Hard to blog

We've been following non-stop the news out of Sichuan province, like everyone else. However, here in China it is impossible to escape the images. Newspapers are hung up everywhere for people to read, it is all that is covered on CCTV 9 right now. It is a very sad, shocking time to be here in China.
In our own garden, the property management has organized aid and clothing drives so the residents can confidently donate money and goods and know that they will make it to Sichuan.

Don't worry, Mom

We didn't even feel a thing here in our part of Shenzhen. The multiple earthquakes were felt all over China, but when I was at Starbucks today at 5 with some friends, no one even mentioned them. It wasn't until I got home that I saw it on the news.

Happy Mother's Day to Mom, Kate, Megan, and Millie

And you can enjoy this, too, Susie (you are a Godmother, several times over).

Go Pens!!!!

Sheng shen jiang lin jie (Pentecost)

Mass at the Nantou church was moved outside again to allow for the larger Pentecost crowd. An invitation had been extended to the foreign Catholics from Shekou, and several of them showed up (mostly Filipino), as well as some of the other usual foreigners (us and some other non-PRC Asians that come from time to time). Also, more people attended the morning Mass that usually go to the evening Mass. Thank goodness it didn't rain!

Mass readings were in both Chinese and English this week. Right before Mass , Father tracked me down to practice the Gospel in English. The Deacon was to proclaim it first in Chinese, and then Father would read it in English. He was nervous but did a fantastic job for someone who had never read in English in front of a crowd.

Our Mass was very much like everyone else's. "Come Holy Ghost" was our entrance hymn. The choir sang the Sequence, but to a tune I did not know. We also had a baptism, the younger son of one of our neighbors here in our garden.

I took this video of the Final Blessing and Dismissal. The Catholics out there will most definitely be able to figure out the final chant at the end.

Again, it was hard for me not to wonder at the Church speaking in different tongues to this day.

When the time for Pentecost was fulfilled,they were all in one place together.And suddenly there came from the sky a noise like a strong driving wind,and it filled the entire house in which they were.Then there appeared to them tongues as of fire,which parted and came to rest on each one of them.And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in different tongues,as the Spirit enabled them to proclaim.

Today's new words

Muqin jie kuai le! Happy Mother's Day!

After Mass today, when we stopped for our usual Sunday Starbucks (yes, as opposed to our any other day of the week Starbucks visit), the manager asked me if we also had Mother's Day in America, and if it were also today. I told her it was, and thanked her for her well-wishes. I didn't want to tell her that we invented the second-Sunday-in-May holiday. (The Post-Gazette has a lengthier history of the American holiday)

Tonight we will dine on Xibanyacai, or Spanish food. A new Spanish restaurant in Shekou recently opened, and its tapas menu includes wo de zui ai de nai lao (my favorite cheese), Manchego cheese. Language-wise, my head spins when we go there. I want to speak Spanish, and everything about that place starts the Spanish gears in my head. However, all the waiters are Chinese, so Xibanyacai it is.

If I were in Pittsburgh tonight

I would be joining my family at a professional sporting event in Pittsburgh.

No, not Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Playoffs. Do you think we could get tickets to that?

What better way to celebrate Pittsburgh sports greatness than to go to a Pirates game and watch them lose? If you missed the Fox Sports round-up of the worst professional sports franchises in the U.S., the Pirates are hands-down #1 the worst. Despite that, I would be going to that baseball game tonight with my parents and aunts and some number of my sisters rather than sit at home and watch the Pens. At least at the ballpark they'll show highlights and the hundreds of people in the stands can cheer together. For the Pens.

Continued vacillations

Last fall in Hong Kong I was able to stop by the big diocesan-run Catholic bookstore in Central. I was looking for some materials concerning the history of the Catholic Church in the People’s Republic of China, and having contacted the Holy Spirit Study Centre directly, sought out some general history books at the diocesan bookstore at their recommendation. The Holy Spirit Study Centre is sponsored by the Diocese of Hong Kong to research and dissemination information about the Catholic Church in China.

The first Holy Spirit Centre publication I have now read is the short book Decades of Vacillation : Chinese Communist Religious Policy and its Implementationspirit publicantio by Dr. Anthony S.K. Lam. I must confess that I bought it because in the maze that is the diocesan bookstore it was the easiest to find. This book isn’t specifically about the Catholics in China, but rather about Religious policy in general in China. It was published originally in 1997, with the English version I read published in 2003.

As I said, it is a very short book that is full of interesting information (if you are interested in Religious Policy in China) as well as several threads I want to pursue further. For instance, in the first Chapter, Dr. Lam provides an overview of the rise of the Communists in China over the Nationalists.. He doesn’t give a specific play-by-play, but suffices to describe what happened in 1949 was not in anyone’s imagination.

