I Think China Did Well - Part 1

In my last posting I hinted that I was not a China-bashing enthusiast. I got bashed nonetheless.

Caveat : I was never and still am not a communist party sympathizer nor a pro-Communist bugger. No Sir, not in the past nor likely in the future! I must admit though that I was somewhat impressed by the structural workings (or, machinations, if you wish) of a 'Command Economy' as compared to a free-market system's ... in poverty-stricken countries.

 My thumbs up for a command economy stemmed from some secondary but 'broad' research into select areas of comparative economics. This was undertaken pursuant to my part-time teaching in the early through mid-80's. Be that as it was, I must unequivocally confess that I have always been into Adam Smith's, Maynard Keynes',  Milton Friedman's et al.

Mind you, I read - albeit not too passionately into and about Karl Marx's, V. Lenin's and G.Hegel's too whilst in college.

By the way,  I named my son after the monetarist's.

Here goes my long winded musings about the PRC's :

For years, I have been predisposed to many things favorable to, of, from and about  the People's Republic of China (PRC). I must admit, however, that at the same time, I held no idolistic regards for or about nor was ever awe-inspired by the Beijing Central Government nor its functionaries. My positive regards for PRC as a nation has been shaped in the main by my personal encounters with, observations of and experiences gained through  three past personal visits to the PRC. These visits  spanned a good 30 years and more.

My first visit was in late 1988 to my late father's ancestral village. The village is on the outskirt of the city of  Xinyi. Present day's Xinyi is one of the administrative county under the prefecture of  the greater Maoming city's region in the province of Guangdong. That made my dad a Cantonese. That made me, of course, a Cantonese too - by birth.

That first visit was in fact a "side trip". Up until the mid-1990's, the average younger-than-60-years-old Joe-Malaysian was not allowed to visit the PRC unless prior official permissions were obtained. Such OK's  would be from the Immigration Department under the Ministry of Home Affairs. Permissions would only be granted after a couple or more of months' waiting and only where application was underpinned by a strong, valid reason.

My first trip to the PRC was as a member of a  Malaysian government sanctioned trade mission to the Guangdong Autumn Trade Fair in late 1988. This 'mission' was comprised of some ten local businessmen and/or manufacturers. They were led by two mid-level trade officials from the Malaysian Ministry of Industry and International Trade (MITI),

It was an eye opener for me. In this Autumn Fair, one particular range of  PRC's products caught my dedicated attention : Aero-model Engines.

I recalled these model engines were tagged cheaply ranging from US$5 to US$30 apiece, depending on the displacements or cubic capacities of the models. The cast-aluminium bodies were coarse though polished.  Even the main component's mould's residual drainage lines were visible. The assembled components attached or affixed and parts married were crude in finishings too despite evidence of  heavy buffings.

Packagings for all the model engines on display were rough brownish cardboard boxes with bare minimum number of printed Chinese characters. The printed characters included only the model-numbers and the names of the state-owned enterprise. There were no individual catalogs nor user manual for each model. Instead,  a generalized printed brochure describing the enterprise's endeavors and its 'business addresses and fax numbers' were distributed to trade visitors. Such on-the-spot promotional literature  and brochures were generally common for other on-display, big-ticket engineering products. Examples were articulated agricultural three-wheeled tractors, hand-operated small agricultural mechanized ploughs. They also exhibited electric rice-cookers, noodles making machines, weighing scales and weighbridges, automatic packaging conveyors, and I think even one or two semi-automatic weaving looms.

My interest in aero model engines began in junior high school where I signed up and joined the Aero Modelling Club together with another classmate, Mr. Y.S. Kong. As an extension of interests in aeroplnes, I also signed up and joined my school's Air Training Corp (ATC). Rookies of the ATC had their weekly 'do' at the KL RMAF Base located off  Jalan Sungei Besi. I attended two drill-sessions there and decided it was a no-go for me. You see, I was more into the Boy Scouts activities as a result of me having much earlier earn the then coveted 'Scout Cord' award.

So, I chose not to continue with the ATC. Consequently, my interests in things 'aero' took a backseat and was by no means lost. Nay, just remained latent!

The PRC now produced their own stealth aircraft after having earlier successfully flew to the moon.

My wife, Kay has over the last few months purchased and used almost daily her many beautifully designed and very sleek-looking Made-In-China electric/electronic and pressure cookers, air fryers, breadmaking machine, hot water dispensers, etc.

HEREINABOVE READ MY FIRST "A+" IMPRESSION OF THE PRC.

More in my next posting. Cheers!👴

(Oh, by the way, I learnt years ago that my classmate Mr. Y.S. Kong was flying as a Captain with the Singapore Airlines. On the other hand, I obtained my Private Pilot's License in the early 1970's while still doing my post graduate studies.)

China Bashings and I Got Bashed Too !

My wife, Kay,  has been a silent follower  of the Hong Kong free democracy movement and its many protests when these were first headlined internationally in early 2019. When these protests turned disruptive, she became quite a vocal supporter. I was pleasantly surprised by her new found interests in politics. I have known her to be apolitical since we got married in the mid-70's.

