The Chinese Dream?
中国梦？
China rapidly climbs to world economic power, some enterprising individuals are emigrating here in the hopes of finding a new version of the American Dream. Blogging For China translates an article from the Southern Metropolis Daily on African traders who move to China (notably the city of Guangzhou, which currently holds an estimated 100,000 Africans) with the same burning desire of an earlier generation who emigrated to America: a better life. Many of them face strong prejudice against blacks in China and struggle to integrate themselves into their villages. The reporter follows one Liberian trader as he greets Chinese store-owners in his neighborhood:
He’ll loudly greet them, “Friend, how are you recently?” His “friends” don’t respond. Some pull out a cell phone and intentionally ignore him. Others impatiently wave at him, and say in a combination of Chinese and English: “If you’re not buying anything, then go… quickly GO!”
It seems friendship only exists between the Africans.
While many poor black traders struggle with racism, Bill Dodson, General Manager of Asia Base A/S and author of the This is China! blog, states in his 2007 post "Black Like Me in China" that he has never encountered racism in five years of living and working in China. Dodson claims that the only color the Chinese see is green:
The bottom line in today’s China: “money talks”. Chinese are equal opportunity opportunists. If you’ve clearly got money and are interested in doing a business transaction with them, they don’t care the color of your skin or the origin of ancestry.
Dodson does acknowedge that the Chinese have their stereotypes of dark-skinned Africans, but these stereotypes are free of a history of institutionalized slavery (and enforced political correctness). If China truly is replacing America as a world superpower, it remains to be seen how the Chinese will react to the inevitable consequence of cornering the world economy-- can China be the world's new melting pot?
corner v. (commerce) acquire monopoly within commercial market: to acquire a monopoly of a particular commodity and so be able to control its market price 垄断（某个市场）
e.g. an attempt to corner the soybean market
随着中国向世界经济强国迅速迈进的步伐，一群憧憬着新版美国梦的有进取心的人正在移民中国。中国博客翻译了《南方都市报》的一篇关于非洲商人的文章。像他们的先辈移民美国一样，怀揣着强烈的追求更美好的生活的愿望，他们来到中国(特别是广州,目前容纳了估计10万非洲人)。他们中的许多人遭遇着黑人在中国受到的强烈偏见,他们努力将自己融入居住的村庄。记者跟随一位来自利比里亚的商人,他正在跟他社区里的当地店主们打招呼：
他大声问候，“老兄，最近可好？”他的“老兄”没有回应。一些店主拿出手机故意不理他，其他的不耐烦的朝他挥挥手，用汉语夹杂着英语说：“不买东西就走…快GO！”
似乎友谊只存在于非洲人之间。
当很多贫穷的非洲商人在挑战种族偏见，比尔·岛德逊是亚洲根基A/S的总经理和This is China! Blog（这就是中国）博客的博主，他在2007年在其博客中贴了一篇文章“Black Like Me in China”，声称其在中国生活工作的五年中从未遭遇过种族偏见。岛德逊说中国人眼里只有绿色：
今天的中国奉行“金钱至上”。中国人现在成了机会主义者的同意词。如果你确实有钱并且愿意跟中国人做生意，他们才不在意你的肤色和血统出身呢。
岛德逊一定了解中国人对黑皮肤的非洲人的一套陈词滥调，但这些陈词滥调和制度化的奴隶制历史（以及强制的政治修正）无关。如果中国真的在取代美国的世界超级大国的地位，还需要观察中国人对控制世界经济后出现的必然结果做出怎样的反应——中国会成为世界上新的熔炉吗？ |
