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I first came to China in 1979 to study Chinese at Nanjing Teachers College. The program failed - most students went home within 12 months. We were supposed to stay two years. I stayed 16 months.
For a 20-year-old from Australia, going to China at that time was like being dropped into a shark tank. China had suffered social upheaval for 150 years, and society was Darwinian. During the Qing Dynasty, the heart and soul of the beast had cancer. Then there was the republic, war, and a few stable years in the early 1950s before the political campaigns started. With a history like that, how do you suddenly produce trust? Rule of law? For me, it was a hugely formative shock. But gradually, glimpses of humanity appeared. People took risks to help me.
In the 1980s, reform was not so apparent in the cities, but there were massive changes in rural areas. The...