The man cave has upped sticks and moved from Hong Kong to mainland China. I am however a day late arriving here, as Hong Kong was hit by a typhoon on Sunday – the day I was originally due to fly to China. A Signal No 10 warning was issued and briefly intensified up to a historically rare Signal No. 11, consequently Hong Kong shut down for the day; all flights were cancelled out of Hong Kong International Airport.
I was impressed with the way Cathay Pacific handled the cancellation. I had a text on Saturday night to inform me my flight was cancelled and that I would be rescheduled at the first possible opportunity. I was also given the option to cancel the flight and be refunded. I needed at least one extra night in my hotel, and that was easily achieved at a very reasonable price. On Sunday morning I woke to a text from the airline informing me that I would be flown out early on Monday morning.
Why can our rail services in the UK not operate the same way? When a train is cancelled that’s it. You have either to abandon your journey or fight to get a seat on an overbooked train. Nobody seems to know what is happening and if you abandon your journey, you must do all the work of reclaiming a refund yourself. Likewise, I cannot imagine how hard it would have been to add an extra night on to a stay in a hotel back home.
Crossing the Great Firewall
Occasionally I get asked about working in China in a mild ‘how could you’ attitude, referring to restrictions on free speech, imprisonment of dissidents and monitoring of social media. My answer these days is usually something along the lines of “home from home then”. Lucy Connolly continues to languish in jail due to her social media being monitored, and saying something that was not worth a minute of police time.
Getting in here periodically becomes almost a full-time occupation. Once an invitation is issued you must apply for a visa. In my 20-plus years coming to China, the process has changed several times from having to turn up at a consulate to a postal process (soon abandoned), and back to having to turn up at a visa centre in person or using an agent.
The only places you can physically apply for your visa are in London, Manchester or Edinburgh. Too bad if you live in Orkney, which is why agents are used – at a cost. Now the system involves submitting an online application, but still, you must turn up in person to present your passport. Then there is the inevitable grilling at immigration with some cities being worse than others. Beijing, which processes thousands of people a day, is a breeze compared with outlying places such as Chengdu or Chongqing.
It’s all a massive pain in the arse but, once you’re in – which is my point – you can tell the difference. Almost everyone is ethnically Chinese. There are no groups of people of alternative ethnic persuasions gathered at street corners. There is hardly any begging, and you get the impression that the few beggars you see are genuinely worthy causes. Nobody here is taking the proverbial piss out of the Chinese state and the hard-working people who support it.
Of course, coming from a political and social system like ours – for all its manifest failings – there is much in China to object to. But, as I said regarding Hong Kong in my last column, whatever it is they have, we need a bit of that ourselves.
The hills are alive with the Mullah’s call
Here at TNC we pride ourselves on our prescience. Regarding the proposed abomination of a mosque in the Lake District at the end of last month I said: “Presumably it won’t be too long before these protestors are identified, visited by Lakeland Plod and hauled before the beak for inciting racial hatred.” Well, the first salvo has been fired by local Labour MP Michelle Scrogham, who has labelled the protestors ‘racist’. They just can’t help themselves.
I have no idea how many Muslims there are in the Lake District. I don’t care. The Lake District is a National Park. That means it belongs to the nation, and in such areas there are sensible restrictions on what can be built and what must be preserved. The proposed mosque is not there to accommodate anyone; it is not just a recognition of our changing demographics or even misguided ecumenism. It is a statement: “We are here”, and the locals are making an alternative and legitimate statement: “We know you’re here, but we don’t want your building here.”
The local protestors against the proposed mosque must know what the optics are and what accusations will follow. It is to be hoped that they will not be deterred by bullying from the likes of Ms Scrogham. Having a massive mosque in the Lake District would be like having one in Regent’s Park. What’s that you say…? Overantout
Roger Watson is a retired academic, editor and writer. He is a columnist with Unity News Network and writes regularly for a range of conservative journals including The Salisbury Review and The European Conservative. He has travelled and worked extensively in the Far East and the Middle East. He lives in Kingston upon Hull, UK.
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Good article Roger,I think the labour party is running out of time if the Scrogham bitch is moaning about right wing taunts I see that the Senedd in Wales got it’s first Reform member Today I wish death to this entire government and this to be ASAP.
Further multiple evidence, if any were needed, of the sad and dysfunctional, almost Kafka-esque, state that our country has now got itself into.