05.21.08
Chinese Appreciative of George Bush and America
Chinese netizens express overwhelming thanks and appreciation to the Bushes and the United States
Today George W. Bush and his wife are very popular people in China. That’s not something you’ll read very often. And all it took them was a short trip from Pennsylvania Avenue down to the Chinese Embassay in Washington, to mourn the vicitms and sign a book of condolensces in memory of the Sichuan earthquake victims.
To see the American president bow his head in mourning (吊唁) to the victims plays exceedingly well to a prestige conscious culture that has felt slighted lately. So far, nearly 1800 comments have been posted to this story (in Chinese).
The comments are very interesting - I’d say 90% of them are positive toward President Bush, his wife, and Americans! This is unlike what one usually finds in the Chinese blogosphere. It also helps that the US has vastly raised its initial donation of US$500,000, which has been roundly ridiculed in China, as Truth from Facts reported on earlier. But the image of America mourning for dead Chinese people means a lot to the Chinese. A lot of the nationalism in this country (China) has to do with feeling that outsiders look down upon them. What encourages me the most by the hundreds of comments of thanks by Chinese netizens is that it shows that the regular animosity and dispise many Chinese have against America and other foreign countries may only be skin deep. There is room for a strong US-China relationship if only these two countries can learn how to stop antagonizing one another.
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