Archive for Peace Through Tourism
August 15, 2008 at 9:26 pm · Filed under Uncategorized, Tourism, Peace Through Tourism
Yesterday was my first day attending the Beijing Olympics and was it a busy one! From the brand new but crowded subway to the mega-security lines and then into the Olympic Green, Beijing has impressed all around. After wondering around the Olympic Green, we attended the quarterfinals and the semifinals of fencing (men’s team epee). Later in the afternoon we saw the mens individual archery competition in which the American lost to the Mexican. Finally the Ukrainian won and I got to watch my first Olympic Medal presentation ceremony, live in person!
Later in the evening, I caught the USA women’s volleyball victory over China (on TV) and then we ended the evening at the Holland (Heineken) House, which was good fun.
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Tags: #080808, Olympics, Beijing, Archery, Fencing, Archery, Medals
August 4, 2008 at 8:36 pm · Filed under Uncategorized, Knowledge and Experiences, Tourism, Learning through Foreign Cultures, Traveling, Peace Through Tourism, China News
The Beijing 2008 Olympics will start in 4 days!!
As of this morning, my plane tickets to Beijing are bought and in hand! I have a place to stay and the promise of Olympics Games’ tickets. Beijing Olympics, here I come!!!
I’ll be in Beijing from the evening of August 14th to the morning of August 19th if anyone wants to meet up. Yay!!!!
February 17, 2008 at 4:15 am · Filed under Uncategorized, Knowledge and Experiences, Tourism, Learning through Foreign Cultures, Traveling, Peace Through Tourism
In the past 3months, I have eaten more bread than I have in years. I started out in Chile and Argentina, 2countries that eat a lot of bread, meat, and cheese. Then I went on to Egypt and Jordan both of which eat a lot pita bread with cheese. Then on to East Africa where the staple breakfast is toast with either jam or egg on it. Living in rice-eating China, I’d forgotten that bread is the world’s staple. The majority of the world, aside from East and South Asia eat bread. I think I’m ready to go back to eating rice.
There should be direct flights between Asia and South America. With the increasing amount of cross-continent travel (I met a number of Chinese in Argentina and many South Americans live in China) and the large trade volume between the 2 continents (notably Brazil and Japan), I believe a direct flight is necessary. Perhaps Air China, JAL, Cathay Pacific, or LAN Chile should think about offering that service. Here are some examples of current inconvenient routings: Shanghai-Beijing-Los Angeles-Santiago, Chile; Beijing-Amsterdam-some random islands-Guayquil-Quito, Ecuador; Hong Kong-Kuala Lampur-Cape Town-Buenos Aires-Ushuaia, Argentina.
Having now traveled to all 7continents, I can say Europe and South America are my favorite. (This probably leads you to the question of why do I live in China? and leads me to the goal of living Buenos Aires after I’ve accomplished all I intend to in China.) I love Europe for its history, architecture, and progressive, forward-looking ideas. I love South America for its contemporary culture, particularly its music and dance, and the color and vibrancy of the culture as well as the people’s relaxed nature. South America’s natural scenery from high, snow-covered mountains to sun-baked beaches is also amazing. The United States, Mexico, and Asia, in my opinion, have the best food. Asia also has an unrivaled entrepreneurial spirit, which at times I love and other times I hate, but is certainly to be admired.
I’m very proud to have accomplished my goal of traveling to all 7continets, even a year earlier than my deadline! 90 days, 29 blog entries, and 18 flights later I’ve returned to where I started from, Shanghai. Concluding a major trip like this can be challenging but trying to sum it up is proving to be even more difficult. I saw some amazing places, met some great people, found some countries that I might like to live in and some that I wouldn’t dare live in, and learned some things that can only be understood through traveling. While I won’t be going traveling again for a long time, I’ll always be a traveler, whether that’s through my memories and photographs, through other people’s stories and photos, or far into the future when the opportunity is right again. I hope you have enjoyed the stories and pictures from my travels over the past months and I welcome you to continue reading my blog as I transition back into blogging about China, as well as tourism and business within this most populous nation on earth.
P.S. Before I leave the topic of traveling, let me again post my alphabetical list of countries visited (original post 10-23-2006) to see how I’m doing now.
