Life and Travel in China

Regarding the demonstrations in Tibet... China is far from a perfect country, but a lot has changed here. I treat China as my second homeland, I have many Chinese friends. In the future, I will miss the middle country when I return to Poland. Boycotting the Olympics will harm ordinary people more than it will change anything in China. The Chinese are a very peaceful and peaceful nation. The authorities treat them harshly and ruthlessly, because with this number of people it is impossible to do otherwise. People who have never lived here for a long time will never understand it. And those who have the most to say are those who have never been to China or have been to the Canton Fair twice and think they already know everything about this country. The boycott will harm ordinary people, shopkeepers, hoteliers and restaurateurs, and it will not impress the authorities much. Poland's opinion is of little interest to them anymore. You need to be able to separate the decisions and aggressions of the government from the actions of ordinary citizens. Ordinary Chinese do not feel any hatred towards people from Tibet, it is the government that suppresses demonstrations, not the whole of China. You can't blame the entire country and judge China based on recent events. The country in the middle is changing for the better, step by step. 50 years ago millions of people were starving here, today they have a better chance of a decent life and even some success. You just need to be able to distinguish between the affairs of ordinary people and communist politics. In China I met many simple, kind, helpful and sincere people, should I pass them off as Tibet?

Regarding the boycott of Chinese T-shirts and other products due to the situation in Tibet. Ironically, such T-shirts are cheaper in India and Pakistan, because cotton is cheap there, but not in China - this is another stereotype. So the best we can do is boycott polyester T-shirts. And if we want to boycott things manufactured in China, please also remember about i-Pods, Playstation consoles and Nokia phones, because these and many other "branded" products are produced in China, near Shenzhen. I will gladly provide the address to those who do not believe. Of course, I mean original products, not fakes.

Today my wife was listing what inventions come from China. When she said paper, I replied - maybe if it weren't for paper, laptops would have appeared in the world earlier. Now we write on laptops, such a stupid joke.

Yesterday I got married for the second time! During a performance at the Splendid China open-air museum, I was kidnapped from the crowd of spectators. I was dressed up in a straw hat, given a fur coat for my back and a shotgun. I was offered a glass of Chinese vodka, and when I grabbed the glass and shouted to the audience in Chinese: "Cheers - ganbei", everyone was happy. Later, my "guardian" and I ran from the stage to the back. There, I was introduced to a beautiful young girl in traditional Chinese clothing - "This is your wife." I was very happy, I couldn't complain. I was dressed up in a wedding outfit. We went out together, my wife was covered with a red scarf. They asked me to unveil it. She of course pushed my hand away. She repeated it again and I shouted in Chinese, "Why!? You don't love me." The audience burst into laughter. Eventually the advances were accepted and we danced together at my wedding. At the end, I was taken to the back room, given a small gift and taken away from the traditional newlyweds' clothes. I looked at my "chosen" once again and said, "You are my wife now." The young artist just smiled. It all happened in the show village of the Yi minority, the Splendid China open-air museum in Shenzhen. Unfortunately, the marriage certificate was not valid, but about fifty spectators had fun at my expense. And I did my best to get this wedding going and establish contact with the audience. It was happening, it was happening...

I was at the lingerie fair in Shenzhen. The fair was nothing special and nothing new in this industry, but it was more about the models and photos. However, it turned out that there would be few lingerie shows on the last day, but there were many photographers. Among the three models, there were about two hundred guests with cameras and photo phones :-). Unfortunately, I didn't have a flash, the photos turned out bad, I couldn't even look into the viewfinder, I did everything by feel, with my hand, over the heads of several people who were standing in front of me. The underwear was not very fashionable, some of the designs were really old-fashioned, but of course the Chinese pretended that it was a French or Italian collection (produced in China, of course). The prices of such underwear are usually half the salary of a Chinese worker. The quality is reasonable, but nothing special, and the designs probably date back to the interwar period. I regret that I wasn't there on the first day, because there were professional models, several different shows and even an actress from Hong Kong.