Volume 5, Issue 4, May 2007 May 解读中国 THE LEGEND OF …

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Volume 5, Issue 4, May 2007

解读中国

THE LEGEND OF SHAOLIN GONGFU

Chinese Buddhist Martial Arts Examined

Chinese Gongfu’s Rise to ProminenceJust in case you get sent to: Kaifeng

Profi le of a Gongfu Legend: Jet LiFilm and Book Reviews

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2 CHINA EXPAT | Volume 5, Issue 4, May 2007

Chinese Gongfu’s Rise to Prominence.......3How a group of pacifist Buddhist monks in Henan Province created one of the world’s most feared martial arts: Shaolin Gongfu.

Just in Case you get sent to: Kaifeng..........7It may not have the cache of nearby Shaolin Temple, but four of the world’s great religions have learned to coexist in Henan’s Kaifeng.

Profile of a Gongfu Legend: Jet Li.................8Although primarily known for his film career, Jet Li’s amazing childhood in the 1970s took him to the Chinese National Martial Arts Championship—and the White House.

REVIEWS

Film: Fearless.......................................................................9

Revisiting a Classic: Enter the Dragon............9

Book: Among Warriors: A Martial Artist in Tibet ......................................................................................................10

Local Partner Page...................................................11

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April 2007 Contents

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CHINA EXPAT | Volume 5, Issue 4, May 2007 3

THE BUDDHIST ART OF WAR:– By Josh Gartner

How Gongfu became a Symbol of China

When people think of China, two of the most compelling images that come to mind are food

and Kung Fu (gongfu or 功夫 in Chinese). Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, and Jet Li are all household names throughout the world, and their movies have become legendary. Yet while there is a deep admiration for the difficulty of the practice, few westerners have much of an understanding of this tradition that extends back thousands of years and grew out of Buddhism. In order to gain an appreciation, I took a journey to China’s most famous wushu, or martial arts, monastery the famed Shaolin Temple in Henan Province.

Today Shaolin Temple is a thriving tourist site, set gorgeously in the rich Song Mountains. Lining the streets nearby are dozens of wushu schools where thousands of young Chinese—and an increasing number of foreigners—come to hone their skills. Only a select few will ever last long enough to work their way through the ranks.

On my first day, reveille boomed through my window at 5:30AM, as it does every

morning, waking the students, and to my dismay, me as well. Over the next couple of hours I restlessly tried to block out the noises of these dedicated youngsters marching and singing, but eventually I succumbed and headed into the bright countryside sunshine.

Outside, students who had already completed some morning running were stretching and horsing around with one another. However, soon the real work began. Wushu masters, themselves only in their early twenties, watched carefully as the novices executed and repeated each of their moves over and over: jumps, kicks, tumbles, and sword thrusts. Periodically teachers stopped the practices and singled

out individual students for improvement, asking exemplary classmates to demonstrate proper form. To my surprise no one seemed to mind me hanging around taking pictures, save once when a boy of no more than four or five seemed distracted (I dutifully went to a group of older students).

Yet Shaolin Temple is not simply a tourist site or a training ground for wushu hopefuls. It has a rich and fascinating history with its roots in Buddhism, and serves as the bedrock for one of the most popular forms of modern martial arts. Walking around gives only the slightest indication of how long and strong the dedication to the art of war has been in these parts, dating back well over a thousand years.

Rigorous repetition

Children hard at work


THE BUDDHIST ART OF WAR: How Gongfu became a Symbol of China

The Legendary Beginnings The story of Shaolin’s ties to wushu begins in the 495 when an Indian monk named Buddhabhadra (Dabatuo or 大跋陀 in Chinese) built the temple on Mount Song bringing Buddhism to central China. However it would be another thirty years before the art form began to blend together with Chan Buddhism (commonly known by its Japanese name “Zen”). Yet another Indian, Bodhidharma (Damo or 达摩 in Chinese), came to Shaolin in the early 6th century, but was denied access, and decided to go to the mountains to wait for a change of heart. Unable to exclude him indefinitely, Fang Chang, the current temple leader, eventually allowed him entrance—but only after 9 years of meditation in cave. A slab of stone in the temple today allegedly holds the imprinted shadow of the Indian monk created by blocking out the sun for 9 years in the same seated position.