A: Austria (Republic of Austria), Argentina (Argentine Republic)
B: Brazil (Federative Republic of Brazil), Bahamas (Commonwealth of The Bahamas)
C: China (PRC), Czech Republic, Canada, Croatia (Republic of Croatia), Chile (Republic of Chile), Cambodia (Kingdom of Cambodia), Columbia (Republic of Colombia), Costa Rica (Republic of Costa Rica)
D: Denmark (Kingdom of Denmark)
E: Estonia (Republic of Estonia), Egypt (Arab Republic of Egypt)
F: France (French Republic), Finland (Republic of Finland)
G: Greece (Hellenic Republic), Guatemala (Republic of Guatemala), Germany (Federal Republic of Germany)
H: Hungary (Republic of Hungary), Hong Kong (Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the PRC)
I: Italy (Italian Republic)
J: Jamaica, Jordan (Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan)
K: Kenya (Republic of Kenya)
L: Laos (Lao People’s Democratic Republic)
M: Mexico (United Mexican States), Malaysia, Monaco (Principality of Monaco), Macau (Macao Special Administrative Region of the PRC)
N: New Zealand, Norway (Kingdom of Norway)
O:
P: Portugal (Portuguese Republic), Poland (Republic of Poland), Panama (Republic of Panama)
Q: Qatar (State of Qatar)
R: Russia (Russian Federation)
S: Singapore (Republic of Singapore), Spain (Kingdom of Spain), Slovakia (Slovak Republic), Sweden (Kingdom of Sweden)
T: Taiwan (Republic of China), Thailand (Kingdom of Thailand), Turkey (Republic of Turkey), Tanzania (United Republic of Tanzania)
U: United States (USA), United Kingdom (United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland)
V: Vatican City (State of the Vatican City)
W:
X:
Y:
Z:
Guess I need another trip through the Middle East and Africa to finish off O (Oman), W (Western Sahara), Y (Yemen), & Z (Zaire or Zimbabwe). That will just have to wait…
February 3, 2008 at 4:25 am · Filed under Uncategorized, Tourism, Learning through Foreign Cultures, Peace Through Tourism
Treatment of Women
Most of us have some idea though not a good understanding of the poor treatment of Muslim women in Muslim countries. That is a lengthy and complex topic and I could write about some of the rumors I’ve heard, but lacking concrete evidence I will not venture there. Instead, I will use our stories to discuss the treatment of western woman in Muslim countries and from there you can imagine how it much be for other women. One of the girls on the trip was walking with her brother in Aswan, though he easily could have been her boyfriend. An Egyptian guy came up behind her and grabbed her butt. She turned around freaking out at him. The brother told the guy to go away but the guy continued to badger her and follow them. Eventually the brother had to aggressively push the guy in order to get him to leave the sister alone.
I was in a bread shop in Jordan and these young, perhaps 10-year old boys walked by me and said hello, so I responded hello. Then one of them made a kissing noise at me. I was thinking ‘how old are you!?! you insolent little rat.’ Throughout Egypt, Jordan, and Qatar, whenever Andrew and I would approach a male (usually in a service role), the man would almost totally ignore me and direct all conversation to Andrew. This was rather shocking for me since I’m older and more well-traveled and therefore have always been relied on to deal with things. More than 1time the man would address a question regarding me to Andrew and expect Andrew to repeat it to me before I’d tell the answer to Andrew who’d then repeat it to the guy. It was as if I was deaf or dumb or speaking a completely different language. And perhaps what freaked me out even more was, Andrew went along with it! until I cut in and answered for myself. How demeaning. I understood the situation as a cultural act and was willing to tolerate in short bouts for the limited time I was these Muslim countries but I could not stand it long term.
Traffic Lights
Egypt and Jordan have almost no stoplights. There are a few stoplights in Egypt, however these are mostly ignored. Drivers only really wait at intersections if a policeman is directing them. Otherwise round-a-bouts are the main means of managing traffic. Jordan is largely the same way. Its really quite amazing that a city as large a Cairo can function with out traffic lights.
Retail
From Egypt to Jordan and into East Africa, the retail sector is very underdeveloped. This was a bit bothersome as I wanted to buy fruit, snacks, water, packets of tissue, and maybe laundry detergent. Finding all of these in 1 place in Egypt was nearly impossible as almost no shop sold fruit; in fact, we saw very little fruit throughout the country at all. The shops were all tiny with maybe 1 refrigerated case for Coca-Cola; even Cairo didn’t seem to have any large shops. In Jordan the situation improved with larger, better-stocked stores.
East Africa’s, specifically Tanzania’s retail sector was much more developed than either Egypt’s or Jordan’s. Even fairly small towns had decent sized stores, as well as local markets, that may have multiple refrigerated cases for drinks, frozen meat and/or ice cream.
