Chinese Identity: Tradition and Modernity

Will the real China please stand up?

An ancient culture rich with tradition, almost completely lost in a flash with the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s: from Confucius to Daoism to the inventors of gunpowder and more, China has centuries of history and ideas that penetrate the interest of the scholarly from intellectual pursuits to myths and traditions that are unfamiliar yet fascinating to the west. Contrastingly, it is also a country whose modern identity is forged upon being seen in economical and business mindsets, as well as a key global force in politics today. Of these two identities, who is the "true" China?

The answer is both and neither.

To illustrate the issue of identity from the external and the internal perspective, I present you with snapshots from different angles of my partner.

My partner is a young lady whose lineage invites people who view her with awe and wonder (at times much to her annoyance) when they see her as the exotic beauty from a land rich with traditions foreign to the wayward westerner, hypnotic and seductive, yet elusive and fragile.

They see the Chinese characters she writes in her notebook as esoteric and full of the same essence which carried on the wisdom of Lao Zi and Confucius in them for centuries.

They hear the language that has been spoken for centuries by high court officials with elegance and authority, understood by over one billion people in the domain throughout the ages.

In the eyes of the fool, this is what a Chinese woman personifies when they imagine her, thinking of a fantastic China that is perhaps more apocryphal and mythic than accurate, yet so prevalent an image amongst the uneducated.

Now in the eyes of those amongst the Washington Consensus and the Corporate Vultures, they see a young woman in a completely different way:

They see a trendy and attractive young girl who is yet another consumer ready to be branded with the newest designer brand, to be torn from the shackles of a former communist ideology into the legions of the consumers in the name of global capitalism.

They see the Chinese characters she understands and try to find symbols to replace the ideograms she knows with far more tempting leanings, from the dollar sign to the logo of the new Louis Vuitton bag she is persuaded to buy, and finally the symbols on the global stock exchange appearing next to the traditional Chinese characters to prove that their investments yield the high rate of return.

The language she speaks is no different from any other person who understands the language of money, and in a land of 1.4 billion mouths, money speaks very loudly there, regardless of the control the Chinese Communist Party attempts to exert over her life. It is her and her kind who the global market will conquer China through rather than through military force as they once did in history when countries went to war for power, which has now changed to clashes in the marketplace for hegemony instead.

Those are two prevalent perspectives that somehow seem to create two very different people that are the same person whose history has fostered a generation that struggles to redefine itself apart from the ancient tradition and the mere consumer statistic.

Regardless of the view from the outside looking in, there is a very different story to be told with few parallels to be found. This is when history becomes her enemy and her pride, conflicting emotions that at times complement the changing face of the new China's generation.

Sun Tzu, Confucius, Lao Zi, Zheng He, and Qin Shi Huangdi: these names are part of the history many Chinese took pride in before much of it was lost in the Cultural Revolution when literature and art was cleared away to foster the communist ideology and the cult of Mao Zedong, as there could be no other Gods before Mao and no other isms before Maoism.

But the history never went away, it was re-imagined from the communist perspective as it was eventually re-imagined once again when Mao passed on and China liberalized itself under Deng Xiaoping and new freedoms were allowed that disassociated China from its Mao era, but not without repercussions.

Growing up with parents who were told to embrace Maoism and later told to forget about it, influenced by the stories of the Red Guard terrorizing the cities and denouncing counterrevolutionaries; then going to school learning about Chinese history without the Red stain of communism and blood over the histories to learn about the old tradition; and finally being socialized by the gradual opening up of China to the world of consumerism and global prestige as the leaders modernize China without Westernizing (a very thin line, ironically) but trying to remain strictly Chinese without having a clear notion of what they want their China to be, and who this generation wants the world to see them as, and who they see themselves as.

Reading a history that should be her own, being told stories of a past that is still difficult to put completely behind, and an ambiguous future lying ahead as well as a difficult period of transition now, I ask you this: what is the China that exists in your mind, and who are the Chinese who exist in your mind? For whatever you can imagine and read in the millions of pictures and stories of all things China, your questions and answers are no more difficult to understand than it is for the Chinese themselves.

It goes even further: the image the the Washington Consensus and many of the Chinese want to believe is their China is the global leader with strong industries, a growing military and economy, high trade and tourism as well as political prestige, and the metropolitan destinations of Shanghai and Hong Kong. Now imagine how easy it is to think of this as the only China that exists, and realize that the other 3/4ths of China exists out west, where much of the land and people are still barely touched by modernity, but hardly immersed in old Maoism. The same rural countryside where domestic human trafficking, child labor, rampant HIV, and separatist minority groups in Tibet and Xinjiang provinces deal with a Han culture that is unwelcome in what they see as still their own land.

This is where the final paradox takes place: in the same China, what a family earns in a rural village for one year less than 8000 RMB due to provincial official corruption (a sore for the central government that wishes to do away with petty low-level corruption undermining its prestige and image) can be spent in a moment by the same girl who sees a Gucci bag in a Shanghai designer store.

The center cannot hold in this land of paradoxes and duality of identities, but consumerism and global prospects have made it easy for the current generation of Chinese in the eastern fringe to conveniently forget that their world is also defined by the less-fortunate who live in the same earth and land as them, but in completely different world and Chinas for that matter.

Asian Americans: Who Do You Want to Be?

To be Asian, to be American, to be Chinese:

From a sociological perspective and as an outsider, I find the group that is identified as Asian Americans as a complex group with an identity crisis. I mean no offense when I list these observations and opinions, because as an outsider with no attachments to either my American or Philippine heritage, the values of this group vary as one narrows down to specifics.

What I talk about here is how Asian Americans, compared with other ethnic groups in America, are marginalized due to a lack of awareness of cultural diversity outside of the community, and as a means for security within the community. For many I have come across, one is Asian based on the color of his or her skin, the ability to use chopsticks and read Chinese characters (or some variant), or some other stereotype.

The problem with that assumption is that it would decidedly not categorize many Southeast Asians or South Asians as what makes one Asian in the North American context, but in Britain the term usually refers to those of South Asian and Middle Eastern ancestry. An even bigger problem is the term itself is Eurocentric in that Asia specifically refers to all the lands East of Europe. In the North American context, however, the problem lies in the fact that it ignores the diversity of the community and each of their different cultures, histories, languages, and traditions.

What I specifically find interesting is how the larger group itself is one of convenience in terms of buying into the lie of marginalization superimposed upon them by the occidentals.

Let me illustrate in the example of someone I will call "Eric":

When Eric claims proudly that he is Asian American, does he emphasize he Asian ancestry or his American birth privilege?

Why does he fight to be recognized as an American, yet criticizes the society for having a hard time as recognizing his place as a fellow citizen (or in this case, denizen)?

Why does he boast about how proud he is to be Asian, yet when immigrants from Korea come, he does not see them with empathy, but with an air of inferiority for not being American or accusing him of not honoring his ethnic heritage in favor of the American dream?

Moreover, if Eric wants equal rights when he complains about how unfair it is for Asian Americans to always be treated as "forever foreigners", then why is it he does not feel any special passion for the achievements or the sufferings of close communities such as the Japanese Americans for their imprisonment in America during World War II, yet was proud when Gary Locke becomes the first Asian American state governor in the American mainland?

It is disillusioning when I run into individuals like these who represent the extreme case, but I will clarify now are NOT the majority or the norm amongst Asian Americans. Rather, it is subtle characteristics and some of these more obvious than others that appear in people I have observed in the sociological context.

