Word: mao
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...Mao's Shadow By Philip P. Pan Simon & Schuster; 349 pages...
China's past 25 years "have been the best in its 5,000-year history," writes Philip Pan in Out of Mao's Shadow, but it's a schizophrenic sort of success: the country's new prosperity and global clout have gone hand in hand with graft and repression. Pan, a Washington Post correspondent, argues that China's current woes reflect a desire by the Communist Party and ordinary Chinese to forget the lessons of its tragic recent past. Traumas like Mao Zedong's Cultural Revolution left many cynical, disillusioned and willing to exchange freedom for stability and growth...
...Direct flights were halted after the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949, when Mao Zedong's Communists took control of the mainland and Chiang Kai-shek's Kuomintang fled to the safety of the island. In recent years a limited number of direct flights were allowed during four Chinese holidays. Under the new agreement, 36 direct flights will be permitted each weekend beginning July 4. In addition, the number of mainland tourists allowed to visit Taiwan will increase from 1,000 daily...
...plastic balls. China decided to develop star paddlers largely because the International Table Tennis Federation was, in 1953, one of the first sports organizations to drop ties with Taiwan in favor of the mainland. In 1959, Rong Guotuan made history as China's first world champion in any sport. Mao deemed the victory a "spiritual nuclear weapon." Determined to maintain Ping-Pong supremacy, coaches fanned out across the countryside looking for kindergartners with quick reflexes and superior hand-eye coordination. "Other countries have produced some really good table-tennis players," says Liu Fengyan, director of China's table-tennis administrative...
...advantage." Chinese women, in particular, are renowned for their ability to withstand brutal training. Unlike in the U.S., where the privatization of athletics means less money for women's sports--just compare the NBA with the WNBA--the Chinese state lavishes funds on its female athletes from childhood onward. Mao used to say, "Women hold up half the sky." In fact, four years ago in Athens, Chinese women did even better, winning 60% of the country's gold medals...