TPR's overall experience in China...

[Movieguy]

My late father worked for the Media Services center of Cornell University, a school that has had a long lasting relationship with Chinese students. In the late 1980's, right around the time of the Tienanmen Square massacre, he got to travel to China twice, to Beijing, Shanghai, Inner Mongolia, as well as trips to Hong Kong (Still a British Colony then) and Singapore.

 

He went there for two video projects, a program about the Chinese diet (narrated by Battlestar Galactica's Mary McDonnell.) and a program following the Cornell Glee Club on a tour through these parts of Asia. He used to tell me about how different it was from the US back then, including how constantly the Chinese smoked. He said that the airport in Beijing was covered in kind of a blue haze with the lights, coupled with all the cigarette smoke.

 

I regret that in a past thread, I made a bit of a tasteless joke about the Chinese and their park rules. I apologize for that, because China was willing to let you all come over and experience their parks, including the awesome looking Hong Kong Disneyland. I guess I'm still a little suspicious of China because of what happened in 89. There were a lot of Asian Cornell students included among the dead.

 

What was the experience of China like, for those of you who went on the trip, covered in the volume 12 expedition? Did you feel any sense of their rather authoritarian government around you, despite the fact you were tourists? I've also heard that the experience varies slightly between Hong Kong and the mainland, due to the fact that Hong Kong has only been a part of the People's Republic since 1997.

 

I'm just a naturally curious person, who can no longer ask his father about such things. Any info is appreciated.

[SharkTums]

It's a little weird not being able to go online to all of your normal websites you visit. Also there were places we were told we were not welcome. Overall it seemed a lot more like us than different from us. They've been cracking down on smoking as well and there are many smoke free areas. The news, well, it's very controlled, and when we were in Chengdu I would try and ask questions about the earthquake and was always told how it wasn't a big deal and everything is now fine and rebuilt even though from outside news we know that wasn't the case.

 

I think the biggest thing is just this feeling of uneasyness I was left with after last years trip that I didn't feel in 2008. It seemed like they were in a lot worse shape economically than the US and the rest of the world is but their government was doing everything in its power to cover that fact up so no one noticed. People were put to work doing random roadworks or building buildings even with completely built empty ones right next to the new ones.

 

I really liked the country a lot and am looking forward to going back in 2012 to see how all of the areas have changed in the last few years.

[Nosferatu]

I haven't been there on a tpr trip, but I visited both Hong Kong and China this summer.

 

Hong Kong and China feels like two separate worlds. In the deal between china and great britain there are some rules that Hong kong will have a certain degree of self control for the next 100 yars. In many cases they operate as different entities. For instance they got totally separate visas, and you need a visa to go from Hong kong to mainland China. Also the economic structure is pretty different, although Shanghai is catching up with Hong Kong.

 

I went to both Hong Kong and China this year, and I would totally recomend going. I really enjoyed both, and especially Hong kong and Shanghai is great cities!