a lot of people ask me why I miss china. it’s a legitimate question. I don’t miss the fear, or the loneliness. I especially don’t miss the grotesque expatriates, hands-down the worst part of my experience in shanghai - the clubbing monsters who made obsequious gestures to the culture but spent their evenings drunk at a mall on huaihai lu or nanjing xi lu or the bund or what-have-you.
what I miss, I suppose, is the sense of possibility, the idea that the blending of what we believe as “normal” could in fact be totally wrong, but revised in a positive way that didn’t infringe on our basic beliefs of equality and opportunity. history in america is littered with failed alternatives to the american dream. in china, I came to believe that those who think the american dream died with lincoln are just as wrong as those who believe the american dream has stood immutable since the monroe doctrine.
there is a future for this country, the united states, beyond the petty narrow dichotomies our politics demand we retroactively normalize. a lot of people look on us with dread and believe the trope inherent in the term “the quiet american,” but I feel like there’s something in opportunity that can unite such a grossly partisan behemoth in a productive, multifaceted way.
in china, I felt that future so close to me that I could reach out and touch it. in the rareified air of washington, I sometimes feel like I’m dying without that close contact, even as I acknowledge that such a longing is a luxury impossible in the PRC. in the grimmest times, I’m tempted to dismiss my feelings as the miserable western imputation of a frontier on china—remember, the response to the oft-quoted maxim “o brave new world that has such people in it” is actually a sarcastic wisecrack: “‘tis new to thee.”
but I’m an optimist, an optimist tempered beyond the schoolboy book-learned dreams of black-and-white that make “the quiet american” such a wake-up call every time I read it. I don’t believe I can change, hasten, reverse, or ignore history, but we, this generation, have been given a golden opportunity to bring a fulfillment and better life to more people than ever before, through understanding and circumventing the great games our elders and betters played.
when I miss china, I mourn the opportunities I lost to really reach out, and dream of the potential we have to make the world a genuinely better place, even as I marvel at the scope of the task before us.
March 27, 2009, 1:48am Comments