Living in Harmony
Egypt while being predominantly Muslim has a large Coptic Christian population. Jordan bills itself as center of the world’s 3 major religions. Churches containing ancient biblical mosaics stand beside Mosques in Madaba (Jordan). Tanzania is 40% Muslim, 40% Christian, and 20% tribal religions and other. All of these countries, particularly Tanzania have maintained peace and stability despite difference of religion and in case of Tanzania, tribes. (Tanzanians are very proud of the fact that all their tribes can live together peacefully, particularly in the wake of the Kenya violence.) Each should be held as a showcase of how people can and do get along if they just respect each other.
July 8, 2007 at 8:02 am · Filed under Uncategorized, Tourism, Learning through Foreign Cultures, Peace Through Tourism
In my job as a tour leader in China, I have developed a secondary purpose for myself. Beside fulfilling my role and duties as a tour leader, I’ve also started educating Chinese people as to Western standards of politeness, appropriateness, and generally just good behavior. Undoubtedly this sentence reads as very arrogant and culturally insensitive. However, much of what I try to ‘teach’ the occasional Chinese is already being strongly suggested by the govt in Beijing. Furthermore, if China wants to be an appealing and attractive country to foreign tourists, investors, etc, it’s people need to minimize those habits which Westerners consider repulsive. By giving a few examples, I hope I shall seem less ethnocentric. (My apologies for the generalizations but all of these scenarios I’ve seen across the country, from big cities, to small middle-of-the-country towns.)
Chinese people (both males and females, though males to a greater extent than females) spit everywhere, regardless of indoor, outdoor, clean floor, dirty street, other people nearby, at the dinner table, in train stations, in train cars, everywhere, literally. The actual act of spitting is preceeded by the most repulsive, sickening clearing of the throat hack imaginable (apparently quite common in India, as well). This is a sound which makes Westerners cringe and unfortunately can be heard at all hours of the day and night, including late at night in crowded train cars. On occasion when I’ve been nearby someone who has just made the most menancing clearing of the throat sound, followed by a large spat I give them a disgusted look and say in Chinese, “that’s disgusting, I hate that, it’s horrible to hear.” Certainly, my 1 comment won’t stop that person from spitting but I just hope it makes him more aware of how we perceive it and in turn makes him consider the time, place, and company before letting out another one.
Chinese people, particularly those with a little money but not much education, have a strong sense of entitlement and superiority. Because they have some money, they see themselves as superior to other poorer Chinese people, particularly those whose responsibility it is to clean the streets and otherwise take care of the trash. As such, they feel it is their privledge, their right, to throw litter or trash onto the ground, again both indoor and outdoor. They do this with the, mostly correct, expectation someone else will clean it up. In one particular instance, I was enjoying a drink with my group on Bar Street in Xi’an and one of the waitstaff of the bar across the road had found a deck of cards that was incomplete. He proceeded to start 1-by-1 flinging the cards through the air and letting them drop into the middle of the road. He showed no intention of picking them up. At that point, I walked up to him and in Chinese said, “What are you doing? You’re making the street dirty. Why are you making the street dirty? Do you believe China is a beautiful country? Then why are you making it dirty? You need to pick them up.” Then I started picking up the cards and handing them back to him and again told him to pick them up. He stared at me stunned, then his friend came over and did the rest of the job picking up the cards. In another example, last evening, while on a Yangtze river boat, a boy of about 8 threw trash over the edge of the boat into the (granted, already filthy) water. I yelled at him, “that’s bad, don’t do that” multiple times. And the parents, in a distinct mocking tone repeated my words, while the older girl of about 10 with them apologized in a rather ironic manner. On more than one occasion, my passengers who are on vacation in China have picked up trash dropped by Chinese people.
The Chinese are notorious at failing to line up, queue, and have patience. Frequently, while standing in line to pay for something at a store or to use a public bathroom, Chinese people have pushed past me in order to get in front of me in line. This action almost always receives from me the following indignant reply, “Line up. Line up. We are in line. Please wait.” Most of the time, this puts the cutter, perhaps a bit irked, back in their place, with great pleasure to me.
I have seen Chinese adults cut all their nails (either hands or feet) in the most ridiculous of places, places almost as ridiculous as those I’ve seen children pee in China. For example, I’ve seen a mainland Chinese woman cut her nails in the somewhat crowded lobby of a 5-star hotel in Hong Kong. Recently, when a man was cutting his nails, not 5 feet from me on an overnight train, I was compelled out of disgust and fear for my eyes to tell him to stop and to express how unpolite that was. He was kind enough to stop.
The noise level in China is absurd. Whether its loud voices, cranked up loud speakers, unimaginably loud cell phones, full volume TV sets, or crazily loud car horns, a high level of noise is gauranteed in China. Of all of China’s, or Chinese people’s, unrefined quirks this one I’ve perhaps come to terms with most. Nonetheless, there are definitely times when the noise seems truly ridiculous and something must be said along the lines of “That’s too loud. You voice is too loud. Please turn it down a little. Please turn that off.”
