Betty Brown Moves to Beijing

It seems Texan bigots aren't the only ones having trouble with Chinese names. The People's Republic itself, to simplify its systems, is asking its citizens to change their names to something simpler.

Ma Cheng’s book-loving grandfather came up with an elegant solution to this common problem. Twenty-six years ago, when his granddaughter was born, he combed through his library of Chinese dictionaries and lighted upon a character pronounced “cheng.” Cheng, which means galloping steeds, looks just like the character for horse, except that it is condensed and written three times in a row.

The character is so rare that once people see it, Miss Ma said, they tend to remember both her and her name. That is one reason she likes it so much.

That is also why the government wants her to change it.

For Ma Cheng and millions of others, Chinese parents’ desire to give their children a spark of individuality is colliding head-on with the Chinese bureaucracy’s desire for order. Seeking to modernize its vast database on China’s 1.3 billion citizens, the government’s Public Security Bureau has been replacing the handwritten identity card that every Chinese must carry with a computer-readable one, complete with color photos and embedded microchips. The new cards are harder to forge and can be scanned at places like airports where security is a priority.

The bureau’s computers, however, are programmed to read only 32,252 of the roughly 55,000 Chinese characters, according to a 2006 government report. The result is that Miss Ma and at least some of the 60 million other Chinese with obscure characters in their names cannot get new cards — unless they change their names to something more common.

Moreover, the situation is about to get worse or, in the government’s view, better. Since at least 2003, China has been working on a standardized list of characters for people to use in everyday life, including when naming children.

One newspaper reported last week that the list would be issued later this year and would curb the use of obscure names. A government linguistics official told Xinhua, the state-run news agency, that the list would include more than 8,000 characters. Although that is far fewer than the database now supposedly includes, the official said it was more than enough “to convey any concept in any field.” About 3,500 characters are in everyday use.

Ms. Ma is managing so far to get around the restrictions. But many more are not. In their rush into the modern world, China runs the risk of oversimplification just to keep pace.

There's Nothing More Forlorn Than A Closed Pub

... unless, of course, it's hundreds of them.

"As the recession prompts U.K. pub crawlers to drink at home more often, two of the country's biggest pub owners are selling or closing hundreds of locations to pay the tab from a decade-long expansion.

Punch Taverns PLC and Enterprise Inns PLC together own nearly a third of the U.K.'s 56,000 public houses. The two emerged as leaders of the pub industry by borrowing heavily when credit was cheap, snapping up thousands of the cherished British drinking halls, which have long served as both an extension of the living room and the social nexus of neighborhoods here."

The WSJ article goes on to describe how the drinking Brit is now buying his brew at Sainsbury's and getting potted at home rather than going out to what used to be the neighborhood social centre and doing it there. A study they cite indicates that "pubs sell 6.7 million fewer pints per day than they did 10 years ago," which is pretty dire as the population has grown substantially since then.

As a footnote, the Bath Tap, pictured above, which happens to be an Enterprise property, was the sole LGBT-friendly pub in Bath when I visited last. It wasn't particularly exciting, but it was friendly and lively when I was there. It's sad to see it go.

UPDATE: it's curious that, just as these two firms are announcing sales and closures of existing pubs, Enterprise Inns is still touting its "Your Way Inn" franchise programme on its Website.

The Immaturity of the Wardrobe

George Will apparently thinks that the problem with America is that we all dress like kids.

Long ago, when James Dean and Marlon Brando wore it, denim was, Akst says, "a symbol of youthful defiance." Today, Silicon Valley billionaires are rebels without causes beyond poses, wearing jeans when introducing new products. Akst's summa contra denim is grand as far as it goes, but it only scratches the surface of this blight on Americans' surfaces. Denim is the infantile uniform of a nation in which entertainment frequently features childlike adults ("Seinfeld," "Two and a Half Men") and cartoons for adults ("King of the Hill"). Seventy-five percent of American "gamers" -- people who play video games -- are older than 18 and nevertheless are allowed to vote. In their undifferentiated dress, children and their childish parents become undifferentiated audiences for juvenilized movies (the six -- so far -- "Batman" adventures and "Indiana Jones and the Credit-Default Swaps," coming soon to a cineplex near you). Denim is the clerical vestment for the priesthood of all believers in democracy's catechism of leveling -- thou shalt not dress better than society's most slovenly. To do so would be to commit the sin of lookism -- of believing that appearance matters. That heresy leads to denying the universal appropriateness of everything, and then to the elitist assertion that there is good and bad taste.

