Asia Photos

I've been doing some sightseeing here in Hong Kong and taking a lot of photos so I decided to put some online. Feel free to take a look at my Asia Photo Collection if you like. I'll be posting more as I get the chance. Since I've seen some great photos of the Hong Kong skyline and harbor taken from Victoria Peak, I went there with my camera a few weeks ago hoping to get some good shots myself. However, I found out that's impossible on most days due to the high degree of pollution in Hong Kong these days. From the peak, you couldn't even see the harbor with the thick layer of smog filling the sky. I've had better luck at some other locations though.

Chinese Students Choose EU Over US

An article in yesterday's edition of China Daily mentions that more Chinese students are attending universities in the European Union than the United States. While a few years ago, the U.S. was clearly thought to be the best place to get a college education, that view seems to be changing. Here in Hong Kong, students seem to talk about wanting to study in England, Australia, and Canada as much as they do about the U.S. While U.S. universities are still a fairly popular destination, they aren't by any means the only destination of choice.

I can't say that I'm too surprised since I've definitely noticed a decline in the quality of the American higher eduucation system over my 12 years teaching. Universities have become more business-oriented, focusing primarily on recruiting and keeping students (which translates into profitability through tuition) as well as fund raising. Obviously, universities have to be concerned with being financially solvent and there's nothing inherently wrong with that, but if its at the expense of educational standards, there's likely to be some negative long-term consequences.

I've personally witnessed a strong trend toward stressing entertainment in the university setting. What used to be considered "extracurricular activities" have risen to a level at least equal to (if not above) classes. Even in the classroom, there is a great deal of pressure on professors to provide entertainment in their courses. I'm by no means opposed to extracurricular activities (which can be a very important part of the college experience) or to making classes entertaining as much as possible. However, I think this can be taken to extremes which tends to result in less focus on academic rigor, dummying down of course content, and less educated graduates. As American universities are focusing more on entertainment and profitability, maybe non-U.S. universities have an opportunity to take over in terms of providing the best education. I've noticed during my limited experience so far in Hong Kong, that academic standards seem to be a bit higher than what I'm used to in the U.S.

It may be that trying so hard to satisfy students short-term interest in being entertained while in college may not be in their best long-term interest. Of course, if recruiting students and keeping them for 4 years is the overriding concern, then it may not matter so much what happens to them after the 4 years is over. I guess it just depends on what your priorities. are.

Asian Millionaires

An article in today's issue of China Daily describes the relatively high degree of growth in Asian millionaires. According to the article, Asia's economic growth helped 200,000 people enter the millionaire club in 2006. The number of people worth at least a million US dollars in the Asia-Pacific region increased by 8.6% in 2006 to 2.6 million, constituting 27% of the world's millionaires according to a study by Merrill Lynch & Co. Inc.

Overall, the wealth of Asian millionaires was $8.4 trillion, with Japan accounting for 43% and China about 20%. Of course a million ain't worth what it used to be so for those of you who aren't impressed, the Asian region's share of super-rich (with assets over $30 million) increased by 12.2% to 17,500, exceeding the global rate of 11.3%.

What does all this mean? I don't know for sure, but it seems to be another of many indications that Asia is experiencing greater economic growth than the rest of the world. Also, maybe it means I should move here permanently to have better odds of becoming a millionaire.

Lingnan Congregation

Lingnan University had its Congregation ceremony for last term's graduates today. I attended the ceremony for undergraduate and graduate students. Although the ceremony is very similar to what I've experienced at American universities, there may be a bit of a cultural difference reflected. While parents here are as proud of their sons and daughters as anywhere else, the audience applauds respectfully for each graduate as their name is announced. In the U.S., there's sometimes almost a competitive aspect to the proceedings as parents, relatives and/or friends in attendance try to outcheer or outscream others. Sometimes it even seems a bit like a circus with whistles and all kinds of other noisemakers. While this is merely a way of celebrating, maybe it also illustrates the difference between an extremely individualistic culture such as that of the U.S. and the more community-oriented culture of the Chinese.

In addition, Lingnan's new president, Yuk-shee Chan was officially installed in a ceremony attended by Hong Kong's Chief Executive Donald Tsang, who put his foot in his mouth a few days ago by saying that democracy might lead to a Cultural_Revolution-like climate (see this article). Mr. Tsang kept away from such controversial statements at Lingnan.

Brits Get Rich in China

I found this series of videos on YouTube about British entrepreneurs seeking their fortunes in China. It seems a bit sensationalistic to me, but kind of interesting. It shows the naive "gold rush" mentality many foreigners have about doing business in China (very cheap labor & 1.3 billion people to sell to) and how they routinely find out that easy money isn't usually easy and doing business in China has many pitfalls as well as opportunities. Here's Part 1 of the series & the other parts can be found here.

China: Taking Over the Internet

Asia is already the region of the world with the greatest Internet use and this is extremely likely to remain the case for the foreseeable future. In fact, Asia's share of Internet use is very likely to increase as more and more of the huge populations of China and India (1.3 billion and 1.1 billion respectively) get connected. Here are some Internet statistics that I find very interesting. Based on the numbers, it doesn't take a genius to realize that Asia, and especially China, is the place to be for many types of Internet-oriented businesses.

China is clearly the country with the greatest potential for growth. There are already 162 million people in China with Internet access (not even including Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan), second only to the United States' 211 million. China is almost guaranteed to overtake the U.S. within a decade or so since the percentage of the population with Internet access is still only about 13%, leaving huge room for growth. The United States is over 60% as are other highly-developed countries Japan and South Korea. China's economic growth has averaged around 10% annually for the past 10 years (the highest of any country in the world) and this is resulting in a rising percentage of the population being raised out of poverty with discretionary income to spend on things like Internet access. China curently has about 1.31 million websites which is about a 60% increase from 2006 and continues to increase rapidly.

