Chinese unhappy with events
As it’s been well documented, the Chinese people are unhappy about the way ‘Western’ media portraits the Tea bet issues, and the ‘aggressions’ on the torch bearers (especially the one on the handicapped lady). As a result, they’ve pinpointed the French as the recipient of their anger. (This plus the fact that the French president said he wouldn’t attend the opening ceremony)
Last week I got a message on my QQ, of all people it was sent to me by my Chinese ’sister’ now living in America. It called for the boycott of Carrefour on May 1st. This kind of message has now been posted for on many Chinese forums and circulated via msn/QQ.
And today, the Chinese MSN users are displaying a (L)China (that’s Love China) on their name/message. See my picture below. It’s apparently a sign of Chinese unity towards the Olympic issue and against France/Carrefour.
Also, I saw on a website a guy saying the cops stopped him when he was illegally riding on his motorbike. And the question the cop asked him was “are you French?” before seizing the bike. He isn’t French, but it shows the animosity Chinese people are feeling towards the French.
Of course, it’s not all towards French. As I said, the Chinese are not happy with the Western media and China has apparently requested for a CNN commentator to apologise for having said bad things about China.
The anti-Western sentiment that has been brooding lately (even before the Tea bet thing) is now getting worse. Visa checks, registration, renewals etc are all getting tougher.
Will this keep going until the Olympics? Who knows. But some expats are starting to complain that because of the actions of people outside China, they (the foreigners in China) are suffering unnecessarily.
I guess we’d better keep low profiles this year.
Posted: April 16th, 2008 under China, Lifestyle, Web and IT.