fast at Tiffany’s, with a dollop of CurlyrnHoward thrown in.rnI was also given an education in modernrnChinese politics, for the comic hadrnmore pressing business than simply tornmake sport of me and my decadent Westernrnways. He disappeared from the stagernfor a few minutes, during which time arnsquadron of heartachingly beautifulrnmodels showed a line of clothing thatrnmelded the high style of Cheryl Tiegs’ KMartrnfashions with the functionality ofrnPeople’s Liberation Army garb. Whenrnhe returned, the comic, no longer smirking,rnwas dressed in a Red Guard cadre’srnuniform, vintage 1966. Above his headrnhe hoisted an evidently well-thumbedrncopy of the Little Red Book. As a discorntune rose in the background, he began tornsing in a high, lovely voice.rnI could make out only a little of thernsong he performed, but it was clear it wasrna protest tune of some sort—clear becausernof the yi-er-san-se (hup-two-threefour)rnchorus, clear because of the discomfortrnthat spread throughout thernaudience, seated within spitting distancernof Tiananmen Square. Wlien I asked arnChinese friend to translate the lyrics, hernlooked at me sadly and said, “I don’t understandrnhis dialect.”rnThe next day, having conferred withrnhis father on the propriety of telling a foreignerrnabout his country’s troubles, evenrnsecondhand, my friend shared with mernwhat the comic had sung. His tune concernedrna student from Beijing Universityrnwho had been sent into the fields duringrnthe Cultural Revolution, frill of enthusiasmrnfor deepening the peasants’ sense ofrnhistorical obligahon and class allegiance,rnand who became disenchanted with thernofficial corruption he saw all aroundrnhim.rnMy friend, who himself had been sentrninto the fields in 1967, was astonished tornhear such a song sung so openly. So wasrnhis father, a cardiologist who, during thernCultural Revolution, was removed fromrnhis clinical practice, denounced for havingrnbeen poisoned by Western ideas, andrnforced to carry corpses from his hospitalrnto a nearby potter’s field for the next threernyears.rnBut that was in a different China, rememberedrnonly by those 35 and older,rnthose men and women who gave mernknowing nods on my daily, thoughtfulrnstrolls through Tiananmen Square. Thatrnwas a China of famine and terror and unspeakablernhardship, in which millionsrndied over mere words, a far cry from thernmodern China of glittering skyscrapers,rnvideo CD players, and foreign joint ventures.rnIn this new China, even the namern”Cultural Revolution ” has fallen out ofrnfavor. The preferred euphemism for thatrnterrible, bloody fime is now “the periodrnof domestic turmoil.”rnChina is a country where such smallrnchanges in phrasing have enormousrnmeaning, where slogans replace independentrnthought. One such slogan, onernthat I heard everywhere I traveled, isrn”black cat, white cat,” a reference to formerrnPremier Deng Xiaoping’s 1991 decreernthat the Communist Party wouldrnhenceforth stop debating whether a givenrnmeasure was socialist or capitalist in nature.rn”It doesn’t matter,” Deng said,rn”whether a cat is white or black. If itrncatches the mouse, it is a good cat.”rnBut evidently it does matter, for thernnew China is shedding socialism asrnquickly as it can in the apparent beliefrnthat the white capitalist cat promises torntrap more mice. Socialism is dead, orrnvery nearly so, despite the government’srnapparent commitment to maintainingrnDeng’s program of “socialism with Chineserncharacterisfics.”rnInstead, Pepsi signs far outnumber redrnflags everywhere, and all China is caughtrnup in a frenzy of new construction andrnbusiness start-ups. In Shanghai, I wanderedrnthrough a Communist Party recruitingrnrally that would have been utterlyrnunpeopled save that the cadres werernoffering free haircuts, which drew arnhandful of takers. And whereas TiananmenrnSquare once sported monumentalrnposters depicting Mao Zedong, KarlrnMarx, Friedrich Engels, Zhou Enlai, andrnother stalwarts of Chinese communism,rnon this particular October day, whichrncommemorated the anniversary of therndefeat of Chiang Kai-shek’s NationalistrnParty, the massive plaza had only onernsuch graphic: a poster carrying the imagernof Sun Yat-Sen, who led the democraticrnrevolution that overthrew the so-calledrnlast emperor in 1911.rnIn state socialism’s stead is the rising ofrndemocracy in all its messy glory —arndemocracy that includes the largely unknownrnability to disagree. I had come tornChina as a student of the martial arts andrnas a tourist first, and only incidentally as arnjournalist, but everywhere I traveled I wasrntreated to little tidbits of dissent, issued byrngovernment functionaries, students, andrnworking people alike.rnSome of the comments were less thanrnprofound. For instance, one CommunistrnParty member said to me, “The governmentrnhas fun. They drink. Theyrnsmoke. They go with girls. But thevrndon’t want the people to do this. Thenrnthey lose control of the people.” But otherrncomments carried more meaning.rnSaid another party member, looking atrnthe well-dressed young people on Shanghai’srnNanjing Road, “In the 70’s, we hadrnblue Mao suits. In the 80’s, we had businessrnsuits. In the 90’s, we have T-shirts.”rnHe was right: T-shirts, the uniform ofrnneoliberalism and Pax Coca-Cola, arerneverywhere. But China is changing inrnmore than just fashion. In a generation,rnthe standard of living has improved dramaticallyrnin almost every sector of society.rnThere has been an immense reductionrnin poverb,- throughout the country.rnIn the wake of the one-child revolution,rn”me first” consimierism is rising, and, forrnthe first time ever, there is plenty to consume,rnalbeit at fearful cost to the environment.rnChina’s growth is astonishing; its economyrnis projected to surpass that of thernUnited States and to become the world’srnlargest no later than 2020. Within therncountry, signs of this growth are everywhere.rnOld wood-and-brick neighborhoodsrnin Beijing are being bulldozedrnaway in the name of progress, displacingrnhundreds and thousands of people; onernsuch neighborhood, not far from TiananmenrnSquare, is being remade into a 24-rnstory megaplaza with shopping malls,rnhealth clubs, luxurv condominiums, andrnfour-star hotels.rnWhether all this will bring democracyrn—whether, as the libertarians maintain,rnfree markets truly do bring politicalrnfreedom — remains to he seen. As wernAmericans wait and watch, we will wantrnto curb our impatience with the way Chinarndoes things. That way is changing, tornbe sure, but on certain matters Chinarnwill not budge.rnOne of them is Tibet. It is a sad fact,rnbut a fact nonetheless, that China viewsrnTibet as a province of the larger Chinesernstate and that, after an ambitious programrnof colonization, more Han Chinesernthan ethnic Tibetans now live in thatrnprovince. The urge to restore a free Tibetrnis a matter of misplaced nostalgia. It isrnproper to deplore China’s actions in Tibet,rnbut it is probably necessary to acceptrnthe Dalai Lama’s grim view that Tibetanrnculture will flourish only outside Tibet.rnWe can also expect that the Chineserngovernment, even if it is more responsivernto ideas of democracy, will not gladly lis-rn38/CHRONICLESrnrnrn