In recalling this period of history, I do not intend to probe into the rights and wrongs of the Nationalist and Communist Civil War during the pre-1949 period. What I wish to point out is that gaining complete control over the country in 1949 was something the Communists did not expect. Because their victory was so sudden, the Chinese Communists failed to have concrete policies in place in many areas. All their energies had been directed towards fighting the Nationalists. It was as if they had been crossing a river by feeling for rocks on the bottom. Their first major concern was how to get the political and economic situation, now in shambles, back on track. Other matters were evidently secondary and not so urgent. (7)

At the time of their coming to power, writes Lam, the Communists did not have a “religious policy,” despite proudly embracing atheism. There are a variety of theories Lam mentions that describe the Communists’ eventual position with respect to all religions in China, including the “devil theory” and “the liberator theory.” To counter the “devil theory,” Lam writes

To define Chinese Communists as devils is easy; it does not require any logic or reflection, and it provides an avenue for self-justification that is always gratifying. Nevertheless, such an opinion without rational basis is tantamount to putting the heads of the people in the sand, and completely obscures the true nature of the problem.

I am Catholic, but I do not in any way consider the Chinese Communists to be devils in disguise. There is no doubt, however, that Communism, being an atheistic social entity, can present formidable challenges to the Church. These challenges can reduce the Church’s influence in society, but they will also help the Church free itself of much unneeded baggage. (8-9)

The footnote in the text to that last sentence, which is not explained any further in this book, refers back to another of Dr. Lam’s books, The Church in Present Day China—Through Darkness and Light. This book is certainly one I have to purchase on my next trip to the bookstore, because I am absolutely unable to understand what he means.

Dr. Lam eventually concludes the first chapter to set up the rest of this thin book, that the Chinese Communists would eventually come to define religion as a “contradiction among the people,” which would then lead to, per Bishop Tong of Hong Kong, “decades of ‘tightening and relaxing.’” (13) He then in the rest of the book analyzes various policies and official documents of various Bureaus to track the “tightening and relaxing” as a matter of official policy. Some of this reading can be rather dry and very tied up in matters of Chinese procedure that I admire anyone for understanding. However, I did find this book, brief though it may be, to be helpful in making sense of much of the mixed information I’ve read about the state of religions in China. If it seems mixed it is because the status of religions in China has been mixed.

There are a few other points he makes that I found interesting. Dr. Lam devotes a chapter to seminaries, which are state-run institutions. One problem he illustrates that has faced the seminaries is that attendance to a seminary has not require anyone to demonstrate a strong religious calling, but merely an aptitude to pass a test (57). He cites high drop-out rates (for instance, he refers back to his data in the book The Church in Present Day China that Catholic seminaries have a drop-out rate close to 30%, though I am guessing from the context this data is from the 1990s). The drop-out rate during seminary and post-graduation also varies throughout the country; from one Muslim seminary in Shenyang in 1990, 45 out of 52 graduates went on to become Imams, Dr. Lam notes, while only 10 of the other 220 graduates from the other five Muslim seminaries continued into the Muslim clergy. Instead of the government propagandizing this situation, they issued a report in 1992 that indicated more alarm than pleasure at these numbers. Dr. Lam writes that “The Chinese government expressed its dissatisfaction with “the weak faith” and “improper motivation” of these seminarians” (57). This is hardly the congratulations one would expect from a regime whose intent is to wipe out religious belief. Further on in this same chapter, Dr. Lam even questions the popular belief that the seminaries, many being under the auspices of the Religious Affairs Bureau, operated exclusively as merely another appendage of the government. From that same 1992 report, Dr. Lam comments

the writers of the report was able to looks squarely at the problem of student drop-outs, and did show concern for the fact that “some seminary students do not value what they learn in their religious courses or keep up their religious practices. Their faith is very shallow and, after graduating, they do not want to engage in any religious work.” This is really quite surprising. In the past many overseas observers criticized the seminaries that were under the control of the Religious Affairs Bureau. They said that they were only a showcase for China’s new opening. Now that the Religious Affairs Bureau has corrected its aim, and sees that it is necessary to train young believers firm in faith and committed to lifelong service is certainly a good thing.(65)

I refer back to this book from time to time, especially when what I read going on with respect to the Catholic Church here in China. I mean, on one hand you have the recent restrictions happening in Sheshan, but on the other hand the China Philharmonic and Shanghai Opera Chorus travelling to Rome to perform Mozart's Requiem for the Pope. In the last two years we've had Chinese bishops approved by the Vatican and those that haven't. And, as I just read at Gashwin's blog, the Vatican may be beginning to close its diplomatic shop in Taipei, a major step towards establishing diplomatic relations with Beijing.

We may never see the end of this.

May in China

May in China means the POOLS are open. No matter how hot April may be (this year it wasn't but last year it was), the pools do NOT open until May 1.
Afternoons this week have been spent at the pool, and it is exhausting.
Back soon.

