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Recent Posts
- Anchluss or ANZAC? — A Solution for Taiwan
- Snow Flower & The Secret Fan
- Bye-bye China
- Somebody Else’s Problem — Decision Making in China
- The Big Parade At Dragon Lake
- The Cigarette
- The End of Capitalism is Announced
- Mind Games Under Heaven
- Choose Your Game
- Australia Blue (cheerfully ripping off Mao Zedong, “Snow”)
- The Earthquake
- Covert & Overt Values
- A Child Goes Missing
- Post Office Blues
- Chasing Out The Devils
- The Iron Rooster and The White Dragon
- A Christmas Story
- Well, hello again
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Author Archives: Thor
Anchluss or ANZAC? — A Solution for Taiwan
Thor May Brisbane, Australia 12 January 2012 In the minds of China’s rulers, past and present, there has only ever been one possible view about the future of Taiwan. For a multitude of reasons — strategic, economic, ethnic, linguistic, historical … Continue reading
Posted in China General, Taiwan
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Snow Flower & The Secret Fan
Snow Flower & The Secret Fan comments by Thor May When Wendi Deng from China magically fell into the pan-national world of international business and married the media billionaire Rupert Murdoch, (who had abandoned Australia for the same stateless realm … Continue reading
Posted in China General, Film
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Bye-bye China
Farewell speech – Zhengzhou, China – December 2010 – Thor May Forty years ago I was working in a large government office in Sydney. There were many desks in the room, and my desk was the least important. At the … Continue reading
Posted in China General, Zhengzhou
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Somebody Else’s Problem — Decision Making in China
Once long ago I was interviewed for a job as language director of the Defence Cooperation Language School in Melbourne, Australia. (The place pretends to teach English in three months or so to exchange military officers from places like Indonesia). … Continue reading
Posted in China General, Life
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The Big Parade At Dragon Lake
The deal was 8am. I’m a just-in-time guy, but here she was knocking on the door at 7:15. Jeez. Can I offer you some breakfast? We sat looking at each other across a big wooden coffee table, the golden drapes … Continue reading
Posted in China General, Life, Zhengzhou
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The Cigarette
Winter morning light had broken clear and cold, so early that night’s shadows were still about and a wispy moon hung in the sky. A small collection of street food vendors had already parked their hand carts by the college … Continue reading
Posted in China General, Life, Zhengzhou
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The End of Capitalism is Announced
The Decider announces the end of triumphalist capitalism. Whose zoo do these simians belong in now? (International Herald Tribune 19 September 2008) The Soviet behemoth with its official fantasy of the communist brotherhood of man looked after by apparatchiks who … Continue reading
Posted in The Universe & Everything
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Mind Games Under Heaven
All the world art mad but thou and I. So it seems. The collective mind of peoples as nations expressed either through the ballot box or by the voice of the emperor ( L’Etat c’est moi) seems erratic at best … Continue reading
Posted in China General
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Choose Your Game
On the wrong side of the railway tracks in Zhengzhou city, central China, you can find some ugly old concrete classrooms built around a small paved sports ground. It is a railway technical college to train nurses and logistics students, … Continue reading
Posted in China General, Zhengzhou
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Australia Blue (cheerfully ripping off Mao Zedong, “Snow”)
Centre country scene: A thousand miles of desert, Ten thousand miles of shimmering heat. In and out the Dead Heart, Only one great vastness; Up and down the Diamantina, Sand torrents stopped and stilled. Hills dance like rainbow serpents, Mirages … Continue reading