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Category Archives: China

Stories from my Grandmothers

(Sun Yat-Sen memorial – Zhongshan, Guangdong) Searching for my heritage… Trans: All that is under heaven belongs to the people.

While in Singapore I had the chance to visit my grandmothers, who I hadn’t seen for a long while. It was during my study of modern Chinese history last year that I realized I knew very little about my grandparents’ past. There is so much of local history that I never learned, because I had opted for a more Western-centric curriculum during A-levels. I suppose I had been more interested in the future back then, but it was partly due to the generational language barrier. After a summer in China my Mandarin has much improved, though not as much as I would have liked it to, but sufficient for most purposes. So I decided to ask about their past.

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Posted in China, Singapore.

1 comment

By qui tacet – January 18, 2009
Vote for Wokai in the Youth Social Entrepreneur Competition

Dear friends, I need a five minute favor.

The nonprofit I volunteer with, Wokai microfinance, has been selected as a finalist in the Youth Social Entrepreneur Competition on Changemakers.net. The final round is decided by online voting. It takes about five minutes to register and vote, and you can do this here, but those five minutes can change the world for us. And if you could get your network to do it too, that would be AMAZING!

Read on for why you should do this:

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Posted in China, Development.

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By qui tacet – November 8, 2008
Christopher Hill visits Columbia

Chris Hill, the Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs and the head of the US delegation to the six party talks was invited to Columbia by WEAI to talk. I was not the only undergraduate present, but the room was largely graduate students and press. I sat in between mainland Chinese graduate students and this lady from a Taiwanese wire service. There were five or six television cameras at the back.

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Posted in China, Korea.

4 comments

By qui tacet – March 30, 2008
Rejected again

Thank you for taking the time to interview recently with a FACES executive. Your written application and experiences and opinions expressed in your interview impressed us greatly. However, we had many extremely qualified interview candidates, and had to make some very difficult decisions. We regret that we are unable to offer you a spot in the 2008 FACES conference.

Thank you again for your time and interest in FACES, and we wish you all the best in your future endeavors.

This is the second time already. I really have no idea what these Stanford people are looking for… I guess I won’t get to visit Chris anytime soon, which is a pity since I would really like to see more of the United States than the borough of Manhattan and the ten block radius around Columbia I hardly leave. So far I’ve been around the DC area and down to Indiana, but that’s it.

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Posted in China, College Life.

2 comments

By qui tacet – February 27, 2008
Interviewing with ViD

In retrospect it was probably a bad idea to leave interview preparation for ViD and FACES to the last minute. After pouring out my heart and soul to the University of St. Gallen and the GSGLP selection committee, I’m just too drained to reflect on such philosophical questions as “tell me about yourself”, “what would you say is your greatest weakness”, “what is something special about you that isn’t in your application”, and “how many piano tuners are there in New York City”. That and the fact that my heart was beating like a jackhammer may have contributed to a less than positive interview experience.

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Posted in Business, China, College Life, Development.

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By qui tacet – February 10, 2008
Farewell my Concubine and Hansel & Gretel

This week I saw the Chinese National Opera production of Farewell my Concubine (霸王别姬) and Met Opera’s new Hansel and Gretel at Lincoln Center.

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Posted in China, Theater.

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By qui tacet – February 1, 2008
2008春季学期练习中文计划

When it occurred to me that I might be interviewed in Mandarin for the summer job I applied for (rural chinese social enterprise development), I realized that I was in deep trouble. I didn’t even know that 小额信贷 means ‘microfinance’, there’s no way I could explain it properly to a farmer, nor could I read a CASS paper on the topic without having to stop every couple phrases to check the dictionary. Even writing a short e-mail in Mandarin about something technical would be difficult.

In order to prepare for summer 2008 in China, my Mandarin has to improve substantially in all areas: listening comprehension, advanced conversation, reading comprehension, and composition, in order of importance. Towards this objective, I have planned various activities to practice Mandarin every day, including watching the awesome New Shanghai Bund (新上海滩） and JJ Lin’s new TW-drama So I’m Not Handsome (原来我不帅).

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Posted in China, College Life, Development.

2 comments

By qui tacet – January 31, 2008
David Ho on HIV/AIDS in China

Although I am nominally taking six (likely to be five) classes this semester, I consider attending seminars and talks to be part of an additional class. Today I attended the first of my series of extracurricular lectures in this semester, and sometimes I think I learn more from these one-off things than weeks of compulsory stuff. Greater China Initiative and CU-Asia (both SIPA clubs) invited Dr. David Ho, a leading AIDS researcher living in NYC, to speak at Columbia about HIV/AIDS in China.

