Pretty things include lots of really beautiful paintings of Chinese Opera singers, vases, beads, etc. Not so pretty things include tiger hide. Dead serious. There was a little group of men on the street just hanging out with some tiger fur. I went over to take a picture and see if it was real or not. I'm not 100% sure if they're for real because they were selling the tiger for 400-something Yuan, which is like, 59-ish US dollars. Tiger can't be that cheap, can it? I told them that I refuse to buy it: fake or real, but then one of the vendors chased me with the tiger across the street. That's scary shit.
Today I had the pleasure of watching a movie with Mom called "The Founding of a Republic" (建国大业). As you may have guessed, this movie is about the rise of Communism in China and was released just a week ago just in time for the 60th anniversary of Communist rule in China (remember Western folks, 60 is a significant milestone year for Chinese). The movie actually detailed the events that happened after World War II, which was basically the Chinese Civil War continued and, in essence, the Communist Revolution in China.
Quick history lesson (you can skip this if you'd like): Chinese Civil War was fought between the the Chinese Nationalist Party (AKA Kuomintang, KMT) and the Communist Party of China (CPC). This civil war began in 1927, which was only a decade or so after Sun Yat-Sen took down the Qing dynasty to build a republic in China. So the KMT, led by General/President Chiang Kai-Shek, and CPC, led by Mao Zedong, fought and fought for rule of China, only stopping for the Sino-Japanese War (aka WWII), together pushing the Japanese out of China. After this great feat, the two parties thought that they could be united in peace; however, the civil war started up again in 1946. The KMT were eventually pushed out of China and into Taiwan while Mao Zedong and the CPC declared China a Communist state on October 1, 1949 in Tiananmen Square and renamed Beiping into Beijing. In Taiwan, the KMT set up their government and declared them to still be representative of China as a whole.
The movie was almost a good history lesson. Lots of battles were discussed in the movie and lots of important personnel were introduced. But, of course, this is a movie about Mao in China, so there were some interesting dynamics. On a side note, the movie was jam-pack full of A-list Chinese stars including Zhang Ziyi, Jet Li, Jackie Chan, and Donnie Yen.
Mao Zedong was depicted as very great man. Every word that came out of Mao's mouth was meaningful, well thought-out, and inspiring. He was portrayed as not wanting to fight anymore and only wanting peace for the benefit of China. The film gave me a glimpse of Mao's life: there he is playing in the meadow of pink flowers with his daughter teaching her how to write, he's up on the roof top looking at the stars and writing poetry, giving the common man a pack of his own cigarettes. Impressive, no?
Then there's Chiang Kai-Shek. Every word that came out of General Chiang's mouth was shallow and selfish. He spoke in platitudes and didn't really care about the republic of China. His family takes money from the treasury, he orders KMT secret agents to kill people that are openly pro-CPC, he even told secret agents to kill off an entire political party (the Chinese Democratic Party that I don't think I've ever read about...). All he wants is to go to war. Yikes.
Ultimately, Chiang and the KMT crew flee to Taiwan, and we see that Mao is victorious! In Beiping, he is greeted by thousands of members of the People's Liberation Army as they chant, "LONG LIVE CHAIRMAN MAO!" Then, the movie closes with General Chiang being told that the US will no longer support their battle to win China, and then we're shown REAL FOOTAGE of Mao at Tiananmen Square on October 1, 1949. The Chinese national anthem plays in the background as we see Chairman Mao greeting all his people happily, the subtitles say that dozens of political parties were invited to voice their opinions and be a part of the first republic, and then we see the Chinese flag waving in the air for a few minutes before the credits roll.
Truth is, the Chinese can't confront anything that happened to China after that day under Chairman Mao. I'm not going to say anything more because I'm in Beijing, but...the movie did show Mao's glory days. Also, truly, the KMT really were selfish. Chiang Kai-Shek's extended family stole millions of money that the US had given to the KMT to defeat the CPC. It's true, they were really focused on their self-interests! However, I'm not so sure about the other things.
Anyway, there's not much more I can say, except that it was a great movie-watching experience. Afterwards, Mom and I found a huge 50-ft statue of Shaquille O'Neal in Chaoyang Park.
Updated my flickr photos, and added some links:
- Communist Revolution Glossary
- Save China's Tigers
- Chinese Babies Stolen For Adoption (ok, so I never talked about this today, but still good article to read!)
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