Frontline: Young & Restless In China

With TV mostly on re-runs during the summer, I began looking for video on the Internet, and stumbled across a treasure trove of documentaries at PBS. I just finished watching, "Frontline: Young & Restless In China." The documentary features, "an intimate look into nine young Chinese, coming of age in a society that's changing at breathtaking speeds."

It follows the life of a rapper, a migrant worker, a rural housewife, an owner of a tailoring company, an internet cafe owner, a public interest lawyer, a businessman, a doctor, and a marketing executive. I think this program does a fairly decent job of representing a cross-section of Chinese culture; both city dwellers, and rural villagers. It contrasts the clash between old traditional Chinese values with new modern values.

Here's a few observations that stood out:

• The Olympics has a huge human cost to it. Millions of poor people were forced to relocate out of Beijing. Their homes and neighbourhoods were destroyed to make way for Olympic construction.
• It was kind of depressing to see how materialistic that modern society had become. The educated professionals seemed to only care about making a ton of money, at the expense of family and happiness. It's ironic that the poor rural villagers often seemed happier.
• Empty materialism seems to be causing a great spiritual hunger in China, and Christianity is taking root.
• Corruption still appears to be a huge problem in China. The internet cafe owner was educated in America, and when he went back to China, he felt deeply conflicted over unethical business practices that were common in China, including bribing officials.
• I've always known pollution was bad in China, but wait until you see the public interest lawyer visit a village that's suing the government for polluting their lands. The rivers literally run red, and yet, people have to drink that water to survive.
• A common aspiration that a lot of these young people had was love. Interesting that modern thinking believes that the right person is somewhere out there. The traditional thinking (as highlighted by the parents in rural villages) is you should find someone who's good enough and just settle, because you're never going to find someone perfect. It was also interesting to see that villages had people who were matchmakers, who facilitated arranged marriages between families.
• It's amazing how sometimes husband and wife are forced to live in separate cities because of their jobs. One of the professionals hadn't seen his wife for three years. This is quite remarkable because I know some couples who can't stand being apart for more than two weeks!
• The story of the migrant worker, who works in an electronics factory really highlights the human toll caused by the West's insatiable appetite for cheap goods. These factory workers work 12 hour days, 7 days a week, and they're paid about $0.40/hour.

Anyway, that's just a small preview of the documentary. I definitely learned a lot about Chinese culture, and what China is becoming.

Frontline: Young & Restless In China can be viewed here in its entirety for free.