats and our largest warships to intimidate Vietnam and the Philippines? They've been holding Live fire exercises in disputed waters to send messages to us. Have we responded in kind? A bully would MILITARILY intimidate them. Have we? Would Imperial Japan have the same restraint? Would the USSR seek diplomatic resolutions? You are not supporting your evil empire claims with facts.

Your aggressiveness is only held in check by the presence of America in SEA. Without America you'll just steamroll the smaller countries there.

IN case your asking how come I'm so agitated against China, do consider that my mother is originally a Filipina from Zamboanga City. The Philippines is at the receiving end of Chinese expansionist aggression now. Those waters which you are opportunistically (because the Philippines now is not really in the best position to resist a resurgent China, and because vast oil and natural gas deposits have recently been discovered there) are well within the EEZ of the Philippines.

 

[RedDragon]

J20 you are too serious about this forum and these people.

 

[Tshering22]

How to understand China?

For starters, look at the Chinese name for their country, Zhongguo. Literally "Middle Kingdom", i.e. a beacon of civilization surrounded by barbarians on the North, South, East, and West.

Ancient Indians had a very similar view of their country. For example, Chanakya describes mlecchas (people from outside the subcontinent) as "even worse than a chandala". But that view has disappeared long ago and has been replaced by worship of all things Western. In China, however, ethnocentrism remains as strong as ever.

That is what India's Sanskrit name of "Bharat" is mean for. While chinese don't use english much, so then don't care about the english name their country has. OTOH English has become our linguistic master because we are all too regionalist and egoistic. to accept a simple Indian language ALONG with our own mother tongues.

 

[agentperry]

bharat means busy in enlightening. if you do sandhi-vicheed and then go on with hindi dictionary.
its moto ised to be protecting weaks and respecting wise. we hear this happening since ages, be it ashoka's time when kalinga offered asylum to weak brothers off ashoka or king offering his seat to scholars on their visit to king.

but now its not even opposite of what it was used to be, also the might of India is nowhere near to what it was used to be