To the great surprise of Bodhidharma, he discovered the temple’s monks were in poor physical shape, unfit for both fighting and meditating. It soon became his mission to resolve this problem through rigorous exercise and equally regimented meditation. His efforts paid off, and soon both Shaolin Wushu and Chan Buddhism were born. The practices combined the traditional inwardly focused spiritual aspects of the religion with the outward precision of martial arts.

Their skill came not only out of a desire for self-improvement, but also necessity. Shaolin Monastery grew successful, and with that came wealth. Villagers and bandits frequently attacked the compound trying to make off with some of its many riches. Yet over time the monks developed into some of the most proficient fighters in all of China. They overcame numerous attacks through wushu and a formidable physical wall of defense.

They achieved great success, with docile monks transforming into world-class

fighters, but it was short-lived. A mere thirty years after Bodhidharma joined the temple it was shut down, as it has been numerous times subsequently. The emperor saw the fighting monks as a threat to his control over the country and decided to take pre-emptive action. As the temple’s disciples grew in fighting prowess they increasingly came to be seen as either a threat or asset—and often both—to the government.

In spite of all of their high-powered fighting, at their core Shaolin Temple’s inhabitants were Buddhist monks, not political soldiers; a fact that is easy to forget. As such, they were pacifists, ostensibly a contradiction in the context of their martial skills. Their goal was to neutralize the threat of invaders, while at the same time avoiding seriously injuring their foes. Warlords ruled the land, and only those who were adept at defending themselves—as the Shaolin monks were—survived.

Much of their training was dedicated to incapacitating opponents without doing any long-term damage. This required the utmost precision, one of the many reasons why wushu requires so much painstaking practice and perfection. The slightest error could cause serious harm either to themselves, or their opponents.

While there are some apparent inconsistencies in pacifists studying the arts of war, there is also a clear internal logical. Hours of daily exercise and a constant push towards perfection align closely with Buddhist ideals about striving for enlightenment. Monks consider gongfu to be the outward manifestation of the inner peace and harmony of Buddhism. Both meditation and martial arts are the pursuit of complete control over oneself.

Shaolin wushu is difficult to classify: it is at once extremely violent and meditatively peaceful. So too did ancient Chinese governments have a hard time trying to figure out what role, if any, the monks should play in society. Not long after

the temple was destroyed and the group banned, they rose up again, even gaining strong standing with the empire’s new leadership. This change of perspective was not a random shift, but rather an act of self-interest.

In their most famous feat of heroism, a small group of monks saved child-Emperor Li Shimin from a revolt. In turn he gave the Shaolin Monastery exulted status in China and the practice once again began to flourish. Yet it has always been a delicate balancing act for the temple, and during the Qing dynasty the country’s rulers again viewed them suspiciously. The monks had previously supported the Ming Dynasty rulers, and their loyalty to the new emperors was constantly in doubt. As a result, the Qing destroyed the temple and many of Shaolin’s relics.

More recently, modern rulers quietly accepted Shaolin’s existence, while continuing to view them suspiciously. However, as gong fu increasingly became a symbol of China’s rich and unique history, the leadership embraced the temple both for its metaphoric and monetary value. In 1982 a young Jet Li starred in Shaolin Temple, the first mainland martial arts movie in several decades leading to a barrage of similar films, and international stardom for the actor (Please see Jet Li: Martial Artist and Diplomat on page 8).

An Ancient Art in a Modern WorldShaolin monks fill an awkward role in today’s China. On the one hand they have the fame to bring in money and tourists, ensuring their financial sustainability. However, it is difficult to view these gong fu masters as we do their ancestors who meditated all day and fought for survival. In contrast, with a steady stream of visitors to their picturesque home on Song Shan, only those with the most intense capacity to block out the world can find inner peace in such a setting.

For real or show?

