Forums > Living in Kunming > Monthly expenses in Kunming @Tonyaod, obviously the point about mmkunming's calculations is to demonstrate more or less extreme possibilities, not to draw up an exact budget for anybody. I think he did that. You seem to be more interested in picking apart the way he says things than in dealing with the issues he brought up. Right - the way he writes is sometimes less than perfect, but to waste one's time attacking it often seems to be a conscious attempt to avoid the issues entirely. If he sometimes presented issues in black & white terms, that's not much different from what other contributors do. Obviously, no foreigner here really lives in a complete bubble, from which one might observe (and misinterpret) 'China' constantly and get into all kinds of self-centered rages (cabbies, food, etc.), and nobody becomes a complete local, but to spend any time away from home and not be changed by it at all because one insists on staying inside a self-affirming bubble & looking out without going out (I'm making an extreme point here, ok?) is pretty much a waste. Fortunately, however, things do not always go according to plan, so there's always the possibility that the individual may be surprised into learning something, no matter how much he tries not to.
But all of this is becoming overblown, and the concentration on fixing blame for it on particular individuals and then bothering to insult them is, imho, a stupid priority engaged in primarily by those who are more interested in winning word battles than in either teaching or learning or discovering anything.
Forums > Living in Kunming > Monthly expenses in Kunming @mPRin: Granted that there may be universal agreement about some elements of lifestyle, but if lifestyles are different, why apply the standards of your 'home' lifestyle to decide what is higher or lower in terms of a different lifestyle somewhere else?
But actually I believe that both you and I are a bit unclear about what we mean by standards and lifestyles, both of which can be changed as we learn of new possibilities. Would seem to me that standards are not sacred, or anyway that they are not necessarily so. And they're not necessarily one-dimensional (high/low, more/less, quantitative, etc.)
Forums > Living in Kunming > Monthly expenses in Kunming @the ghost of mmkunming: I agree, more or less, with your calculations, but I don't necessarily think that's 'living like a local' - sounds more like living according to common sense anywhere, especially if you're a little short of coin. And you can eat meat daily for very little more.
@Dazzer: take education wherever you can find it.
As for rudeness - no comment necessary.
Forums > Living in Kunming > Leaving These Forums The insulting assholes here would be happy you're leaving, except that I have a feeling they need somebody else to insult. I'm sure they'll have no trouble finding one.
Forums > Living in Kunming > Advice on renting a studio flat. @mPRin: For the price you're looking for, try Fengningxiaoqu, on Jinhuapulu north of Renminxilu and just inside the 2nd Ring Rd. - single bedroom, living room, small inside sunporch sort of affair (hard to describe, but plenty of light from windows), kitchen, bathroom, RMB800p/mo., maybe less. No hassle with gate guards any time day or night, direct buses to Wenlinjie, & Renminlu has many buses, will have an underground after they finish tearing it up and putting it back together. Virtually no foreigners.
China, US discuss human rights in Kunming
Posted byI think what these governments are most interested in is not human rights, but how not to be accused of violating them.
Inside Kunming's 'dwarf empire'
Posted byTell it to Steven Hawking. A person's physical stature does not limit his/her potential for work that does not rely on his/her physical stature (e.g., English teaching, as well as physics). The cultural attitude that those who are discriminated against because they do not fit the culturally desired norm should be outcast or should be provided for by special environments that can be sold as entertainment venues to those who will not deal with their own prejudices is a cultural attitude that perpetuates discrimination against all who are 'different'. The problem here, as elsewhere, is a matter of dehumanizing those who are 'different' - prejudicial culture that regiments anything that deviates from its standards, rather than dealing with the prejudice itself. Why not have a theme park within which 'foreigners', with all their funny habits, can be kept, so that they do not disturb the 'normality' of cultural prejudices? Actually, there could be many: one for 'black people', one for Tibetans, one for Japanese, one for gay people, one for Han Chinese people who have given up their 'traditional' clothing for 'western-style' clothing (e.g., the great majority of Chinese, over the past century or so) - in fact we could subdivide and subdivide until nothing was left but mutual nonrecognition. All these would help to maintain the narrow identities of 'normality' that can be relied upon to advance support the cultural attitudes that promote the continuing inability of people to recognize each other as human, and to celebrate and accept their differences - not as entertainment items, no matter how 'cute', but as full human beings. How different is all this from apartheid?
This effort to maintain prejudice can, of course, be profitable to those who invest in it, and convenient for social engineers and political elites who want to maintain an elite power status by reliance on it.
The place is an insult to our common humanity and a spotlight on cultural attitudes of exclusion. Those who find that they enjoy such displays should take a good look at the nature of the culture that has formed them so narrowly. Cultures change; cultures have always changed; cultures are presently changing and will continue to do so; there is nothing sacred about cultural attitudes. Our common humanity is an ongoing project, and those who imagine they are not part of such a project are simply contributing their own blindness to it, and limiting themselves in the process. It's not the 'dwarves' who are the problem, its the people who will not accept them as within the boundaries of 'us'.
Around Town: Southwestern Associated University Museum
Posted bySee John Israel's EXCELLENT book on the history of the university:
Israel, John. Lianda: A Chinese University in War and Revolution. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998
Books about universities do not normally strike me as exciting, but this one is.
John has lived in Kunming for several months per year over the past 10 years or more.
Chinese climbers among those murdered in Pakistan
Posted byModern nationalism is a manipulative ideology to manage global capital, and nationalist blindness to actual human beings leads to the punishment of innocents. China is not a communist country. People who murder in Pakistan cannot be extradited to China to be judged for murders of people in Pakistan, even if they're Chinese.
Chinese climbers among those murdered in Pakistan
Posted byWhich regions are 'these regions'?