Now is your very last chance to impress your friends with a hilariously political joke. Here goes:
Q: ‘Who is the president of China?’
A: ‘Hu. Hu Jin Tao, that’s who!’
Cracking.
This Thursday, China’s communist party begins its eighteenth big meeting to decide who’s stepping up to the leadership plate. Here, the leadership hand-over process could barely be more distinct from those also concluded this week across the Pacific. American electoral campaigns may have lasted many months, but it has taken years of political wrangling (behind thick closed doors, of course) for China to prepare for this round of changes. New leaders have emerged about whom most people know little, though the party is sure to have guaranteed them as the ideal choice. Thursday’s result, then, is certain to be predictable, safe and orderly. At least, that will be the public perception.
In order to get better acquainted with the new fella, Xi Jin Ping [shee-jin-ping] 习|近平, I’ve made a portrait of him. If my design were to be championed by China’s masses, as they have Mao’s iconic portrait, I could be on to a winner. However, Mao and his people earned that infamy the hard way, so here’s hoping 习|近平 keeps his head down and doesn’t do anything too rash.