A monastery first

Deep in the Mountains


Beyond the noise and clamor of tour buses and Chinese guides waving yellow flags, there are more fundamental questions about the traditional Shaolin gongfu. First, the current emphasis for many of the monks is not necessarily the Buddhist spiritual aspects of the art, but rather the physical skills. In some ways it is hard to separate the two since they are both predicated on deep concentration and self awareness. However, there seems to be a clear disconnect for many who tend to start their careers at the private schools in the area. These facilities, of which there are dozens, offer varying quality of martial arts training, but tend to have limited focus on the spiritual aspects Shaolin wushu. In fact, a growing number of the students are girls in mixed gender classes, a feature that does not mesh well with the chaste lifestyle of traditional Buddhist monks.

Second, there is little need for the monks to defend themselves through gong fu, and as a result the practice has become more of a show for curious audiences. This in itself does not contradict the practice of Shaolin gong fu as the practice is supposed to be defensive in nature: picking fights in order to make the skills useful would contradict Buddhism’s pacifist teachings. Nonetheless, one has to wonder whether putting on performances has taken the monks toward the flashier facets of martial arts at the expense of technical expertise.

Third, the impact of commercialism has placed the temple squarely in the courtroom numerous times. As the most famous gong fu temple in the world, Shaolin has more than a little cache and marketers who have no affiliation with the monastery have been eager to cash in. Over the last twenty years the monks have engaged in a type of fight that they are less accustomed to—lawsuits—at an increasing rate. They have succeeded more often than not, but it is an unfortunate requirement for these spiritual practitioners.

Finally, some people have wondered what the real goal of Shaolin Temple is today. Many derisively refer to its leader, Abbot Shi Yongxin, as the sect’s “CEO” on account of his routine trips around the world pushing his brand. On his journeys he has looked for places to open new temples for Shaolin training among other merchandising ventures. Given that the original site makes more than enough money to sustain itself, one has to wonder if the true motives are not sheer capitalistic instinct.

The Future of WushuIt is hard to predict the future of wushu in general, or the Shaolin style in particular. Clearly with worldwide popularity and a huge tourism business it is not going to disappear anytime soon. On the contrary, training centers are popping up around the world from Australia to North America. The concern is not whether something will manage to endure, but rather if it will live up to its tremendous reputation as the art of dedication embodied by Bodhidarma’s 9-year stint of patience in the mountains.

Wushu has already deviated greatly from Buddhism over the last hundred years. For many people it is easy to separate the sport, which was intended to by a physical extension of the internal spirituality, from the religion. Throughout history activities originally associated with religions have diverged from them. However, rarely have two that were so closely connected become so seemingly independent.

Walking around Shaolin Temple there are reminders of the crucial role that Buddhism traditionally played in gongfu. Hundreds of pagodas stand as tributes to the great monks of past generations. One in particular symbolizes the common members of the temple—those devotees that never rose to institutional prominence, but whose dedication to the art form made the

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THE BUDDHIST ART OF WAR: How Gongfu became a Symbol of China

monastery the sign of excellence that it is today. Yet despite all of these artifacts, there is a clear lack of spirituality in the modern experience.

While Shaolin gongfu seems to be separating itself from its religious tradition, one could also argue that the globalization of the practice is in fact spreading Buddhist teachings to a wider audience, whether they realize it or not. During my visit I heard a ‘hello’ shouted at me, hardly an unusual event in China. However, when I turned around to look I saw a young man with a neatly shaved head wearing the same traditional clothing as his shorter, younger companion. As I looked at his face something seemed different.

His skin was slightly darker than mine, similar to many Chinese, but his features looked somewhat different. “I am not Chinese,” he said laughing slightly at my obvious confusion. “I am from Venezuela.” We chatted for a few minutes—his English was good but not great. Few of his classmates could speak as well as he could, and he knew no Chinese, but he had managed to get by for six weeks, making friends and practicing wushu from 5:30 in the morning until sundown. He said he did not consider himself a real Buddhist, and he will surely never become a chaste monk. Yet he was learning the principles that adherents to the religion had developed over hundreds of years in line with their spiritual beliefs.

This Venezuelan is typical of many modern practitioners of wushu: they do not

necessarily associate themselves with the Buddhist religion, but nonetheless devote their lives to the principles. They focus on complete awareness and control over their bodies, strict, almost obsessive dedication to perfection in every action, and a respect for their colleagues and opponents. Without ever overtly crossing the line into the realm of religiosity, people from around the world have accepted many of the ideals of Shaolin Buddhism. Perhaps in the end, amid all of the commercialism and watering down of the art form, that will be the real legacy of the modern Shaolin Temple. CE

What will the future bring ?Reminders of Buddhist beginnings

China Zhengzhou International Shaolin Wushu Festival is held every year. This year it will be September 20-24.


