The village and the girl

But what if people here found the technology more interesting than the contents of the article. I understand your frustration, but it comes off as being impolite. If people are interested in talking about the font or the scroll than what gives you the right to tell them what to write about.

Now that being said, it does seem that Westerners know very little about China. That is due to many reasons I believe: 1) most people are not interested in learning about their own history, economy, geography, so it is hard to expect them to want to learn about another country. 2) the lack of role models or ambassadors; growing up in Africa we all knew a lot about the US mainly because of its economic strength, its history, but perhaps more importantly its ambassadors: pop stars, Michael Jordan and other NBA players, etc... I do not know many Chinese actors. I love Asian movies, I just re-watched IP Man I and II yesterday, but I am not even sure those actors are Chinese, Korean, Japanese, etc... China could do more to further promote its Arts and Culture. I suspect many people think most Asians to be Chinese, similarly to how most people will never know the difference between a Liberian and a Nigerian and a Senegalese. 3) Distance: China seems (mentally) just far from everywhere; far from Africa, far from Europe, far from America. I know it is not that far, but it just seems so. 4,5,6...n

Edit: 4) Honestly Asian seems un-approachable, or at least not very approachable. I could strike conversations with a European, a Southern American, an American, an Indian, a Turkish, but most Asians seem to not want to talk to you. Now this entirely something I was either fed to believe, or it is my own false assumptions. I just have this belief, but I know its enirely wrong because I can count at least 4 to 5 truly awesome Chinese, Korean, I have known in the past 5 years. Heck I even lived with a Chinese family in the US. Lovely family, but from the outside had you told me this I would have laughed at you. I hope I can truly undo this, and I fear many people are not engaging Chinese and learning more about them because of they have this entirely false belief.

This sentence stood out for me. It's interesting that China is pushing for urbanization for its people and that some of those people (like Xiao Zhang in the article) are impatiently waiting for the better life to come, but I wonder about the long-term consequences of this -- how many people will simply be conditioned to not improve/work on their lot in fear/hope that the government will provide?