Save for the GE in 2018 and especially its outcome, even Malaysian politics never meant much to her let alone politics in faraway Hong Kong S.A.R. Hence, me and my euphoric surprise -  geopolitics too! Oh, I digressed.

Did my wife then  had an audience? Yes, my daughter and I.

When the protests up-ticked into violent confrontations between the protesters and the Hong Kong Police, my wife became agitatedly more vocal. She blamed the chaos as the direct consequence of the  incompetence of the CEO of the HK SAR at first and laterly the Beijing government. Mind you, she was real mad and had all the sympathies for the HK youthful protesters.

Trying to pacify her for the self-inflicted anger, I telephoned my graduate school's classmate Mike and asked for his personal views about the political unrests ruling in HK then. Mike nonchalantly said, "It is all about control." When pressed if he and family members were OK, he added, "Um... yes, it is still normal  for us here." My wife paid no heed to this ground zero HK citizen's defacto sitrep (situation report).

Mike was born and bred in HK and he retired as the MD of a midsized HK bank. Mike was also credited to be the first HK-banker that started PRC's first private commercial bank in Shanghai in the late-80's/early-90's. Mike told me then it was at the behest of China's then finance head honcho, Mr. Zhu Rongji.

When the deadly coronavirus or Wuhan Virus (later referred to as 'the Covib-19 virus" by the W.H.O.) first broke into the international news media, my wife became even more judgemental about the 'reported' goings-on in the world in general and in the People's Republic of China in particular.

Every morning she would switched on our television set (a Samsung smart-tv) and follow the latest "news" streaming out from Youtube's as well as specific websites she selected. These included main stream media organisations' as well as non-bona fide so-called news 'stations'. Save for a few HK-based Cantonese "stations" and almost without exception, all other 'stations' reported in English.

Each time she bounced off her remarks of displeasure about the Chinese Communist Party of the PRC, I reminded her that some would be no more than voices of China-bashing rhetoric. I added that these were likely drummed up by the Western Media in consonant with their political leaders'  anti-Communist stances.

OMG...! You know what?

I got bashed real good by my wife!

Why? Why and why my siding with things of and about the  PRC?

Read my next postings - if you want to. Ciao!

Trying Times !

It has been some nine years and eight months since I last posted some of my two-cents' worth of thoughts.

Fast forward to the present - where the deadly covid-19 has put the entire globe in harm's way!

For almost 30 days now my family and I have hunkered down in our 2,000 sq,ft. condominium in Kuala Lumpur. We have complied with our government's call to stay in at home when the Movement Control Order (MCO) was first invoked and took effect from the 18th. March, 2020. Now the MCO has been extended and, God willing, is scheduled to end on 28th. instant.

It was very unreal during the first four or five days of the MCO : No outdoor exercises nor even a casual drive out to the city's markets to shop for foods. Having my usual rounds at my preferred pub were and still remain impossible. Pubs, being in the non-essential service sector stayed closed. Driving out would likely be challenged by policemen and soldiers manning many officially sanctioned roadblocks. With no tenable excuses nor valid reasons for flouting the MCO's rules, one would likely be put into a slammer and fined RM1,000. For me, no way, Jose!

Prior to the MCO, my wife had the foresight to and did stock up her four refrigerators with fruits, vegetables, meats, baking flours and other canned foods. For the first week or so, foods were  plentiful at home. Before they ran out, our daughter, Mel, has the presence of mind and ordered online for home deliveries various foods, fruits and even my heart's medicines. She is still doing this every four or five days..

Mel now works from home by ways of teleconferencing and phone calls. She carries a double burden, really. How so? Well, she has a 7-years old daughter (our granddaughter) who now has the luxury of not having to go to school.

"Hil! You stop watching the Ipad now and do your homework," sternly ordered Mel. This outburst or similar exhortations were oft-repeated daily. The resultant whining of reluctance (perhaps defiance actually) from the kiddo were, I must admit, quite unnerving, if not irritating. That's life under the MCO I guess. No thanks to the pandemic.

Of course, the grand kiddo was also kept busy with online tuition and even online gymnastic classes. These are ongoing and at least accorded the kiddo some semblance of normalcy sans school. Besides, she also facetime-chatted every other day with little Eli, our neighbor's 6 years old girl . They were regular playmates before the MCO days. It is a mere 10 ft. across that separated ours and Eli's condo units.

As for me, the daily routines now follow this sequence : Morning in-room exercises, then breakfast mainly of cereals; next with my Ipad and Iphone, catching up with the latest local and international news and checking inward email as well as chats dished out by my many chatgroups; dithering with my old PC and my equally old Dell laptop; occasional pranking with the grand kiddo, and having my late afternoon walk inside the condo unit. The daily walk round lasts for 30 minutes and, yes, I smartwatch-recorded an average of about 2,700 steps - equivalent of  some 2.0 km each time .   Around midnight I would watch an actions or sci-fic movie and have a can of beer before I retire.

Of course, lunches and dinners too - all cooked by my wife. She was, still is and will continue to be the person who tired out most by the end of each day. She forced herself to and regimentedly cook every meal instead of ordering foods from vendors without. She has less than full confidence over the handlings of cooked foods by deliverymen. Understandable.

Yes, my wife ... She is the reason that I have decided to blog-write again. More in my next posting... See ya. Cheers!