In another example, I ask more questions about a girl named "Ashley":

When she is amongst peers in the academic setting, why does she highlight the struggles and achievements of the community that she believes others virtually ignore, yet feels no special passion (or knowledge, for that matter) for Chicano or African American communities, preferring to superimpose her?

When she talks about how culturally sensitive and diverse her background is, why does she do in a manner that flaunts her ethnicity and culture as more of a fashion statement than an expression of her individual being?

It's the marriage of the American and Asian culture(s) that creates a very vague culture that many of the ethnic groups within the community agree upon unites them:

1) that they come from a region with a few cultural similarities but have similar values based on familial relations,

2) that they are marginalized as one group by an outside group,

3) that their experience as immigrants or children of immigrants who try to hold on strongly to their mother cultures creates brotherhood through shared experience, and

4) that there is strength in numbers for representation of the group as a whole rather than each group trying to fend for themselves.

Those are only a few pillars I have observed, but none of what I say should be taken as absolute. These are, as I stress for the sake of avoiding offense and misunderstanding me, observations from an outsider. From an anthropological and political perspective, yes, there is strength in numbers and people have traditionally gone into bigger groups for security, but the big criticism I have of the homogenization of these different groups into Asian Americans, coupled with the homogenizing nature of American culture (or the melting pot as they say), is that their values and identities don't become absorbed into one collective voice and consciousness that fosters solidarity in the community, but rather a loose confederacy that is unable to meet all the individual needs of each ethnic community as a whole, whereas the individual communities within the group do not have the numbers to meet their needs, especially for smaller ethnic communities like the Hmong and Laotians versus the larger groups like the Chinese and Filipinos.

It's the damned if you are, damned if you aren't dilemma I see here, which is what makes me admire the activists who mean to contribute to the community, yet know that it is a losing battle because it is difficult to please all the sub-communities within the Asian American community. In a nutshell, it's hard to please everyone all the time, and that's what makes me admire the few activists out there, and also helps me empathize with them when it all comes down to them choosing individual gain when giving to the community goes unappreciated and underappreciated, especially with free riders.

Visitors from theworldly.org, welcome to my blog! I must apologize, but my past few articles have not been published here yet, but they will appear simultaneously by the end of this week due to a recovery issue. Check back soon and look around at the archive for now, but stay tuned. - Johnny

Plato, Hobbes, and Confucius: Dialogues and Analects Against Democracy

The Greek philosopher Plato was one of the many Greeks who frowned upon the concept of democracy, which in its original translation, meant the rule of the people-- but in its original context, the people who rule were actually closer to the mob mentality and the chaos that comes out of it. Historically, the old Peloponnesian War of the 5th century BCE had the democratic power of Athens throwing its weight around trying to impose its will on other Greek city-states, whereas the militaristic oligarchy of Sparta was fighting against their empire-building ambitions and for their own sovereignty. This example is often used by critics of democracy when they show how it has traditionally never been the pure and infallible ideal that has been championed by the west (especially the French and Americans) for so long.

Plato believed that people should be ruled by what he refers to as the "philosopher king" who is a just, fair ruler that becomes the leader not because he wants to rule (he actually does not want to wield power at all; he actually avoids it), but because he fears what could happen if an inferior ruler was in charge, and takes the job only to make sure it is done right.

By contrast, the Confucian belief system was that everyone had a role in society based on specific social relations that are often misunderstood in the west, especially when confusing it with the later Neo Confucianism of the Song Dynasty that outlined women's roles as being strictly tied to their duties in the home. In terms of how the relationship between the ruler and his subject in the traditional Confucian philosophy, it was not just people putting their faith in the absolute authority of the ruler, but the accountability and responsibility of the ruler to his people, lest their faith be misplaced.

Looking at these two perspectives of governmental responsibility, how do we assess democracy in an age where the definitions still elude many? To begin with, it is important to know that democracy is not simply entitling everyone the right to vote, as it can happen as an act for show, much like the elections in Iraq that voted Saddam Hussein into power for another term before he was ousted in 2003 along with his totalitarian dictatorship. Democracy-- especially in terms of development-- refers to the institutions and bureaucracies, as well as the accountability of them and officials in charge for their actions and responsibilities.

How much of this has been lost since democracy has been mis-represented as the freedom to express offensive ideas or promoting the process of voting rather than creating actual accountability and representation? When looking at current failures and corruption in governments masquerading as democracies in name only (the fallen Republic Iraq and the Democratic People's Republic of North Korea being prime examples), or the Americans who allow hate groups to exist in the name of their democracy, it is somewhat disillusioning to see what has happened to the idea of democracy.

Under the current (mis)understanding of democracy, the Philippines, after a visit from Singaporean leader Lee Kuan Yew, earned his comment that it "needed more discipline and less democracy" due to the communication divide. Part of the problem in developing countries is that the criticism of leaders by allowing an excess amount of expression in democracies is that it creates such a level of distrust that governmental support and political aspirants rarely have a chance to work in good faith due to the unfair association of being susceptible to corruption even before committing those acts, which in turn inspires them to achieve their political goals through corruption in order to survive.

Thomas Hobbes, author of Leviathan a pillar of western political thought, would be disappointed at the way that the allowance of excessive free expression undermines the authority of the government and the respect due, which in turn weakens the relationship between the citizens and the government. After all, the social contract did not just detail the responsibility of the government to protect its citizens, but for the citizens to be responsible for their government as well, meaning that if they expect to have a responsible government, they cannot erode its image by mixing its effectiveness with the personal lives of its leaders, especially if it is no concern of the people to judge whom their leaders are sleeping around with behind their wives' backs, especially if those same leaders are doing a good job.

Perhaps the real issue is not to just let the idea that democracy is about voting and freedom of expression, but to correct that misconception and clarify its meaning of accountability and responsibility, as well as limiting the expression that allows libelous articles from tabloid-level journalists to mistakenly draw connections between state leaders and their extramarital affairs while promoting an image of the government that is consistent with its level of responsibility.

Cultural Imperialism 101: Colonizing the Panties

One of the greater divisions in the cultural gap between east and west is evident in the popular western sexual fetish for Asian pornography. Asian pornography does not necessarily refer to pornography produced in Japan or Korea, but based on the ethnic stereotypes for people who would otherwise all be categorized as Orientals. Oriental here is referring to not actually being from the Orient (as the term is now far too archaic and politically incorrect), but to the idea and concept that those who are perceived as having Asian heritage are forever foreign, exotic, and mysterious, left to the minds of the misinformed and uneducated to fantasize and speculate, thereby objectifying the culture and people they have misrepresented and misperceived, especially in their pornography.

The basic stereotype for women is that she is exotic, forever a foreigner, knows ancient pleasure techniques, submissive, and willingly offers herself to the westerner, whom she finds far more pleasing and greets as a liberator rather than lecher. The stereotype for the male is that he is sexually impotent due to his supposedly smaller body size (and consequentially his penis size as well), selfish, and oppressive to women. Both stereotypes speak more about the racial bias from early or initial impressions that westerners have of the Asian peoples rather than being drawn from factual evidence, as well as a complete disregard for culture.

One of the common fantasies in Asian pornography are usually about how some sexually-charged women are visiting the west in search of sexual partners or encounters with western men, whom they perceive as physically more attractive and capable with larger penises and muscular frames. Parallels to the Nazi Germany ideology of the Aryan as a symbol of human perfection comes to mind when observing this mindset.

Another fantasy involves a young girl lost and seemingly unaware of the environment she has found herself in, to which the lecherous pornographers seek to take advantage of her by telling her things such as how she will be a model and that they simply wanted to get to know her better, which involves much sexual touching and objectifying much like they were inspecting goods, before they proceed to make sexual advances on her.

