Miss Manners meets the average Zhou
By Pallavi Aiyar
BEIJING - When late leader Deng Xiaoping declared that "to get rich is
glorious", China's feet were firmly set on the path of economic reform. Thirty
years later, another revolution is brewing in the erstwhile Middle Kingdom;
this time thanks to the Summer Olympic Games that open in Beijing on Friday.
"To queue is glorious," is the new catchphrase plastered on large red banners
festooned across strategic parts of the capital.
Ever since Beijing won the bid to host the 2008 Olympic Games, strenuous
efforts have been made to ensure that the city is ready to put its best face
forward. The municipal government has poured billions of dollars into giving
the capital a face-lift. Iconic stadiums have been erected, hundreds of
kilometers of expressways and
new subway lines have opened, 40 million potted plants put out to beautify the
city.
But for Beijing's harried authorities, the efforts required to put in place the
physical infrastructure necessary to ensure a smooth Olympics have been matched
by an even more challenging task: that of developing the "civilizational
levels" of the city's average Zhou.
While the main campaign to transform Beijingers from the rude to the refined
has been the charge of a special department called the Office of the Spiritual
Civilization Development Steering Commission of the Communist Party of China
Central Committee, BOCOG (the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Olympic
Games) has also been involved.
The authorities have spent the past few years focussing in particular on five
major lacunae identified in the city's social etiquette. These include:
Beijing-style name-calling, casual spitting, littering, disorderly queuing and
not smiling.
As a result, somewhat bemused Beijingers have been subjected to random fines
for spitting, dazzled by smile campaigns and exhorted to form queues. Taxi
drivers have been asked to wash more regularly, put on clean shirts and avoid
eating inside their cabs. For the past several months, the 11th of each month
has been designated Queuing Day, with government employees fanning out to
hundreds of bus and subway stations urging people to eschew their preferred
survival-of-the-fittest push-fests in favor of forming orderly lines.
The city government has also instituted a "civility-evaluation index" that
ranks neighborhoods according to the level of refinement they are able to
achieve by the time of the Olympics. The resulting competition between
neighborhoods has been intense. Anxious to secure the coveted epithet of
"civilized community", neighborhood committees across Beijing have been vying
with each other in organizing weekend discussions on edifying topics such as
"Host the Olympics with civility" and "Smile in Beijing".
Manuals with "guidelines for the building of courteous communities" have been
distributed; criteria outlined include sharing housework, speaking a foreign
language, regular reading of newspapers, large book-collections and balconies
displaying potted plants. Also mentioned are a number of "forbidden" activities
such as alcohol abuse, raising pigeons, rearing livestock at home, noisiness
and spitting.
Another common Beijing practice that is under threat as a result of the
Olympic-friendly image that is being promoted is the use of kaidangku (literally
open-crotch pants) for babies. For decades Chinese parents have opted for the
maximum convenience, with minimum coverage provided by the use of these pants
that are slit around the buttocks, enabling kids to answer the call of nature
anywhere on the streets without the fuss of actually having to pull their
trousers down.
Neighborhood committees have however been pressed into persuading parents to
eschew bare bottoms in favor of diapers, at least for the duration of the
Olympics. Signposts abound sternly asking what kind of impression foreign
visitors will take home of Beijing if they see public spaces being used as
open-air toilets.
All this "civilizing" activity appears to have paid off. According to a survey
conducted by the People's University's Humanistic Olympics Study Center, the
"civic index" of Beijingers was 73.38 in 2007, up from 65.21 and 69.06 in 2005
and 2006, respectively. The index reflects compliance with rules involving
public health and public order, attitudes towards strangers, etiquette at
sports events and a willingness to contribute to the Olympic Games, explained
Liao Fei, a sociology professor who worked on the survey.
"A citizen's behavior embodies and reflects on the entire nation's culture,"
she said, adding that the average Chinese needed to modify his manners to be
more in line with the changes created by the country's zooming economy. "With
economic reforms changes in China happened very rapidly and people didn't have
time like in Western countries to develop the manners that should go along with
a developed economy," Dr Liao continued.
While emphasizing that the etiquette standards of the average Beijinger had
improved since the start of the "good manners" campaigns, she also admitted
that much work remained to be done. "I think during the Olympics most people
will make an extra effort to be on their best behavior so that the etiquette
level of citizens should reach that expected of a host city," the professor
said. "But in the long-term it is harder to change people's behavior."
Indeed, etiquette-campaigns notwithstanding, for a Beijinger the ability to
spit with spirit and swear with style remains almost a badge of authenticity.
Despite Dr Liao's optimism, visitors to the Olympics will do well to be
prepared for a little local color.
Pallavi Aiyar is the China correspondent for the Hindu and author of
Smoke and Mirrors: An Experience of China (Harper Collins India, May 2008) . For
a review of the book, see Middle Kingdom deciphered.
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