At first I was surprised to find out that Kaifeng, Henan’s ancient city that once served as China’s capital,

did not have an airport. However, once I arrived via Zhengzhou, it all started to make sense. Kaifeng looks like something out of an old western movie, with dusty streets and low buildings. Small, and easily navigable by foot, pedicab or taxi, it is a little gem only a couple hours away from Shaolin Temple, the famed monastery and Kung Fu training site.

Well-known for its Jewish population that came from Europe via the Silk Road hundreds of years ago, there is not much left to see of them, having long ago been absorbed into the general population. While the story is fascinating and somewhat bizarre, the only remnant of the synagogue is a manhole cover over an old well. After all of the build-up, it is a serious letdown. A few people claim to be Jewish there, but they tend to be selling related goods and have dubious credibility. After this initial disappointment, it quickly became clear that the city has a number of features that more than redeem it.

Interestingly, aside from Judaism, Kaifeng has a strong and visible religious history, with a large Muslim population, beautiful Buddhist temples, and an old church founded by

an Italian missionary in the 17th century. All of these coexist in close proximity and provide fascinating contrasts. It is great to read about the local Jewish history, but in terms of things to see, the other religious structures in the area have much more to offer.

Probably the most interesting—and unexpected—site is the sizeable Catholic church (维新敬老院) a short walk away from the “Jewish manhole” ( which is behind #4 People’s Hospital if you want to see it). Its history is almost as odd as that of the Jewish migration. In 1666 a French missionary came to China, somehow ended up in the country’s heartland, Henan, and

established a church in Kaifeng. In the last hundred and fifty years three Italian priests have lived in the city and overseen the congregation. The most recent left in the late 1950s, and more than one resident told me they could recall the tall foreigner walking around the town when they were children.

The current building first opened in 1919, but closed in 1966 during the Cultural Revolution. It reopened fourteen years later and today boasts a significant following. When I visited on a Monday afternoon there were a couple of older women praying inside. Furthermore, the impact of these missionaries can be seen throughout the province as a number of churches sit in the middle of farmland, looking quite out of place. From my bus I spotted one at the end of a large field without a single home within 500 meters.

As for China’s more traditional religion, the best Buddhist temple to visit is the famed Da Xiang Guo Si (大相国寺) located near the Kaifeng Binguan (开封宾馆), which, incidentally is the best of the city’s mid-range hotels (there is nothing high-end to be had). The temple is fairly grand in scale and sees its fair share of tourists. The hotel is also quite charming with a old-style Chinese façade. They can be reached at 378-595-5589 and there is a UBC Coffee Shop out front for those who need a caffeine fix.

There are not too many options for nightlife other than the lively Kaifeng night market (鼓楼夜市), which has a wide range of delicious local foods. A group of young people eating at my restaurant invited me along with them to a Karaoke spot, but unless you have a better knowledge of Chinese songs than I, it tires quickly. For food, restaurants also tend to be small in scale, so your best bet is walking around until you see something that strikes your fancy. The Muslim food in the area is particularly good, and the largest community is close to the church.

Originally Kaifeng also had more than a dozen gates that served as entrance points through the city wall. A cab driver told me that in the 1960s most of them were destroyed, but there are three that remain. Near the large and beautiful north gate is Tie Ta (铁塔), an ancient pagoda that is supposed to look like iron. It is situated in a large park that is especially nice in the spring when flowers are in bloom.

Overall there is more than enough to make a stop in Kaifeng as part of a longer Henan adventure well worth your time—perhaps during a pilgrimage to Shaolin Temple. It may not have the cache of some of the more famous places around China, but its history is both diverse and interesting. Furthermore, it is a fascinating study as a crossroad of four of the world’s ancient religions. CE

Just in Case You Get Sent to: Kaifeng– By Josh Gartner

Four great religions coexist deep in the Chinese heartland

The “Jewish Manhole”

Kaifeng's Church

One big family

The north gate


How many people have met three American presidents, visited forty-six countries, and won four

national competitions before their eighteen birthdays? If Li Lianjie (李连杰), better known as Jet Li, had done nothing after he retired from Kung Fu competition at age twenty, his life would have already been remarkable. However, most non-Chinese had scant idea of who he was before 1997 when at thirty four he starred in Lethal Weapon 4, the movie the spurred him to global stardom.