By contrast, perhaps the most disgusting and bothersome is the smoking. China is the largest cigarette market in the world. The govt makes 14% (?) of is tax revenue from cigarette sales. I could go on with the statistics. Chinese people seem to pay little heed to No Smoking signs either indoor or out, nor to people with sensitivities to smoke such as children, nor to nearby diners. While in the museum at the Terracotta Warriors, a Unesco World Heritage site, 3 men were sitting on the floor, smoking. As the smoke blew in to my passengers faces, I said the them “There is no smoking. You’re not allowed to smoke here. You can smoke outdoors.” With this, they scrambled to put out their cigarettes and rush out the door (leaving the butts on the granite floor.) Most people are generally responsive to requests to move the smoking away from us, however, frequently this involves switching the cigarette to the other hand as if then, the smoke will blow a different direction. I’ve encountered very insolent people who continue to smoke in the middle of a sleeper train, even after being asked repeatedly to go elsewhere.
Part of my job description is to promote ‘responsible travel.’ This term is normally meant to apply to the foreigners coming into visit a country so that they should act and dress appropriately, promote the wellness of the country they are visiting, and not leave the area worse than they found it, but perhaps better. The last part is exactly what I’m trying to do also while adopting a more liberal interpretation of the term, ‘responsible tourism.’ I hope that by reacting to certain Chinese behaviors, as mentioned above, I can make China a better place and make it more appealing to foreigners and more sensitive to their sensibilities. In doing so, I wish that through tourism China can continue to showcase its beauty and history to the world and that future travelers to China can find it a bit more pleasant than past and current travelers.
February 18, 2007 at 4:15 am · Filed under Uncategorized, Knowledge and Experiences, Learning through Foreign Cultures, Peace Through Tourism
Saturday marked the start of the Lunar New Year holiday as it was New Year’s Eve. Lunar New Year in China is like Christmas, New Years, and 4th of July all rolled into one massive holiday. Its a very important family time, religious time, and also a time for presents and celebration.
On New Year’s Eve, my friend celebrated with her family, including aunts, uncles, cousins, by having 12 people altogether for dinner. She was kind enough to invite me. It was a real treat, partaking in an authentic Chinese family celebration.
I brought a gift to the host, as is customary. I had asked my other Chinese friends what is an acceptable gift. They suggested fruit, wine, chocolate, or cake. I opted for fruit. Flowers are never an appropriate gift as they are only given as gifts to dead people.
When I arrived she had made a few flower arrangements to brighten up their apartment and her parents were still cooking. My friend had set up an elephant next to oranges, a bit of a curious combination until she explained the Chinese pronunciation, which when put together sounds similar to ‘lucky’ in Chinese and therefore is a way of wishing for luck. There are many many such symbols in Chinese language/culture. Another such example is putting ‘fu’ upside down so that the ‘fu’ (luck or prosperity) comes to you.
Her parents had been cooking all day as was quite apparent by the quantity of dishes that had already been prepared. As appetizers they had an assortment of nuts, fresh fruit, candies, and dried meats. They set up a larger table to accommodate all 13 of us and once the rest of her family arrived we all sat down to dinner.
There seems to be a rule that everyone fit to drink must drink alcohol. Multiple times I was questioned as to whether I had enough alcohol, but fortunately it was in a friendly manner and nowhere near the high pressure gan bei style of the previous week.
The table certainly fit everyone but was barely big enough for all the dishes. I can’t imagine 1 kitchen and 1 family preparing so much good food. It was amazing–seafood, meat, veggies, tofu, & rice dishes. She even remembered my dislike of seafood and then insisted that the dinner not be weighted to heavily on seafood and cooked mapo doufu to satisfy my love of mapo tofu. Then dessert was never ending, 2 different kinds of rice-based cake, spring rolls, tofu rolls, 2 kinds of soup, lots of red bean. Altogether many, many fantastic dishes.
After dinner we watched the CCTV New Year’s special on TV. Her younger cousins received ‘hong bao,’ red envelopes filled with money from their aunts & uncles. Children and college-age students all receive these money packets from older relatives.
It was such a wonderful experience. Never before have I felt so included and been able to so fully partake in Chinese culture. It was such a memorable experience and I hope I can offer the same back to my friend.
Thank you, Mikthy! 新年快乐！恭喜发财！
December 13, 2006 at 3:16 am · Filed under Uncategorized, Knowledge and Experiences, Learning through Foreign Cultures, Peace Through Tourism
I’m so proud of myself in terms of my geographic knowledge and country knowledge. Even though it was not enough to let me pass the US Foreign Service exam it’s still far more than the average person and enough to impress others at cocktail parties. 