Denim is the carefully calculated costume of people eager to communicate indifference to appearances. But the appearances that people choose to present in public are cues from which we make inferences about their maturity and respect for those to whom they are presenting themselves.

Denim has waxed and waned repeatedly in my memory. In grade school it was merely an option. In high school one was judged not merely by whether one wore jeans but by the label they bore: Levis were egalitarian and eternal, Jordache and Calvin Klein were trendy, anything else smacked of poverty. At university the labels changed but the trend continued. Grunge and hip-hop gave baggies street cred. But in each instance denim was the default casual wear.

Part of this is cost-effectiveness. Jeans are perceived as more affordable than pants of other materials (frequently true), and more durable and forgiving than their counterparts. Levis jeans are comparably priced to their dressier Dockers, which require pressing to look their best, and far cheaper than even casual slacks from other makers (which also require more care). the US Bureau of Labor Statistics had an interesting breakdown of household expenses. For an average household pre-tax income around $60,000 (which assumes approximately $42,000 after tax), those surveyed spent less than $2,000 on "apparel and services," versus around $3,000 on healthcare, $8,000 on transportation, over $6,000 on food and roughly $5,500 on "personal insurance," and a 'blog post here (regardless of the methodologies for the rest of the item, which assumes a 3.5$ income tax rate) pegs housing costs at around $17K. Another study indicates that uniforms in the workplace actually lead to an increase in spending on apparel. Will is right in that it's a careful calculation, but not necessarily the one of taste that he suggests: with expenditure numbers such as these it's easy to understand why the US is dressing down. It's not that we're dressing down out of fashion; it's that we are increasingly unable to afford dressing up.

Another part is the ready distinction that denim affords a closet. As our free time has shrunk, and as the demands of work and life have increased over the years, it has become increasingly rational to minimize time spent deciding less important things. Sorting out one's healthcare, taxes, family decisions etc. should take priority over figuring out what to wear. Denim provides a clear dividing line between work and home. I will freely admit to owning several pairs of jeans, and wearing them regularly when out of the office. But my closet also holds three tailored suits and a dozen ties for businesswear, and several pairs of Dockers for less formal business and social events. Colour and texture are easy guides in choosing what to wear out Saturday morning to the coffee shop and what to put on for weekdays in the office. Taking the time required to sort through appropriate garb has been a luxury our society has grown unable to afford to all but the extremes of the employment and wealth scale: the supremely wealthy, because they either work fewer hours or employ staff to assist them with their choices, and the struggling because they can't afford the separate sets of clothes for work and play and lack the time required to choose between them.

Certainly if we all dressed better the nation would be a more attractive place. I've seen more than my share of folks in grubby t-shirts and ragged jeans in the shopping malls, people in ill-suited and ill-tailored attire out for an evening at restaurants and clubs, and business attire that suggests colour-blindness and dressing in the dark far more than any sense of style. But suggesting that sort of pride of place in the current environment smacks of privilege. Apparel is costly, time is scarce, and too few of us have enough resources and free hours and closet space to afford to make the kinds of distinctions Will clearly desires.

What's In A Name?

Apparently the Religious Right no longer likes "Religious Right" as a name for the movement.

Gary Bauer said this week, "There is an ongoing battle for the vocabulary of our debate. It amazes me how often in public discourse really pejorative phrases are used, like the 'American Taliban,' 'fundamentalists,' 'Christian fascists,' and 'extreme Religious Right.'"

A Focus on the Family official added that the "religious right" label might generate negative impressions: "Terms like 'Religious Right' have been traditionally used in a pejorative way to suggest extremism. The phrase 'socially conservative evangelicals' is not very exciting, but that's certainly the way to do it."

