A word on the Chinese people

I typically got the same response from people when I told them that I was going to China. It was essentially a mixture of "wow that's really exciting...but why the eff would you do that?" Yes. It's true, for our standards the Chinese are incredibly rude. They stare. They hack and spit. They are so ridiculously loud. They walk around with their shirts up and bellies exposed when they get hot. They piss everywhere. They push, they shove, and don't seem to care about anyone but themselves. (This isn't true for all Chinese..mainly for the older crowds). But to understand why the way they are you need to understand their history. Well, at least when Mao came into the picture.

These people have been straight up abused by their government since 1949. They say that Mao did 70 percent good and 30 percent bad for China. It's all how you look at it and what you believe, but I know for certain the 30 percent that was bad was really, really bad. I mean, he did get the whole country off of their opium addiction, and he did turn it more into a land of opportunity. But my God the other stuff he did was just ridiculous. Like killing all the sparrows in china, which caused an increase of locusts eating crops and starting a giant famine that killed some 30 million Chinese people? That was one of the many strengths on his resume. He decided that China needed to be a superpower and to achieve that he needed to destroy basically their whole culture. He knocked down all the of the ancient temples and monuments. All the ancient city walls. In their place he put up factories. Hence the smog and pollution levels, and the hacking and spitting. Hence the sad, cheap immitation knock offs of old temples.

It made me think. What would China be like if the communist party hadn't won? Would China have blue skies and be cleaner? Would the people be less pushy because it wasn't survival of the fittest? Or would they be worse off. Because now China is really like the wild west. Full of opportunity to make some money, to get out of poverty. It's pretty interesting to think about. I mean I go back in forth with this a lot in my head, but nothing seems to explain the staring...except for the borders being opened up only thirty years ago.