A Day in Mumbai

Well, I’m in Mumbai for a business trip. I’d been looking forward to this trip because India is unlikely to be a place I’m going to travel to much on my own, so business trips will be the way I get exposure to the country. I had a memorable trip to Dehli around 1997, also for business.

Mumbai International Airport — Ugh!

For a country that is on the up and up, Mumbai’s international airport is a huge disappointment. It’s chaotic, inefficient and more bureaucratic than most airports. I didn’t have any checked luggage, yet still spent nearly 45 minutes in various lines before emerging through the airport exit — and this was at 1:00 a.m. in the morning when you’d think things would’ve slowed down a bit.

I’m staying at the Taj Lands End, a nice, modern business hotel with a superb Indian restaurant. You’re constantly reminded of the terrorist threat in the country though. Every car coming into the hotel is checked for bombs, and all guests pass through not one but two metal detectors before being allowed into the building. I later discovered most important public buildings have similar security measures in place.

Crawford Market

I took a walk near Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus and Crawford Market on my first day in Mumbai, a Sunday. The Gothic style Terminus was breathtakingly gorgeous. I was advised not to go near the place on weekdays, however, because of enormous crowds and petty crime against foreign tourists.

There are many beautiful colonial buildings such as the Terminus dotted throughout Mumbai, and skyscrapers are popping up all over the place as well. But most of the city is pretty old and decrepit. The sights, smells and textures are definitely Third World. The air is hazy with pollution, there is a sea of humanity everywhere and the traffic is chaotic. If China and India are competing to modernize, India is definitely the tortoise in the race — which may be a good thing for India in the long run.

The street markets in Mumbai are infinitely more interesting than the ones in Hong Kong. Like Hong Kong’s markets they also sell a lot of cheap junk, but in addition you’ll find a lot of nicely made arts and crafts, jewelry and textiles.

As in China, many of the men in India — particularly those from rural areas — still have the habit of spitting on the street. But at least they don’t launch phlegm missiles with an emphatic “Pa-TOO-ey” the way the Chinese do. Instead, Indians just sort of let it dribble out — which is still pretty gross, come to think of it.

Another good thing about India compared to China is that people smoke less here, so you’re not choking from second-hand smoke all the time.

Indians are obviously mad about cricket. You read about it in the front pages of newspapers and you see boys playing the game in many side streets and back alleys in Mumbai. I wonder how come the game never took off in Hong Kong, another former British colony.

Arranged Marriages and the Modern Indian Male

My Indian colleague J, whom I met on this trip, is an energetic, boyish, 32-year old white-collar professional with an MBA from a prestigious Indian university. He was born in Mumbai and spent most of his life here. To my surprise, he had an arranged marriage, and he wouldn’t have it any other way.

“I probably wouldn’t have gotten married if it wasn’t for my arranged marriage, you know” he said. “I’m really shy around women.”

When I asked J how his arranged marriage worked, his description of it didn’t sound too harsh or rigid. Basically various family members went out and searched all over for a suitable wife on his behalf, and even helped him filter candidates based on a set criteria. They brought him ten prospects, and he even had the right of refusal.

“That sounds more like a personalized dating service than an arranged marriage,” I said.

J laughed. “Yeah, it’s great. I recommend it for everyone!”

I asked him how long it was from the day he met his wife until they got married. “Fifteen days,” he replied.

“Fifteen days?!” I was incredulous. “You weren’t obligated to marry that quickly, were you? Why didn’t you wait a little longer to make sure she was the right one?”

“Well, I didn’t want to go through a long dating period,” he replied. “If we went out on dates, we’d be going to clubs, bars, movies, and I just didn’t want to see my girlfriend doing those kind of things as an unmarried woman, you know what I mean? Not that they’re bad things, mind you. I have many women friends who date and do those things. I’m completely OK with that. Really, I am. I just don’t want my girlfriend to be doing those things. If my family finds a good wife for me, I want to go straight to marriage.”

J is obviously happily married and has a three-year old daughter whom he adores. He beams every time he talks about his family. His eyes light up, his chest puffs up and his smile spreads from ear to ear.

A Chinese Chef in India

For dinner on my first night I went to Ming Yan restaurant in my hotel. I had a feeling I was going to have lots of rich Indian food over the next few days so I thought I’d have some Chinese comfort food in this restaurant first.

The restaurant’s Chinese chef happened to be at the entrance when I arrived and was visibly excited to see a fellow Chinese. He kept chatting with me even as the hostess started to lead me into the dining room.

I ordered steamed fish Cantonese style and stir-fried veggies. The food tasted more or less like food in Hong Kong, though the fish was swimming in twice as much soy sauce as a similar dish in Hong Kong and the vegetables were a bit bland.

The chef later came to my table to see how I liked the food. I told him it was nice to fine decent Chinese food in India.

“Indians like strong, heavy flavors, so I usually add more sauce to dishes than I would back in Hong Kong,” he said.

He stood there for a while to chat with me. A middle-aged man with a warm, round face, the chef is from Hong Kong but has worked at the Taj for more than a decade. He lives in the hotel with his wife, and had raised his daughter largely in Mumbai.

He said there weren’t that many Hong Kong people in the city, and he can’t relate to the Mainland Chinese who have been arriving in recent years. He seemed to lead a relatively isolated and lonely life in India, living in a culture that perhaps remained alien to him, and yearned for the things he’d left behind in Hong Kong.

I asked if it had been hard to convince his daughter to come to India.

“Oh yes,” he said. “She resisted it for a long time. But I wanted to have the family together with me here. She understood that. So in the end she gave in. Luckily she did well here and is now studying in New Zealand,” he said proudly.

Does he intend to stay on? He took a deep breath. “Well, they keep renewing my contract, and it’s good money, so I stay,” he replied. “And I get to live in this grand hotel.”

Mumbai Massage

I ended the day with a massage at Aura Thai Body Spa. It was exactly what I was looking for. Every move made by the masseuse seemed deliberate and purposeful. Just what I needed after an exhausting day navigating the crowded, noisy streets of Mumbai.

The Bumbling Barrister & The Weaselly Juror

Hong Kong's High Court

I had jury duty in Hong Kong recently, my first time ever in any country. Quite a fascinating experience, actually.