Dialog also proves to be tasteless: when two performers are discussing the physical differences of each other's anatomy and resulting incompatibility as one example seen on a popular American site specializing in the Asian fetish, the male performer says, "the egg roll does not fit in the take-out box!" Hearing lines like this, one feels more inclined to laugh before shaking his or her head in disbelief.

It is such garbage like this that generates income for the pornography industry at the expense of ethnic groups being misunderstood and the viewers absorbing the misinformation, fostering ignorance in the long run. Surprisingly, some of the people who benefit are the performers, as a number of the female performers are college students earning tuition money. Some could argue that it is no different from prostitution, but one performer in the U.S. said "wouldn't you blame the education system for forcing me to subject myself to this, with student loans and financial aid harder and harder to come by?"

Other people have different opinions. One college student from China at UCLA who was asked about how the stereotype affects people's perceptions of her said that "I feel people are approaching me because they want to try something new instead of actually getting to know me or about my culture, like I'm some sort of new food they want to try for the sake of trying as they attempt to hit on me and tell me how much they like my culture. It's very degrading and disrespectful, and I don't tolerate it." Since arriving in the U.S., she feels that people are constantly trying to take advantage of her the way they do in pornography. "I'm not interested in their approach, their methods, or pornography. I'm just another person not from the U.S., I don't want to fulfill someone's fantasies from what pornography they have watched," she said after the stereotype and the popular fantasies.

If the west wants to start taking other cultures far more seriously, then perhaps some methods of control should be utilized in spite of constantly fighting for creative expression and corporate profits. Perhaps we need to be reminded that such ignorance can be dangerous, recalling specifically the American soldiers in Okinawa, Japan or Angeles City, Philippines where they were charged for raping local girls, under the impression that they can get away with their actions for being men of privilege, coupled with the misconception that these women were helpless and completely submissive-- common misrepresentations of both the western men and Asian women in pornography.

Text messaging: the new tool for democracy?

People power ousted Estrada in the Philippines, and popular protests in China that the government has a hard time controlling how they are organized both share one thing in common: they were organized by text messaging on mobile phones.

As of 2005, 27% of China were the owners of mobile phones, which allows for far more expression than e-mails that are censored or blocked by a regime that closely monitors its critics, who are usually viewed as synonymous with dissenters. As of 2006, the Philippines, a country with only 2 million Internet users and 3 million land phone users, had over 30 million mobile phone users, many of whom can multi-task anything they do while text messaging in one hand without even looking at the screen.

It is this extreme familiarity with the technology that helps people overcome the censorship of the news media, even in places like North Korea where some 20,000 mobile phones are smuggled in and used as a primary source of news about the outside world that the DPRK wants none of its citizens to be familiar with in order to protect its regime. Even the most outspoken blogger cannot compete with international text messaging when his or her blog is subject to being blocked or even shut down with heavy Internet censorship.

But development is not what causes people to resort to text messaging to spread information or organize protests: South Korea, which has over half of its population connected to high-speed Internet connections, still has an obvious divide between the people and the information. According to Cathy Hong of the online edition of Christian Science Monitor:

In South Korea, for example, many experts agree that current President Roh Moo Hyun would not have been elected without the help of the Internet and SMS. Back in December 2002, conservative mainstream media favored his rival Lee Hoi Chang to win the election, especially when a former rival who had endorsed Mr. Roh unexpectedly withdrew his support on the eve of Election Day. But Roh's core supporters, who were of the younger "information technology" generation, launched a massive last-minute campaign. They fired off e-mails and text messages to 800,000 voters on the morning of election day, urging them to go to the polls. Source: http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2005-06-30-politics-text-tool_x.htm?csp=34

So even with greater access to technology, text messaging is now in of itself a necessary tool for the spread of information, especially with technology like the Apple iPhone which grants Internet access for direct access to news articles online that are complementary to people who have configured their mobile phones to receive news via long or multiple text messages. The mobile phone is an important tool in Africa as it is the one piece of technology that links everyone together, especially when farmers in the rural countryside get actual prices from friends or relatives in the city via text messages so that they do not get cheated out of their earnings from the agents who come to pick up their goods to sell to the city and give their own daily prices.

The downside to people text messaging is the limitations on characters each text message. People do not necessarily utilize the dictionary tool, but their abbreviations sometimes habitually end up in written form, including people occasionally writing words such as "2gthr" under the strains of in-class writing assignments, such as in the Philippines.

Beyond text messaging, mobile phone technology has had its own fair share of scandals, from the Tammy Nyp scandal in Singapore of February 2006 when a student's phone was stolen and erotic movies of her and her boyfriend saved on the phone were sent to multiple people and even uploaded to the Internet, despite Singapore's strict controls and censorship. Furthermore, some debates are going on about having mobile phones with cameras being allowed in places such as locker rooms, and security measures need to be taken into consideration amidst the advent of mobile technology, as it is much easier to snap a photo or record a movie of classified information and send it long before being caught.

Not to totally dismiss the use of the video and camera function of mobile phones however is the video below uploaded to youtube of one of many instances in which students have taken video recordings of abuses by teachers. One case in Taiwan caused an uproar and debates on the subject of corporal punishment in Taiwan, available in BBC's archive at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4378412.stm.



Mobile phones have already penetrated popular culture as much as the Internet has, possibly even deeper considering their ease of use and wider user base. Movies such as Japanese horror film One Missed Call show creative interpretations of mobile phone use, such as its plot about a ring tone that plays and leaves a prophetic message of the listener's own voice and approaching death by supernatural means.

Perhaps in the near-future, there may be stricter controls over the content of mobile technology and capability as governments are wary of their people's creative use of the technology, especially when terrorists potentially use text messaging to organize or plan attacks. There is also the potential for governments to take a page from the Israeli government, who in 1996 planted a bomb in the mobile phone of Palestinian suicide bombing mastermind Yahya Ayyash which resulted in his assassination.

So in the age of information and misinformation, we see a new field that is still in its developmental stages in the form of mobile technology, especially having seen what its potential can already do. Just don't go expecting your phone to explode in your face

More articles about the text messaging phenomenon

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2005-06-30-politics-text-tool_x.htm?csp=34

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/04/25/news/internet.php

http://www.textually.org/textually/archives/2005/11/010591.htm

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/24/AR2006082401379.html

http://technology.guardian.co.uk/online/story/0,3605,1176738,00.html

http://www.bulatlat.com/news/4-25/4-25-texters.html

http://www.time.com/time/asia/asiabuzz/2001/01/23/

http://www.smh.com.au/news/Technology/Mobile-rings-changes-for-worlds-poor/2005/04/21/1114028473872.html

When you're a jet, you're a jet all the way-- or are you?

“When you’re a Jet, you’re a Jet all the way from your first cigarette to your last dying day” go the lyrics of the famous song from the classic American musical, Westside Story. That seems to be akin to the popular attitude with westerners towards religion. If you are Jewish, Christian, or Muslim, you subscribe exclusively to that faith, any taint of belief in similar concepts such as Karma is to Buddhism as Providence is to Christianity results in conservative religious fundamentalists denouncing those who believe in false scripture, in spite of existing similarities.

But come over to the Asia Pacific region, especially in Southeast Asia and Japan, it is a different story altogether. Historically, many traditions reveal that the understanding of the world in both Southeast Asia and Japan did not distinguish between the sacred and the profane, as spirituality was part of their everyday life. Such spiritual traditions are varied and diverse.

