China Uncertainty Principle

“There are two kinds of travelers. There is the kind who goes to see what there is to see, and the kind who has an image in his head and goes out to accomplish it.  The first visitor has an easier time, but I think the second visitor sees more...  My head was filled with pictures of Paris, mostly black and white, and I wanted to be in them."

-Adam Gopnik, Paris to the Moon

Most people, I'd guess, have a strong desire to be part of something bigger than themselves, to have some small role in a larger scene.  The above passage, from Paris to the Moon, gets at that idea.  This paragraph stuck out to me because that desire to go and find an idealized vision of a place, and to try and melt into that vision, is something I've felt before.  Especially when living abroad long-term, there's a need to move from superficial experiences of the visitor towards everyday activities of the local.

Certain foreign cities, maybe Paris more than any other, enjoy a status in America's collective consciousness.  By the time your average American is twelve or thirteen years old, they've likely seen Midnight in Paris or Ratatouille.  Many American adults can list a few destinations in the city, but more importantly, they can recite some quintessential "Paris experiences."  In Paris, you should buy a baguette, brie and wine and enjoy in a park with your significant other, for example.  And to go and do that, to pretend for a few hours that you're a part of a scene inside all the movies and books and songs is, according to Gopnik, harder but better than just walking around the Louvre.

What really struck me when I read this is how little it applies to a place like China.  I would say that, for most Americans, no place in China has these kinds of experiences attached to them.

But the problem isn't just that a picture of a "quintessential China experience" is at best hazy for most Americans.  The whole idea that you could discreetly float yourself into that kind of vision, as Gopnik seems to want to do in Paris, just doesn't work as a white American in China, mostly because of race.  Gopnik wants to be in those photos of Paris, to become a local in his own eyes and, maybe more importantly, judged as a local by Parisians.  But for a white person to insert themselves into scenes of authentic, everyday Chinese life would be a little ridiculous.  It would totally change the focus of those experiences.  I think a natural reaction a Chinese observer might have to that kind of situation would be to wonder what that foreigner was doing in an otherwise authentically Chinese scene, and to maybe conclude that, bless their heart, they were trying to learn about local culture.

To a certain extent though, that doesn't stop us from trying.  I enjoy having the same kinds of everyday experiences that Chinese people have.  Often I find that these very mundane social rituals are the most rewarding experiences I have in China.  The feeling of emerging from a China Unicom office after buying a new SIM card, or deciding not to take the easy path of riding a taxi and instead using the Baidu Maps application to take public transport, or walking through a maze of pathways in an electronics market to find a second-hand iPhone.  Of course, the point of doing these things isn't to feel part of everyday life in China.  But these kinds episodes do bring a feeling of accomplishment and belonging. Even so, all throughout these mundane experiences are reminders of your otherness; a child's non-stop, open-mouthed staring on the bus, a telecom company agent's casual questions, "Where are you from?  How long have you been here?"

It can be difficult figuring out what authentic is here, let alone acting it out.  I've realized that, sometimes, locals will change the way they act around foreigners.  When I first thought about this, it reminded me of Heisenberg's uncertainty principle in physics, the idea that by observing a particle you could change something about it.  In the same way, a Chinese person (particle) might alter something they say or do around a foreigner (observer), simply because they're being watched by someone with a very different background.  And this is completely understandable; it makes sense that a Chinese person, when discussing politics, would say different things to fellow citizens than to a Westerner.  Or that a Chinese person may not expect a foreigner to know conventions for pouring tea at a meal, and instead of explaining, might just say to hell with convention.  This "China uncertainty principle" makes it harder to figure out which experiences are authentic, and which ones are being adjusted to Western sensibilities.

I think that as China liberalizes and develops, more foreigners may begin to come here and, difficult as it is to imagine now, become more integrated into society.  Right now, it seems to me that the only place in China where Westerners might be able to have a sense that we could be a natural part of a snapshot of everyday life is super-modern Shanghai.  But, as some Chinese people are quick to assert, Shànghái bú shì zhēnzhèng de Zhōngguó le, Shanghai isn’t really China anymore.

The implication is that, as a foreigner in China, you can't just mesh into Chinese society and culture.  Instead, your own culture acts as a diluting agent.  The more foreigners and foreign influence, the less "Chinese" a place is, AKA the Shanghai story.  No matter how much you know about the country, its language, history, culture, politics, no matter how many close Chinese friends you may have, you can never be part of it, just apart from it.