New Posters

This blog will tell something about the intricacies of daily life in China and all other interesting things that come across my mind. Let's just start with the advertising poster of the Dong Cheng (East Side) district we saw today during lunch in the Jiauzi Restaurant around the corner. We had this tasteful, fresh-made tea-leaves mixed with pig dumpling and some tofu carrot flavored variety and noticed these poster hanging next to the giant jar of bluish Dasuan (garlic) on the dubiously yellowish wall. The layout of the poster is just telling. It is one of these "what is the official opinion about how the future and your home should look like" posters or propaganda pamphlets. These banners with large yellow white characters on red ground are an increasingly popular sight in the streets and attached to highway bridges in Beijing. I am not sure if the presence of this paroles is recently increasing or it is just that I am more aware of these because my reading capabilities improves. They are ranging from "Let's build together a modern China" to "Unswervingly push the great cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics forward into future" and the likes.

One poster on the wall read "Be a civilized and polite Beijinger to build a harmonious charm of the new East Side!". This one on the picture reads "Build up an exemplary civilized city district, be a civilized citizen of the East Side!"
To those who are not familiar with the ancient city design of Beijing, the Dong Cheng district is one of the two inner districts formerly enclosed by the city wall. Accordingly there used to be a lot of old and royal buildings inherited from China's dynasties, but old quarters are now rarely seen as they were mostly teared down in the last 10-20 years or so to build these nice buildings and broad streets the poster is advertising of the "New China". I think these posters are thus for those to remind that one should not be guided by its own sense of aesthetic, but rather feel reminded of the warm guidance of the great party's prospective insights of the Chinese future.

In any case, I don't think that a lot of common people give attention to these posters really. They are much more concerned with the choice of what to eat. Next to us two elder Chinese workers from outside of Beijing had apparently trouble to read the menu, and, too proud to admit their illiteracy, pointed at our dishes  on our table and ordered the same. A good move in principle - I did use it myself in times of less conversational fluency - but  when paying the bill we could not avoid a chuckle about their disappointment when discovering that half of the Jauzi fillings were just vegetarian...