@Geezer: I've never been an inpatient in China - I was referring to outpatient services. It's best to learn Chinese. Do nurses yell at inpatient foreigners a lot in Chinese hospitals? The guy who had the triple bypass didn't mention any of this. His Chinese is almost nonexistent. Enough of the staff at the hospital he went to spoke English so that language was not a problem. In state hospitals this is less likely to be the case, of course - my doctor, however, could speak a little, and pretty much knew the medical terminology in English. $400,000 for 4 operations - okay, I was wrong - it's 5 times more expensive in the US than in an excellent private hospital in Kunming.
I have an American friend who had a triple bypass here, at a private hospital, a couple months ago - it may have cost him as much as US$20,000 - peanuts in the US. Surgeon came down from Beijing to do it. Saw him about 2 weeks ago at Salvador's, having a drink; looked better than he has for at least a year, very happy about his choice.
For my own condition I used the Kunming #2 Hospital - no complaints, although you do have to run around a bit to different places in the hospital (blood test here, X-ray there, pay bill somewhere else, etc. - but it's not rocket science to figure it out, even if your Chinese language ability is not so good yet.
@virus4762: I don't have any medical insurance, which would cost much more almost anywhere I bought it than the amount I'm ever likely to have to spend on medical care in China. I may have spent as much as US$1500 over the past 12+ years - most of this was for care for a fairly serious health problem, or anyway one that could become life-threatening. I'm now doing fine. Compare that to US health insurance prices - what you pay even when you don't get sick. Thank god for national health schemes - may the US someday wise up.
@Liumingke: Nonsense - who would be running any agenda for depopulation by letting people from affected African nations into the US?
@Magnifico: lowering the human population seems a good idea, but only if it's done by having fewer children - the planet can only stand just so much life-affirmation.
The great thing in the Kunming Museum is the pillar from the Nanzhao Kingdom, which shows clearly that it is much too simple to consider that 'Yunnan' was simply one part of 'China' 1300 years ago.
Magnifico is right - the main concern is profit, and to this end brains are cheerfully twisted through advertising that preys on insecurities derived from the past: "Buy a car and be modern, with a face larger than the moon!" - minor alterations in this message have made it work everywhere; locally the traffic-jam situation in Kunming is the result (almost magically created within a mere 5 years or so - those who have been around awhile can tell you that there were then no taxi or bus problems 5-6 years ago). Now profits can be made by building an underground train system at enormous cost, to relieve the problem that served the competitive greed of corporations and nations (Game of Thrones: You win or you die) rather than the needs of the population.
I don't understand '...absolutely a capitalist venture, depending on how you look at it.' Also, the article mentions that the rubber was started in the mid-50s, but expanded greatly in the mid-90s - e.g., with government aid to privatized smallholders.
On a grander scale, it's all about capitalism - rubber first planted in time of competition with globally-capitalist world of nations armed to advance their own economic interests; Communist movement was an attempt to break with that, didn't work; the solution, if there will be one (quite likely not - no guarantees from evolutionary theory) cannot simply be 'capitalist', since that's what's brought us to the current state of mutual planetary destruction, which continues to be advanced with every private car sold.
Peter99 - "hundreds of years"? I think it's been going on since agriculture was invented and class society came into being, built on the possibility of creating, and 'privatising', a surplus.
'the crap that China builds are not made to last' - perhaps an overstatement, and I don't think there was anything structurally wrong with the workers cultural palace. I always liked the building/institution because it represented something from the earlier heavy-'socialist' period that was not at all a bad idea - ie, we hear of the inefficiencies and over-the-top political campaigns etc. of that period all the time now, but it wasn't ALL bad. And now sometimes the baby goes out with the bath water (e.g., rural health arrangements, once based on scarcity of health facilities and personnel but with a real impetus for equality and decent across-the-board development).
Not quite what you'd call a jumping place, but not bad at all for rather standard US-type meals, not overly expensive, and with a really good salad bar that's cheap, or free with most dinner dishes after 5:30PM. You can get a bottle of beer or even wine if you really want to, but I've never seen anybody do it - maybe that's just to take out. Chinese Christian run, and they hire people with physical disadvantages, who are pleasant and helpful. Frequented by foreign (mostly North American) Christians and Chinese Christians - was started by a Canadian couple associated with Bless China (previously, Project Grace), who are no longer here, but no religious pressure or any of that. Steaks are nothing special, and I avoid the Korean dishes, which I've had a few times but which did not impress me.
As a shop and bakery, it's very good bread at reasonable prices, of various kinds (Y18 for a good multigrain loaf that certainly weighs well over a pound. Other stuff too, like granola and oatmeal that is local, as well as imported things, including American cornflakes and so forth, which some people seem to require.
Large portions, seriously so with the pizza, which is Brooklyn/American style, I guess. Convivial, conversational, good place to drink with good folks on both sides of the bar, especially after about 9PM.
Around Town: Flying Tigers Museum
Posted byThe great thing in the Kunming Museum is the pillar from the Nanzhao Kingdom, which shows clearly that it is much too simple to consider that 'Yunnan' was simply one part of 'China' 1300 years ago.
New taxi placards target 'civility'
Posted byMagnifico is right - the main concern is profit, and to this end brains are cheerfully twisted through advertising that preys on insecurities derived from the past: "Buy a car and be modern, with a face larger than the moon!" - minor alterations in this message have made it work everywhere; locally the traffic-jam situation in Kunming is the result (almost magically created within a mere 5 years or so - those who have been around awhile can tell you that there were then no taxi or bus problems 5-6 years ago). Now profits can be made by building an underground train system at enormous cost, to relieve the problem that served the competitive greed of corporations and nations (Game of Thrones: You win or you die) rather than the needs of the population.
Interview: Economic ecologist Yi Zhuangfang
Posted byI don't understand '...absolutely a capitalist venture, depending on how you look at it.' Also, the article mentions that the rubber was started in the mid-50s, but expanded greatly in the mid-90s - e.g., with government aid to privatized smallholders.
On a grander scale, it's all about capitalism - rubber first planted in time of competition with globally-capitalist world of nations armed to advance their own economic interests; Communist movement was an attempt to break with that, didn't work; the solution, if there will be one (quite likely not - no guarantees from evolutionary theory) cannot simply be 'capitalist', since that's what's brought us to the current state of mutual planetary destruction, which continues to be advanced with every private car sold.
Yunnan county cooks the books for $850 million
Posted byPeter99 - "hundreds of years"? I think it's been going on since agriculture was invented and class society came into being, built on the possibility of creating, and 'privatising', a surplus.
Workers' Cultural Palace imploded in Kunming
Posted by'the crap that China builds are not made to last' - perhaps an overstatement, and I don't think there was anything structurally wrong with the workers cultural palace. I always liked the building/institution because it represented something from the earlier heavy-'socialist' period that was not at all a bad idea - ie, we hear of the inefficiencies and over-the-top political campaigns etc. of that period all the time now, but it wasn't ALL bad. And now sometimes the baby goes out with the bath water (e.g., rural health arrangements, once based on scarcity of health facilities and personnel but with a real impetus for equality and decent across-the-board development).