Boro Nut

It would seem that 60 years of authoritarian communist rule have done little to dull the appetite of the everyday Chinese for religion, and that the state no longer seems to repress or persecute religious adherents.

I was listening to the Chinese ambassador on radio last night and he mentioned that nowadays all Chinese children are taught to pray in one form or another from an early age. Most children also tell their teachers that their home lives revolve around praying with each other, and during their school life, time is also set aside to allow them to pray, half an hour mid-morning and another half an hour after runch.

Boro Nut

seanie

Wise words glasshopper.

Leesifer

:notworthy

Vorkosigan

Boro, the Chinese have no trouble with R. That is a Japanese problem.

Vorkosigan

DonnieDarko

Thats interesting. I was just saying in another post that I visited China in November and an American ex-pat mentioned to me a poll of the Chinese showed that 95% claimed to be atheist. I'm sure lots of that is just holdover from the days when religion was more restricted. I talked to a few students at Fudan University in Shanghai and all of them said they had no religion, it just wasn't something they thought about. I saw one Catholic church beside my hotel in Beijing, and I visited a couple of Buddhist and Taoist temples, but other than that I saw no signs of religion anywhere. The temples seemed to be more of a tourist attraction than anything else.

Boro Nut

Just to set the record straight, it’s L they have trouble with, not R, but neither the Chinese nor Japanese have the letter R in their alphabet anyway. I know this for a fact.

Incidentally it was the British ambassador to China who was being interviewed, but he was eating his sandwiches at the time. You would have known this if you listened to the radio more often, where you might learn something, instead of wasting your time on the internet chatting to the likes of me.

Boro Nut

Boro Nut

Oh, so if there was a massive billboard in Chinese opposite your hotel window that said "Opening Soon - Massive Church" you would know what it said would you?

All I can say is there are stacks of posters and signs and stuff all over the place. They could be saying anything for all you know. I bet they are full of religion.

I wouldn't bother buying one of them tourist phrase books to help you out either. I wasted the best part of my Chinese holiday once trying to decipher the neat writing along the top of the hotel garden wall. It was massive. I gave up after two days and asked one of the waiters. I'd expected it to be some of Mao's propoganda for the benefit of us westerners, but he told me all it said was trellis.

Boro Nut

The Naked Mage

Any man who can make fun of himself is either dangerously suicidal or a funny man. Conan O'Brien taught me that.

DonnieDarko

You're right I would have no idea. And I wasn't really looking for a church anyway. I'm just going on the information the American gave me, plus some Chinese students.

The ex-pat mentioned the poll where 95% responded that they were atheists, so I said that was pretty cool. I told him I couldn't go a mile here without seeing a church. He said "It feels good to get away from that shit doesn't it? You could travel China for months and never run into a church" He could be completely wrong for all I know. The only thing I know is that he was very cool and most likely an atheist himself, although I didn't ask him directly.

diana

Boro Nut,

Would you have my children?

d