One example shows how shamans and ancestral worship are important, such as going to shamans to communicate with ancestral spirits in order to find out what makes grandma so angry that she takes it out on the family by preventing a young couple from bearing any children. Another important example are rites and rituals such as mamemaki in Japan that is celebrated on the day of setsubun, setsubun referring to the day just before the beginning of each new season, and mamemaki performed by throwing soybeans out the door to cast away evil spirits from the previous season and prevent new ones from coming into the next. Most noticeably even today is the penchant for spiritual protection in the form of amulets and other lucky charms which people carry around for good luck or protection. But what happened to these when the advent of exclusive religions such as Christianity came when Europeans did, as well as the attitudes of little or no tolerance for traditional beliefs and superstitions?

Some current arguments show that in these cultures, there is no separation of culture and religion, because religion is part of their culture; it was what defined their outlook on life and was the basis of all their activities, from music in sacred rituals to government structure, such as the way Cambodia’s Angkor Wat temple was built to replicate the cosmic home of the Gods. So even when you have a high concentration of Islam in Indonesia or Christianity in the Philippines (yet some superstitions still remain especially in the form of amulets for good luck), how does this work out?

Here’s the thing: those beliefs never left with the arrival of the religions of the west. There is a western misconception that these traditional belief systems worship a wide pantheon of gods and do not respect the authority of a supreme deity above all, which is actually far from it.

The issue is not really a matter of inconsistent spiritual practices and religious beliefs, but a matter of definition and level of involvement. In the West, people tend to view religion as synonymous with the institutions that represent it and thus can eliminate it from their daily lives since they can separate themselves from it due to separation of the sacred and profane, especially with people feeling a greater attachment and more relief from the Almighty Dollar or science as a way of explaining how things work or even manipulating nature. Coupled with the fact people don’t feel too happy about church on Sundays asking for donations and thus taking away money, their source of comfort and society’s life blood, we can see why the spiritual realm of the gods has a limited role in society, even though the dollar says, “In God We Trust.”

Back East, however it is another story. An interesting discovery pointed out by UCLA history professor Herman Ooms shows that in a consensus of religions in Japan, 140% of the population are listed as Buddhist. Where does the other 40% come from if 100% is supposed to be the entire population? The answer is quite interesting: people checked off more than one box identifying which religion they felt they were, and the majority felt sympathetic towards Buddhism, practiced Shinto rituals, and got married in western-style Christian weddings. So interestingly enough, a person who checked off these three choice can theoretically be practicing three religions, which is difficult for a westerner to fathom if he believes that religion is a set path to meeting the Supreme Being, and we can only walk one path, not multiple.

In the value system back East however, this is not what religion is, since there is a very thin line between religion and culture as noted earlier. Though difficult to convey, essentially there are categories of importance in terms of spirituality that all fall under the overall belief system of these societies. Fellow history professor at UCLA Geoffrey Robinson on a visit to Indonesia wondered how a Muslim family in Indonesia was able to practice a ritual that could essentially be classified as ancestor worship in spite of the popular understanding that Islam was a strict religion with no tolerance like its brother Christianity. To the family who explained this to him, they felt that it had no conflict with Islam at all, that it was simply a part of their tradition to honor their ancestors. The key word here is “tradition.” Much like the Chinese in Hong Kong who use Feng Shui to make use of the sacred geometry of the universe for luck and prosperity who find nothing wrong with their conscience on the way to church Sundays, these practices would best be understood as traditions or superstitions in western eyes. Professor Herman Ooms, on a trip to Japan before, once asked a lady if they actually believed in the rituals they practiced, in going to graveyards for people to pay respect to ancestors, or in the good luck charms that people buy. Her response said it all about religion and culture: “Do you believe in Santa Claus?”

In a sense, people become too attached to tradition that it loses meaning, much like going to church becomes routine and it is no longer a spiritual day that reminded people of the powers that be. Why is Sunday in the United States a day when banks are closed and people somehow feel lazier than any other day of the week? Why does it seem weird to open up a drawer in a motel or hotel and not find a Bible placed by the Gideons? It is when the religion becomes so enmeshed in the culture that the culture takes it in without needing the religion to justify or explain it, since it becomes the norm.

Pay attention the next time you go to Borders bookstore and look by the cashier to see such novelties such as Buddha-in-a-box or a miniature Zen garden and more to decorate your desktops as well as offer a little more enlightenment. Why be a Jet when you can be whomever you want to be and reap the benefits of it all, just like the Japanese and most people in Southeast Asia do?

The Tesseract of Globalization

Put several squares together and fold them up, and you will have a cube. If you were one of the imagined Flatlanders from Edwin A. Abbot's 19th century literary classic Flatland, you would be bound to the Second Dimension and only be able to imagine those several squares to idealize what a cube would look like, but never truly know it until you have experienced it. Our own situation here is trying to understand the concept of the hypercube through the tesseract, an unraveled hypercube, which exists in the fourth dimension, one dimension over us. Like a Flatlander bound to the second dimension, he can only imagine several squares combining to form a cube, but can never truly fathom the cube without experiencing beyond his dimensional prison.

Keeping with this metaphor and knowing that globalization is an inescapable truth that only becomes harder to deny, we still find ourselves trapped in understanding the world through our default categorizations as we visualize a superficial world through our limited understanding, whether it comes from a lack of information due to the filtering of what is available by hiding it from us, or by what is highlighted for us.

But in spite of all the images on TV, the Internet, magazines, and the accounts of others, we have to remember that this is only a fraction of the other world we have not experienced; like a Flatlander cannot imagine a cube because he only understands the square, we cannot understand this hypercube of reality solely based on the information out there, no matter how much detail we have.

Whether it is an Indonesian nationalist's account of his country's history, or a socialist reporter's understanding of outsourcing in the People's Republic of China and its effect on workers' wages and conditions, there are many truths that are out there they are eager to reveal, but it is their perspectives that create the biases that are evident in their choice of replicating their experiences; from these accounts come a false picture of reality that has some truth in it and is thus only a fraction of what's really out there.

Whether it is Noam Chomsky's conspiracy theories or Tom Plate's chaos theories on popular news media, both cases illustrate the potential for misrepresentation of the world through the media, as well as inherent cultural biases that influence the cultural insensitivity that prevents adequate research and choice of words.

In the case of Noam Chomsky's conspiracy theories, it is believed that the news media deliberately attempts to maintain the status quo as it is influenced by the dollars of the consumers who buy the products from the corporatioons who bombard them with advertisements and control what the media focuses on through corporate sponsorship. In making the real world issues of ongoing genocides or human trafficking less significant by allocating less time to them and more time to sporting events, people are bred to become apathetic machines who consume and consume like animals in a farm. So in this case, it is lack of time given for actual thought as well as limited information which leads to hardly a fragment of the overall picture of reality. The metaphor here is a used-car salesman trying to sell a car for more than it's worth: he cheats the customer by withholding information of better deals or vehicles found elsewhere, and lies about his credibility, achieving the effect of limiting the consumer's choice and making him believe that it is also the best choice.

In the case of Tom Plate's strong case for chaos theory, the news media is definitely influenced by consumer dollars and corporate sponsors, but not to the extent that people are mindless slaves: more specifically, it can simply be explained that it is a matter of stupidity, not sin. From the space restrictions, the rushed editing jobs, lack of sleep from the reporters and editors, as well as differing educational backgrounds and different needs of the audiences, sponsors, and bureaucracy, the real issue is the chaos that arises from an entire organization trying to both earn money and please everyone at the same time, which is a very obvious case that explains why the world is difficult to grasp from the news stories and images that we are fed. The metaphor here is of an office secretary being told to multi-task and accomplish several objectives within a five-minute time frame, from making 200 copies of one document, faxing another one, making a new pot of coffee, answering and connecting an expected phone call to her boss, as well as dealing with any other assignments that come in: this high level of expectation and small time frame is what causes many people to get annoyed when mistakes happen during any of the tasks or if any of them are not completed.

