PandaPassport.com – China Blog

Ok. So I’m at a bar a few weeks ago, and I meet what we call “an old China hand.” This guy was from Canada too, and had been in China for about 10 years. We got to talking, and of course – as us laowais often do – we started comparing China vs “back home.”

He professed that he loved China: “If I want to drive down the street at 100 clicks, no problem. I’m free to do so. There’s no cop hiding around a corner with a radar gun, looking to slap a fine on you for speeding. You tell me which country has more freedom?” (I’m paraphrasing of course, because this conversation involved too many beers to get it verbatim).

While I don’t know if I agree with his viewpoint totally (i.e. living in China is way better than living in Canada), I had to admit he was making some interesting points. I’d certainly like to be able to run some red lights at 4 in the morning when there are no other cars to be seen.

Now, just recently I started thinking about another cool thing about living in China. That being, it’s a really really safe place to be. Here in Dalian, people tend to get off the streets and go home before 10 or 11pm. And if there’s anyone not at home, they’re likely in a net bar or selling meat-on-a-stick. Walking down a dark street at night is not something I worry about here.

There’s no place like home?

Now Canada is, or at least used to be, thought of as one of the world’s safest countries, and one of the best places to live. But apparently that might not be the case anymore, if what happened to my cousin a few days ago is any indication. I’m not gonna go into too much details, but suffice it to say that a guy was trying to break into his car in the middle of the night, and my cousin did succeed in stopping him. The would-be-theif got the shit-knocking he deserved from my cousin, but apparently retalliated with some box cutters during the scuffle. My cousin got the Xmas turkey treatment, but didn’t even realize it until he went back in the house:

Not that I haven’t heard of such a thing happening in China before, because I have. But I guess I was being a little bit optimistic when I thought that our little safe corner of the world (i.e. Newfoundland was exempt from such tom-fuckery.

It seems that the world is indeed changing.

Both sides of it.

China Stolen-Media-of-the-Day

The family sends our best wishes to my cousin, and we all hope that he heals up quickly.

And on a totally unrelated note, here is my China Stolen-Media-of-the-Day, The Godfather.