When Jet Li was born in the early 1960s just outside of Beijing at the height of global political tensions, he seemed an unlikely candidate to help ease

the Sino-US rift. His father died when he was only two, and his family was poor, even by local standards. While claiming their vegetarianism stemmed from Buddhism and an incident that made his grandmother seriously ill from meat, it is likely that this was merely an excuse to hide the fact that they could not afford anything else.

At the age of nine Li was discovered by a particularly harsh teacher, Wu Bin, who took him under his wing, but also worked him much harder than his classmates. Soon Li had developed to the point where he won the junior martial arts championships and began living and studying full-time at the Beijing Martial Arts Academy, only coming home to see his mother on the weekends. While at the academy he not only became a wushu (Chinese martial arts) master, but also learned inner discipline through his Buddhist-oriented training.

So fast was his ascent through the ranks of wushu, that as US-China relations were warming up in the wake of “Ping-Pong

Diplomacy,” Li was sent to the White House to perform for President Nixon and Henry Kissinger. Before he made it to

the capital, he stopped in Hawaii, which, with its beautiful beaches and luxurious lifestyle must have confused the young boy who had been told about the horrors of America. Sadly the whole country is not a tropical paradise, and soon he was off to San Francisco, New York, and finally Washington DC.

When Jet Li returned from what would be the first of many trips abroad, he won the Chinese National Martial Arts Championship at ages twelve, fourteen, fifteen, and sixteen—a record that has yet to be challenged. All of these accomplishments coincided with a tremendous international travel schedule for a young man who was quickly becoming the face of traditional Chinese culture. He returned to the United States each year in the mid and late 1970s, more than twenty years before world travel would become accessible to most of his countrymen.

An injury at age twenty forced him to retire from competition, but it was just the beginning of his career. He immediately began making movies starting with Shaolin Temple in 1983—one of the films that made the monastery internationally famous. It was the first Kung Fu movie from the mainland in decades and propelled him again into the spotlight. Soon he was a mainstay in Hong Kong’s well-established film industry, and being paid handsomely for his efforts.

Jet Li has had a charmed life, but has endured his share of difficulties as well. In addition to the brutally rigorous daily regiment that he endured, he also underwent a number of personal and professional problems. In a New Yorker article, Fredric Dannen claimed that Jet Li’s manager was killed by the Triads (local mafia) in Hong Kong, not because of an unfavorable portrayal, but in retribution for not signing onto one of their projects.

Li was also keen to break into Hollywood, a desire that initially resulted in miserable

failure. It would be more than ten years after his initial attempts to crossover before he finally caught on. In addition, he has had problems in his marriage to a female Kung Fu champion that he tried to keep from public view. Eventually he married his long-rumored lover Nina Li, a former Miss Asia.

Personally, Jet Li seems to be in touch with the spiritual aspects of wushu more than most of his contemporaries. After a two-week stint in a monastery in northwestern China, rumors flew that he would give up his life of luxury to devote himself to religion. His agent quickly shot these down. True to form, aside from a brief break when his wife was pregnant, his career has gone forward without pause.

It is easy to watch Jet Li’s movies and forget the tremendous difficulty that turned him into the finely tuned martial arts master that he is today. Sometimes the plots can be thin and easy to dismiss—although many of his films have received high praise, including 2002’s crossover hit Hero. However, the sheer skill and remarkable life story that Jet Li has are enough to give an appreciation beyond any theatrical shortcomings.