With two proposed reasons for the misinformation fed our way, whichever you choose to believe is one thing, but the important thing to know is that we can not wholly rely on the news media for our world understanding. Thinking critically from the information we receive is one thing, but knowing that there is plenty of information out there to dig through is another thing; the lack of time (or interest for many) prevents us from getting a better perspective that comes from looking through that myriad of information. Suffice to say, we all live on the same planet earth, which is the same shape and size it has been for millions of years, but we all live in our own different worlds, based on different experiences and subjective understandings of what the world is, or whatever it happens to be, if there is any objectivity at all.

Brain drain: Manila’s finest don’t live there anymore, nor do they want to

The first time I dropped out of university was probably one of the better decisions I’ve made in my life.

The travel advisory currently issued on the Philippines by the U.S. government meant that UCLA had cut off its Education Abroad Program in the Philippines for fear of sending students to their untimely demise. However, the university UCLA is affiliated with there is reputable, so I will withhold its name out of respect for the institution.

Ignoring post-9/11 norms of paranoia, I went there independently to study for their first semester to see what life in a local university—the most prestigious public university with many Filipino intellectuals as its alma matter, including former president Fidel Ramos—would be like through the eyes of a self-proclaimed citizen of the world who could survive in any environment, thus influencing my (perhaps misguided) attempt to live and study like the typical Filipino student.

An entire semester of tuition for a local (lucky for me, I am a dual citizen and have an apartment there) was approximately $70 U.S.; some of my textbooks at UCLA cost more than this. And in a country with English as the other official language, I wouldn’t have to worry about learning another language, making it fare more attractive to earn credits and save on tuition, and comparatively cheaper than studying in England, which even former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill once jokingly remarked about America and Britain, “it is the English language that divides us.”

Churchill could not have been more prophetic about my experiences in the language divide in Manila: I survived for three weeks before wisely abandoning my futile attempts at university life, since we all knew English, but spoke another language entirely, preventing us from seeing eye-to-eye.

On the first day, in spite of looking the same and dressing down to fit in with the other students in a country where the average family’s income converts to just a little over $3,100 U.S., I stood out like a marshmallow floating in a cup of hot chocolate, and I’m not white.

There was something about me that caused everyone to pay attention to me, even while hiding my California accent, wearing sunglasses to avoid direct eye contact, and shuffling my feet like everyone else did instead of hurrying off to class. Perhaps it was my obvious surprised reaction to a snake coming out of the toilet when I went to relieve myself, which everyone else laughed at and shrugged it off as the janitor was called who himself took a nonchalant approach as he went to remove it, everyone seeing it as just another thing that happens, much like overgrown grass in the floors and trees all coming into parts of the building.

My cover being blown already, I was thankful that my professors let me know that I would not receive any special privilege for being an American. Instead I get stigmatized.

Looking for the non-existent textbook store, I was instead pointed in the direction of the long hallway of Xerox copying stalls, having to go to several in order to obtain copies of entire books as my assigned readings. A handful of texts fresh off the copier, I can only describe the long march between buildings as equivalent to crossing deserts, even when riding overcrowded jeeps and squishing between hot, sweaty people.

My second day of classes, a syllabus was then distributed, followed by the assignment of groups and topics. Group work already? Okay, I can deal. I was part of a group they jokingly nicknamed “United Nations” due to my partner being half-Armenian, but already a third-generation Filipino. We did our research and picked a presentation date, and I did the same for my other two classes, which followed a suspiciously similar pattern of topics and assigning of groups.

It turned out to be a very popular university professor’s technique in the Philippines: getting paid to be a teacher who does not teach. They introduce the subject material, then assign topics after the one or two week introduction for student groups to research and present to the class for the rest of the semester, criticizing students for not presenting what the professors would emphasize had they been giving the lecture.

In a history class, students were told to read chapters, with each group presenting a few chapters and themes, getting awarded higher grades for giving snacks and theatrical presentations. In a chemistry class, when a professor spent half an hour wondering why her equation was wrong got embarrassed when my friend, a visiting white guy from Massachusetts, said that she had it wrong because it was upside down, and left the class saying that since we understood the subject material so well, she wouldn’t have to explain it anymore. This is when he got screwed over for homework and became the enemy of the students.

By the end of my third week, I jumped ship and had an extensive talk with my long-time mentor from Boston living in Manila in a self-imposed exile, who had spent time as both a professor and student in that university, saying that his time there in the 1970s was exactly the same, and praised me for being wiser than him in my choice of dropping out instead of dragging out a semester, like he did for two years.

The basic formula ended up like this: teachers don’t earn enough money, so why waste effort on teaching? Let the students pay them to be just as unhappy. The students, however, are to be praised for being ruthless and enduring four or more long years of this in attempts to improve their family’s place in society. A sad fact of life there is that moving up in society is either marrying an American or moving the U.S. And if staying in the Philippines means ending up being overworked, underpaid, and not appreciated turns once-hopeful students into bitter professors, then we can see why the conditions of Manila are pushing out these promising and hardworking individuals who slave through systems similar to this university in attempts to rise above their conditions and class. Until they find reasons to stay and contribute instead of looking for greener pastures such as the U.S., Manila only loses its potential every year.

Women in Southeast Asia: another status quo

Before the advent of Europeans and Christianity, Confucianism and cholera, women in Southeast Asia until the late 16th century were equal to men, and many times even above them in traditional societies. Believe it or not, this is history. It is hard to believe when the region of Southeast Asia is plagued with social and developmental problems, as well as being the hotspot where the most international human trafficking and sex slaves are found in the world. Amidst these and religious conflict or political turmoil and corruption, Southeast Asians can look back at history and hold their heads up high even by pointing to current events in comparison to the west.

How many leaders in the west have been women in the past 20 years, besides New Zealand's Helen Clark and the United Kingdom's Margaret Thatcher as each country's former prime ministers? Not too many, compared to Corey Aquino of the Philippines and today's Gloria Arroyo, Aung San Suu Kyi of Burma/Myanmar, and Megawati Sukarnoputri of Indonesia, amongst many names. When people talk of how these societies are backwards and women are unequal, amidst sex slaves and religious extremism forcing women to cover themselves, they really miss the bigger picture. It is a paradox to understanding this when women can find themselves at the bottom of the social hierarchy yet be at the top of the political chain of command, but this is nothing strange to the people who live in these societies.

Even historically, women have traditionally held much higher importance in Southeast Asian societies than men, for they controlled trade in the marketplace since men were out sailing, were leaders many times since rulers simply had to prove that the Gods favored them, preferred over men as palace guards in some old sultanates since they were seen as more trustworthy and less likely to seize power in a coup d'etat, diplomatic relations since men were seen as too brash to be rational when trying to make peace, and most importantly were their religious leaders according to traditional animist and shamanistic beliefs, related to their sensitivity to life for bearing children parallel to their sensitivity to the spiritual world. And amazingly, they controlled the househould as well, even drawing the attention of Chinese traveler Zhou DaGuan who observed that "men should expect their women to seek company in their bedchambers from others if they were to abandon their women for more than ten days, for women had their needs and men had their responsibility to meet these needs..."

