E-Book, Englisch, 198 Seiten
ISBN: 978-1-64268-322-6
Verlag: novum pro Verlag
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark
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However, we are warned to watch out for KO drops in some bars. As minors, Alma and Marina should not be seen there anyway. If they are caught in a raid, there will be trouble. Occasionally, police have taken hair samples25 from visitors to check for drug use, similar to Singapore. If the results are positive, the delinquent and possibly the entire family will find themselves on a plane back home within a short period of time. During the school vacations, Alma completes a short internship in one of the international clinics. One remarkable insight is not directly medical in nature. In the introductory session, the supervisor explicitly points out that doctors and medical staff in China are not obligated to provide assistance in the event of accidents and other medical emergencies outside of their working hours. This coincides with anecdotal reports among acquaintances that accident victims are simply left lying in the street and can say they are lucky if someone calls the ambulance. Neither legally nor morally is there a duty to help strangers. There is no social ostracism for failing to help. When a colleague is hit while crossing the street, she is fortunately still able to use her cell phone to notify her colleagues in the nearby office. They call the ambulance and accompany her to the hospital. In such an unforgiving society, we understand all too well why people prefer to rely on their network of family, friends and colleagues rather than on laws and the state. While things are looking up again in China, the rest of the world is still struggling with the pandemic. Beijing is seizing the opportunity and de facto burying Hong Kong's autonomy with the so-called National Security Act of June 30, 2020. To the outside world, the principle of "one country, two systems" is nevertheless maintained as a facade, because otherwise one would have to openly admit the breach of the British-Chinese declaration of 1984, which was supposed to guarantee Hong Kong a high degree of autonomy and freedom rights until 2047. For security reasons, the existence and content of this declaration are not mentioned to the domestic public. The measure is sold as the restoration of law and order and as a patriotic act. The activists are branded either as chaotic, as traitors incited by foreign countries, or, in the most harmless case, as misguided young people who are to be guided onto the right path in the future by patriotic education and media loyal to the line. Within Hong Kong, enough claqueurs can be found, out of conviction, fear or ingratiation because of economic dependence. The usual helpless expressions of consternation from Europe roll off the Chinese leadership. There, they understand only the language of economic and military power. The government is smart enough to know that sooner or later, Hong Kong's status as an international financial center will be lost. It is propagating a different perspective for the future. The formerly cosmopolitan metropolis is to be absorbed into the "Greater Bay Area" in the Pearl River Delta, together with Guangzhou and Shenzhen. Back from the Champions League to the Bundesliga. Young people are being urged by the government to try the mainland for a living. I wonder why Western media coverage always revolves around individual incidents. It seems more important to me to realize that China cannot be relied upon to comply with international treaties and international law, and that in case of doubt, all other interests are subordinated to pure power preservation and nationalistic considerations. Incidentally, the Chinese media are making it clear that the annexation of Hong Kong has opened the endgame for Taiwan. In response to accusations from the West, China points to Britain's meager democratic record in its former crown colony. It presents a phalanx of 53 supporters before the UN and its own public.26 An otherwise face-saving government voluntarily invokes a club of shame. Everything is represented that has rank and name among the human abusers of this world, among others North Korea, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Belarus. The axis of evil, especially with Moscow, which later makes headlines in the context of the Ukraine war, is already openly apparent at this point for those who want to perceive it. A power policy free of values or concern for one's own image does not necessarily mean that the leadership would find all these countries good or want to be put on a par with them. It is enough that they side with the Chinese leadership at the right moment and stand up to the West. Because moral values play no role either in normal life outside the family and one's own circle or in big politics, even educated and well-traveled interlocutors find nothing extraordinary about such allies. In fact, I encountered the topic of values beyond empty phrases only once in two and a half years. A successful career woman, outwardly the epitome of capitalism, confided in me that she could not, in the long run, come to terms with seeing her children grow up in a society without values, even though she lacked nothing materially in China and was acutely aware of the undesirable developments in the West. I cannot find a convincing answer to the question of whether the leadership is now completely indifferent to its image abroad or whether it is deliberately aiming to be hated and feared, or whether it is perhaps misjudging the mood abroad. For in the meantime, I am getting the impression that large parts of the state apparatus live in a special kind of bubble, long before Corona. The higher state functionaries and military officers climb in the hierarchy, the smaller their radius of movement. To "protect" such "secret-keepers," they are usually not allowed to travel abroad, or only to a very limited extent, for example as part of official delegations. Upon their return, they must surrender their passports. Not ideal conditions for making acquaintance with a critical public and other opinions. Consequently, the mass of the people and large sections of the elite have not the slightest idea of how unpopular, feared and even hated the Chinese government has become in large parts of the world. It is difficult for them to adjust to liberal patterns of thought. When, in mid-2021, I once told an expert on the West that the CDU had decided on certain defeat by selecting its candidate for chancellor, my interlocutor reacted with horror. Firstly, he fears for good relations, and secondly, it is beyond his imagination that the voters might decide differently than the current head of government would like. He gets the impression that China has reached the most advanced and at the same time most dangerous stage of propaganda, where the clients and authors of propaganda believe their own stories. Curiously, the officials concerned rank on a similar level as oppressed minorities in questions of travel (in)freedom, albeit of their own free will. Unlike Han Chinese, Tibetans in particular have hardly any chance of obtaining a passport for private reasons, and the situation is hardly any better for Uyghurs.27 An interim relaxation in some provinces with Tibetan settlement areas was reversed28 , presumably because some citizens had used the trip abroad to attend events of the Dalai Lama in India. In general, Tibet seems to be the most sensitive of all regions. Foreigners are allowed to visit Tibet only in organized groups, and for a long time during the pandemic not at all. Not even state propaganda can think of arguments about the dangers posed by the Tibetans, and reporting on the region remains sparse. Unlike the Uyghur culture, Tibetan culture dies a quiet death, little noticed by the world public. In contrast, there are no particular hurdles to visiting the region on one's own in Xinjiang. In reports from various travel chats and from visitors who have been there, we read and hear about widespread police controls, but no obvious obstructions to travelers as long as they do not engage in investigative activities. After exciting months, we don't feel like experimenting in the summer of 2020. We book a ten-day vacation on Hainan in the same hotel as in 2019, after the travel ban for students has just been lifted. While in Shanghai the rainy season does not want to end, there the sun burns from the north. Most of the time we move into the shade. During an excursion along Haitang Bay, we pass elegant new housing developments on the coast that could just as well be in Florida. I ask our cab driver who can afford such splendid apartments here. He tells us that these are vacation homes sold to customers from the mainland. This has made real estate prices unaffordable for locals. As a result, the Hainan government has summarily banned the purchase of second homes in order to curb the building frenzy and real estate speculation. I secretly imagine what resourceful ideas interested parties will come up with to get their hands on the coveted properties. Perhaps a family member might apply for the island's "hukou." The new arrangement explains why the ubiquitous real estate agents elsewhere are absent and some complexes seem deserted. Another trip to the surrounding area takes us to an open-air museum designed as a minority village. On Hainan, two of the 56 officially recognized national minorities make up a significant part of the population. The provincial government's website proudly highlights the several thousand years of Li and Miao history, language and culture. The site delivers what the announcement promises, we find optimally renovated houses, regional specialties and quite to the taste of the local tourists, a shuttle bus takes us up the hill. Zipline and a rainforest chamber with lots of real water from above provide...