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Posted in China, Development.

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By qui tacet – January 26, 2008
Microfinance education via television dramas

Microfinance usually isn’t this dramatic…

In July 2007, the South Korean ministry of finance announced that it had hired the lead actor and actress from a hit television serial that aired May-July to promote their microcredit program. That television serial, “War of Money” (쩐의전쟁), was about the informal moneylending industry in South Korea, reaching an average of 32.8% of households in the greater Seoul area and 31% nationwide, and it was the top-rated serial of the season, so popular that ‘bonus’ episodes were produced – it remains one of my personal all-time favorite kdramas. Much of its storyline emphasized themes of income volatility, uncollateralized credit, innovative entrepreneurship, and good (and bad) borrowing practices – all themes relevant to microfinance. In an interview prior to the serial’s airing, the lead actor Park Shin-yang (박신양, of Lovers in Paris/파리의연인 fame) had even noted that one of the sources of inspiration that he drew from was the work of Muhammad Yunus and the Grameen Bank.

Perhaps it may be useful to take “Money’s Warfare” one step further, and consider a similar application of television serials in microfinance education, through its plot, themes, and product placement strategy.

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Posted in China, Development, Essays & Writing, Korea, TV Dramas.

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By qui tacet – January 17, 2008
Jay Chou’s Secret: Xiaoyu vs Qingyi

The romance between Jay and Xiaoyu (Kwai Lunmei) in ‘Secret/不能说的秘密’ is so perfect… it really is a simple love straight out of Jay’s 简单爱, or pretty much any of his early songs. And this MV by SY-sempai is set to my favorite piece from the OST. But my heart goes out to Qingyi’s (Alice Tseng) disappointment, and the sorrow behind her forced smile – it must be so painful to pine from afar, but even more so to keep that longing… secret (LOL).

Posted in China, Film.

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By qui tacet – November 12, 2007
Perhaps Beijing?

I am considering whether or not I can attend this without too much cost:

On behalf of the Global Forum for Health Research and The Lancet, we are pleased to confirm that your essay entitled The fever at the bottom of the pyramid: Towards private sector and market-oriented solutions for the 10/90 gap was chosen as one of 40 shortlisted by the organizers from almost 300 entries from 60 countries. Your essay will now be published in an anthology to be launched at the Global Forum’s 2007 meeting in Beijing on 29 October. As you know, the winners of the competition have been invited to Beijing for their prize, all expenses paid. Should you be able to find funding to allow you to join us in Beijing, we would be happy to waive the participation fee and to involve you in the celebration of ‘Young Voices’. Do let us know. Please accept our congratulations on this success and our very best wishes for your future.

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Posted in China, Essays & Writing.

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By qui tacet – August 20, 2007
Not going to Beijing

I might be attending the Global Forum for Health Research in Beijing in Oct/Nov, which would be about 7-8 months too late to when I should’ve been there, or 8-9 months too early. Might being the operative word – I am very unlikely to succeed.

Thank you very much for sending an essay for our competition. All essays have now been reviewed and we are in the final round of judging. Results will be announced at the beginning of August. I am pleased to be able to tell you that your essay has been shortlisted.

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Posted in China, Development, Essays & Writing.

3 comments

By qui tacet – June 30, 2007
The First Emperor opera

I went down to the metropolitan opera early monday morning before class to get $20 standing-room tickets for the second-last performance (this run) of the world premiere of The First Emperor. I got orchestra standing-room tickets, which in retrospect was a poor choice – family circle standing-room might have been better.

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Posted in China, Theater.

1 comment

By qui tacet – January 23, 2007
夜宴 / The Banquet

I attend a lot of Asian groups events (just now I had kimbap for dinner with a Korean Christian campus group). On Friday evening I met a lot of students from Beida, Tsinghua, Fudan, Shanghai Jiaotong etc who were in town for the China Future Leadership Project, and discovered just how difficult it is to communicate when their English and my Mandarin are both subpar. On Saturday I went for a Chinese students event (one of the graduate student groups, mostly Mainland students and recent immigrants with their families) celebrating the Mid-Autumn Festival. Lots of little Chinese kids running around the classrooms while the adults had karaoke and mahjong. Ko (my burmese friend) and I went for their screening of the film 夜宴 (English title: The Banquet) in a lecture theater. Not entirely kosher as I could tell it was from an RMVB… but I will probably watch it again in a proper cinema with the rest once it premieres in the states, simply to test whether or not I can follow the dialogue without subtitles.

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Posted in China, Film.

1 comment

By qui tacet – October 8, 2006