All of this changed when Christianity came with Europeans to much of Southeast Asia (namely the Philippines and Eastern Indonesia, plus pockets of Vietnam), and China with Confucianism to most of Vietnam. With their traditional beliefs being forsaken and de-sanctified by Spanish missionaries who would urinate and defecate on Philippine idols telling them that their gods were dead, people watched the status quo reverse, with men becoming priests and women becoming nothing but child-bearers. In Vietnam, women became housewives as well, for Confucianism and its social relations dictated women had to submit to men, namely their husbands. By the end of the 16th century, women were not in the best position they could be in.

Fast forward to the twentieth century with all the developmental problems and armed ethnic and religious conflicts. Fighting wars over centuries-old conflicts seems to imply that these folks in Southeast Asia seem to be the kids you just can't keep your eyes off of for more than a minute before they jump at each other's throats. Far from it.

Brad Pitt once said that war was "old men talking and young men fighting", but when you look at the iron ladies of Southeast Asia, they call the shots and they haven't called off their soldiers, leaving more men to die. Goodbye loyal customers in the Southeast Asian sex trade? Nah, we have western sex tourists coming in and out for their fix. Plus, they make more money off of westerners since they charge them more than they charge locals. Women are back in the marketplace as well, since it's harder for a western tourist to bargain with a pretty young girl who pretends that she doesn't understand his English as she proceeds to rip him off before a kid on the streets steals his thinner wallet. Finally, before he goes home, a nice Filipina Catholic nun can send him off to a confession booth so not only what happens in Southeast Asia stay in Southeast Asia, but he can be forgiven by a legitimate organization as well, making it that much easier to forget.

Okay, all of these are facetious comments, but the end result is, you can't categorize where women in Southeast Asia stand in the social ladder in modern times that easily, considering their political roles today and historical roles in the past. But what can be said about women in Southeast Asia today is that they have by far some of the biggest tolerance and strength of will to endure centuries of the ever-shifting status quo. If you think Asian women are submissive, stay away from Southeast Asia.

If Asians can think, then can Americans learn geography?

The Unknown

As we know,
There are known knowns.
There are things we know we know.
We also know
There are known unknowns.
That is to say
We know there are some things
We do not know.
But there are also unknown unknowns,
The ones we don't know
We don't know.
—Donald Rumsfeld at Department of Defense news briefing Feb. 12, 2002, available at http://www.slate.com/id/2081042

Donald Rumsfeld left out a very-often unmentioned type of known here: the unknown known, the things we don't know that we know. This is a fundamental flaw in a world where we are overloaded with communication, particularly with the advent of the Internet. It is not that we are missing the fundamental facts; it is that we are not looking at the big picture and putting the pieces of the puzzle together!

Don't lose too much hope, though. We don't know how to make the pieces fit because we don't know what the solution is or what the big picture should look like, though we like to hypothesize.

Take the American surprise at the global rise of China over the past 20 years: unless you were actively questioning the way the American media categorized China as pinko commies with a complete disregard for individual freedom, you would never guess they would suddenly grow into a big player on the world stage. All the information was there, but not all of it was presented to Americans.

Now, if you were a Sinophile, you would surf the Net for all things China-related, and you would be a fool to limit yourself to American news sources (especially if you limited yourself to English language sources as well).

One way to explain the phenomenon of why many were surprised was that the news media was portraying a different picture and limited our potential for understanding and making our own conclusions, due to foreign policy and cultural biases. If you're not angry about being lied to, maybe you should be: the majority of the American news media today tends to strongly emphasize conflicts of development and corrupt government officials and synthesizing it with Asia's economic "miracle" in an attempt to show what the price of progress is in the region.

But you should also probably be a little more sympathetic towards Americans and their media instead of outraged, considering:

1) the United States is a big country with so much going on that people tend to only care about what goes on in their community, and if anything more, what their State and Federal government affairs mean to them;

2) the information is there, but that doesn't mean they'll read it or access it;

3) alternatively, they may not even have the means to access all the information, such as the non-tech-savvy and those who can't read (illiteracy is still common); and

4) how much does a West Virginia coal miner care about the new independence of East Timor, let alone why should he care when it may have no effect on his life whatsoever?

Now to totally throw that one around by reiterating the earlier statement of the unknown known: there are things we don't know that we know, and it can and will hurt us because we don't prepare for it. Biggest example: all the information for 9/11 led up to it, but it was virtually ignored because it was categorized as low-priority by the higher echelons of national security, and through that perspective, we didn't expect to be attacked, yet we knew we were going to be attacked. To hit a little harder, the Detroit automobile manufacturing industry didn't know how bad Japan's rise would affect them and destroy their industry.

Fact of the matter is, we should care about Asia. We should learn Mandarin Chinese and Japanese (and potentially Korean soon) for business and political reasons (and because your boss may just speak one of those as his or her mother tongue), plus because it gives us access to information that is not limited by our English. We know that it's important because we don't know what can happen, and though we do know that the less we know, the stupider we feel when someone tells us that the Philippines is in Asia, not Latin America.

A tribute to the best waste of time: celebrities

When people pry themselves off of their blogs and online communities, it's a bit hard to find out what's going on in the streets outside of their apartment highrise since they're disconnected from word of mouth. They are not, however, altogether hopeless, as the Internet is another privilleged resource for their daily dose of wasting time. After all, there are incentives to traverse the streets of Hong Kong and New Delhi, amidst the aroma of stinky tofu and chicken curry, amidst the hustle and bustle of crowded streets and city lights. Some of those incentives are entertainment, and what better incentive than entertainers themselves?

If love can move mountains, then sex can shake the foundations of reality and the universe. And this isn't pornography, this is sex appeal, coming from beauty. Who better else than perhaps the world's most beautiful woman, Aiswhwarya Rai? Bollywood's biggest starlet and former 1994 Miss World, has a myriad of fans worldwide, and the websites keep on coming. Aishwarya forever is no exception to this, with a site that collects all of her filmography, interviews, pictures, a message board for all her followers, and news updated daily, those who need their quick fix can head over to http://www.aishwarya-forever.com/home.html. Leave the curry in the oven; it should be ready once you come back from the video rental store with a handful of her awe-inspiring movies. Even for those who don't want to spend time navigating the site, the bar at the top has splash images to give would-be viewers a look at the stunning actress. The archive of files are always growing, with contributions from site members not just limited to news bulletins or message board posts, making it a very inviting site for one-time visitors and enticing for regulars.

Not to leave out the opposite sex (or those who just admire the masculine abstract as opposed to the feminine divine), there is Chinese-American superstar celebrity based in Hong Kong, Daniel Wu, with his own equally devout following of fans and just as many sites. Although the site has more of a teenage girl's blog, it is the most informative with news updates by a dedicated host and a growing photo archive. Let the married women turn the other way as they hide their ring-bearing fingers when Daniel Wu graces their computer screens, and do yourself a favor by preparing for it when you check him out at the most resourceful site on Daniel Wu on the Internet, at http://inlovewithdanwu.50webs.com/. Although not as inviting since it does not allow for the interaction the way Aishwarya's site does beyond its tagboard (like a comment guestbook but not a message board), as posts and updates are made by the webmaster herself(?), though some of the pictures and news posts are contributed by regular visitors, but they are not allowed to post on their own, since they rely on e-mailing the webmaster who credits their discoveries every time the sightings are posted. One gripe about the photo gallery is that it is linked to a Yahoo! photo album, which is understandable for the frugal webmaster who is dedicating the time and money to the site for your viewing pleasure.

