Terry asked with interests: "when was the last time you were back to China, and have you seen a lot of changes?" David said: "Oh yeah, there were indeed a lot of changes. I last went home in 2003. Comparing to when I left twelve and half years ago, my hometown changed so much that I could no longer find the street where I was born and nor could I find the first elementary school that I attended. They were all leveled and then became parts of some other new constructions. When I met, close to my home, a college roommate whose job involved traveling all over China, he told me that my hometown was one of the slowest changing cities in the country. Most cities in China had been dug up, paved with a layer of offices, houses and stores and then dug up again and paved with another newer layer again, and then dug up and paved over again. The difference between my hometown and other Chinese cities was probably that: my hometown had only been dug up twice while most of other cities had been dug up and paved over at least three times already.

"How about the political system in the country, is it still undemocratic with many human rights abuses?" Terry asked like an average American reporter with opinions unknowingly censored but appearing to be filled with ideals of freedom. "Well, it's a cultural thing", David grimed like a smart Aleck.

"I also tell people 'it's a culture thing' whenever someone asks me about China with prejudgments about her, which I felt out of whack. For example, the first time I replied 'it's a cultural thing' was when a colleague of mine from Taiwan resigned from her job. It was rumored she resigned because she accidentally found out how much money her husband made after her husband lost a laptop on an overseas business trip. Since she learned that her husband was rich, she decided it was no longer necessary for her to work. Other colleagues asked me whether it was in Chinese culture or tradition for husbands not to tell their wives how much they made. I decided to oblige them with the answer 'Yeah. It's a cultural thing'. In fact I knew she told me at least once that she had compared the salaries and benefit packages with her husband's and found what had been raved about her husband's rich and generous employer was merely a fiction".

"Another time was when my daughter Crystal used to spend too much time playing with this one girl in kindergarten, that made the girl's mom came to me and my wife complaining Crystal did not leave enough space for her to play with other kids. Out of her snobbishness, she also added 'well I understand that China is a country with such big population, maybe it is the culture for Chinese to be too close to one another . . .' We happily obliged her with a sorry and said 'Yeah, it's a cultural thing' and then just ignored her. What our daughter did with another little girl, whom she viewed as her best friend at that age, really was none of our business. If an adult does not want our daughter to befriend with his or her daughter, then so be it. I am sure there are plenty of little girls in this world."

"Another winter I saw two co-workers staring out of the window watch snow falling and discussing how hard it would be to drive home. They watched so intently, so I asked them whether they were trying to 'impose their wills' on the snow to make the snow melt. One of them asked me whether 'imposing the will' on something was an Asian cultural thing. So I answered 'yes' even though it was a phrase I learned from NBA commentators describing Michael Jordan often "imposed his will" on his opponents. Otherwise, how could a China man have such words in his vocabulary?"

"People in United States often look at Chinese cultures as they do in the 'Donna Chan' or 'table of 4' episodes in Seinfeld. That probably is the way most Chinese look at the American culture as well. I had the fortune or misfortune to see and hear how both sides making fun of another and it had been really great."

"If you want to hear the truth, nothing but the truth, then I will tell you what I think about China. Otherwise 'it's just a cultural thing' that you can picture anyway you like with the guidance of your TV, at the best, to the extent of the "Discovery" channel. Recently, I felt like every time I open my mouth and talk about China, I am offending Chinese and Americans; Republican and Democrats; Communists and Capitalists; left and right."

"Come on" Terry said "This is still a free country. You can say any thing you want. Besides I am not a snitch and I will not report you to the SS". David believed Terry would not take him to the SS, because SS no longer existed, but there was almost an urge to tell Terry that he only thought he was free, when in fact he could not escape the mental institution of democracy. As some said, "only truth can set you free". But since that reasoning took a long time when he talked it out with Bud Westwood, David refrained from discussing it with Terry again. Instead, he decided to only stick to the topic of China, and it seemed appropriate while watching a Rockets game after all.

"Terry, you said you would not take me to the SS and I think that is one of the problems how common Americans perceive China. SS was in Germany in the 1930's and 1940's. It was under Nazi which was at the extreme right, meaning it was on the capitalists' side and the American side, not the left, which was the Soviet or the Communist China side. But until today, so many Americans would still try to connect Chinese government with an extremely oppressive government existed more than 60 years ago. Do you think it's through the teaching of a fair and objective educational and cultural system?

When I left China, I was a rebellious youth filled with anger towards that country. But after living overseas for a decade and a half, I started to sympathize with the country for being unfairly and almost never objectively portrayed in the Western media. Did George Washington warn Americans against having too much passion or resentment towards one nation, at the cost of your own national interests?

If you read CNN.com, for the last 10 years, every article that mentioned the "word" Taiwan, there would be a phrase afterwards "a renegade province regarded by China which would be taken by force if necessary". OK, OK, we got the point. Do reporters understand "repetition" is one of the grammatical errors in writing? Maybe they are paid by word count, or I guess every reporter needs to make a buck just like the IT staff in your department. When ask them to try something new that requires independent thinking and creativity, they would always defer to "it's not in my job description".

Immediately after George W. Bush took office, he made two important announcements regarding international policies. First, America would not continue to be involved in the Middle East peace process; Second, China is not a strategic partner and nor is it an unpalatable foe, added Collin Powell a little later. OK, China is not a strategic partner, nor is many other countries, but why do you only mention this country and want to make this a headline with the name China in it? I guess good headlines always sell newspapers, such as when a truck driver had an accident with ceramic dishes in his tractor trailer, the local paper would report: "Truck driver smashed China". When a pawn shop pretty much buy everything used from the locals, it would erect a billboard as "We buy China" along the highway with small prints saying that it also buys other things, such as toys and furniture.

After the Wen Ho Lee espionage case broke out and congress conducted an investigation which pretty much used vague languages to say Chinese did learn to use computers supposedly out of their leagues, I later saw many printed or online newspapers used the headlines with something similar to 'China DID conduct espionage on United States'. I had to almost laugh at that poor sap Mr. Lee. He was from Taiwan and was he a guy supposed to be against China according to American teaching? Well, but he looked Chinese anyway and when it became hard to find anything in Los Alamos, a Chinese looking face would do.

In the Chinese community, the well circled around story about his espionage case was this: he visited mainland China in the mid 1980's when some Chinese colleagues joked 'Oh, you are from Los Alamos. Can you tell me how to make a nuclear bomb?' and that was pretty much it. Then about ten years after, this Lab of Los Alamos started encouraging employees to report any suspicious activities if being contacted by any suspicious people. Lee recalled the question asked by some Chinese scientists 10 years ago and reported the story to get some brownie points as a good employee. Suddenly, his security inspector's eyes lit up and screamed 'This is a serious security breach!!! You should have reported this incident 10 years ago, because it is clearly written on the employee's conduct book'. Lee did not expect the seriousness of his reporting and did not know what to do. The Los Alamos security officers swiftly conducted a thorough search of Lee's house and found that he took some classified documents home to continue working on them without asking for overtime or authorization. That was when "beans", "garbage" or whatever "more gross" hit the fan and all hell broke loose. It took years for Lee to get his name cleared and I am sure the stories about a cleared Mr. Lee did not get on many headlines. But when Mr. Lee was dirty, many headlines reported about him while news media and talk show hosts had years to make jokes like this: 'China and U.S. are even now, we bombed their embassy and they stole our nuclear secrets' . . .