Essay question

Myles: Mommy, let's discuss all the differences between Oswald's world and God's world.

Derby picks from folks that know

Courier-Journal has the picks all the races of the day. You think people would go to all that trouble of dressing up today if it were just one race? And I am out of the business of picking. I used up all my luck picking Silver Charm, when I actually was at the Derby, but someone (Randy) didn't think I should waste my money on betting. Or rather, I didn't want to wait in the really long $1 bet lines in the infield and wanted to go to the open higher-stakes ($50 I think) window. He prevented me, and I would have won--big.

No one needs to text me the winners. I'll read about them Sunday when I wake up.

From around here

Thursday afternoon, some Australian tourists in Kowloon wanted to make sure we knew that the Olympic torch was going to be in Hong Kong on Friday.

"We know. That's why we are going back to China tonight. We don't want to get caught up in any of that," I told them.

They rolled their eyes at us and tsk-tsked. They obviously didn't understand we are from around here.

I guess maybe we missed a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, perhaps even the possiblity to witness something truly dramatic, with all the frenzy going on around the world. I mean, Mia Farrow was there, somewhere, even. However, the simple thought of trying to get through immigration on Friday, something that was surprisingly easy on Wednesday for us, was just not pleasant. We probably aren't on any watch list, or even could be suspect of any disruptive activity, but we really envisioned Friday to be a miserable day to try to get around Hong Kong because many modes of transportation in Kowloon and Central would be shut down at one point or another, and the lines to get get back into China would be insane. And what if some sort of riot broke out? And to do all this with a probably impatient and over-tired four-year-old.......you get the picture.

I hope the child-free Australian couple got to see something special, and got fantastic pictures and memories and whatever else. However, for us, it was enough just to follow it on TV. On the news. Hours after the fact.

We do have another chance to miss it, when it comes through Shenzhen on May 8.

Long Island, but not that Long Island

Cheung Chau means Long Island in Cantonese. It is one of the small outlying islands of the Hong Kong SAR. Perhaps its name should be Deceptively Small-looking and Very Steep Island.

The only way to reach this island is by ferry, and no cars are permitted on Cheung Chau. That in and of itself is relaxing enough to be able to walk around with our family and not dodge all the cars or inhale any exhaust. Most of the beaches are an easy walk from the ferry dock, but just about everything else on the island requires serious hiking up and down the steep hillsides. The paths are paved, fortunately, but the hills are still steep. To get to the house where we stayed and to get to a pirate cave that is an attraction of the island required hours of walking uphill (both ways it seemed).

We required a lot of breaks during all of our hiking around, having luggage and three children
(one a two-month old in a carrier) between our two families. The breaks allowed us fantastic views of the rocky coast and South China Sea.




Heck, even the cemeteries (and there were a lot of them) had great views of the South China Sea. In this particular one, the tombstones even face out to sea.


We stayed at a missionary retreat center run by Bethany Ministries. My friend Katie, with whom we went, had stayed here before, first when she was an English teacher in China. There are many Christian organizations operating legally inside of China offering aid but not necessarily proselytizing. Some teach English; one of the early interviewees on At Home in China podcast worked for a Christian micro-credit company. Bethany Ministries provides a retreat house primarily for the Asian missionaries, though Katie, because of her past affiliation, was able to get us inexpensive rooms there for the night.

The highlight of the trip was, of course, the beach. It was just about all that Myles wanted to do.
It was the very first thing we did when we arrived.

It was all he wanted to do the second day we were there. He even was up before 6 am, wondering why no one else was ready to hit the beach.




Cheung Chau is also interesting because religious people are everywhere. I don't know why, but this island hosts several Taoist temples (no less than four are dedicated to Tin Hau), a Buddhist college, a Salvation Army retreat center, Bethany Ministries, a Lutheran camp, a Salesian retreat house, a Catholic youth camp, a Jesuit retreat house, and probably several other things I forgot or didn't see.


Filial devotion was evident everywhere. Between the cemeteries with their areas for burnt offerings, and the houses with their altars outside their gates, this is probably one very smoky place around the Chinese New Year and especially Tomb-Sweeping day.



All over the hillside we also saw many apparently abandoned houses. One of the directors of Bethany Ministries said that they have tried to acquire some of those neighboring properties as they've needed to add to their facilities, but with no luck. Many Chinese people still value the ancestral connections to these properties. They may have no interest in living or even rehabilitating these homes, but they also will never part with them. It gave this small island yet another romantic dimension.



One sign I saw all over the place in the village was this advertising the Diocese of Hong Kong's plan to join in the Pope's special May prayers for the Church in China. As I mentioned before, the Hong Kong Diocese had to cancel their plans to pilgrimage to Sheshan outside of Shanghai for the weekend of May 24. I don't know if this sign advertises their new plans, or if it had already been in the works for those Hong Kong-ers that would have been unable to go to Shanghai anyway.

