Category Archives: shenzhen fieldnotes

人的城市: dongmen (2)

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the first fat bird collaboration took place in the summer of 2003, when yang qian, wen rongbing, liu hongming, zhang yuelong and i occuppied famous shenzhen landmarks. at the time, we were experiementing with using the landscape as stage. more often then not, we performed short pieces and then were either sent away (by local security) or ran away (because the police had been notified). think of these pieces as fat bird’s first engagement with shenzhen.

located at the shenzhen-hong kong border, dongmen is the largest commercial center in shenzhen. indeed, it has its own neighborhood government and websiste.

华强北：life beneath the buildboards

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we live in the shadow of advertizing, at a scale much smaller than the model. in fact, it’s all already in place–the temptations, the rationalizations, the critique. just look.

人的城市: dongmen (1)

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the first fat bird collaboration took place in the summer of 2003, when yang qian, wen rongbing, liu hongming, zhang yuelong and i occuppied famous shenzhen landmarks. at the time, we were experiementing with using the landscape as stage. more often then not, we performed short pieces and then were either sent away (by local security) or ran away (because the police had been notified). think of these pieces as fat bird’s first engagement with shenzhen.

located at the shenzhen-hong kong border, dongmen is the largest commercial center in shenzhen. indeed, it has its own neighborhood government and websiste.

The Theatre Practice visits Fat Bird!

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From September 17-22, 2006, Fat Bird will host The Theatre Practice from Singapore for five days of discussion, exchange, and performance. On September 20 and 21 at 2:30 and 7:00, Practice will perform “Play Play”. Fat Bird will perform “This Body, These Movements”. There will be a public forum held after the Thursday matinee.

This is not the first time that Fat Bird has worked with Practice. Throughout 2003, Fat Bird members Song Jie and Yang Qian collaborated with Practice choreographer/dancer Kuo Jing Hong and Cinematic Theatre’s Ching-Man Lo to create Women Play, an evening of short plays from three cities (Shenzhen, Singapore, and Hong Kong). In December 2003 and January 2004, Women Play toured Singapore, Hong Kong, and Guangzhou. Cinematic Theatre posted publicity photosof the three plays: Fox Tales (Fat Bird), Lights Up (Practice), and Tell Me More (Cinematic).

(front) yang qian, fat bird artistic director and kuo jing hong, practice director
(back) kuo jian hong, practice artistic director

开学了！

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first flag raising ceremony, 2006-07 school year

by law, chinese children are guaranteed nine years of education, which is divided into two parts: primary (小学 grades 1-6) and middle (初中 grades 7-9, but called in chinese middle 1, middle 2 and middle 3). in practice, however, many children don’t receive an elementary school education, let alone a middle school education. by law, the obligatory education (义务教育) that each student receives should be equal. in practice, however, even within the same school, students often receive very different educations. things become even stickier at the high school level, where the state is no longer required to educate all students, even though a high school education is a prerequisite for taking the college entrance examination.

the other day, i met with other educators to discuss the problem of education equality in shenzhen. they presented two reasons for the discrepancy between the law and its implementation.

first, each municipality or county is responsible for the education of all children with household registration in their district. this means that children with beijing household registration have the right to go to public education in beijing, while children with a rural anhui registration can go to school in a village school. should a child be moved from the place of household registration to another locality, that child does not have the right to public education in the new locality. at this point, parents have a choice. they can either send their child to school back to the place where they have household registration and thereby take advantage of the public education system; they can pay extra fees to send their child to school where they are living, or they can pay more money to send their child to a private school. consequently, poor children, who have moved with their parents often do not go to school because their parents cannot afford the fees.

in shenzhen, the problem of educating children without household registration is particularly acute because most inhabitants aren’t legally shenzhen residents. moreover, roughly two-thirds of the city’s estimated 13 million come from the countryside and cannot afford to pay extra fees at either public or private schools. consequently, there are squatter schools (棚户学校) located throughout the city, where poor children are schooled. these schools are underfunded. moreover, they usually only provide for an elementary education. many children must return to their hometowns in order to go to middle school.