All About Heroin

It was a drug trafficking case. Here’s a quick rundown of the facts:

In April last year police raided the defendant’s home in the upper middle-class Pokfulam district. They discovered in his spare bedroom 320 grams of heroin, which has a street value in Hong Kong of about US$50,000.

They also found caffeine and other substances that dealers normally use to dilute heroin and increase profit margins. Inside a large, red-checkered plastic bag they saw equipment typically used to make heroin, including a disassembled blender, metal molds and various utensils. Also discovered was a sack full of clear plastic bags typically used to pack heroin for retail sale, and a lighter that could be used to seal the bags. All of these items were found together, mostly lying out in the open around a writing desk.

The accused — an ordinary-looking 51-year old — claimed to have never seen the items before and had no idea who had placed them in his flat, a 1000 square foot, three-bedroom unit which he shared with his wife and youngest son. His entire defense was based on the notion that visitors to the flat may have left the stuff at his place. The only problem was, there was no evidence that he ever had any visitors.

Selecting the Jurors

I was one of seven jurors selected by the barristers from the pool of potential jurors summoned to the court on the first day of the trial.

Potential jurors were called one at a time to the front of the court for evaluation by the barristers. Each barrister could reject up to five potential jurors on sight.

You aren’t supposed to take a barrister’s rejection personally because the barrister has never met you before, knows nothing about you and doesn’t get a chance to interview you (at least not in the case I was involved in). Still, it can’t be a good feeling to be rejected. As you return to your seat, you feel everyone’s eyes on you, wondering why you were turned down. Are you too dumb-looking? Too fat? Too hip?

The defending barrister used up his entire quota of rejections. Intriguingly, all of the people he turned down were women. He did accept one female into the seven-person jury, but probably just to make the gender bias less obvious.

Jurors had to show up at 10:00 a.m. every day and were dismissed at around 4:30 p.m., with a 90-minute lunch and a couple of breaks in between. We received a daily allowance of US$45. For lunch and the breaks, we were free to leave the premises and go anywhere we liked. The only time we were locked in a room and cut off from the outside world was when we deliberated the verdict.

Don’t Talk to Strangers

Something very curious was that the jurors – all educated, white collar Hong Kong professionals – didn’t say a word to each other until the afternoon of the second day.

Prior to that, during breaks and other occasions when we spent time together in the juror’s room, there was dead silence. Everyone just sat there completely still, avoiding eye contact and pretending that the others didn’t exist. The silence was all the more deafening because the juror’s room was soundproofed. As a result, even a minor physical act like someone getting up to go to the bathroom became a big deal — “Oooh, look at that, someone MOVED and made a rustling noise!”

Hong Kong people are notorious for being less-than-friendly to strangers but this was just too bizarre and silly for me: seven adults playing a game of “let’s see how long we can go without acknowledging each other’s existence”. By the afternoon of the second day I couldn’t stand it anymore and broke the ice with some inane comment. As it turns out, this was a relief to almost everyone and you couldn’t shut some people up after that.

Alien Barristers

Walking into the courtroom on the first day, something felt oddly surreal. After settling in, I realized it was the two barristers who were giving me this feeling (the judge had not yet emerged into the courtroom).

Barrister's Wig

Partly it had to do with their quaint wigs and robes, a legacy of the British legal system. I’d seen barristers and judges wearing them in photos and TV shows but never in person. Being an American, I felt it was faintly ridiculous for grown men to wear these things while doing serious work.

The odd feeling was amplified because the two barristers also happened to look strikingly alike — elderly British men with dour, ashen faces wearing nearly identical wire-rimmed spectacles and sitting almost side by side. They had a remote and aloof presence, seemingly alien to everything and everyone else in the courtroom.

Interestingly, the week after the trial, the South China Morning Post ran a feature article on Hong Kong’s barristers, describing them as an elite class who spent much of their lives sequestered in quiet, lamp-lit offices surrounded by plush chairs, dark-wood furniture and thick, leather-bound books. Well, that goes a long way to explain what I felt looking at the two barristers.

John Cleese is in the House

Though they looked like clones of each other, the two barristers in the case couldn’t have been more different in terms of professional ability. The defending barrister was impressive, but the prosecuting barrister was, to my surprise, bumbling and incompetent. On three occasions the judge, a charming Brit with a razor sharp mind, stunned the courtroom by berating the prosecuting barrister in front of everyone.

On one of these occasions, the prosecuting barrister had called to the witness stand an expert on the production of illicit drugs. This witness, the barrister had announced, was going to physically demonstrate how the various items in the red checkered bag fit and worked together to produce heroin.

But then the barrister, in his plodding, stuttering way, started to ask the witness a lot of minutely detailed questions about the nature and purpose of each piece of equipment.

He went on and on for several minutes until the judge abruptly cut him off and said with exasperation, “Mr. Whitmore, you’ve told us that Mr. Lau would be demonstrating to us how the various pieces of equipment fit and worked together to produce the drug, so why not proceed directly to that rather than have Mr. Lau tell us about how the items work together in theory?”

“Oh, yes, yes, my lord,” the barrister stammered, “you do have a point. Uh, well, in that case….let’s have the court clerks bring the actual exhibits to the witness table, shall we?”

The clerks then created a minor ruckus shuffling over to the table containing all the exhibits, sifting through them to identify the relevant items, hauling them over to the witness table and cutting open the double layer of plastic bags that each item was carefully wrapped in. There were about a dozen items in all so it looked like this was going to take a while.

As this was going on the defending barrister suddenly stood up and said, “My lord, I don’t think there is any need to go through this exercise at all. The expert witness has previously provided written testimony that the various items in the red checkered bag fit together and could work together to produce the drug. This is already accepted evidence in the case. The Defense is not contesting these facts.”

The judge arched an eyebrow. “Well, thank you for clarifying the matter, Mr. Grassley”. Then he turned to the prosecuting barrister and said acerbically, “Mr. Whitmore, given what the Defense has just said, do you have any reason at all to proceed with this rather elaborate exercise?”

