9/28/2010

Chinese pirates

Chinese pirates
China is continuously growing both economically and in its military power. The sheer number of Chinese people that stands behind these developments makes the nation something like a potential “swarm of locusts” that will run over certain regions (the entire world?) and devour everything in its path – leaving the affected area devasted and uninhabitable.
It is well-known that just about 100% of any kind of software (computer, music, video etc.) and the vast majority of so-called branded or proprietary products is “pirated”. Along similar lines China respects intellectual property (patents, trade marks etc.) in a similar way = considers them worth s**t and free to use as it pleases.
Pirated” products: that means pirates have taken them and by definition pirates steal from other people for their own profit.
That makes China a nation of thieves that even take pride in their criminal actions, proudly broadcasted on their national TV.


Pirates: a Chinese pirate ship hit a Japanese vessel from obliquely behind. The Chinese blame it on the Japanese, but in a traffic accident, when one car hits another from obliquely behind there can be no question as to whose responsibility this is!!!


I originally came to the Far East over 30 years ago, because I was inspired in part by ancient Chinese philosophy. Today I do not trust ANYTHING that comes from China. That includes even most things related to acupuncture and/or oriental medicine – even though China claims to have a 3000-year tradition in this area. The so-called “traditional Chinese medicine” is not traditional at all. It has been cooked up on behalf of Mao during the cultural revolution, eliminating “undesirable” aspects and anything that might be related to ethinic groups not really “Chinese”, mixed with a fair (rather large) amount of western medicine and them very noisily promoted world-wide as “TCM”. And the sad thing is, that most of the world believes this noisy clamoring. The funny thing is, the studies made in China ALWAYS show an effectiveness of the treatment of 90% of more, a value that can never be duplicated anywhere else in the world. So, just take the Chinese by their word and believe them?


If I see a box of needles and it says there Made in China, that is for me a sign NOT to use those. Personal experience has shown, that needles made in China are VERY poorly manufactured – totally unfit for the gentle treatment that should be involved in “moving qi”. But for a people that believes that patients MUST suffer (quite severe) pain in order for the treatment to work, this may be natural.

9/07/2010

Give them (visitors/students) a chance

(This pertains to my efforts to find places to shadow/observe/study for people wishing to study a little about acupuncture in Japan)

In the words of a British colleague practicing in Tokyo, who I recently asked for his help:

"I must say it's a bit of a mixed bag. In my view there are few that genuinely want to learn. The non Japanese especiallylike to say on their resume that they studied in Japan after being here for one day or going to a seminar of a famous teacher and calling them their teacher."

This sentiment may not be restricted to him, but I believe a substantial portion of the Japanese practitioners are also inclined towards this attitude.

In my email response to the above colleague I wrote:
"I think, I understand the problem of having "bad apples" in the lot.
But you never know who will fall into this category, unless you give him/her a chance.

And that is all I am asking for: Give those who ask for it a CHANCE.
After all, you, me ... in fact EVERY acupuncturist throughout history has been given his/her chance at one time, by somebody. Some turned out to be historically important figures, others just dropouts. The outcome is (maybe) not ours to decide.
But what we can do, is provide the **chance** - and thus repay the "debt" we carry,
because we had our chance.

Maybe I am completely off the mark, but I have the hazy, fixed idea, that this is what I should do.
Unfortunately, I myself am an uneducated, clumsy old fool (with VERY few patients),
so that I always can welcome potential visitors, but cannot show them anything worthwhile .....