There was a comment on the “Sunny Day” post that prompted me to explain a little bit of modern Chinese culture which our family likes to laugh about. This little tidbit may have some interest to others who aren’t following the comments on that post so I have reposted my reply here:

There is a bit of a family joke here – While living in Southeast China, we saw very little “wild” nature. Almost everything was carefully planned and “landscaped”, though not always very well, as we discovered at a National Park near our home. The governmental planning there is so thorough that when Mr. Hot Stuff was on a visit to an area full of waterfalls, he asked a woman in the group with them how much money and how long it took the government to create such a beautiful area. The woman and several other people seriously conferred for a few moments and then turned back to him to say that they were fairly certain that this was indeed a natural area that the government had not planned, but carefully protected. It was all he could do not to laugh. Imagine going to Niagara falls and seriously considering that the government might have made it!

Here in the U.S. when we see the beauty of nature we just assume that such things are just, well, naturally occurring or created by God. In China, they are steeped in the world view that the government has provided all things for the good of the people (the government is God), and people, especially living in urban areas as we were, consider the government to be the supreme controller and provider for the welfare of the people. The government wants it this way and so this is part of the reason for the crackdown on religious beliefs and practices by groups not registered with the government.

winner-winner, chicken dinner 🙂