There is more than a little irony that one of the most ancient, traditional, and humble activities would propel Jet Li from a poor boy in the countryside, to diplomatic envoy, and eventually movie stardom. Yet for many people he is the public face of a deeply spiritual form of Chinese martial arts. Regardless of whether you like the high-action, limited-plot style of film that is Kung Fu cinema, there is no denying his importance to both wushu and his native China. CE

Profile: Jet LiJet Li: Martial Artist and Diplomat

– By Josh Gartner

Grainy picture of an unlikely diplomat

A child prodigy


Film Review: ENTER THE DRAGON Revisiting a Bruce Lee classic

China Film Reviews

If Jet Li or Jackie Chan owns the mantle for greatest

Kung Fu movie star today, then Bruce Lee undoubtedly is the granddaddy of them all. Throughout the 1950s and 60s he built up the genre, and at the time of his tragic and still unexplained death in 1973, he had just completed work on his final film, which ultimately propelled him to worldwide fame posthumously.

Despite its martial arts emphasis, Enter the Dragon is shot almost entirely in English and several of the main characters as well as the director are American. It is the story of a disgraced Shaolin-Temple-disciple-turned-shady-businessman, Han (Shih Kien) who holds a gongfu tournament on

his island near Hong Kong. Unbeknownst to his guests, the real goal is recruiting superior martial artists to expand his illicit operations abroad.

Among those that he attracts are the down-and-out gambler Mr. Roper (John Saxon), and his “from-the-ghetto” friend, Williams (Jim Kelly), who show up to cash in. Meanwhile the Hong Kong police send Lee (Bruce Lee) undercover to find out what’s Han’s evil scheme is. It is never clear exactly what the business is per se, but it most certainly is illegal, with murder and drugs both involved.

The film is filled with 1970s era style and stereotypes, which 35 years on are more amusing than offensive. Williams has some of the better lines in the movie, including a particularly prescient comment to the villainous and over-the-top Han, “Man, you’re out of a comic book.” But the real star is Lee whose fighting and mystical know-how make him into a quasi superhero.

It is difficult to know whether Enter the Dragon would have been as popular had Lee not died before the release, but it arguably spurred two dominant genres of the 1970s: Kung-Fu and blacksploitation. Its success and style shaped the direction of the film industry for years to come. Needless to say, this movie cemented Lee’s legacy as the immortal king of Chinese martial arts. CE

What Fearless lacks in good acting and clever plot development, it makes up for in elaborate gong

fu (Kung-Fu) fight scenes. Jet Li brings his tremendous physical gifts to this film that tells the untrue, but “inspired by real events,” tale of nationally famous folk hero Huo Yuanjia. A local of Tianjin, Huo (Li) is a masterful martial artist unmatched in the land. Despite his extreme dedication to his craft, he has let his fame turn him into a conceited man of excess who forgets the real spiritual meaning of Chinese martial arts.

Consumed by arrogance, he seeks revenge on his long-time nemesis who allegedly has wronged one of his students (it turns out to have been a warranted beating). Huo confronts his enemy for the last time in death match. Flying around a restaurant, bouncing from floor to floor, in a climactic

scene, the two men destroy the restaurant and do great harm to one another before Huo eventually walks away victorious. That night he learns of his student’s deceit, and arrives home to discover a disciple of his enemy’s has taken vengeance on his family, leaving the master to ponder the error of his ways.

Huo turns to a life of vagrancy before being rehabilitated in the countryside and ultimately returning to fight foreigners for national pride. There is no real point in getting too caught up in the story, as it is fairly predictable, and highly inaccurate. As Huo’s descendants point out, if the family was all massacred, why are so many relatives alive today? However, if you like carefully planned fight scenes that demonstrate the considerable skills needed for Chinese martial arts then this is the film for you.

Yuen Wo Ping, who choreographed the Matrix, does an excellent job letting the star’s ability shine, which is of course the main draw. The film has a number of bizarre aspects, including using the discussion of wushu as a potential Olympic event to set the stage. However logic and plot are not the point of Fearless. Instead, if you can put this aside then you will enjoy a real showcase for the ballet of gongfu. CE

Film Review: Fearless Jet Li Strikes Again


China Book Review

Book Review: Among Warriors: A Martial Artist in Tibet - Pamela Logan

Fortunately for Pamela Logan, life is about the journey and not the final destination. A Cal Tech grad,

self-proclaimed science nerd—and black belt—she heads to western China and Tibet chasing the shadow of a mythical group of local fighters. After seeing three Khampas in Nepal she spends a significant part of the next five years planning how to get back to a locale where she can again make contact with these warriors. Showing a persistence and determination that reflects her extensive martial arts training, time and again she tries to fool the Chinese authorities and make it to Lhasa—and even more challenging destinations.

