An (originally) short comment about facebook. I hate it. It's slow, it's annoying, and as every sane person, i don't like getting idiotic messages, not to mention the eternal "this and this made a quiz about that and that".
At the same time, i enjoy reading people's statuses, which always brings the most human and at the same time most creative of people, and even the looking at their pictures. Moreover, I do believe in it's ability to maintain relationships, and bring people together.
People are quick to criticize the “fake” friendships, which are based on nothing more than two people knowing each other names. Some are so. But i cannot wonder, how deep do "real" personal friendships really go? I am not talking about the most intimate of friendships (how many of these can an average man have? I'd say no more than 10), but of the ones with other people, who are in the same social circles long enough to be defined as "personal friends". These also can of course be very rewarding, but during my life, I have gotten (and certainly given) the cold shoulder from people regarded as personal long-time friends, and on the other hand, received great help from people who barely knew me.
Take my time in China as an example. Now i have a kind of a house in China, but there was a time i only had bags to move from bed to bed. More than half of it (Beijing, Yinchuan) was spent in other people's (4) houses. Only one of them did I know before coming to China, and also only shallowly. Nonetheless, they have let me into their house. This is, in part, thanks to the world created by networks such as facebook or couchsurfing, according to which, if somebody is a friend of a friend, he's probably also your friend.
Going back to the example i wrote about recently - the guy who is in a "Arab hating" group. with me as a friend, and with the friends i have, i wouldn't rule out the possibility that he's a mere three friend \ Kevin Bacon degrees from a guy in a "hate Israelis" group. Facebook has actually brought them closer together. Us optimistic "friends" can hope it's a matter of time before they realize that - whether they like it or not, whether it be real or virtual - they are part of the same network.
Saturday, May 9, 2009
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Swine flu has made it to Beijing!
no, it's just me. but i do enjoy a good swine, when it's still alive and snorting.
so i've made it back to big b, after a long night of hard seat traveling with the rest of us country bumbkins. hard seat costed a hundred yuan less that sleeper class, and i told myself "it's not my first day in China, i can make it", picturing myself happily sleeping despite sitting (i am proud about the unfussiness of my sleeping ability). little did i know that darkness is a luxury kept only for the sleeper class. as in an experiment, everything was left lit, enough reason to push the number of non-sleepers to a majority, which (in a democracy as a democracy) was glad to exert its rights by smoking, laughing, shouting, and of course - loudly playing bad quality music in horrible quality sound out of cellphones. now that's one chinese habit the world could do better without.
but i did manage to sleep, and made it back to the good old warm city, the improved version of the menacing cold city, to which one pale february afternoon a young ambitious traveler came, equiped with nothing but a fully-stamped passport and a dream of studying Mandarin (three-months-old nostalgy... how pathetic can you get?). now it carressed me with its giant buildings, reassuringly showing me how small i am, and with its huge yet already familiar transport system, in which i sat sorrounded by various bejingers, all of them just too cool for school (in comparison with the kaifengers' "too poor for school"). there's nothing as efficient as an underground system in order to remind me how far i am from home.
meeting again with local friends - amongst them the great teacher Zhang, sure was a treat, on top of it new friends, such as the nice mister Ping, who ran into me in this nice Taoist temple, "White Clouds Temple", and showed me around. he has spent a year in Israel back in 1990, studying its agriculture.
so all in all it's been a refreshing two-day experience. tommorow i probably get a new passport, and head back to Henan.
so i've made it back to big b, after a long night of hard seat traveling with the rest of us country bumbkins. hard seat costed a hundred yuan less that sleeper class, and i told myself "it's not my first day in China, i can make it", picturing myself happily sleeping despite sitting (i am proud about the unfussiness of my sleeping ability). little did i know that darkness is a luxury kept only for the sleeper class. as in an experiment, everything was left lit, enough reason to push the number of non-sleepers to a majority, which (in a democracy as a democracy) was glad to exert its rights by smoking, laughing, shouting, and of course - loudly playing bad quality music in horrible quality sound out of cellphones. now that's one chinese habit the world could do better without.
but i did manage to sleep, and made it back to the good old warm city, the improved version of the menacing cold city, to which one pale february afternoon a young ambitious traveler came, equiped with nothing but a fully-stamped passport and a dream of studying Mandarin (three-months-old nostalgy... how pathetic can you get?). now it carressed me with its giant buildings, reassuringly showing me how small i am, and with its huge yet already familiar transport system, in which i sat sorrounded by various bejingers, all of them just too cool for school (in comparison with the kaifengers' "too poor for school"). there's nothing as efficient as an underground system in order to remind me how far i am from home.
meeting again with local friends - amongst them the great teacher Zhang, sure was a treat, on top of it new friends, such as the nice mister Ping, who ran into me in this nice Taoist temple, "White Clouds Temple", and showed me around. he has spent a year in Israel back in 1990, studying its agriculture.
so all in all it's been a refreshing two-day experience. tommorow i probably get a new passport, and head back to Henan.
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