Last weekend I became friends with an articulate Chinese man who kept returning our conversation to classical China. China today is a complex conversation! It's changing faster than most developing nations, with arguably the greatest impact on the world community.
A Bitter Revolution was a great read, describing cultural, political and economic events in the 20th century in broad strokes.
China had to learn how to learn technology after being closed for so long. Consider how the Family exists within the State and its course of change. The Party and its authority are controversial and Chinese people I've met are mostly fatalistic about government. Like a lot of Americans. A Bitter Revolution was a great primer and created empathy.
Today I discovered chinaSMACK "Popular Chinese internet news, stories, pictures, videos, bloggers, memes & trends translated into English along with real Chinese netizen reactions " It's fun and very pop-culture.
Having read The Marcos Dynasty by Sterling Seagrave, I just started The Soong Dynasty, another account of the United States' capricious influence, this time in China. It is investigative journalism at its most entertaining. Feeling kind of worn out by the Tea Party nonsense, Obama's struggles and our military burdens always in the news -- it's more fun to follow China.
