Politics... of China.

August 18, 2012, 8:30 p.m.

                I am traveling through a country that is often referred to as an “emerging superpower” of the world, yet 36% of the population lives on less than $2 a day and 56% (700+ million people) in the country live in the rural communities. Of these 56% of people, roughly 20% of them will leave their community to take on low wage jobs in the city, hoping for a greater success and more money for their families (their children not able to go with them). Within the rural population, only 1% of secondary students will move on to college or university, and there would be approximately 1.5 health care workers per 1,000 people. If you were living in this rural community, you would go to the bathroom in squatters – holes in the ground - where the urine and feces would collect and potentially contaminate the soil or water within your community.

                As a citizen in China, you are automatically part of the hukou system – a system in which your household must register for the government. Once you register your family with the government, that place becomes your home and certain restrictions guide your life. For instance, if I am registered in the Gufupu community (a rural community about two hours outside of Beijing), because my parents and their parents grew up in this community, I would then be restricted to that community when it comes to education, health care, work, etc. I could choose to head into the city to find work, which as you read roughly 20% do, but my children would have to stay in Gufupu and be raised by my parents because they would not be allowed to attend school in Beijing. We could get health care in Beijing, but we would have to pay for it, which many rural community members cannot afford. Also, if I am choosing to work in the city in attempts to support my family, I would be listed as a “migrant worker” and certainly not be  paid as much as city dwellers would be. Finally, there is the one child policy. Every person in China must be registered with the government, otherwise, they have no identity, and if they have no identity they cannot go to school, get health care, etc. Each family is allowed to have one child, to slow the rates of over population, and then it is common for one of the parents (mostly the women) to be sterilized. This poses problems because in China, it is very desirable to have a boy so he may carry on the family name, therefore, it is undesirable to have a girl. Legally, you cannot find out the sex of your baby until it is born because otherwise there may be forced abortions, however, you can sometimes pay off a doctor to find out. Also, there is the chance that the girl may be killed or sold off after she is born if the family either does not want to have a girl or cannot afford it (think dowry when she is older and needs to be married).

                These trips always amaze me because they force me to look at hard issues from two stances. On the one stance, I look at it as a human, a global citizen, an activist. How can people kill their baby based upon the sex? How can a government tell you that you can only have one child? How can a government hide a massacre, a part of history? How is it that the rest of the world isn’t exposed to this side of China? Why is it that we refer to it as a superpower when so many of their own citizens are struggling to survive and maintain a proper identity? These experiences force you to consider the other side as well though. How is an overpopulated country expected to maintain order if they don’t have records of its citizens? How is an overpopulated country expected to keep its cities clean and safe without restricting people from constantly migrating in? If there’s anything I have learned on this trip so far, it is that nothing is black and white. There are many gray areas to the Chinese government whether we like to admit it or not.

Tang Jia Qiang, the boy who stole my heart

                Today we visited a Kung Fu orphanage that we will be volunteering at all week. It wasn’t until later tonight that I realized... if these kids are orphans, they don’t have birth certificates, therefore having no identity with the Chinese government. If they need health care, Kung Fu Daddy (he heads the orphanage) pays for it out of donations. They have teachers at the orphanage to educate them but the children have no future in further education because they have no identity and no way to take high school exams for college admission. That means Tang Jia Qiang (or John as he allowed me to give him an English name), the sweetest, most obedient, and soft spoken 5-year-old I have ever met, with the softest touch as he held my hand, will never have a fair shot at his own basic human rights. Unless he makes it big with Kung Fu or gets a good break through Kung Fu Daddy and can leave China, he doesn’t have much of a future here. He’ll grow up in an orphanage, with a family of teachers, coaches, and 80 other orphans, loved more than anything... but as soon as he turns 18 and has to move on (whether he chooses to teach there or move on), he will still have no identity. Unless something changes in the policies of the Chinese government...