I can well understand. National Socialism, when it first started out, didn't sound all that bad either.

I Think "Frozen Hot Chocolate" Covers Everything

The NYT had an opinion piece on Friday on why the Obama administration's call for a $500K salary cap is bad.

Granted, New York is an expensive city. And granted that executives have an image to uphold as part of their responsibilities.

But more than one NYC expat I've run into here has said that getting by in Tampa is more difficult than in the Big Apple, and that the intangible costs of a place (property insurance, anyone?) are often not figured into the math when it comes to cost of living when the statisticians run that math. One in particular, a former executive assistant (to one of those CEOs by the way), tells me the costs are fairly equivalent (taking into account insurance, commute costs, groceries and ordinary consumables) and that salaries are at most half here what they are there, so the standard of living is consequently lower for the same professions - and has done so in some detail.

I, too, have lived and moved in some of the more exclusive and expensive areas, both in the US and the UK. The costs for some parts of the US, compared with the most often-cited examples of New York and San Francisco, are surprisingly high when one factors in things like insurance, lack of infrastructure and increased commute times and distances.

I've often said that Florida is a remarkably inexpensive place to live - as long as you never step outside your door; the moment you do, some meter starts running. Tickets to theatre and concerts here run the same prices I saw for shows on Geary Street and concerts at the Fillmore - only here the shows are at Ruth Eckerd Hall, the TBCPA, the Ford and Van Wezel (hardly nationally renowned venues), all of which are miles from most residential neighborhoods and none of which has reasonable access via public transit. Some years ago, for example, I paid $40 to see The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe on Broadway; I couldn't get nosebleed seats for that price at any of the venues in Tampa Bay. The attire for such events is unchanged, and prices for clothing are fairly constant. Home insurance is perhaps triple here what it is elsewhere, assuming you can get it. Groceries are nearly double what I was paying in SFO and have been since I arrived. None of these things seem to impact the cost of living calculations one sees in the various studies and articles.

The Times item does list some useful statistics for what it takes to live on Park Avenue these days. But that lifestyle has been viewed less than favorably for decades. The greatest critique I have seen of that is The Women (one of my favorite films if you haven't already guessed). The disconnect is skewered unsparingly:

Sylvia: "I consider myself a perfectly good wife, Nancy. I've sacrificed a lot for Howard Fowler - OOH, smoked oysters!"

This is from a 1939 film, based on a play about ten years older, so the critique is hardly new.

Yet somehow the Times seems to think that such a lifestyle is not only defensible but desirable:

The total costs here, which do not include a lot of things, like kennels for the dog when the family is away, summer camp, spas and other grooming for the human members of the family, donations to charity, and frozen hot chocolates at Serendipity, are $790,750, which would require about a $1.6-million salary to compensate for taxes. Give or take a few score thousand of dollars.

Does this money buy a chief executive stockholders might prize, a well-to-do man with a certain sureness of stride, something that might be lost if the executive were crowding onto the PATH train every morning at Journal Square, his newspaper splayed against the back of a stranger’s head?

They even qoute Candace Bushnell, of Sex and the City fame:

“People inherently understand that if they are going to get ahead in whatever corporate culture they are involved in, they need to take on the appurtenances of what defines that culture,” she said. “So if you are in a culture where spending a lot of money is a sign of success, it’s like the same thing that goes back to high school peer pressure. It’s about fitting in.”

That line says quite a bit: spending a lot of money is a sign of success. In an age when the entire nation is tightening its belts, and even the corporate giants are feeling the squeeze, the Times thinks success is still indicated by extravagance. From the recent actions of Wall Street, "success" is apparently defined as finding someone to buy your crippled enterprise before it declares bankruptcy: that's not exactly a ringing endorsement.

And the sheer decadence of some of the incidental expenses referenced - my favorite is the "frozen hot chocolates at Serendipity" - play right into the hands of those of us who think that the heady days of executive elitism are past due for their own correction.