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Strategies & Market Trends : Asia Forum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Worswick who wrote (4843)	6/26/1998 10:39:00 AM
From: Bosco	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 9980

g'day all - dear Clark, 1st, I certainly do not mind people, especially people of your caliber, having a constructive criticism of China [or any other country, culture, civilization for that matter.] I must agree that the official face of China isn't that funny - or fun - unless one has a twisted sense of humour. I mean, if one sees a PRC official smiling, one should be worried <vbg>! If one had a choice, maybe one should hang out with the tibetans instead! So, personally, I don't see a problem calling a spade a spade. Having said that, obviously, spades are not a full deck made. In case of your example about you offered to the Indian hedge fund manager, my guess is that waitering cuts across all cuisine lines, chinese restaurant or not chinese restaurant, especially if the table prior to yours just ran off with the check without paying! Of course, the chinese waiter usually has the last laugh when he has eaten 1/2 of your order of S&S Pork before serving it to you. There is no doubt that China has a long way to go - and certainly it is in stack contrast with its civilization [ok, depending which of the 24 sets of history one is using <G>] However, the equal puzzlement applies, I suppose, to the split image between some of the sublimed cultural traces of Japanese and its behaviour in WWII [or even some of the preversities bubbling underneath the surface of modern Japan.] Or the native indians before they discovered casino in this country. Two wrongs don't make one right, I am not trying to justify bad behaviour with ideas like "the pot shouldn't call a kettle black." Personally, cynicism aside, I think we should be critical of injustice and absurdity regardless of its original. More important, armchair philosophizing without any follow thru probably does more harm than good. So, maybe it is a good start to bring opinions to the fore [even if this is a subtopic of an investment forum.] Of course, for people like yourself with insight and understanding, there are other venue like H Con Res 283 etc. Good luck best, Bosco

To: Worswick who wrote (4843)	6/26/1998 11:55:00 AM
From: Constant Reader	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 9980

Clark: I have eaten in at least 1,000 Chinese restaurants in about 20 different countries, probably far more. (Actually, Clark, I *have* lived on Chinese food for almost 25 years.) I would not dream of generalizing about all of those restaurants in one single sentence. I don't know what reaction you would expect anywhere in the world if you shouted at someone to come back to your table when they were already 10 feet away. I think the reaction would vary, although most would probably not appreciate the method or the tone implied by such rude behavior! I tested your theory at an American coffee shop this morning. The waitress was far from pleased, as was my much embarrassed dining companion. It seems to me that you must believe this statement is a fact: *If the current leadership and the Chinese people are the same then, since this is an investment forum, I don't think we'll ever see the cash. Never.* Thus, I certainly hope for your sake that you have not invested in any company doing business in China. I think the Chinese leadership was out of synch with the people for quite some time, perhaps the entire 40 years you mention, although I think it may be a shorter period than that. For much of that time, they were able to forcibly repress, or deflect criticism and disappointment in their administration of the nation's affairs by pointing to progress made since the economic/poltical/military disasters suffered from 1920 until 1949. An appeal to patriotism, after all, is the last (and best) refuge of the scoundrel. Take care, Randy

To: Worswick who wrote (4843)	6/27/1998 12:23:00 PM
From: Doug Soon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 9980

Worswick, I earlier commented on one of your earlier posts that we all need to get a lot further under the fabric of a culture to have any chance of understanding people. Your Chinese restaurant story further illustrates this. I am sure (maybe not) that this is how you you have generalized an entire ethnic group. I know a little about Chinese restaurants in America myself. Growing up, my friends and I would often go to Chinese restaurants. They were pretty much the same kind of thing but we had a favorite that we went to for years. The waiters were even somewhat as you describe, and our favorite place had a particularly dour guy that often waited on us. But, we were kids, which meant that we usually had too much to say and too often showed it. Worswick, you said you wait until they are ten feet away from the table and call them back. Very funny, here were a few of our tricks. We called our waiter "Larry". For the years we went to this restaurant, others picked up the name "Larry", and he eventually reconciled himself to answering to this name. His english was poor and we made fun of it. We teased him about the food, (was soya sauce made from bugs? Is the chicken really cat? Does your family eat dogs?), it was as relentless as it was repetitive. Of course, we chose the name "Larry", because he had trouble pronouncing it himself. Throughout, he remained inscrutable. He did little to fight back, he just gave us lousy service. After our school years, we all went our separate ways including "Larry". I finally grew up and realized how badly we and many people like us had treated him. "Larry", of course, was not his real name, we didn't want to use his "foreign" name. This only scratches the surface of how badly we treated him, and I have seen this same scenario many times in many places in America and it continues today. If you haven't seen this you haven't been out much. If I ran into "Larry" today I would apologize to him for the abuse. I would not expect his forgiveness although it would sure help my guilt. Oh, by the way, our group of friends were multi- cultural, with me being ethnic Chinese, born in North America, and wanting to be "Western" like my friends.DS PS: Next on Jerry Springer, Chinese Waiters with guest Clark Worswick on "My patrons keep telling lousy jokes".