By the way, if you are following the developments regarding the busy pilgrimage month of May in Sheshan and haven't already read what Adam wrote last week, this is a must read. The Diocese of Hong Kong shouldn't take it personally; no one is getting to the shrine in Sheshan easily this month.

Wiped out!

Two days on Cheung Chau island wiped us out.
If it had only been a beach trip, we wouldn't be so tired.
It it had only been a hiking up and down the mountains trip, we wouldn't be so tired.
BUT, since it was a beach and hiking trip, we are sore and beat.

It's all made in China

Even the most unlikely things.

Randy can vouch for the car inspections coming into the SEZ of Shenzhen yesterday. Their factories are outside the SEZ, and while their company van was not stopped at the checkpoint, many other cars were. Randy said it was much more congested last night trying to come home at that checkpoint.

Update 10:37 pm: Randy's van was stopped tonight, but they only asked to look at the passport of one of his coworkers.
We are supposed to go to Hong Kong tomorrow. I have a doctor's appointment at 11:00 and then we are planning to stay with some friends on an outlying island overnight for a little May holiday getaway. I hope we can get across without any problem.

Make me jealous

Is this as much fun to watch as it sounds?

GO PENS!

Update: fixed the link

Happy Pascha!

Any Orthodox Christians in the house?
My friend Katie's blog has pictures of the Orthodox church in Shenzhen. It is in an apartment in Shenzhen and is served by a priest that travels up from Hong Kong. Most of the people who attend the Divine Liturgies, when they have them, are Russian. I think Katie and her family are the only Americans.

Eat dirt!

Randy ate at this restaurant last night. It was explained to him that the "Soil" is really supposed to mean "Organic."

Another image from Carrefour

I actually took this picture back in January, within a month of the new giant Carrefour's grand opening. In China, Carrefour and Wal-Mart are really going after the unimaginably enormous local Chinese market. Their stores look a lot like other Chinese grocery store chains and carry the same products. Only a few of their outlets go after the higher end market--foreigners (which would include any non-mainland Chinese nationality) and mainland Chinese people that have a taste for foreign products (anything from dairy to the fixings for sushi).

So when Carrefour opened this store and included in its mix an impressive amount of imported products, some of the signs targeting the unitiated local Chinese consumer asked them if they have "tried the new lifestyle." Nearly all of these signs were above the American/European products, like milk, cheese, and crusty bread, rather than the Japanese or Taiwanese products. I'm not quite sure what kind of lifestyle choice involves drinking milk, but I guess we've made it.

He's (still) got that ambition, baby

"When I'm 53, I'm going to work at Starbucks! Maybe even this one!" Myles announced over our coffee and milk break yesterday.

Those rising food prices

Fortunately, here in China our family hasn't been as affected by the global rise in food prices as much as our Chinese neighbors. The items seeing the greatest cost increases are not that big a part of our at-home diet: peanut cooking oil, rice, and pork. We have had to deal with imported milk and other imported food costs increasing, but for us that is offset by the still relatively low cost of vegetables at the Chinese grocery stores. The price of milk imported from New Zealand is right now about US$10 a gallon, where it was more like US$8 about a year ago. I try and try and try again to drink the Chinese or Hong Kong milk, but I just can't get over the taste. Even the "skim" milk tastes like someone poured butter into it.

In my Google alerts I found this story out of Hong Kong about New Territories shoppers crossing the border to Shenzhen to shop for groceries because the Hong Kong prices are rising beyond people's means. Or rather, the prices in the poorer, less-densely populated ares of the New Territories are significantly higher than other (more affluent) parts of Hong Kong.

I haven't noticed yet, but I wonder if the new Carrefour, being rather close to the bridge to Hong Kong, is a regular destination for the Hong Kong shoppers.



Since its opening, the new Carrefour near our current apartment has really done an amazing job to set itself apart from other Chinese groceries and Wal-Mart, and even other Carrefours I've been to in China. Most Carrefours I've been in are large, poorly air-conditioned, crowded, chaotic, and not-that-clean. I've been disappointed at the absence of imported products, mostly because as a French grocery chain, imported products are part of their advertised product mix. However the new Carrefour, while it still looks unpleasantly like a Carrefour, has a fantastic amount of imported food, like cheese and breakfast cereal.

Carrefour at this new location, close to the foreign enclave of Shekou and the Hong Kong bridge, has even made it easier for foreigners and Hong Kong residents to buy groceries. Unlike just about everywhere else in China, this store officially accepts foreign credit cards and Hong Kong dollars. While it would seem that this would target the more affluent shopper, Carrefour's local reputation for low-cost Chinese groceries would probably attract the thriftier shopper as well.