The prosecuting barrister swallowed hard and replied, “Uh, well, in that case, my lord, p-perhaps we can omit this demonstration after all.” A murmur arose in the courtroom.

“Fine,” glowered the judge, “then let’s move on.”

The clerks then created another ruckus shuffling back to the witness table, clearing it of the cut-open plastic bags and ferrying the exhibits back to their original location. Essentially, then, everything that occurred in the previous ten minutes had been a complete waste of time.

This is frigging unbelievable, I thought to myself, it’s like I’m watching a live taping of the Monty Python show!

The Verdict

After two days of courtroom testimony, the judge sent us off for the verdict. He encouraged us to return a unanimous vote, although a 6-1 or 5-2 vote was also permitted.

We deliberated the case for about 90 minutes and unanimously found the defendant guilty as charged.

After reaching our decision, one of the jurors — a wiry guy in his 40′s who wore black plastic-framed glasses and had a habit of giggling whenever something controversial or sensitive was discussed — gingerly suggested that perhaps we should submit a 6-1 vote to the court instead of a unanimous one. The rest of us gave him a puzzled look and asked him why.

“Well,” he said, “this guy, you know, might not be acting alone, right? He might even belong to a triad, right?” Giggle. “He might want to, you know….get back at us for convicting him.” He paused for effect as we digested this startling thought.

Then he continued, “If it’s a unanimous vote, then there’s no question about who voted to convict the guy — every one of us did. But if we make it a 6-1 vote, you see, we might be able to better protect ourselves because there will always be some doubt about who — “

Before he could finish, a couple of us stopped him. We knew where he was going with this and weren’t interested. There was something very unethical about manipulating the vote, for whatever reason. Turns out this weasel works for the Hong Kong civil service, which is renowned for weaselly behavior.

Later in the afternoon, after everything had wrapped up and we were just sitting around chatting one last time before going our separate ways, another juror revisited the issue again just for discussion’s sake. He said, “Would you guys have rejected the idea of submitting a 6-1 vote out of hand if we were living in the corrupt Hong Kong of the 1960’s, or if we were doing this in China?”

Hmmm……………….

The Sentence

Partly because of the unanimous verdict, the judge gave the defendant the maximum sentence of 17 years. He pointedly noted to the defendant that “if you had committed this crime in almost any other country in Asia, you would’ve gotten the death sentence.” Throughout the trial, there’d been moments when I was reminded of the heavy responsibility shouldered by jurors. This was one of those moments.

At this point we also learned for the first time that the defendant was in fact a repeat offender, having just gotten out of jail for the same crime four months before this latest incident. You wonder why he was so foolish as to commit this crime again. He was fairly well-off already, lived in a nice neighborhood and had been able to send all three of his kids to study in Canada. Now he was going to spend pretty much the rest of his life behind bars and apart from his family.

Final Thoughts

Stepping out of the courthouse and into the afternoon sun after the trial, I thought about something the judge had said to all of us prior to jury selection on the first morning.

With a warm, charming glint in his eye, he had been making us laugh by chiding us good-naturedly about all the schemes and excuses to get out of jury duty that he knew were running through our heads.

Then he paused and said, “You should also consider, however, that serving on a jury is not only every citizen’s duty, it is also a privilege. The rule of law is, after all, one of the things that makes Hong Kong unique and has made us successful and prosperous. We all sleep easier at night knowing that our legal system is there to protect us and our families. Serving on jury duty, then, is how you can personally contribute to the rule of law. So I sincerely hope that you’ll value this unique opportunity.”

After my three days in court, I came to better understand what he meant – in spite of the bumbling barrister and the weaselly juror!

Dubious About Dubai

Burj Khalifa

So we’re in the midst of one of the worst economic crisis in modern history and Dubai launches the glitzy Burj Khalifa, “the world’s tallest building”. Only in Dubai. But then again the emirate never made any sense to me, especially after I visited the place for the first time a couple of years ago on a business trip.

A few things stand out in my mind about that trip:

After a meeting on the second day of my stay, our business partner — an affable, Western-educated Iranian living in Dubai named Tom — was driving me back to my hotel. After a while on the highway he slowed down, rolled to the side of the road and pointed to our left.

“There’s your hotel, just across the way. If you walk across the highway, you’ll get there in five minutes. If I drive you over there from here, believe it or not, it’ll take twenty minutes or more. So do you mind if I let you off here and have you walk to the hotel? I’m really sorry about that, but I’m running late for my next meeting.”

I told him not to worry, but was completely taken aback. The hotel was right there, just 110 meters or so to our immediate left across the highway. Why would it take twenty minutes to drive there? As I stepped out of the car in my suit and tie, the mid-August Dubai heat bore down on me; the car radio had said that temperatures reached 50 degrees Celsius in open areas that day. Fortunately, as Tom said, it only took me a few minutes to get to the hotel after weaving through light traffic on the highway, but I was still drenched with sweat by the time I reached the front door.

The next morning while in his car again Tom explained: “Hey, I’m really sorry about yesterday. But as I told you, it would’ve taken a LOT longer to drive you to the hotel from where we were. Know why? Because they threw up all these roads and highways here but didn’t plan very well for simple things like off-ramps! We end up wasting a lot of time just driving around as a result. It’s frustrating as hell.”

He was working himself up. “That’s how Dubai is. They always do things without thinking through the details. Like, there’s this brand new five-star apartment right next to where I live. The place looks really sleek and modern, so you’d think everything in that building works perfectly, right? But noooo….Every morning residents there have to wait in line for up to fifteen minutes for the elevators. Fifteen minutes! They spent millions building this luxury housing complex and didn’t think about how many elevators they really needed in there. It’s crazy! They just throw money at things and think that’s enough.”

If this place ever crashes, I thought, maybe Tom will be one of the first to get out of town!

Something else that was curious during my trip was how we’d sometimes have to arrive ridiculously early for meetings. For example, if our meeting with a prospect was at 10:00 a.m., we’d try to get to the vicinity of the prospect’s office by around 9:15 a.m. The reason was because in many parts of Dubai, finding a parking place is really difficult. Typically, we’d arrive at a place and find that all available parking spaces were completely occupied, and would have to drive around and around waiting for a space to open up, which could take up to half an hour — another huge time-waster (and very environmentally-unfriendly) caused by poor planning.