If all this isn't impressive enough, China currently has over 600 million mobile phones which means that about one out of five mobile phone users in the world is Chinese.

Internet statistics are available on the Internet at the Internet World Statistics website.

Special Olympics in China

Next year, China will host the summer Olympics which, in addition to its importance as an international sporting event, will also be a spectacular showcase for China to the rest of the world. However, there's been a lot of news coverage lately about the Special Olympics currently being held in Shanghai, China (see this article or this one for example). This year's Special Olympics will involve 7,500 athletes with intellectual disabilities, including 1200 Chinese athletes (the largest national team in Special Olympics history).


The importance of this occurence can't be underestimated for many reasons. For one, this is the first time the Special Olympics has been held in Asia where people with disabilities haven't generally received the same degree of support that they get in the U.S. and other Western nations. China, with its 1.3 billion population, obviously has a large number of disabled citizens - its estimated that there are over 60 million people with disabilities in China. Historically, the disabled were mostly hidden away at home in China and received little government support. Since the 1990's, that's started to change gradually with the enactment of laws protecting people with disabilities, government support programs and aid from private organizations.

Last Summer, while co-teaching a study abroad course from Belmont University, we visited a school for the disabled in Nanjing (see accompanying photos). Out of the many exciting things we saw in China, this was one of the experiences that seemed to stand out the most for the students. While the school was nothing special by American standards in terms of its facilities, it was clear from the dedication of the staff and the attitudes of the students that they were getting education, training and attention that could help them lead better lives. One of the teachers told us that some of these students were barely functional before coming to the school, whereas with the training and support they received, they could communicate and express themselves reasonably well, despite their disabilities. Hopefully, the publicity from the Special Olympics in China will lead to increased attention being focused on helping the disabled in China and elsewhere.

Lingnan Toastmasters

Yesterday, I went to a Toastmasters meeting. Toastmasters is an organization that helps people improve their public speaking ability. There are clubs in 90 countries that meet weekly or bi-weekly for 1-2 hours. During meetings, several members make short prepared speeches (generally about 5-10 minutes) and there’s also usually a “table topics” portion where people volunteer to give a very short (1-2 minute) impromptu speech on a topic chosen by the session host. Although this can be very intimidating, its great experience in thinking on your feet (both literally and figuratively). Since most people are afraid of speaking in public, Toastmasters provides a great way to conquer that fear and develop confidence since everything is done in a friendly way.

Anyone, the meeting I went to was at the Lingnan Toastmasters group. Several students and one guest from another Hong Kong Toastmasters club gave speeches on the topic of “heroes.” The standard superheros like Superman, Spiderman, Wonder Woman weren’t the wiiners though. Instead, it seemed that to the members, the biggest heros of the evening were anyone willing to take the chance to get up in front of the group to speak. As I was listening to the student speakers, I kept thinking how difficult it must be to make a speech in front of a fairly large audience in a language that isn’t your native language. All of the speakers were Chinese, but the speeches were all in English. Although many of the speakers were nervous, they all managed to get through it and do a good job, making some good points and even using some humor.

If I had to make a speech in Mandarin Chinese, I’d be pretty nervous and would probably end up saying something that no one would understand and I’d have a hard time filling up anywhere near 5 minutes. After all, there’s only so many times you can say ni hao (hello), wo shi meiguoren (I am American) before you have to just give up and say zaijian (goodbye). Of course, my fear of public speaking has diminished greatly since I started teaching since I speak to a classroom audience regularly, dazzling them with my genius and wit (as evidenced by the photo below).

Note: This photo is not from one of my classes, but I have observed this reaction on occasion. I gues that means there's always room fro improvement. End of speech - Until next time, Zaijian!

Freedom of Speech?

I'm teaching a class called Legal Aspects of Business at Lingnan University in Hong Kong and have been discussing the Hong Kong legal system with some comparison to China, England and the U.S. One of the things we've covered is the basic freedoms that are guaranteed in jurisdictions with a legal system based on a Constitution (or Hong Kong's Basic Law) . So it seemed a bit ironic when I just saw a new story about a student at a John Kerry speech in Florida who ended up being arrested and shot with a taser gun by police, apparently for exercising his freedom of speech. Like just about anything else nowadays, the scene was caught on video (see below). Of course, there are some limits on freedom of speech, but from watching the video, it seems like the guy was simply asking some questions although he may have been taking up too much time. He also might have been playing it up a bit as the police tried to escort him out, but it certainly didn't appear like he was inciting a riot or anything else that would be deemed impermissable forms of speech.



Freedom of speech under the First Amendment gives people the right to protest as long as they do so peacefully. There were some student protests against the Iraq war last week so maybe that's an indication that the Constitution still has some practical value. I particularly appreciate a quote at the end of this article which desribes a student protesting the protest with a sign saying "Get your ass back to class," but acknowledging that although he's opposed "to the ideologies of the protest, he still appreciates the fact that Americans are able to protest." Maybe our legal system still has some hope.

The public relations folds at Belmont University have put together a little announcement on my sabbatical here in Hong Kong at here. I went out Friday evening with some other Lingnan faculty members to a restaurant at Hong Kong Gold Coast, a resort area not too far from campus. We had a table on an outdoor patio with a nice view of Castle Peak Bay. Some of the Lingnan faculty live in the apartment complex there and its also home to Chinese pink dolphins (the sea, not the apartments).