China
November 14, 2009
- As a child, the only trip my parents took me on was to Southern China, to visit my dying grandmother. My parents spent months applying for various travel documents, retrieving permits from the local police and standing in long lines for days to buy the train tickets. When we had to spend a night in a hotel, the clerk not only demanded that my parents show all kind of official permits, she also ...
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November 10, 2009
- In my debut novel, Revolution is not a Dinner Party; there is a scene where Ling, the main character, watches her father burn the family's books and photos. This actually occurred in my childhood. My father, a prestigious surgeon trained by American missionaries, destroyed all his beloved books to protect our family from the zealous Red Guard. Yet he continued my education in secret, which ...
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November 5, 2009
- For three years I worked as the food editor for Martha Stewart's magazine, Body+Soul. I began with my own food column, "Yin/Yang Diner" in which I developed recipes based on the Chinese concepts of Yin/Yang balance and harmony. Before long I was asked to develop all of the recipes for each issue. Instead of trying to pre-plan each recipe, I would go to numerous grocery stores and ...
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October 30, 2009
- While I was writing A Banquet for Hungry Ghosts, I frequently wondered if at some time every child has fantasized about having a powerful ghost come to their aid. The brightest light in my childhood was torn from me when, at the height of the Cultural Revolution, my father was imprisoned for the "crime" of being a Western-trained surgeon. His act of loyalty, choosing to stay and help ...
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October 29, 2009
- The last boyfriend I dated in China, before I left to attend graduate school in the US, was an army officer whose father was a general. One afternoon at work I received a distraught call from him asking to see me immediately. I met him in a park near the Seismological Bureau where I was working as an English interpreter. He arrived in his military jeep. When he stepped out, his face was ...
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October 27, 2009
- As a young girl living under the Communist system in China, nothing was more thrilling for me than breaking government rules and getting away with it. I traded ration tickets at the black market, and bought meat and eggs from the "back door," where Communist Party members obtained their fine food without the inconvenience of ration tickets or long queues. The story "Tea ...
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October 23, 2009
- My favorite city sits on the edge of history. She comes complete with a past of more than 2800 years. You will also find her on the forefront of the future. She is Xiangfan, Hubei Province, China. Xiangfan is made up of two ancient cities that have transitioned to the present day on their way to the future. Fan Cheng sits on the north side of the Han River. It had its beginnings way back ...
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October 6, 2009
- Despite its roller-coaster economic upheaval, China still remains one of the few places in the world with a lifestyle characterised by basic simplicity which almost resembles child-like innocence. Most of the people I have met in China are simply down-to-earth curious about non-Chinese. They are so earnest that sometimes people who don’t understand often misunderstand some of their words and ...
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September 15, 2009
- So, last night I have this dream that I'm wandering Chicago in my 2005 Toyota Camry, searching for a Chicago auto repair shop. It seems my water pump is bad. Now, there are a number of strange things about this story that make me realize it's a dream.1) I didn't know a car has a water pump.2) I don't have a Toyota Camry, let alone a very specific 2005 model.3) I don't live anywhere near ...
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September 10, 2009
- The fresh perspective of an outsider-on-the-inside releases energy from all directions. What strikes us about a place — and may entice our fellow country-people – often does not resonate to the same degree with the average native.I was pleased to meet an expat woman entrepreneur on LinkedIn last week who was once a director at the American-Malaysian Chamber of Commerce. She now advises the ...
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