The Burj Khalifa is just the latest example of that Dubai mindset and way of doing things.

Other anomalies in Dubai include: the population consists of 80% foreigners, the majority of whom are just living in Dubai temporarily; there’s a clash between the “decadent” lifestyle of expat Westerners and that of the local Muslim community; the male-to-female ratio is three-to-one; Dubai is basically a huge theme park with very little industry, culture and history; the emirate is ruled according to the whims of one man, Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, etc. All of this plus my experiences there made me wonder who would want to buy up all that luxury property that was being built and how sustainable Dubai’s development model was.

Now we know.

Karaoke With The Stars & Other Beijing Tales

I flew up to Beijing in the last week of October to hang out with some friends. Autumn in Beijing is always great — the weather is perfect and the capital’s residents are at their happiest.

Rock Star Romance

I had dinner one night with my Italian friend Annalisa and her lovely family at their elegant Beijing apartment. Annalisa and I studied Chinese together at the Beijing Foreign Languages University back in the 80′s. She stayed on after her studies and eventually married Li Li, the former bassist for 1989, one of China’s earliest rock bands. Annalisa now works for a bank and Li Li runs a wine import business, though he still plays bass for an African world music band in Beijing.

Over a dinner of home-made pasta and Italian wine, Annalisa recounted her first meeting with Li Li:

“I’d always been impressed with how provocative and politically aware 1989 seemed to be. The band was formed around the time of the Tiananmen massacre, yet was bold enough to name itself ’1989′ and sing political protest songs like Sting’s ‘They Dance Alone’.

“So after I met Li Li and we went out on our first date, I was full of curiosity and started to ask him all sorts of questions. I asked him why they named themselves ’1989′. To my surprise he just shrugged and said, ‘We were formed this year (1989), so we named ourselves after the year’.

“Then I asked him why they chose to cover songs like ‘They Dance Alone’. He shrugged again and said ‘It’s a nice tune, and Sting has a nice voice. Why, what’s the song about?’”

Annalisa’s girlish dreams of running away with a rebellious, idealistic, Dylanesque Chinese rock star were immediately dashed, but it obviously didn’t prevent a beautiful romance from blossoming. And that romance blossoms still.

Karaoke With The Stars

One evening my singer friend Chang Aifei took me out for karaoke, normally not one of my favorite activities. She invited renowned songwriter Cui Shu (崔恕) and his singer-songwriter wife Cui Yan (崔岩). They in turn brought along some TV starlet who is trying to become a singer as well, but I don’t remember her name.

Cui Shu & Cui Yan

It was a blast to karaoke with bona fide singers. I sat between Aifei and Cui Yan as they paired up to sing a couple of Ah Mei’s (张惠妹) fast-paced R&B songs. Aifei sang the lead, and Cui Yan sang backup, timing her entrances perfectly and matching Aifei’s melody line with just the right harmonies. They sang in tune, in rhythm and with a professional’s sense of musicality. It felt more like a private concert than a karaoke session.

They even took requests! I asked Aifei to sing a couple of Pan Yueyun’s (潘越云) songs. Just as I thought, Aifei’s voice was perfectly suited for Pan’s melancholic ballads. I don’t remember ever being moved by someone singing at a karaoke, as I was on this occasion.

It was also interesting to hear Cui Shu sing “爱如空气“, the lyrics to which he had penned. The song became a massive hit for Sun Li (孙俪) largely on the strength of Cui’s lyrics. He’s developed a well-earned reputation for writing songs that perfectly reflect women’s sensibilities and emotions.

The highlight of the evening was when Aifei stood up and belted out a full-throated rendition of Celine Dion’s “The Power of Love”, hitting all the high notes at the climax. Man, that brought the house down! Even the waiter who walked in with our bill did a double-take when he heard that feat of vocal virtuosity.

The Myth of Red Leaves

Xiang Shan (香山), in the northwest outskirts of Beijing, is most famous for its red leaves in the autumn. Thousands upon thousands of tourists from all over the country trek up the mountain every year to take in the gorgeous and inspiring sight of Xiang Shan’s red leaves, which blanket parts of the mountain around mid- to late-October. The mountain’s red leaves have inspired countless poems, odes, paintings, you name it.

There’s only one problem: The red leaves DON’T EXIST. Take a look for yourself:

Xiang Shan blanketed with red leaves - NOT!

I took that photo during a visit on Oct. 26th, an “ideal” time to catch the red leaves. I was at the peak of the mountain and did not see a single patch of red leaves anywhere.

This wasn’t the first time Xiang Shan let me down me either. I remember going on outings to the mountain to see red leaves on several occasions during my student days in Beijing, only to find nothing of the sort. In fact, when I get together with old foreign classmates from that time we still laugh about our futile quest for Xiang Shan’s famous crimson leaves.

During this trip I asked a Chinese friend about the hype v.s. reality of Xiang Shan’s autumnal leaves. He claimed the red leaves really do exist, but they tend to be red for a very brief period of time and often fall immediately to the ground after a gust of wind. RIGHT. I don’t buy it. As far as I’m concerned, Xiang Shan’s red leaves are just a myth concocted to bring tourist dollars into the area!

Zen & The Art of Making YouTube Videos

Yesterday someone forwarded this amusing YouTube video to me:

The first time I saw the video, I naturally focused on what the cat was doing. The second time I saw it, though, I was struck by the way the person behind the camera made the video. I’m guessing he or she is Japanese.

Most people making such a video would have chased the cat into the various rooms, tried to get the cat to do certain things, or maybe provided a running background commentary. In other words, they would have been very active and controlling in order to get what they wanted for the video.

By contrast, it’s intriguing to see how the maker of this video just quietly hangs back and lets things happen and unfold in their own way, yet still obtains an interesting result. There’s a stillness, calmness and wisdom underlying all this that is somehow very Japanese, very Ozu-esque — very Zen!

Mao, Mozart & Me

Wow, we’re nearing the 30th anniversary of the release of “From Mao to Mozart”, one of my favorite documentary films of all time. The New York Times published a feature article about the anniversary last week, and in October there will be a special concert in Beijing to celebrate the event.

