How do you explain Dashan's popularity?

[imron]

Dashan had it all easy and gets attention for it.

Did he have it all easy? I'm sure he encountered his fair share of difficulties on his road to learning Chinese, as we all do. Unless of course you just mean easy compared to someone with a disability, or someone from a disadvantaged background, in which case then, most Chinese learners "have it easy" so why single out Dashan?

I'm with Trevelyan and Yonglin.

[cdn_in_bj]

I hadn't heard of Dashan prior to coming here, even though we share the same home country. But it didn't take long for me to figure out who this "大山" guy that everyone kept referring to was.

Dashan seems to be well thought of, even admired by, many local Chinese. I think he has contributed to the acceptance of foreigners in Chinese society, which to me is more profound than his mastery of the Chinese language.

Even today I still enjoy watching him on TV. Which is more than can be said for some of the other "newer" foreign faces on CCTV, whom I find a bit annoying.

Has anyone here actually met Dashan in person?

[roddy]

Sinosplice has a nice write-up from when he met with him here. And I once got an SMS from a friend who worked in TV production saying something along the lines of "I'm sitting next to Dashan. His Chinese is WAY better than yours." Which was nice.

[cdn_in_bj]

Even that blog entry (and the resulting comments) is focused on his language skills. However, the following article mentioned in the comments is quite enlightening:

http://english.people.com.cn/200406/23/eng20040623_147314.html

The Dashan character provides Rowswell with more than just a $500,000 annual income. Commuting several times each year between China and his home in Canada, he carries the personal satisfaction that his efforts may chip away at the Great Wall of cultural misunderstanding between China and the West.

"I try to bring to the Chinese a new image of foreigners that flies in the face of the stereotypes most have grown up with," he said.

Part of that public relations effort is to direct his star status toward social activism. Big Mountain appears in campaigns against smoking and suicide, and he has urged Chinese citizens to reduce global warming through energy conservation. The campaign included his recent visit to the elementary school on Beijing's outskirts to promote a government pilot program to bring regular education to the children of itinerant laborers.

Ok, so his career choice has paid off. But he deserves it.

[SeekerOfPeace]

Sinosplice has a nice write-up from when he met with him here. And I once got an SMS from a friend who worked in TV production saying something along the lines of "I'm sitting next to Dashan. His Chinese is WAY better than yours." Which was nice.

I read all of that blog. Fascinating stuff.

I like this comment, I find it really entertaining:

“I must add, too, that having worked for CCTV I can certainly believe that he earns peanuts.”–Tom

He may be making peanuts from CCTV, but his celebrity has him raking it in, according to The People’s Daily Online.

“The Dashan character provides Rowswell with more than just a $500,000 annual income…” http://english.people.com.cn/200406/23/eng20040623_147314.html

Yes, that’s right, Dashan makes half a MILLION freakin’ dollars a year. I say good for him. Whether or not he was exposed to China at a young age, one day he discovered his appetite for asian women, (what motivates the overwhelming majority of expats in Asia) and went over there and kicked butt. And brought back that wife.

Why do people hate him so much? Hessler touches on it in his “River Town” book. Every white guy who gets the asian expat bug wants to live out this fantasy of being the first and only white guy over there. Hessler writes about the rare occasions when he ran into another laowai in “his” town. He would think, “Get out of here. This is MY China.” For guys like this, the idea of some other white boy hiking your mountain paths and pissing on your trail is sickening. It’s territorialism. Like a dog sniffing a female’s butt to see who had her the day before.

Part of the reason people settle abroad is the adventure and learning a new culture. I have mucho respect for that. But the other half of the coin is that they like being popular and “different” for once in their life. If they were back home, they would be largely ignored.

When I mention the desire to go over there and get an asian wife, i.e. “conquer” asian women, I think this is THE major reason most white males want to settle abroad, especially in asia. If “learning the culture” or “adventure in a remote part of the world” were the ONLY reasons white expats settled in a asia, then why don’t they become expats in a REALLY exotic location like the Islamic middle east or Africa? Because most asian women in asia are easier for a white American to catch than a cold, that’s why.

