Still want to migrate to the West? Are the days of European Enlightenment over?

[neddy]

In the light of debt-burdened USA & Europe, is European Enlightenment a depleted cultural and political resource and Asian values the borned-again force for the world today?

Recalling how the IMF prescribed austerity to East Asia after the financial crisis of 1997, Singapore's only thinker*, Mahbubani, wrote that many Asians feel “the time has come for the West to administer the same bitter medicine you prescribed to us: stop living beyond your means.”

But we remember the writer Ian Buruma once remarked, “what the likes of Lee Kuan Yew call Asian values are more or less the values they were taught by their colonial schoolmasters in the days when Kuan Yew was still called Harry. The white man’s burden has been covered with a Confucian sauce.”


http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-07-08/asian-values-offer-no-special-sauce-for-europe.html

* He wrote the book "Can Asians think?"

 

[neddy]

Ah Tiongs always consider themselves very smart people, with good Asian values that the West should follow.

But this writer cannot even find a genuine Cuban cigar! How smart?

去年除夕,我在上海一间酒吧等待观看一年一度的壮观景象??海量的爆竹和烟花齐齐燃放,就在那一刻,我想吸一支雪茄。我问侍者酒吧里是否卖雪茄。他说,外面马路上有人卖。我走出了酒吧。果不其然,有个看上去是外来工模样的中年人身旁停着一辆自行车,车的一侧挂着一捆雪茄,全是古巴来的。帕特加斯四号(Partagas 4)每支50元人民币,大约是香港价格的一半。如此便宜的价格带给我的激动没能持续太久。不一会儿,我开始意识到真相:有人在上海的人行道上销售古巴雪茄可能不大对劲。这雪茄绝不是古巴雪茄的味道。



　　上个月,我在逛北京一家高档购物中心时,发现一家非常大的雪茄商店。我走进去,看到每一面货架上的古巴雪茄都高高堆到了屋顶。加湿器朝暗色的木货架呼呼地喷着白雾。在那里可以找到任何一种古巴雪茄,而且存货充沛。这个景象看起来令人震撼。可我接着发现了一件怪事:所有的雪茄看起来颜色完全相同,而且没有香味,就好像是我在上海人行道上买到的那支。



　　几天后,我试着去一家五星级酒店买一支雪茄,以前我在那里买过好多回。那家酒店已把雪茄搬到了大堂里的一间精品店。一开始,我真不愿相信,连这家店也在卖和我先前遇到的一样的没有香味的假古巴雪茄,所以闻了又闻。这家酒店的名声很好,但它销售的雪茄和我在上海人行道上买到的是同样货色。原来这家精品店被外包了,包给了一个精明的家伙。



　　这是中国新富阶层遇上的另一件令人不爽的事。在中国,你可能很有钱。但当你要享受美好生活时,你喝下去的是假拉菲(Lafite),吸进去的是假古巴雪茄,心里还要祈祷,它们千万别是有毒的。



　　包下一家开在五星级酒店里的精品店,没有几个非常能干的人是做不来的。在价格极其高昂的餐厅里出售古董级的1982年拉菲酒,也是如此。这样聪明的人,却参与到了造假的生意中。他们甚至打入了最有名的酒店。由于这种生意规模如此庞大,体系如此成熟,中国最优秀、最聪明的人当中,肯定有很大一群参与了进去。为何这么多有才能的人会做这种事？这样的人难道不能通过合法生意取得成功？这个现象,可以从中国的经济结构中获得解释。

Also, there is a strange fascination with steel making that the socialist world equate with prosperity. Remember history 1958-1962 when Chairman Mao launched the Great Leap Forward.
There is a strange similarity with today's China. The economic figures indicate Low 2.2% inflation.

 

[jiangrenhua]

Yeah lah some Asians beri rich. No soul. Like zombie.

Majority are living below poverty.

What is there to boast about?

 

[neddy]

What does Asia has to offer?

In bad times ...

China managed to conduct its own genocide in the Great Leap Forward. Number of death was as high as WWII total death. All the grains were proudly sold to USSR to show that China was powerful! Country folk sacrificed in deliberate move by Chairman Mao to quash dissidents.

Now in Singapore, LKY offer fresh graduates jobs but not those in their 50s. Why? Young people are hot blooded, start revolutions!

Singapore govt still stealing from the people. The people do not know anything, can only guess. A class ponzi con! Top secret. Boh sia*




* not to be mistaken for the Malaysian definition

 

[maozedong]

Smart of you to highlight that Mahbubani wrote "Can Asians think". Mahbubani seems like an opportunist.

Is Asia so good now? Why then are so many super rich Chinese applying for PRs in Western countries like Australia, Canada, and even poor bankrupt USA.

Why are the two sons of the richest man in Asia and 9th richest in the world holding Canadian citizenship (okay, one of them also has Singapore PR)? And Bo Xilai sent his teenage son to UK for boarding school. And the next president Xi Jinping's daughter is doing her bachelors in Harvard. Now that's really telling. If you are really an aspiring world superpower, you don't send your princess to your nemesis country to study bachelors (which in these days is like high school diploma). It's okay to do Masters or PHD in the West because you can say that the West is better in certain fields. No loss of face. Lucky Bo Xilai isn't the next President because it is quite shameful to have a prince studying high school in UK. No confidence in your own educational system? Not even at high school level?

Don't listen to what they say. See what they do.