second, the point of education remains high scores on the college entrance exam. high schools are ranked by the percentage of graduates who go to college, as well as the percentage that test into the best colleges. in turn, middle schools are ranked by the percentage of students that test into the best high schools; likewise, elementary schools are ranked by the percentage of students who test into the best middle schools. in order to cultivate students who can achieve the necessary scores to test into top schools at the next level, many chinese schools have what are known as “important homerooms (重点班)”. the best teachers in the school are assigned to these homerooms. students are placed in these homerooms based on test scores. mid-terms and finals determine ranking and students are moved from or into an important homeroom after test results are posted.

in shenzhen, for example, an elementary school many have six sixth grade homerooms, two of which would be important homerooms. the students in those homerooms would get the best teachers, the best materials, and the most opportunities to participate in school activities in order to prepare them to do well on middle school entrance exams. students in the other four homerooms would also take the middle school entrance exams, but without the extra preparation given to students in the important homerooms. this filtering process continues through each examination level. in fact, these exams are so competitive, that at the middle and high school level, it is not uncommon for schools to stop offering gym, art, music, and other untested subjects to students. by the end of their senior year in high school, students are only doing test preparation.

this fall, the shenzhen government will be holding meetings to discuss what can be done to make education more equal within the municipality. however, as educators pointed out, until the municipality takes responsibility for students without shenzhen household residence or eliminates the practice of important homerooms, inequality will continue to define educational opportunities in shenzhen. what’s more, they said, until the college education system changes, officials, educators, and parents will continue seek every possible advantage for their students and children, that is, perpetuating rather than ameliorating the inequalities.

the school i work at has a primary and middle school division; we are currently applying for accreditation of a high school division.

浪心：surging hearts

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grandma sou from langxin village

The characters for 浪心村, Langxin Village literally translate as “wave heart” village. However, I’ve chosen to title this entry “surging hearts” because of the four people I met there.

This weekend, Yan Ling invited me to go with her to langxin to interview Grandma Sou, a 90 year-old woman who was still living in her old home; indeed she had been in the same home for over seventy years, since the day she married into Langxin. Her children, grandchildren and great grandchildren have all moved out of the village. Some are in the United States, others live in new village housing located next to the old village, which is now home to migrant workers.

Because neither Yan Ling nor I speak enough Cantonese to actually interview anyone, we asked A Jun to go with us. Once we arrived, however, A Jun suggested that we find someone from the village to introduce us to Grandma Sou. In old village housing next to the yuan surname ancestoral hall, we asked who had a key to the ancestoral hall so we could see it. A woman from Hunan brought us to Uncle Chen’s house. Born in Langxin, Uncle Chen retired to langxin in 1992. Before that he had been in Beijing and for a time in Hong Kong.

Uncle Chen told us that the Yuan ancestoral hall was one of three important buildings in the village. The other two were a family temple and the old school. All three were in various statges of disrepair, although money was spent to keep the ancestral hall and village clean and incense burning. In order to earn the roughly 5,000 rmb necessary to keep the ancestral hall clean, Uncle chen had rented out space behind the hall to migrants. the rental money was used for the upkeep and an annual dinner for all the villagers.

“How many villagers are there?” I asked.

“Roughly 20 males in the village,” Uncle Chen replied.

“Not many.”

“No,” he agreed. “They’ve all left.”

Not quite it turns out.

We asked uncle chen to introduce us to Grandma Sou. He agreed to ask if she would see us. And she did, with the caveat that she was partially deaf and couldn’t understand most of what was said to her. So we went to her home, where she smiled at us, and we smiled back, as Uncle Chen occasionaly screamed our questions at her.

WHY DON’T YOU LEAVE?

Because its quiet here.

DO YOU COOK FOR YOURSELF?

Yes.

WHO DOES YOUR SHOPPING?

My children.

After a few photos, we left. I was struck by her graciousness and also her independence. We could come or go; this was her life and it certainly needed no explanation or documentation. At the door, we met two of her friends, who have also lived in the village for almost seventy years. They come to visit everyday, even though they know Grandma Sou can’t hear them speak.

