The chinese hair experiment

In a country where 90% of people are the same ethnicity, foreigners stick out. As a blonde man in China, I seem to be spotted from miles away. I've gotten used to the attention that my foreign appearance brings, but some days it would be nice just to blend with the crowd. One day I decided I would try to do just that. I figured my blonde hair is the number one thing that identifies me as a foreigner. If my hair wasn't blonde, would I stand out as much?

CHINESE HAIR

All Chinese people have naturally black hair. However not all Chinese hair is natural. Especially among youth, dying hair is very popular. In my opinion brown hair works well with Chinese who want to stand out. Red and Blonde are also very common, however it always looks awful. Maybe black hair can't look natural dyed a lighter color...I really don't know. Anyway, I did the opposite of many of my Chinese students and dyed my hair black. Here is the result:

I couldn't find a picture of me with black hair. These are just two chinese people I saw on the street.

Did dying my hair black conceal my identity as a foreigner? Certainly not. But it DID make me blend into a crowd better. Instead of being spotted from down the street, Chinese people would need to be within a few yards of me to recognize my foreignness. This turned out to be more of a burden then a blessing. The upside to being a foreigner with blonde hair is its really easy for your friends to spot you in a crowd (there is ALWAYS a crowd in China). Now I understand why many of my students dye their hair or wear ridiculous looking clothing--so they don't have to waste ten minutes looking for each other every time they want to meet up.

After a month of intensive field work, I put the chinese hair experiment to an end. I donated my spent research materials to a local barber shop for further study. On the subject of barber shops, every hairdresser I've seen in China is male. There are over a dozen barber shops on the commercial street near my university which collectively employ over 100 hairdressers. My theory is that they all stay in business because Chinese people get their haircut every week. A haircut is about $1.25--shampooing and head massage included. 

Without my black hair I've noticed I stand out much more. Buzz cuts aren't very popular in China.

Happy Summer.

The current political situation in China

I have been following the Republican primary passively over the past few months. I'm glad to be here in China where I can choose to follow the debate or not. During the 2008 election when I lived in Missouri (a swing state) I had nowhere to escape from the campaign. In China it is also an election here, and If I wasn't so observant I could have missed the whole thing entirely. There is no advertising blitz, no rhetoric, and no catering to base or swing voters here.

Ever since Mao's leadership in China ended, there has been a change in the top political leadership every ten years. China's government is modeled on the old Soviet system with a nine member Politburo Standing Committee that decides policy for the country. The mechanics of how the new leaders are selected are not well understood by people outside the upper echelons of the communist party. However, this transition has happened smoothly for decades. This year there have been a few hiccups.


BO XILAI

Bo Xilai was a rising star in the communist party. It was expected that he would get a position in the new Standing Committee. Most recently he was the highest ranking official of Chongqing municipality (one of China's largest cities--28 million people). He was very much a populist/man of the people. His popular personality is in stark contrast to the current leadership (ie Hu Jintao, Wen Jiabao) who are much more reserved.

Bo Xilai's political career ended quite suddenly in the past few weeks. It all started when Bo's police chief was caught trying to seek political asylum at a US embassy. The police chief had been conducting a corruption investigation of Bo and feared retaliation. The police chief has been placed in 'vacation style rehabilitation' by the central government for seeking to flee China. Bo Xilai has been demoted from his post and faces a serious corruption investigation. What will happen to him next is still a mystery.

Here is a good article on Bo Xilai.


BEIJING COUP

Last week there was a rumor going around the Chinese internet that there was a coup attempt in Beijing. Although there was little evidence to substantiate the claims, the government was quick to squash the rumor mill. All in all, 6 people were arrested for spreading the rumor and 16 websites were shut down. The most important among those websites was Weibo, the Chinese twitter. It wasn't completely taken down do to its immense popularity, but it's comment feature was disabled (so you can respond to anyone's tweets). The website will be restored to full functionality tomorrow.