Pakistani prime minister Gilani hailed China as our “best and most trusted friend,” and affirmed that bond in various different ways. What is garnering the most newsbytes upto now has been the decision to institute the learning of Mandarin as a required language in schools in Sind by 2013. This decision has been critiqued as being too taxing for the students who are “already learning four languages, English, Urdu, Arabic and Sindhi and learning Mandarin as well will prove to be difficult for them.” It is abundantly clear the driving politics behind such a decision. Despite China being a neighbouring country, local regional languages have nothing in common with languages and dialects spoken in China. Granted, it is not an easy task for a young person who hears and speaks Urdu and Sindhi mostly: the text and lingual alignment is entirely different, to say nothing of phonetics and grammar structure. I am not in two minds about the cause for advancement and sharing of languages; it opens up the world and breaks down borders in fantastic ways and ultimately helps create a more plural, tolerant global community that can practice greater understanding and empathy. At the same time I wonder why other developments such as this is not being talked about as much - “China is now believed to be Pakistan’s biggest supplier of military equipment, providing surface-to-air missiles, warships and fighter jets.” furthermore, according to ”any divisions between Pakistan and the United States could be an opportunity for China - Pakistan is desperate for foreign investment, especially in infrastructure, one of China’s specialities.” Official Chinese media is also playing its part. In the overseas edition of The Peoples Daily, China’s main official newspaper, an editorial on May 16th said “US opinion has not only failed to criticize its own unilateralism in this action (against Bin Laden) violating Pakistani sovereignty, it has vilified Pakistan as a scapegoat for its own rough going in its war against terror.” It is common knowledge (apparently) that China owns much of US debt. Is China also willing to take on where the US left off? picking up on military deals, and infrastructural contracted rebuilding. Now, China’s imperial history and present is less critiqued than US imperialism, and the workplace strikes and factory shutdowns reported even less, but how do we call out China while maintaining this level of “best friend”ship?
in the meantime, I look to Habib Jalib’s words, “cheen apna yaar hai, cheen apna yaar hai, cheen apna yaar hai, uss pe jaan nisar hai” of course the following verses from the poem speak to communism, which i fear, seem rather anachronistic in the contemporary chinese moment. but then given the history of china, moments exist in a rather particular way. (this is of course another story).