“How many old women are in the village?” we asked.

Over ten was the answer.

They asked me where I was from and laughed when I insisted that they were beautiful, one of the few phrases I can manage in Cantonese. They allowed me to take their pictures and then went in to sit with Grandma Sou.

人的城市: seaworld

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the first fat bird collaboration took place in the summer of 2003, when yang qian, wen rongbing, liu hongming, zhang yuelong and i occuppied famous shenzhen landmarks. at the time, we were experiementing with using the landscape as stage. more often then not, we performed short pieces and then were either sent away (by local security) or ran away (because the police had been notified). think of these pieces as fat bird’s first engagement with shenzhen.

“seaworld” was filmed on reclaimed land in shekou. and yes, that actually is a fire burning in the background.

人的城市: dogs on a bus

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the first fat bird collaboration took place in the summer of 2003, when yang qian, wen rongbing, liu hongming, zhang yuelong and i occuppied famous shenzhen landmarks. at the time, we were experiementing with using the landscape as stage. more often then not, we performed short pieces and then were either sent away (by local security) or ran away (because the police had been notified). think of these pieces as fat bird’s first engagement with shenzhen.

“dogs on a bus” filmed on shenzhen buses and the huangbeiling pet market.

玩品味: shenzhen antiquities market

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yan ling shopping for jade

yesterday, i went with two friends to the shenzhen antinquities market (深圳古玩市场), which is located in huangbeiling (黄贝岭). now we hadn’t started out in huangbeiling, but rather langxin (浪心) and it took us an hour to get from langxin, which is in baoan district to huangbeiling, which is luohu. at lunch, a jun had offered to take me to the antiquities market because i was interested in old things. true enough, but i was content to prowl around langxin. only later did i realize that he had been wanting to go to the antiquities market all morning. a piece of jade had his heart itching (心痒痒) and he just had to have it. while at the market, a stone carving caused yan ling’s heart to itch and after much negotiating, walking away and returning to the peddler, she also just had to have it. i left with a small stone chop. yan ling promissed to introduce me to a man who could carve 马丽安, the characters for my chinese name into the stone.

a jun became interested in jade about fifteen years ago, and began seriously collecting about three years ago. i asked him what he does with his jade. he said he goes home, listens to music, brews some tea, and takes out the pieces to admire, rubbing them into oily smoothness. “jade,” a jun explained, “should be moist (润).” yan ling laughed, teasing, “you’ve started to play with taste (玩品味).”

as i understand it, “play with taste” means not simply to cultivate good taste, but to start consuming various items associated with good taste; learning through trial and error, which tasteful objects satisfy an itching heart. players need knowledge to distinguish fakes from the genuine and they need passion to take the time to sort through everything out there. and there’s a lot of it. two levels in fact.

on the first level of the antiquities market, peddlers spread their wares out on blankets, having paid 50 rmb to rent the space for the day. yan ling liked this area especially because she assumed everything was fake, and therefore cheap. however, she stumbled upon a fujian peddler, who had some genuine but low quality stones for sale. a jun encouraged her to buy if she liked because even if it cost as much as a dinner, it would give more than one evening of pleasure. a jun, however, shopped on the second level, where ostensibly song dynasty ceramics and expensive jades were on display. he had made friends with several dealers as well as with other afficionados. they would sit together with a dealer examining and debating the merits of each object. i stood on the side an listened, occassionally adding little to the conversation except to say, “yes, it’s nice,” or “how can you tell the jade is that valuable?”

my last visit to huangbeiling was in 2003 with fat bird as part of the “human city” series of guerilla performances. that particular day, we were interested in visiting the pet market and using the cages of inappropriately fuzzy dogs as our stage. what occurs to me know, is how pets have become a way that shenzheners play with taste. as are the paintings at dafen village, at least if the publicity is to be believed.

so i come to the point of this entry. eleven years ago, when i first came to shenzhen, not many people played with taste. most were busy pursuing the shenzhen dream: a shenzhen identity card, a full time job, and a house. however, now, those who have achieved the shenzhen dream are pursuing other interests, including the cultivation of good taste. as in other parts of the advanced capitalist world, shopping has become an important way for individuals to create, express, and experience themselves as both part of and different from society at large.

photos of us playing with taste are now up in my galleries.