I first saw “From Mao to Mozart” in 1981 when I was in high school, and remember that it affected me deeply. The film documents violinist Isaac Stern’s historic visit to China in 1979. It’s fascinating to watch because it offers a rare glimpse into China at that critical moment in time, when the country turned away from Maoism and the Cultural Revolution and took the first tentative steps towards reform and opening up to the world.

The film won an Academy Award in 1981, and the entire documentary is now on YouTube (see below). It’s a must-see not only for classical music lovers, but for anyone interested in China, or in general human interest stories.

Isaac Stern

Watching “From Mao to Mozart” again recently, I realized there was something that I’d completely missed the first time around: the film is ingeniously structured like a concerto in three movements.

The opening scenes of Stern arriving in China and meeting his hosts are like the first movement of a concerto, setting the tone and laying out the main themes. The middle section describing the damage caused by the Cultural Revolution, culminating with the Shanghai music professor’s poignant account of his incarceration, is like an adagio — the emotional core of a concerto. The film then segues into scenes showing Stern interacting with China’s youngest generation of music students, who represent a more hopeful future, and climaxes with a flurry of increasingly fast-cut scenes of Stern’s virtuosic concert performances. This part is like the last movement of a concerto, full of exuberance, humor and vitality. The film’s structure is not only clever, but works perfectly to frame the story that it tells.

An amusing exchange occurs near the beginning of the film (at the 12:35 mark) when Li Delun, conductor of the China Central Philharmonic Orchestra at that time, tells Stern in all seriousness that Mozart’s genius was the result of the composer’s “liberation from feudal society” and entrance into “a new stage of social development, the modern industrial society.” Stern struggles mightily to keep a straight face as he listens to this Socialist gobbledygook, covering more than half his face with his hand, perhaps to conceal a huge smirk.

No matter how many times I watch “From Mao to Mozart”, however, one scene stands out above all the others. It comes at the very end. As the credits roll, a 10-year old boy in worn sandals is seen playing a cello as big as he is. His eyes are shut, his brow furrowed. He is lost in his music, lost within himself. The boy’s extraordinary musicality and expressiveness are astonishing, and the scene ends the film with a sense of hope and renewal.

Wang Jian in "From Mao to Mozart"

A wealthy Chinese-American named Sau Wing-Lam had been so moved by this scene that he fought through mountains of bureaucratic red tape in the 1980′s to meet and bring the boy to America, where the boy eventually studied at Juilliard. The rest, as they say, is history. The skinny 10-year old in the documentary grew up to become the famed cellist Wang Jian, who now resides in Europe and is recognized as one of the greatest musicians of his generation.

Chang Aifei: Live in Concert

Aifei on stage

I was back in China last week, joining my friend Chang Aifei on a trip to Huaian in Jiangsu, where she was performing in a concert with a few other singers. It was cool to have a chance to check out the Chinese pop music scene from an insider’s point of view.

Rockin’ in Huaian

Huaian is a relatively small city with a population of around 5 million — that’s what passes for “small” in China. The city’s main claim to fame is that it’s the birthplace of former Chinese Premier and communist legend Zhou Enlai. But it has experienced a mini-boom in recent years, and we saw new buildings everywhere, including a surprisingly grand train station.

Most of Aifei’s concerts are held in small to mid-sized cities such as Huaian because people in large Chinese cities prefer to hear singers from Hong Kong and Taiwan like Andy Lau or Jay Chou, who still have greater cachet with Mainland audiences than domestic performers.

Concert Venue

The concert was held at a gymnasium that could seat about 5,000 people. It must’ve been nearly sold out because the venue was packed. The local TV station was there to videotape the event for future broadcast.

The concert included several local acts, but the four main performers were from either Beijing or Jilin. Aifei seemed to have gotten top billing. In the concert posters and banners around the venue, her picture was placed in the center and was larger than any of the other performers.

Top billing for Aifei

I’ve never asked Aifei about her fees, but from bits and pieces of our conversations on the Chinese music industry, I gathered that she probably charges around RMB15,000 to perform, not including transportation and accommodation costs. I suppose she splits that fee with the company that represents her.

The Mongolian Diva

Ge Ge about to go on stage

The first “star” singer to perform in the concert was a Beijing-based woman originally from Inner Mongolia named Ge Ge (格格). She’d come in from Beijing on the same train as us. At first, Ge Ge thought I was from Hong Kong and didn’t pay me much attention. But after she found out I was a Chinese-American, it was all smiles and cutesy conversation. Interesting that mainland Chinese people’s fascination with America is still so strong.

When we first saw Ge Ge, we thought she was an assistant to one of the performers because she was so low-keyed and casually dressed. She went from Plain Jane to Mongolian diva for her performance though, mounting the stage in a dazzlingly colorful Mongolian costume and platform shoes to make her appear taller.

Ge Ge had trained as an opera singer, but with limited opportunities in that field, she now mainly sang Mongolian pop songs.

Like all the other singers in the concert including Aifei, she sang to background music recorded on a CD rather than with a live band. She was a good singer and her Mongolian folk melodies, though cheesy when arranged as pop songs, were easy on the ear (click here for her music video “Huo Miao”). Her dimpled smile charmed the audience, who gave her a rousing round of applause at the end of her set.

Aifei the “Heavyweight”

Aifei backstage

After a couple of other acts it was Aifei’s turn to go onstage. When introducing her, the emcee built her up by saying, “Well, we’ve had a lot of strong performers tonight but now we move to the ‘heavyweight’ class of singers with Ms. Chang Aifei!” With that, Aifei strode onstage, looking sleek in a black, figure-hugging outfit that her sister had bought her from the United States.

Aifei started her set with her most famous song, “Ci Xin” (click here to listen). As soon as Aifei sang, you could tell that she was on another level compared to all the other acts. This was only the second time I’d heard her sing live, and I was struck by her ability to sing powerfully without being a belter like, say, Celine Dion. Aifei had technical prowess, but always sang with sensitivity and authentic emotion. At the end of her three-song set, the audience yelled for an encore, but the emcee chose to ignore these calls to move the show along.

