Silent Tao » Gu Zheng

Fashion, Music and Poverty: Is China a Third World Nation?

Shawn Cartwright — Wed, 03 Nov 2010 19:05:29 +0000

Recently we had the opportunity to see a performance by a visiting Chinese culture troupe at the Bullis School in Potomac Maryland. The Bullis School is an elite private preparatory school for boys and girls from 3^rd grade to high school.

The Chinese troupe featured performing artists from all over China who presented short acts displaying Chinese music, ethnic minority fashion, and dance. One interesting fact about this troupe was that it was not soley a professional group. The performers also included university students who were selected as cultural ambassadors. Some of them were only a few years older than the oldest students at Bullis.

One of the acts was put together by students from Xian Engineering College in Xian, China. They are fashion designers and models. Yes, models in China often have university degrees! These students also learned fashion design so that once their modeling career is finished they still have a viable means of employment. Another act consisted of musicians from the Beijing Traditional and Folk Music Conservatory. They played the Pipa, Guzheng, and Erhu. The Erhu player was a professor, but the other two were students.

After the performance, the artists met with students to answer questions about China and its ethnic minorities. One 9^th grade class was taking a course on the third world. They asked a very interesting question, “How do you feel when people call China a third world country; and is China still a part of the third world.”

One of the members of the delegation said “China has made great progress in the last 30 years. Although we are a country having the same land mass as the US, we have 4 to 5 times the number of people. If you look around our country there are many who are still very poor, whose living conditions are not good. When you look honestly at this, you must conclude that China is still a part of the third world. We are still a developing nation.”

It is easy to forget this when studying China. The Chinese culture has reached very high levels, perhaps some of the highest. The central government is strong enough to provide a reasonable level of social order – you don’t have to worry daily about armed bandits and warlords, like in much of Africa. The major Chinese cities are huge – marvels of engineering and design with state of the art public transportation and infrastructure.

But the story is different in the rural areas. Many of its people are very, very poor. If you have never been outside the United States, it is difficult to understand what ‘poor’ really means. In the US, some of our worst housing conditions, for example, the projects or tenements associated with our poor, would already be considered luxury in many of the third world countries.

After this sobering reminder of the realities of a day to day life that is very different from our privileged existence, we turned to the musicians. Music has a way of elevating the spirit and lightening the burdens of life. Perhaps it is no coincidence that Chinese ethnic minorities, many of which are still very poor, produce some of the best music and dance in the country.

The Pipa and Guzheng artists played requests from the Bullis school music faculty – Chinese musicians don’t need music, they memorize everything! The final act was an impromptu duo with a nationally ranked pianist from the US and the Erhu professor that was nothing short of amazing.

East met West in Washington DC, learned something and made beautiful music!

Chen Tai Chi Yi Lu Form by Shawn Cartwright

Shawn Cartwright — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 13:20:55 +0000

For every Yin there is a Yang. In this case, the Yang is the Chen Tai Chi Form performed by Mr. Shawn Cartwright, Executive Director of TCCII. This form shows the obvious hard and soft, fast and slow movement of the original style of Tai Chi Chuan. Mr. Cartwright is a 20^th generation Chen Tai Chi lineage disciple of Grandmaster Chen Quanzhong, the most senior of the Chen grandmasters. Although a meditative state is also required to properly execute this form, it is different from the Yang 24 form. The variations in style are important and the reason why many of the great teachers learn more than one style of Chinese internal Kung Fu!

The music featured on this video is “Spring Comes to the Snowy Mountain” from the “Rising Moon” Guzheng CD, by Bing Xia Available http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/BingXia

East Meets West on a Steamy Night in Guangzhou

Shawn Cartwright — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 23:15:18 +0000

Guangzhou, China is a crucible of east and west. The city is enchanting, the women lovely, and the nights are steamy. Long open to the west, it has absorbed influences from around the world. And when you put two cultures together you get some pretty amazing things. Although we spend most of our time in the city studying Chinese medicine, Yi Jing, and Internal Alchemy, we save room to experience the unique flavor of the Flower City. You don’t know what to expect, as I found out during a recent visit.

When we stay in Guangzhou, we prefer to stay in the old colonial district by the river’s edge. A number of the old colonial buildings survive such as the US and French naval attachés. Many of them have been turned into restaurants featuring a variety of styles of pan-Asian cuisine ranging from Indonesia to local Cantonese specialties.

We stay on the river in a relatively old but passable four star hotel. Four stars in China can be really great or below standard. This one just barely makes the cut; the place’s real charm is its location next to one of the city’s best restaurants and on the river walk.

It’s the food in the area and the daily activities along the river that make it great. They are all part of the normal daily activities. There is nothing tourist-like about them, except for the lone Lao Wei saying “Wow, that’s cool.”

In the morning, starting at 5:00 AM, you are treated to classical Chinese Gu Zheng (Zither) and flute music. The numerous musicians play by themselves or in small groups, but the sounds seem to mix together well. Retirees can be seen doing Tai Chi and Qigong along the walk. A few younger guys practice Kung Fu.

There are even people swimming in the river! For those of you who haven’t been blessed enough to see the effluence of Chinese civilization up close, Chinese rivers are generally pretty dirty, especially in large cities. The Pearl River seems a little cleaner than most, but only a little.

At night you are treated to Chinese Dance, sidewalk calligraphy, and all sorts of entertaining sights…

Although many are worth mentioning, one particular experience stands out for the innovative fusion of east and west.

As my interpreter and I were walking back from dinner one sultry Guangzhou evening, I noticed a number of women walking along the river dressed… well, how shall I say it? Dressed like high class ho’s.

One lady looked to be about middle age. She was wearing VERY short denim shorts, mid-calf tan suede boots with pink fuzzy pom-poms, black fishnet stockings and a red cashmere form fitting halter top.

She had various assorted bangles on one arm and a traditional jade bracelet on the other. She had blue liner on her eyes, but wore no other makeup.

I’m not making this up. And she wasn’t the only one dressed in some variation of this theme.

Now, middle aged southern Chinese women are a lot hotter than you might think. First, they are southern Chinese. Second, they seem to generally age well. This is probably because they eat better that we do in the west and exercise regularly. You won’t find very many overweight Chinese people. Their skin is naturally soft and smooth, but the muscle is firm because they walk everywhere and they work hard. Finally, they wear very little make-up and avoid the sun.

So it seems we have a bunch of well-preserved ladies of the evening walking the river in Guangzhou.

I asked my interpreter “Is this where all the prostitutes hang out?”

Now my interpreter this trip also happened to be a hot middle aged southern Chinese beauty, but she was dressed a bit more tastefully, and certainly more deliciously, in a Tang dynasty jacket and tailored skirt.

She laughed and said “No, she’s a middle aged mom. See her two children?” as she pointed to two young children running and jumping about 15 feet away. Obviously it takes a mom to identify who belongs to who, because I didn’t even notice them.

She continued “The prostitutes in China rarely walk the streets. They are more civilized than that.”

“Then why do these women dress like LA hookers?”

“They don’t know any better. They probably saw it on TV, but they don’t know what it means to dress that way.”

When east meets west, the fashions can get interesting! Such are the joys of an evening stroll in the Flower City.