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China Elevator Stories
“Don’t Go On The Streets To Do Something Stupid”
A friend of mine receives a call from her Tibetan mother.
22/02/2014
Ruth Silbermayr
Author
In March 2008, just a few months before the start of the Summer Olympics in Beijing, and right after protests took place that would later lead to deadly riots in Lhasa, Qiu, a friend of mine from Northwestern Yunnan, receives a call from her mother. Her mother is ethnically Tibetan, and her father is Han Chinese. Their hometown, Weixi, is located in a fertile mountainous region, not too far from Myanmar and the Tibetan plateau. At the time of the call, Qiu is 20 and staying in Beijing for her undergraduate studies.
Her mother, who has lived in Northwestern Yunnan all her life, says, “Don’t join them and don’t go on the streets to do something stupid.”
Qiu responds, “Mum, have you forgotten that I don’t speak Tibetan? I wouldn’t even be able to communicate with them.”
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