After Aifei came off the stage, the TV crew pulled her to one side for an interview. Before the cameras were turned on, the reporter smiled and said to Aifei, “Your performance is definitely the highlight of this concert!”

In Love With A Divorced Woman

Chen Yujian

Aifei was followed by a male singer named Chen Yujian (陈玉建). Chen is from Jilin, and we first met him at the welcome luncheon that the concert organizer, Mr. Liu, had put on for all the visiting performers.

Chen had arrived late. He strode in with his handler, talking loudly and cracking lame jokes. He sat next to me with his thighs spread wide apart, invading my physical space. He jiggled his right leg incessantly and slurped down mouthfuls of food while peppering his conversation with smart-ass remarks.

Chen’s behavior irritated Aifei to no end. She doesn’t have a huge ego, but she’s a proud woman who values mutual respect with other performers. Chen was acting as if he was the biggest star in the room and Aifei would have none of it. When the organizer rose and asked everyone to toast and welcome Chen, Aifei remained in her seat.

You have to wonder why Chen had been so cocky. He had an unremarkable voice and sang in a cloying manner — think of someone doing a bad imitation of Smokey Robinson at a karaoke. His songs were run of the mill and off-puttingly sentimental (click here to hear Chen’s most well-known song, “I’m In Love With a Divorced Woman”). Chen had done nothing to dress up for the occasion either, simply wearing the T-shirt and tight jeans that he’d shown up in at the luncheon. The fact that he came on after Aifei’s impressive set made his mediocrity even more obvious. The audience applauded him politely but there were no calls for an encore.

Sexy Young Vixens

"Young Beautiful Girls" rehearsing

After Chen’s set, the show came to a close with a performance by the five-member girl group “Young Beautiful Girls” (青春美少女). This was the first girl group in China, established in 1995 before China learned what it meant to be hip, hence the group’s prosaic name. The group is now in its fourth incarnation, but no longer enjoys the popularity it once did because of intense competition from countless other girl groups that have emerged over the years.

The girls had also been on the train from Beijing. Without makeup, they looked like ordinary city girls and were skinny as beanstalks. They kept to themselves and generally came across as somewhat spoiled and haughty. Their harried manager, “Big Tang”,  was a nice guy who seemed to be at their beck and call: “Big Tang, tell the driver to turn down the air conditioner!”, “Big Tang, bring some water please!”.

I later went online to learn more about the group and was surprised to discover that unlike Twins, the hugely popular girl group from Hong Kong, Young Beautiful Girls aren’t packaged as sweet innocents, but as sexy young vixens (click here to see their music video).

Young and Beautiful Girls’ performance was anticlimactic. I suppose the organizer wanted to end the concert with an act that featured singing, dancing and plenty of eye candy. But the girls neither sang nor danced with any panache, and they chose to dress conservatively for this family concert.

Beer and Stinky Tofu

Immediately after the concert, Mr. Liu threw a dinner banquet for the visiting performers. Beer flowed as everyone feasted on local specialties like stinky tofu and crimson-colored crabs stir-fried with Chinese herbs.

I noticed that Chen Yujian was much quieter than he’d been at lunch. Maybe he finally realized his true place in the Chinese pop music world. I concluded that he’s a ne’er-do-well who bluffed his way into the pop music scene, had a minor hit and is now trying to pass himself off as a star in a desperate attempt to belong and be respected. In the end, I felt a bit sorry for him.

It was already 10:45 p.m. when a few local government officials dropped by to say hello. They were drinking in an adjacent room and apparently knew Mr. Liu, the organizer of the concert. After a round of introductions, during which time I saw them ogle the Young Beautiful Girls, they returned to their room along with Liu and his assistant.

A few minutes later, Liu’s assistant came back into our room and whispered something in Big Tang’s ear. Big Tang’s face drew tight and he became increasingly agitated. He shook his head vigorously and waived the woman away.

Big Tang then rushed over to Aifei, looking as if he had ingested too many pieces of stinky tofu. “You know what Liu’s assistant just said to me?” he said, “She asked for the girls to stay longer to help them ‘entertain’ those goddamn government officials! What the hell is that? Who do they think we are? We’re professional singers, not Geisha! Let’s get the hell out of this place!”

Even though Aifei wasn’t directly involved in this incident, she was offended by it and leaned over to tell Ge Ge what just happened. All of us from Beijing quickly finished our meals, gathered our stuff and fled the place.

Counterfeit Communism

In China these days, Communist Party membership is mostly an opportunistic way to get ahead in life. I was hilariously reminded of this during a trip to Shanghai earlier in the year.

I was in a taxi chatting with a mainland Chinese friend. She belongs to the new middle class in China which has benefited enormously from the country’s economic reforms. It helps that her family are all members of the Party; she’s definitely well-connected and well-informed.

While in the taxi my friend started to warn me about counterfeit money. “Look out for fake RMB100 bills, especially if you’re buying stuff on the streets. There’s so many of them floating around these days.”

“Do you ever get them?” I asked.

“Of course,” she said.

“What do you do with them?”

“I turn them all over to my dad.”

“And what does he do with them?”

With total nonchalance, she replied: “He uses them to pay off his Party membership fees.”

I stared at her wide-eyed and howled with laughter. After a split second, the full irony of what she had said suddenly hit her and she too doubled over and giggled uncontrollably.

Perhaps the CCP ought to rename itself the Chinese Counterfeit Party. That would better reflect the reality in China these days — in more ways than one.

Encounter With a Chinese Pop Diva

The first time I saw Chang Aifei (常艾非), she was walking alone on the vast, empty grounds of an 18th century French chateau, lost in her thoughts. She wore a long, dark dress, looking forlorn as the wind blew through her raven hair. She was the vision of a melancholic beauty, in search of love, yet untouchable. As the day receded, she faded into the sunset, a sad, lonely, mysterious figure.

Actually, that was a scene from Aifei’s music video for her hit song “Ci Xin” (刺心). We were introduced to each other by a friend and were meeting up for the first time the following day, so I checked out the video beforehand in order to get to know her music.