Japan Interpreted and Reinterpreted

From the land that gave us household brandnames for appliances, televisions, stereos, and automobiles, little else is known besides the consumer image of Japan. We know it exists, and we love to make fun of them (at least in the United States) when we aren't devouring their instant ramen as a staple of the university student's diet or wishing we had a Japanese car of our own. However, beyond brands, beyond cultural bias, and beyond the image (arguably facade), the image of Japan is more than meets the eye, especially if one only looks with the eye of the consumer, regardless of whether or not the consumer loves or loathes Japan.

One of the challenges, however, in trying to find the "real" Japan in spite of the nature of Japanese culture to have a consensus on news media when providing the image Japan wants to portray, is where does one go for top news on Japanese politics and all things Japanese? Furthermore, Japan is overwhelmingly advanced in terms of Internet technology, so digging through the myriad of news feeds available is a challenge that boils down to interface preference and if the information provided is satisfactory.

An important detail to note about Japanese media culture is that stories that would generate a controversey are seldom-reported due to fears of disrupting both order and the status quo, which the media, in tandem with the government, work hard to preserve. Regardless, one does not view Japanese news with a grain of salt along the same vein of China's Xinhua news agency where there is an obvious bias, because reporting is honest, though there is a big difference between outright lying and withholding information.

Cheers: Though lacking in presentation and being a list of different news feeds, News on Japan is the most informative site there is, for the viewer who does not need news images to relate to Japan's political issues. It is updated daily from multiple news sites and listed chronologically. Although the mixing of different news sites is debatable as the quality of each varies, one gets a very diverse image of Japanese politics due to the mix of sites and simple, accessible page loaded with information. It is one of the few news indexes that proves linking to multiple sites is not a bad way of sharing information, as organization is important, as well as consistency. After all, each site-- though having different interfaces and contexts-- provides in-depth analyses, background information, and come from reputable sources. Advertisements are minimal, limited to a google ad bar on the right, but everything else is visible without being distracted by ads or other content, including the easy-to-locate foreign exchange rate box on the left sidebar. It still loses points for creativity and interface, but for those who want the straight facts, head over to http://www.newsonjapan.com/html/newsdesk/morenews/Politics_News/. Conveniently enough, it also has an RSS feed which gives people the headlines and direct link to the articles of interest straight from their bookmarks toolbar.

Jeers: In trying to be partial, the Japan Today news site has literally tidbits of information because it has no opinion or depth. Even the headlines seem to present more information than the actual news articles, which are so short that it seems one could receive an entire news story in a single text message for his or her mobile device. Organization is one good thing, however, as almost all of the ads are small excerpts from a larger ad on the right in a small sidebar; and there is one banner ad at the top, so everything appears micromanaged just like most things in Japan. It is the organization which makes navigating the site easy and good, but is absolutely shallow in terms of depth since its articles are sometimes no longer than three sentences in a lone paragraph, making it seem like a robot wrote the article since there is no opinion, no emotional depth, so boring that it feels like reading out of a textbook. An example of this is seen here:

TOKYO — Ichiro Ozawa, leader of the largest opposition Democratic Party of Japan, urged Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, his cabinet members and senior lawmakers of Abe's Liberal Democratic Party on Tuesday to disclose how they spend money on maintaining their offices.

His comments came after he revealed documents related to his own office expenses following a spate of money scandals, including fuzzy accounting of political funds, involving cabinet members and other key players of the LDP. Taken from http://www.japantoday.com/jp/news/399563

This is a a clear example of how boring articles here are, with only two sentences, and each sentence seems to take the tone of an aloof speaker who says a few key words which make the reader think and wonder what the author refers to, with nothing to explain what money scandals or who was involved with the scandals. Events are reported dutifully, but information is scarce.

For those with a short attention span, the link to Japan Today's political news feed, free of opinions and depth, head over to

http://www.japantoday.com/jp/news/cat/9

How to be an environmentalist without worrying about being politically correct

There are two images that spring to mind when people mention Asia and the environment in the same context. From the idea of an exotic, far-off locale in the Orient that is lush and praised by traveler's accounts like Marco Polo's trip to the Orient, to poets that include Samuel Coleridge glorifying the land, and even to Lonely Planet backpacker's guides, the first image of Asia shows a place that can exist only in traveler's dreams. This is an Asia that does indeed exist-- but possibly for not much longer.

The second idea of Asia is what is quickly transforming with modernization and industrialization, taking a page from Westernization (while at the same time criticizing it), very reminiscent of the traumatic Industrial Revolution of Europe in the 19th century.

So whether it is the exotic Taj Mahal of India and Great Wall of China that we imagine when someone mentions Asia, or it is the Beijing smog and Bhopal tragedy, these all exist in the same Asia, but different contexts. The question is, how long before these lines blur and we see industrial waste in the waterways of the Taj Mahal or a thick, black smog eclipsing the sun over the Great Wall?

One way to find that out is to become environmentally and geographically aware. China and India--the two giants of East and South Asia-- are in the process of rapid economic and population growth. As a result of that, however, the environment is taking a hit, for in order to overcome third-world living standards at the speed both countries want to proceed at, they choose not to take their time, as the forests and rivers prepare to depart, followed shortly by the ozone.

The risk in discussing the environment in the same context as the massive economic booms of India and China inc. is that one undermines the image both countries wish to portray of themselves. With China, it is a bad idea to discuss the destruction of the environment and China should perhaps grow a little bit slower, lest one gets labeled a dissident and disappears off the face of the earth. With India, its issues are very public, but one can not avoid its attraction for outsourcing due to its English advantage and tech sector, all inside airconditioned buildings under fluorescent lights as people die of the smog and heat outside.

For honest information on India's environment, one goes to India Together, a news site that is very up-to-date and with an easy interface to go with its simple-but-attractive color scheme. Stories are very diverse and they go beyond the simple laws and news updates on measures being taken, but individual opinions and in-depth analyses of a variety of issues that are ongoing in India. One example of this is in an article (http://www.indiatogether.org/2007/jan/env-expert.htm) on the debate over whose expertise is more valuable in terms of advising what to do and what can be done or what should be done over the use of forest lands for non-forest use, which is very objective and informative, detailing the background of the issue, the significance, and current news on how the issue is developing. There is such a wealth of information that it even has its own RSS feed located at the bottom of the page. Its location is conveniently found (and not only highly recommended, but highly encouraged to view) at http://www.indiatogether.org/environment/.

Sadly, the site that is least helpful-- no thanks in part to its interface and abundance of text or lack of not even monthly updates (the last update was November 2006)-- is the official government website of India. The problem with this site is it seems more like an index listing for the government officials to navigate through-- which seems to be the case, as nobody would feel inclined to wade through the site, due to the difficulty of navigation through the site, many of which are broken links. Most of the information is also in .pdf files, which one is more inclined to print out instead of utilizing the Internet to view. They are easily found (and not highly recommended) at http://envfor.nic.in/.

Coming along to China, the most informative source comes from the outsiders, for all the information that the government has is reserved for its officials, lest the statistics and visuals that reveal the price of progress hinder the image China wishes to show to the world and its population. A welcoming note is that it comes from a fellow blogspot user, with good news feed of select articles and links. Though a very recent site, it is perhaps the place to go for one's environmental fix, located at http://china-environmental-news.blogspot.com/

Not surprisingly, the most informative source comes from the official government site, but with a twist: almost all the information shows how the government is combatting pollution, and all causes of pollution are by individuals. The government website essentially says that its hands are clean of causing any pollution, but it is willing to get its hands dirty to clean up their country. A wealth of information is available, but it should be taken with a pinch of salt. Well, perhaps a shaker, but nonetheless, one should observe the information cautiously. For the daring, the site is located at http://english.sepa.gov.cn/.

