[ablium]

Originally Posted by gerchin

Chinese and Western values still differ very much, and that's the main reason why our people don't understand each other, and never will.
Chinese will never understand the spirit of European Christmas, as example, nevertheless so many must try to copy and "celebrate" it in China. The same with the V-day, and it isn't the same issue when ABC is trying to copy a NBC show, or Wal-Mart is trying to overtake a strategy of 7eleven.

Chinese Confucius culture does have the problem of yearning too much for the past, which is probably one of the reasons that hindered the innovative spirit in Chinese society. Confucius (lived about 400BC) himself thought that social order in Zhou dynasty (about 1000 BC) was better and tried hard to resume the social order of the past. However, I think that the celebration of Christmas and Valentine Day in current China is not driven by Confucius culture but the commercial interest. They don’t need to understand Christian tradition and spirit because they just want to use Christmas or Valentine day as opportunity to promote sales.

Originally Posted by gerchin

Calligraphy, the most important Chinese art, is based on imitation not only since the era of Wang Xizhi (born 330, who's only copies and no original works exist), and every "creative" writer would be despised in China for his "artistic" interpretation today.

To a lesser degree, imitation of masters’ works also happens in the western culture. In the western museums, you can often see some art students imitating the masters' paitings as training practice.

Originally Posted by danezia

Of course the French want an TGV style network and not the German MagLev.

I can fully understand this. In China, there is also a heavy debate on whether to introduce French TGV, German Maglev, or Japanese Shinkansen technology or develop indigenous technology. In the end, China probably will have all of these technologies. China has German Maglev in Shanghai since 2003. The recently debuted high speed trains adopted some Japanese Shinkansen technology. Beijing-Shanghai high-speed rail might use French TGV. All French, German, and Japanese leaders are using their influence to convince Chinese decision makers to use their technologies because it is going to be multi-billion dollar business for their countries.