I didn’t expect much from this moderately well-known Chinese singer, but was pleasantly surprised by what I saw in the video. Aifei sang with authentic emotion and there was a sense of longing and loneliness to her voice that I found intriguing. Moreover, her manner in the video was earnest and completely unaffected. I thought to myself, this isn’t the usual manufactured Mando-pop diva but a real person who seems committed to her craft. Here is the video:

http://v.ku6.com/show/UlkFFqlY1IpXeWNo.html

The Lan Club

We met up for lunch the next day at The Lan Club, an ultra chic restaurant designed by Phillippe Starck in the Chaoyang district. The Beijing traffic held me up and I arrived late. As I approached Aifei, she turned to face me and I noticed what a photogenic face she had even without professional lighting and makeup.

To my great relief, Aifei was easygoing, down-to-earth and surprisingly self-effacing for a person working in the entertainment industry. We talked about her life and career.

Growing Up in Nanjing

“People tell me I look like a Northerner,” Aifei smiled, “but actually I’m from Nanjing.

“My dad performed in a song and dance ensemble attached to the People’s Liberation Army. Though he was mainly involved in the performing arts, he acted just like a military man. He treated the three of us — my older sister, brother and I — as if we were soldiers! It didn’t help that he had a bad temper. He’d bark at us if our shoes weren’t lined up straight, and would beat us if we got into trouble. I grew up afraid of my father, and would sometimes hide from him after he came home from work.”

Aifei wanted to become a singer after graduating from high school, but her father insisted that she go into accounting, as her grandfather had done. She dutifully completed her accounting degree and worked joylessly in an office for a while, but just couldn’t shake off her yearning to sing.

After countless arguments with Aifei, her father came to realize that his own genes ran too strong in this daughter, who not only inherited his good looks but also the very same expressive impulses that roiled within him. With a sigh he finally relented and let Aifei go her own way.

“I packed my suitcase and headed north to Beijing,” Aifei continued, picking through her salad. “For me, this wasn’t only a chance to pursue my dream, but also to release myself from my father’s grip. I loved him and understood that everything he did was out of love, but I desperately needed to break free from his control. I just wanted my freedom. Freedom, freedom, freedom. That’s all I could think about.”

A New Life in Beijing

Arriving in Beijing in 1997, Aifei tried out for and successfully entered the Beijing Dance Drama & Opera Theater. This state-run troupe put on quaint and politically correct song and dance performances, which were hardly Aifei’s cup of tea. But it offered her a degree of professional respectability, a roof to live under, a low but steady salary and reasonable medical benefits. Besides, work at the Theater was stable but infrequent, allowing her time to explore other performing opportunities. Joining the troupe also helped to reassure her father, who had been concerned that Aifei would just end up drifting in the capital’s messy entertainment scene.

“My musical hero at that time was Su Rui,” Aifei said. “What I really wanted to do was to sing like her.”

Su Rui (蘇芮) was a Taiwanese pop icon in the early 80′s who lit a fire under an entire generation of young Chinese across Asia with her rock-inflected, socially conscious music. But the gigs that Aifei managed to line up on her own – mostly evening performances at bars and hotel lounges — didn’t demand this kind of music, and neither did the general public, which preferred saccharine love ballads.

Sex and the City

I asked Aifei if she ever ran into trouble or had to deal with shady characters working at bars and clubs. “Not really,” she replied. “There was just this one time at a bar. I’d just finished a set when someone tapped me on the shoulder and said his ‘boss’ wanted me to join their table. I politely turned him down, and he gave me a cold stare before walking away. Later, the manager of the bar told me the ‘boss’ was actually a local gangster, and advised me to stay away from performing in the area for a while because I’d offended the guy. But that was it.”

Really, that was it? Aifei probably detected my skepticism. She took a sip of tea, gathered her thoughts and then continued.

“You know, in many ways I’m still very much the person I used to be in Nanjing. People tell me I’m too simple and naïve for this industry, and they’re probably right. But early on I made a promise to my father – and to myself — about how I’d live my life here in Beijing, and I’ve stayed true to my principles, probably at some cost to my career. I avoid bad people. I go straight home after performing. I live healthily.

“I’m well aware that people in the entertainment industry have a bad reputation. You know, most men in China immediately rule me out as marriage material because I’m a pop singer. They read the gossip headlines and assume everyone in the industry is taking drugs, having affairs or whatever. But in fact most of us are just like everyone else, trying hard to make an honest living.

“If anything, I’m sometimes shocked at the lifestyle of my white collar friends. I know this really pretty woman who is a high-flying manager at a multinational company. During the day she goes to the office wearing these smart, conservative suits. At night, she throws on her miniskirts and goes hunting for Western men.

“I remember she called me up late one night, begging me to go out with her to The World of Suzie Wong. I arrived at her flat around 11:00 p.m. She was still dashing to and fro, showering, putting on makeup and picking out clothes. I usually don’t stay out late unless I have to, and almost fell asleep on her sofa waiting for her to get ready.

“When we got to the club, she sat at the bar with a cigarette dangling between her fingers. Her eyes darted left and right like a hunter looking for prey. Given that she was gorgeous and was hardly wearing anything at all that night, it wasn’t long before guys started coming over to her. They ignored me, though!

“That night she took a guy home and I left on my own. She later bragged to me that she had four different men over four nights that week.

“In the end, she became pregnant by a foreign man she had an affair with. But he disappeared and she had to go through the pregnancy all by herself. After raising the baby alone for several months, she eventually found the father again. Last I heard, they’re still together, but who knows for how much longer?”

Aifei leaned back in her chair and took another sip of tea. I smiled and nodded to let her know I understood what she was trying to say.

Affairs of the Heart

Turning back to the topic of her career, Aifei said she regrets staying in the Beijing Dance Drama & Opera Theatre for so long. “In the end it’s a state-run ensemble, and its lazy culture sort of rubbed off on me. I settled into that lifestyle and the time just slipped away. If I’d been out on my own, forced to scratch out a living, I’d probably been better able to fulfill my potential.”

Album Cover for "Ganqing Guanxi"

A glimpse of that potential came in 2006 with the online release of her self-produced album “Ganqing Guanxi” (感情关系 Affairs of the Heart). The single from that album, “Ci Xin”, became an Internet hit, and the ringtone of the song has been downloaded at least 300,000 times.

