By continuing you agree to eChinacities's Privacy Policy .
Sign up with Google
Sign up with Facebook
Q: Has China actually improved anything after "creatively appropriating" it?
The other day I went to a Spanish pasta restaurant in my city; it had a rich smell from the outside and what looked like a good kitchen, so I popped out 55 rmb for a chicken pesto pasta. Turned out to be total s***, the noodles were undercooked, chicken was dry and overbaked; I figured the owners had been to Spain, liked what they saw, imported everything they could, but were unable to emulate the actual quality of the Spanish food. A 20 rmb plate of "XJ bpaat mian" from the local Lanzhou Lamian place is far better.
This is in contrast to other Asian countries such as Korea and Japan, who have been able to emulate and even improve on foreign products. Like Samsung, which delivers Apple quality at a fraction of the price, and Japan makes everything from perfume to whiskey at an excellent quality and good price. So, do you know of any case where China has done the same - "creatively appropriated" foreign products and actually delivered an improved product at a reasonable price, or is the Spanish over-priced s*** quality restaurant typical of what we can expect from China?
I am going to call BS. Your local Spanish style restaurant is no good, the Galaxy 5S is good. China can't improve anything, Koreans can. I am pretty sure I could my own personal experiences in Korea to make a similar yet just as BS argument about Korea.
tomcatflyer:
If you are going to call BS, why not answer the question and give an example of something China has improved. In my experience there is nothing, they even managed to "borrow" a piss up in a brewery and couldn't organize that properly.
sam239:
I am not outright dissing China either, they do things of their own well, in some cases. But I am not aware of something where they have taken something and improved it, or delivered something like Samsung or Japanese whiskey, both of which are improved upon "creative appropriations".
They copied America's "Playground for the Rich", and by such criteria, I guess they improved upon that. The corrupt dictatorship puts corporate capitalism to shame. I'm lower class, and I'd still prefer to be living in the 'can't-do-anything-without-a-car' USA.
Talking specifically about food, you simply can't make good to excellent dishes if you lack the most important ingredient: passion.
coineineagh:
Food is one thing they don't need to copy from the west. I can understand why their attempts are hlaf-hearted at best. Sure, the skin, tendons and splintered bones take a lot of getting used to, but the flavours are delicious. Most westrern food is consumed here for gaining face as you are seen consuming foreign products, or just out of hygiene concerns and mistrust of local sellers. Those factors aside, Chinese food is quite tasty.
Chinese food is a reflect of the average Chinese person during the past 5000 years: poor.
There is no place for passion in Chinese cuisine, the food is basic, cooked only to be eatable and not to satisfy the gourmets, obviously when Chinese people open restaurants offering foreign food they apply the same principles coupled with "maximum profit" and that include saving power by undercooking dishes.
I always laugh when Chinese people talk to me about the "great foreign food restaurant" or the "great [insert name of the country] restaurant" because these people seriously think that KFC and McDonald's are Western gastronomy, thus I know that their so said "great restaurant" will be overpriced and taste like crap.
coineineagh:
Maybe it's because i live in the Sichuan countryside, but my experiences with food here are quite different. Locals spend lots of time preparing and eating dishes. They look and taste delicious, too.
In the past, yes. They've taken cellphones and tablets and made them a lot better than the original counterpart, and it's released before the actual product.
Some Shanzhai products are actually really good.
Not sure if they still do this.
sorrel:
but the question is, how do they compare in terms of quality and durability?
Meh, in China... I severely lower my expectations...
That way when something is actually decent, I am incredibly happy.
Like yesterday, I went to an awesome shrimp and bull frog restaurant. It was excellent.
well, a few things to note: my chinese friends/acquaintances dog-out chinese products a lot more than I do and are forever telling me to buy it 'in HK'.
saving bucks running a restaurant? hell, 90%+ won't even turn on (or up) the ice-box to get a cold drink~
Samsung = Apple quality? haven't ever noticed that. their laptops seem dated and look old quick, their Note phones while being pretty good still hang alot, or at least mine and my buddies do, i think their TV sets must be pretty damn good though.. and Android sux as an OS compared to OS X. well, these are my observations/opinions anyway...
royceH:
Wo ting bu dong, by and large. But I get the thing about not turning their fridges on. Arseholes!
Eorthisio:
Android and iOS don't target the same people.
iOS is good if you have no knowledge about informatics, it's like a corridor where every doors are locked, you can't do anything but what Apple of the apps' developers want you to do, you can't customize anything, basically you can't get off the tracks.
Android let you do whatever you want, there is no need to jailbreak (and thus void your warranty) to customize the OS from the appearance to the very core, yes it's a maze for the average person but a wonder for the techies, the possibilities are infinite.
In terms of build quality for the devices Samsung is crap but HTC among others is on par with Apple and their phones are running Android.
Thanks for the responses, but
(1) not trying to outright diss Ch., which has done some things well IMO, but
(2) seems like no one came up with a successful creative appropriation. Comparisons with other East Asian countries are fair. I guess there is none, and I will stick with the LaMian.
No mate. Nothin. I'm just about over this unimaginative filthy wasteland.
I know that any 'foreign restaurant' will serve only a chinese bastardisaton of what should have been intended.
You'll pay shitloads and declare never to go there again.