In preparation for her adventure she has studied not only Chinese, but also Tibetan, indicating a rare level of dedication. Over many months she tries every means possible to achieve her end goal—bike, truck, horse, or any other method that will get her across the Tibetan Plateau. To make things even more difficult, she attempts this quest shortly after the incidents in 1987 that led to restriction of travel in the area. Her persistence is so doggedly relentlessness that you cannot decide whether to admire or pity her. It is best not to get too involved and simply listen to her remarkable journey unfolding.

Half of the fun of reading the travails of others in China is the familiarity involved and getting the opportunity to hear about all of the things you have missed by arriving ‘too late.’ Yet, during the course of the book you begin to realize that this feeling of regret is timeless, and that each wave of foreigners has lost the chance to see some things—but made it just in time to see others. With this insight comes an appreciation of everything that you experience, and a lessening of the disappointment for those things past.

Logan has read the accounts of several early western pioneers who managed to elude unwelcoming authorities hundreds of years earlier. In those times Lhasa was the ultimate destination, and during her struggles Logan also begins to see the Buddhist Mecca as the gold standard—until she refocuses on the horseback-riding fearsome warriors that strike terror into the heart with just a glance. Through all of her hardships and

obstacles she continues to remind herself of the much greater difficulties faced by visitors in the past, and also draw strength by visualizing the regiment of her fellow martial artists back home. It is not terribly clear what Logan expects to do when she meets up with the Khampas, but during the course of her physical and metaphoric journey she covers some of the most beautiful and untouched areas of the world. She makes it to obscure monasteries, stays with locals, and meets—occasionally feeling superior to perhaps—other westerners similarly drawn to the unknown. There is a clear sense that this is her last chance to do something crazy before a career in academia, and she has allowed us to peek in on her unbelievable adventures.

Much of her journey is fascinating, but some of her hardships—like biking in heavy snowstorms—are probably better enjoyed from the comfort of your living room. Most of Logan’s friends seem to think that she is crazy, and I certainly cannot be one to disagree. However, she saves us the trouble of the travels, while providing at least a little of the insight that she is able to gain. Hopefully her zeal will inspire us to push out to the bounds of what seems rational, and try just a little bit harder with the knowledge that our road is not as tough as it could be.

Tibet has opened up somewhat since the days that Logan spent her time hunkered in the back of dark trucks bouncing along cold mountain roads. A train connecting Chengdu to Lhasa has further increased traffic there, although restrictions still exist, and some of the off-the-trail places that she wanted to go are clearly off-limits. Nonetheless, getting out to the province is not particularly hard and well worth it.

Some of the Tibetans that Logan met were skeptical that it was difficult for foreigners to get to Lhasa. One said that he had been there several years earlier, in the mid 1980s, and he saw what seemed like an endless stream of non-Chinese. So too did our hero herself believe that she would have no problem get out there—until the government changed its mind and shut down access.

Among Warriors is a reminder that we should not take things for granted. It is important

to see the less-traveled parts of the world because we cannot know what might be left in the future. At the same time, just because something changes does not mean it is no longer worth visiting. Without spoiling whether she makes it to see the Khampas, Logan surely believes that her journey was worth it, irrespective of the final success or failure of her initial goals. Mostly she lets us know that if you do not take risks—and few are crazier than giving up a tenure-track job to bike around the Tibetan plains for a year—there is no payoff. Caution is an excuse not to attempt the difficult. CE


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China’s Largest Independent Business & Tax Consultants,

Established Since 1992

For assistance with business incorporations, tax planning and on-going accounting & audit work, anywhere in China, contact Dezan Shira & Associates. With over 1,600 international clients in over 80 Chinese cities, we provide a truly national service. Enquiries please email us at [email protected] Office contact details and extensive China investment and tax information available at www.dezshira.com

Volume 5, Issue 4, May 2007 May 解读中国 THE LEGEND OF …

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Transcript of Volume 5, Issue 4, May 2007 May 解读中国 THE LEGEND OF …