“I was in my mid-thirties and realized that the prime years of my singing career would soon be over. But what did I have to show for it? After much thinking I decided to put out an album. Without much of a track record, though, no company would invest in me. It doesn’t help that I’m not willing to make compromises to get ahead in this industry, know what I mean? So I had to take out a large chunk of my own life savings to produce the album and the video. It was very risky.”

The experience turned out to be quite an ordeal. Two Taiwanese producers gouged her financially to produce some of the songs; her CD distributor in Guangdong only paid a fifth of the fees she’d contracted them for; and she’s sure the company selling the ringtone for “Ci Xin” is vastly under-reporting the download figures to her.

“I’d do something about all these breaches of contract, but you know how the legal system is in China. So I just let it all go,” Aifei said with resignation.

Aifei’s shoestring budget enabled her to finish producing the music and video, but not to actually promote the album. As a result, the album became popular primarily through word-of-mouth from people who’d heard it on the Internet or the radio.

“If you look through the Internet,” Aifei said, “you’ll see a lot of comments from ordinary people on websites saying ‘Who is this singer, and why haven’t we heard about her before?’ or ‘Why isn’t this great song (i.e. “Ci Xin’) being promoted anywhere?’ So even though I didn’t make money from the album, it’s great to know so many people liked it. It has also brought me more attention from the industry, and I’ve gotten some opportunities as a result of that.”

I asked Aifei what her ultimate ambitions are. She wistfully replied, “At my age, the window of opportunity is likely to close very fast. I just want to make something I’m proud of, something I can leave behind, so that in the future I’ll be able to say ‘Hey, I once was a singer, and this is what I sang.’”

(See also “Chang Aifei: Live in Concert“)

 

//

Portrait of an Artist as a Young Woman

I just came back from a short trip to Beijing, a place I used to call my second home. Since saying goodbye to the city in 1994, however, I’d returned only once, in 2003.

My fondest memories of Beijing are the people I’d met there. Beijing probably has the most diverse collection of talent anywhere in China. Politicians, intellectuals, writers, directors, rock singers, avant garde artists, dissidents — you name it, they’re all there. During my short stay this time I was fortunate enough to meet some very interesting people as well.

About Haoyi

Haoyi

One was a rising Beijing Opera star named Wu Haoyi (吴昊颐). At 29 years old, Haoyi has been performing professionally for a few years now and is one of the leading lights of her generation of Beijing Opera performers. Standing at about 5 feet 5 inches, Haoyi has the slim, fit physique of a Beijing Opera actor. On this night she had her hair swept back and fastened with a clip. A dimple flashed whenever she smiled. But her most remarkable feature are her large, expressive eyes. In Beijing Opera, a lot is expressed through the eyes. I can imagine sitting in the back rows of a theater and still being touched by Haoyi’s eyes.

Given Beijing Opera’s lack of popularity in China these days, I was surprised at how busy Haoyi was, seemingly occupied with activities every day. I was only able to catch her during her dinner break on a weeknight. She was in the middle of  a rehearsal for an experimental performance conceived and directed by a French director.

“How’s the rehearsal coming along?” I asked. “So-so”, she replied with a sigh. “The director is pretty willful and stubborn.” How quintessentially French, I thought.

A Family of Artists

Haoyi’s family is no stranger to the performing arts. Her grandmother was a Beijing Opera actress, and her father is a singer. Haoyi recalls being a boisterous child and something of a ham, always eager to act, sing and dance. “There wasn’t much doubt what I wanted to do when I grew up,” she said with a smile.

Haoyi started training in Beijing Opera at age thirteen. I bow to her for having the discipline, perseverance, character and talent to survive the years of arduous training in this difficult art form. Beijing Opera actors not only have to master singing and acting, but also dancing, the martial arts, acrobatics and applying makeup — all of which are done in the highly complex and idiomatic style of Beijing Opera. For Haoyi to have gone through all this and reach the top of her profession is an immense achievement. I have nothing but the deepest respect and greatest admiration for her.

An Art Form in Peril

Haoyi in costume

And yet, the rewards for such dedication and achievement are meager. Each time Haoyi goes on stage with her troupe, she earns but RMB100. The audience for Beijing Opera is getting smaller and older by the day. Go to a performance these days and all you see is a sea of white hair. Many of her young colleagues have left the profession to go into pop music, TV dramas or business. At one point even Haoyi had contemplated giving it all up. Fortunately for Beijing Opera, she chose to stay.

As we talked over a meal of chicken and vegetables, Haoyi expressed frustration at the ultra-conservative, hierarchical and political culture of the state-owned opera troupe she performs with. Beijing Opera desperately needs to be reformed in order to attract new and younger audiences, but the art form has become ossified, especially in Beijing.

“In the days of Mei Lanfang“, Haoyi told me, “actors never stopped innovating. But these days, people are satisfied doing things the way they’ve always been done. I’m not only talking about how we perform, but also how troupes are run and operated.

“In the Beijing Opera world, for example, seniority counts for everything. Regardless of how talented a young actor might be, they’re not given many opportunities in the spotlight until older actors pass from the scene.”

In the West, by contrast, the classical arts are kept vibrant in part because of the heavy marketing of young, stylish-looking performers whom young people can identify with. When I mentioned this to Haoyi, she nodded and said “I know”.

Seeing the World

Haoyi brightened up, however, when she talked about the opportunities to see the world traveling with her troupe. She has been to California, Las Vegas, Europe, Hong Kong and other places in the past couple of years. In the travel photos displayed on her blog, you can see how joyful she is when experiencing other cultures and seeing new things.

But even her enthusiasm for travel has had to be tempered. “Two years ago, our troupe signed a multiyear agreement to perform in the United States,” she told me, “and I’d been looking forward to visiting the country every year. But during our first trip to America under this contract, one of the actresses slipped away and defected. To our huge disappointment, the government responded by banning the entire troupe from any further travel to the United States for the next five years.”

After dinner, Haoyi drove me a short distance to catch a taxi. As I waived goodbye to her, I thought to myself that as long as there are people like her in Beijing Opera, this 160-year old art form will always have hope.