As I have mentioned before, my FB friends are an amalgamation of a number of nationalities scattered from Sacramento to Mongolia. It would be less diverse if FB werent blocked in China. Except for a few exceptional individuals who use VPN tunneling (software to circumvent the Great Firewall and similar blocks), most of my Chinese friends are on QQ, one of a number of competing services which provides FB, Twitter, Skype, and Flickr like functionality. Occasionally I add friends. I am most tickled when the friends are roommates at third-tier Chinese universities. These kids often dont have computers so they text chat on their phones, often at the same time in the same room. They usually have never known a foreigner; if they have, it has been one teacher in their entire school career. They are kids with high aspirations, as well as fears; their parents have hope they will be successful and take care of them in their old age. Chinese universities are graduating hundreds of thousands more graduate than there are white-collar jobs for. While I do have a few Chinese friends who are fortunate to study abroad or attend top tier universities, these kids studying at universities in cities you will never hear of, are the ones I like to help and hope to meet face to face in China, if possible. I started going to China when one of Doug-Wendy Millers old school principals said they never had foreigners come to Enping, the small city in Guangdong where she spent several years of the Cultural Revolution, and asked why she didnt come there to teach. The enthusiasm of students (and teachers) like those in Enping and Shanxi is what pulls me back to China again and again. (Maybe I should start writing these long posts on my blogsite.....)
Posted on: Sun, 27 Oct 2013 23:55:27 +0000
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