When I was at the Interchamber Mixer on Wednesday last week, I asked one of the rare black guys in Shanghai, where are you from and he said Cameroon. And then he asked the obvious question, do you know where that is? After about 10-12 seconds I said, west Africa. And with a pleased but surprised tone to his voice he said, wow, how did you know that? My answer: I studied African geography as part of my prep for the Foreign Service exam, and I’m planning to go to Africa in the next year.
Later that same evening, a guy said to me, I’m from Belgrade, do you know where that is? In the Balkans, was my response. Again, I was correct!
The location of Mauritius is also a popular discussion as many Chinese have immigrated to Mauritius and many native Mauritians play in bands in Hong Kong and Shanghai. By the way, it’s an island off the coast of Africa.
Also while at the Interchamber Mixer, I met a Dutch guy and I wished him Happy Sinterklaas and he was of course surprised that same random American girl was wishing him Happy Sinterklaas. Then I explained last year I celebrated Sinterklaas with my Dutch friends on exchange in the US. He accepted that and then proceeded to explain the holiday in detail to an American we were chatting with. Just the day before I had emailed my Dutch friends and acquaintances to wish them Happy Sinterklaas and one who I don’t know very well asked me why do you know about Dutch holidays. My response to him? How am I supposed to find a Dutch boyfriend if I don’t know about Dutch holidays. 
I’ve also gotten pretty good at guessing people’s native countries. But there are so many small countries in Europe that unless you listen closely to the language, it can be hard to pinpoint. While shopping on Saturday there were some good-looking European guys also in the same shops we and so I asked them, “Are you German or Dutch?” They said, “No, we’re from Belgium.” I said, “Oh, I’m sorry.” And one of them commented, ‘wow, your knowledge of Europe is very good to know to apologize.’
Yay! for being culturally aware.
October 10, 2006 at 7:23 am · Filed under Uncategorized, Tourism, Learning through Foreign Cultures, Peace Through Tourism
Recently I returned from Singapore and Hong Kong, where I enjoyed site-seeing, shopping, dining, clubbing, etc with many friends.
Pictures wth friends mentioned below.
In Singapore, Brenda and I were able to spend time with our mutual friends: Stuart, Stanley, Melissa, and Quan. And she saw another friend from high school. I also saw Aana, as well as my very close friend from USC, Kacey. In Hong Kong, I reconnected with Teresa, Phoebe, Edmond, Raymond, Vivien, Leon, Hilton, Peter, Grace, and Joseph. It was great to see all of you again! I also enjoyed meeting other friends of Aana, Stuart, Kacey, and Joseph. Since most of us met either on out-going exchange, in-coming exchange, or through case competition of the USC Marshall School of Business, I think we all owe our thanks to Sean O’Connell for facilitating the international programs and therefore our meeting. I’m so glad to know you all and I hope the next time you will come to visit me and I can show you around. A special thanks to Brenda and Aana for letting me encroach on their personal space for far too long.
All of us studied business and as we chat about who we know across the globe, we come to find we are actually a fairly small global community of undergraduate business students who participated in exchange (or other international programs). This makes me wonder if in 3-7 years we’ll all be competing to get into the same MBA programs. Then we may find that those same people who were only our classmates for 1 semester in undergrad (say at USC) may become our classmates for 2 years of MBA say at INSEAD, or somewhere else completely remote from USC. Then in 15-35 years we may all find ourselves leading some of the world’s largest and most well-known firms. And we may again come to rely on each other, not as group mates for a group project, but as suppliers and customers, or consultants or financiers that help us make our next billion $$. I wish all of you the best of luck!
Its truly a wonderful thought to know that I have friends in multiple countries. When you think about it, knowing people in other countries really enhances your appreciation of those countries. Those far away and exotic places become more real, more tangible, more authentic, and more human. When we know people, and particularly have friends in other countries, we are more likely to have a favorable impression of those places and to feel they are trustworthy. In doing so, we won’t feel ill-will toward them, and also would have no reason to want to cause them harm. In its most basic form, the concept I’m referring to is Peace Through Tourism. When written like this, this seems like a very basic, straight-forward concept. But yet, in reality, it seems very difficult to put into practice. I wish that more people would have and would take the opportunity to make friends throughout the global community. In doing so each of us could individually contribute to peace on a global scale. As we create trans-border friendships, we strengthen our global bonds, interconnect our worlds, and create peace among us. I wish that everyone could have at least one good friend who is not of their birth country.
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