九街：an ethnographic post-script

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remnant gateway to the xin’an fairy town walking museum

one of the earliest articles i published was “becoming hong kong, razing baoan, preserving xin’an: an ethnographic account of urbanization in the shenzhen special economic zone” (cultural studies 15(3/4), 2001, 419-43). i argued that hong kong appeared in shenzhen urban planning as both the origin and telos of modernization. as origin, hong kong capital, know-how, and connections jump-started manufacturing in shenzhen. as telos, hong kong’s glossy skyline provided a model for urbanization. at the same time, contemporary hong kongers were integrated into guangdong society through narratives of hometown and tradition; according to this story, everyone in shenzhen and hong kong were all descendants of xin’an county natives. in this way, hong kong was inscribed into the history of the prc and hong kongers into local history.

hong kong was originally part of xin’an county, and this fact shows up in hong kong histories. however, xin’an county ceased to exist as an administrative unit of guangdong province in 1913, when the nationalist government renamed it baoan county. consequently, histories of shenzhen identify baoan as the city’s rural predecessor. thus, various levels of shenzhen government have found it necessary to stress the common spatial origin of the two cities precisely because hong kong and shenzhen have distinct temporal origins.

at the time i was writing up those earlier fieldnotes, the slippery twists of socialist nostalgia fascinated me. a shared origin – xin’an county – structured this nostalgia, where hong kong’s postwar history (1950-1979) became the past that shenzhen (rural baoan) would have had, if not for cold war politics that isolated the county from global markets. indeed, locals offered hong kong’s prosperity as evidence that socialism had delayed modernization in shenzhen. in order to prove that xin’an county was the origin of both shenzhen and hong kong, it was necessary to engage in acts of historic preservation – at the tianhou temple in chiwan, the pengcheng fortress at daya bay, and old nantou city.

in anticipation of the return of hong kong to chinese sovereignty in 1997, the nanshan district government collaborated with an overseas chinese investor to restore some buildings in “nine streets”, creating a walking museum. nine streets is the contemporary name for nantou, a market town that had been the xin’an county yamen. nantou was the yamen where, after the conclusion of the first opium war in 1842, representatives from the qing and british empires met to sign the papers that made hong kong island a crown colony. indeed, nantou was the xin’an county seat for roughly 600 years, from the ming dynasty until 1953, when the communist government moved the county seat to shenzhen market, which would in turn give its name to the new special economic zone in 1980.

the idea behind the walking museum was to demonstrate the historic links between shenzhen and hong kong. thus, for example, the nanshan district government designated nine streets the nantou old city (南头古城) historic area, which was the actual name of the market town. in contrast, the museum was called xin’an fairy town (新安故城). ironically, the gateway for the museum still looms in front of the nantou city wall.

from the museum’s opening, few people came to explore the restored pawnshop, opium den, brothel, gaol, and yamen. instead, most went to the restored temple to guandi (关帝), the god of wealth to burn incense and pray. at first, the temple was explicitly used as the gateway to the museum, and visitors could purchase tickets there; museum staff tolerated but did not encourage supplicants. however, nine street residents soon dominated temple and, during my latest trip to nantou, the museum had closed and the temple had a resident monk who was reading fortunes in the god’s shadow. rooms that had once held exhibitions about shenzhen and hong kong’s common history had been transformed into alcoves for new gods.

another historic transformation: when i was doing the research for that long-ago paper, i had been unable to gain entrance to an old orphanage, which had built by italian missionaries at the turn of the 20th century and was located in jiujie. however, on this trip, it was possible to visit because it had become the center of the patriotic catholic church of shenzhen. the deacon lamented that the church had been razed and they were now using the orphanage instead. i was struck by the building’s similarities to macao’s churches.

i invite you to take a walk through nine streets, once upon a time the yamen of xin’an county. note that the temple was moved outside the city wall in order to attract visitors. museum designers also intended to make the old ming-era gate the first element of the walking tour.