Business Where It's Nobody's Business: The Burma/Myanmar Edition

Dealing with people who subscribe to the Marxist ideology is not as difficult as one would presume, especially when one looks at a country with two names but the same problem: an absolute lack of money. This is followed by a plethora of resources ready to be tapped into by corporate and government vultures eager to take advantage of its resources and eventual need for developmental assistance.

Myanmar-- or Burma for followers of Suu Kyi who dislike the ruling military junta's preferred official name-- are not the People's Republic of China who are communist on paper only, though they both share the recognition that maintaining power the good old Stalinist way politically is effective until it comes down to economics. When it comes down to economics, the stock market and the corporate agendas do the talking, not the Western diplomats.

With very limited development, Myanmar will have to take what it can get for business ventures. There is a catch-22 for this, however: Myanmar wants to preserve its image and its "state secrets", so information is highly regulated and thus not very inviting to the prospective corporate vulture or government watchdog.

So while prospective business ventures will have to take what little information the government of Myanmar can offer, likewise, Myanmar will have to take what it can get until it opens up its information and stops denying its economic woes. This is especially evident in what is the best site for information, and--ironically enough-- the worst site for information on Myanmar business due to being a propaganda vehicle of the government, the Myanmar Times, located at http://www.mmtimes.com/. Information is meant to entice prospective businesses, although without a doubt there is an extent of manipulation of information, since Myanmar sites are monitored by the government, and being an official governmental site means that it is no exception to this rule. Organization is very good though, as it has no pop-ups, very few advertisements since there is little need to advertise on a government-run site since they already have the funding for quality, categories for news as well as business are listed under tabs making it very user-friendly, and all news releases come on a consistent basis. Since contacts are directly with the government, interested parties can work things out with representatives. Furthermore, job offerings are posted on a regular basis, even from places such as the Italian embassy for folks in the lower echelons of the work force, making it a very accessible site in spite of the questionable government information.

It could be worse, though. Though the rest of the world can see right through the veil of the government, one has to essentially scour through sites full of the depressing reality that is Myanmar. With far more legitimacy but offering little incentive for people to do business with Myanmar, the worst site to go to would also ironically be the most informative, which essentially states that one should not do business in Myanmar.

This makes writing about business news feed a very grey area for business-seekers, as the most informative and honest site would be considered the worst for official business, and that honor goes to business-in-asia.com's link at http://www.business-in-asia.com/burma.htm. It is very honest with information, but you can't get any business dealings aside from a summary of the trade and a few contacts, though reading how Myanmar deals business on the site may turn people away from seeking business ventures. Site organization is more of a snapshot from a catalog rather than a news site like the Myanmar Times, but is definitely much easier to navigate, though information differs significantly. It even gives a general overview about doing business in Asia, which makes it a good resource in general, but not for Myanmar, because it is likely to turn aside the average businessman due to the many warnings against Myanmar.

We all know that in the end, it isn't the official business dealings, but the under the table dealings that promote the economic growth at the expense of human rights, where the only winners are the government officials and the corporate vultures who employ their knowledge of loopholes in WTO regulation rules.

If nobody talks about it, does it really matter? The Philippines and Thailand in news media

Some people believe that the Philippines is somewhere in Latin America. Some people also still believe in the tooth fairy. The problem with these people is that they are ill-informed due to the lack of information provided to them. When a child is told that the tooth fairy and Santa Claus are not real, he resents the person because he is taken out of his necessary delusion. However, when stuck in the myth, a person only gets hurt by the limited information he has on the subject. He also gets hurt by being given the wrong information, such as being told that Santa Claus does not exist for children who are Jewish. Absurdity is the norm for those who do not have access to information, and it's just as bad when they are given terrible information.

Let's look at Thailand and the Philippines. They are more than just countries that are mentioned on the label of a shirt or pants that you wear which read "Made in Thailand" or "Made in the Philippines" (yes, there are things not made in China; hello globalization). When the word "globalization" is mentioned, the first thing people think of is economics-- whether it is outsourcing and sweatshop labor, or if it is more of China's massive growth. But there are other economies of importance out there besides China's, and their economies do not appear and re-appear every few weeks like moon phases, they are always there, just poorly reported.

The best site to visit for the Philippine economic news would have to be abs-cbn news, a local news media network there located at http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/. Navigation is easy, as the interface has a good color scheme and each cateogry has a tab with headlines for each subject listed under in a well-organized manner; headlines are always up to date; and news is available in print and Internet format, as well as broadcast on television. From the minimal and non-intrusive advertisements to the link for a daily prayer reflection called daily bread showing how Catholic the country is, to the pictures and option to have news sent via SMS text messaging, this is the resource for the Philippines, even beyond news, for it is a window to the Philippines.

If you want someone to think that the Philippines is some tropical archipelago where people wear grass skirts and serve pina coladas to sex tourists, go to http://www.newsflash.org/, which is a site that looks like it was put together by a high school student whose greatest achievement in life is his ability to use flash media and program in it. One learns almost nothing but to find a list of links to news events in different sites. Clicking on each link opens up another window and list of headlines, NOTHING ELSE. Extra navigation from a page that attempts to be a good index portal to more noteworthy news sites does not give it high marks. If anything, you can do much better using google to find news sites because the news is all over the place and gives you the feel of pop-ups that you want to block. Although it is a simple resource hotlinking to other places to give you a quick Manila feel, it does not have the interface that makes you want to save it in your bookmarks and return to it time and again.

Thailand gets its Bangkok Post, the simple interface and up-to-date news with not too many advertisements getting in the way make it more attractive to the newcomer. Although the site is not professional, and definitely has the look of an independent effort, it has direct news feed that is consistent, simple navigation on the sidebar to the left, minimal but smart use of images, and a direct link to its newspaper print version as well which uses the cool epaper program to read it as though you were reading a newspaper by clicking on each page, article, and image for close-ups, similar to using pdf files. On the right sidebar, they have useful information on exchange rates, breaking news, and opinions. The bottom navigation bar also links to some non-news areas of the site, which show personal stories, special interests such as automobiles, and travel information. Truly a delightful (though somewhat simple-- or minimalist for the picky) site, it is conveniently located at http://www.bangkokpost.net/.

For people who believe Thailand and Taiwan are synonymous with one another, feel free to point them in the direction of http://www.thainews.com.au/news-bkk.html, which is also just a listing of links to different news feeds, done in the annoying comic sans font. Though it claims to be updated hourly, it just means that there are hyperlinks posted to about six different news sources, meaning that you would have to navigate through each and every one of them. This means you do more work than you should be doing in surfing for news. A waste of time, especially when they post advertistements along with news headlines, like this one that clearly reads "Mortgage Rates at 3.0% - Save Thousands...
$150,000 loan for $391/month - refinance, home equity and purchase. Sponsored Link - Refinance.LeadSteps.com Tue Mar 06 2007 16:09:00 GMT-0800 (Pacific Standard Time)", the fact that there are no pictures, and an annoying pink color font against a bland background image which is barely visible unless your screen settings are dark enough. There is no webmaster to contact, hence there is nobody to complain to about how the site needs a complete overhaul to be considered useful

Classroom Assistants should not be abbreviated to Class Ass.

Professor Tom Plate is extremely handsome and generous with giving an A+ grade to students, especially to John Chuidian, the magnanimous and talented young man.

Laurena Chen and Victoria Chin are beautiful, smart, and talented young classroom assistants who grade kindly and give the only A+ to John Chuidian, the jet-set traveler from Southeast Asia.

John Chuidian is the greatest legend and his name is spoken with awe and wonder throughout the Orient.