China: Quick Trip To The Future

In 1976, Chinese police politely escorted two foreigners - my friend and me - out of a railroad station while we were looking at a giant Chinese-built steam locomotive.

Twenty-three years later, I looked for, but could not find, that railroad station in Beijing. So different was the city and its culture that I thought that I had been dropped onto a new, modern landscape on a newly discovered planet.

I first went to China as part of a trade delegation for IBM, which had been contacted by a unit of the People's Republic of China foreign trade organization to engage in talks that might lead to the sale of a computer there. We were sent in 1976 to explain and describe the various computer products that IBM was offering at that time.

There was a great deal of confusion over what to tell the Chinese, since the United States and NATO export licensing restrictions were not understood very well by most countries, and least of all by the Chinese audience.

Although the IBM delegation had no idea who was in their audience, the presentations apparently went well because, two months later, China asked for a negotiating team to begin talks on a possible sale. Those talks continued for the next nine months, punctuated by occasional two-week vacations in Japan or Hawaii. It took four months just to learn the identity of our client - a factory in Shenyang that manufactured high-pressure air and gas compressors and pumps.

The process we went through was like the preparation of a treaty between IBM and the PRC - every word, every comma, every paragraph in the contract was important for the future. During that time, we got to know the people on the other side of the negotiating table. They became friends in the Chinese sense, trustworthy in word, predictable in response, and excellent hosts for strangers in a foreign culture. At appropriate times, we ate together, we drank together and we were taken to sporting events and tourist sights.

On my recent visit, I met with these friends from twenty-three years ago. Although some were retired, most were still working since they had not reached the mandatory retirement age. Their hospitality was overwhelming.

During my first visit, we walked past shrouded machines that we were not permitted to see; this time, I was taken on a tour of their factory to be shown the newest imported technological machine. Where secrecy was the hallmark of my previous visit, full disclosure was the theme this time.

I discovered that China today is a world apart from the China of yesterday. Even though some of the feelings remain, there is a decided looseness and openness that was totally new to me.

At our first meeting with the Chinese in early 1977, there were five people at the table. The guy in the middle introduced himself, but offered no introduction of the other four. It took two weeks before we knew their names; and during our meetings, other people came and went whose names we never learned.

People spoke more freely on this visit, although not as freely as in the U.S. As before, I heard no criticism of the government or of government leaders. Quite the contrary, I heard nothing but praise for the present and the immediate past leaders as well. In fact, I heard, quite proudly, that Hua Go Fung, a leader of 23 years ago, was retired and in good health. That was in contrast to when the only past leaders were dead leaders.

There were other behavioral differences as well. I think that every third Chinese now has a cell phone growing out of his ear. I saw cell phones in use in toilets, in the customs area of the airport and in front of a policeman who had stopped a car for a traffic infraction.

While in the '70s, it was unusual to see couples holding hands while walking on the street, it is common today to see couples almost smooching on the street. And now you even can find prostitutes at work in the bars at night.

I was used to the dingy, gray façade of the buildings, the day-and-night pollution and the general dirtiness in the cities. I once told friends the only place in the world where the snow is gray is in China.

On this visit, the buildings were sparkling and new, the streets wide with automobile traffic and generally very much like new cities in the West. Looking at the architecture in Beijing was like turning the pages of an architectural magazine— each building was bigger than the last, each building more striking than the last, each building had more glass and chrome than the last.

In 1977, I thought that the Chinese were experts at instant antiquing. The day a new building was opened, it looked as if it had been used for a hundred years. It's no longer true; I must apologize for even thinking like that!

The automobile traffic in Beijing, as well as in the other cities I visited, was chaotic. I'm sure there are traffic rules, but they weren't evident. Bicycles and pedestrians shared the area with cars from one curb to the other. It was impossible to figure out which one had the right-of-way at any particular moment or place.

Chinese-made Audis, General Motors autos and local brands were common, but very few Japanese brands were evident. There were thousands of cars on the streets during rush hour, ten lanes of cars in both directions, going I don't know where.

Where there once were narrow streets, there now are major Western-style superhighways. At street corners where once groups of people read their newspapers under a single streetlight, there now are hundreds of cars waiting for the red light to change.

The Chinese must be congratulated. The progress they have made in the past 23 years took the rest of the world twice that time. The cities have been revolutionized, the people have been revolutionized, and their industry has been revolutionized. I wonder if their thinking has been revolutionized as well.

Written By ALLAN JOSEPH
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