Some will admit it. Others get insulted when it’s mentioned. Relax. There’s nothing wrong with it.

Males have a natural desire to spread their seed. During the Exodous, the Jews were f*ing the Moabites left and right, even though their god forbade it. What did explorers or armies do when they landed in a new country? They set about screwing all the foreign women. That’s why we hear people saying, “She’s ‘exotic’.” It really just means “She’s of different blood. I want to conquer her.”

And this is why expats hate Dashan. It’s not because he speaks perfect Chinese. It’s because expats have a little Conquistador blood in them and Dashan is the ULTIMATE modern day Conquistador. He came to China and conquered it when it was “romantic”, i.e. no other ugly laowai faces to be seen, and he got his woman and makes half a million dollars speaking chinese and being white.

[Meng Lelan]

Did he have it all easy? I'm sure he encountered his fair share of difficulties on his road to learning Chinese, as we all do. Unless of course you just mean easy compared to someone with a disability, or someone from a disadvantaged background, in which case then, most Chinese learners "have it easy" so why single out Dashan?

Yes, I mean easy compared to someone with disabilities or disadvantaged background. And this thread is singling out Dashan so that is why I said I don't admire him but there are people I admire for learning Chinese, though this thread isn't singling out people we admire for learning Chinese.

[Guest realmayo]

Also: must be quite a burden being the world's most famous Canadian.

[gougou]

I think in most countries, people like Bryan Adams or Alanis Morissette are much better-known than 大山.

[Guest realmayo]

yeah but how big are their populations?

[gougou]

Good point! Quite possible that there's really more people out there that know Dashan than Bryan Adams.

But I don't think it's too much of a burden if your popularity is limited to one country. Alanis Morissette pretty much can't go have dinner anywhere without being afraid of being recognized, whereas Dashan should be able to have a peaceful three-month holiday in Europe without ever being recognized.

[gato]

Don't forget Mike Myers (Austin Power). He's probably the most famous Canadian.

[Guest realmayo]

I'm not sure 800 million people know who Mike Myers is.

[Meng Lelan]

Aren't there any female counterparts to Dashan? Seems like all the much-admired-zhongguotongs being mentioned here are male. Why is that?

[gato]

Well, Austin Powers is known in India, which has almost as many people as China.

http://www.indianexpress.com/res/web/pIe/ie/daily/19990824/ige24023.html

Austin Powers -- The Spy Who Sssh. Rest is censored

Sandeep Unnithan

MUMBAI, AUG 23: The spy can `shag' no more. Or at least not in India where the censor board has completely exorcised the word `shag' from the film Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me, for the same reason that `quinny' was ousted from Shekhar Kapur's Elizabeth.

[imron]

Aren't there any female counterparts to Dashan?

That would be Charlotte MacInnis. See her website here. However she differs from Dashan in that she grew up in China.

[gougou]

India, which has almost as many people as the US.

What did I miss??

[gato]

Doh!

[Guest realmayo]

nah, not convinced by mike myers, most people who know of him would be in a fairly limited age range, unlike Dashan in China who must be familiar to a much wider age range.

Dashan is MFC.

[yonglin]

Charlotte MacInnis

Oh my god! Is she not the white girl doing 林娜 on the NPCR DVDs (my Chinese teacher forces us to watch these every class!)... she looks very similar! I always thought she was dubbed!

I'd no idea she'd been living in China since she was 7 though. In this respect, she doesn't make as good of a role model for those of us who are struggling with this language starting at... a more mature age. It might be a bit harsh, but I expect anyone moving to a foreign country at such a tender age to attain native fluency.

Doesn't mean that she doesn't deserve being on TV though: she even went to acting school at Columbia! That is desert if anything...

[gougou]

nah, not convinced by mike myers,

OK, how about Celine Dion? Granted, they might not know the face, but there's one song pretty much everybody should know in China.