| | Environmentalism is usually something that I'm aware is a good thing, but to be honest, it doesn't really come into play in my daily life so much. Since I've lived in China for the last three years, I've had to do without things like owning a car or using a dryer for my laundry. Yeah, I walk, ride my bike, or take a bus 95% of the time, but it's necessity. Yeah, I line dry my clothes, but if dryers were for sale in China...well I would get one if I could afford it. Two things happened this week though, to bring the whole envirnmentalism idea up front and center for me.
The first was meeting a girl who we had been "text-message friends" with for several months now. She got our number from the vet where we took Baozi to get all his shots, to be neutered, and where he boards when we are out of town. So originally this girl texted us and said she worked at the vet place, but later we found out it was her friend who worked at the vet place and she pretty much was texting us to improve her English. Meeting people who want to use us as English practice partners is so common that usually we don't pursue the relationship, but for some reason we have kept this one up, and it's been good for us too, since usually she can't figure out how to text us in English. It's good Chinese reading practice for us. So anyway we had our first face to face meeting last night, and she decided to bring us random gifts. Most of it was "Hainan local products" which means it is produced from coconuts. We got coconut flavored wafers (a sort of thin cookie) coconut flavored candy, coconut powder (which apparently you mix with hot water to make a beverage) and some other coconut snack which was sort of a cross between a cookie and candy. All nice, I guess, if you like coconut flavoring! The thing that really got to me though, was the bag of dried shark fin.
 It's used to make shark's fin soup, and it's an expensive delicacy. The thing is, I'm morally opposed to sharks' fin soup. Here's a little background on why:
"While shark fin has no flavor and very little nutritional value, it does provide texture to soup, not to mention handsome profits to an industry estimated to be worth $500 million per year. Fins are dried, de-skinned, boiled and sometimes bleached, and then made into soup by the addition of chicken or fish stock, which provides the flavor. The fins of certain species are considered more valuable because of the length and thickness of the "fin needles" that they contain.
Until the 1980s, the consumption of shark fin soup was discouraged in China. However, the Chinese government relaxed its attitude towards what had been seen as an elitist dish, and consumption soared. Mainland China is now the world's biggest end-market for shark fin: the effect on shark populations has been disastrous.
A bowl of shark fin soup can sell for as much as $100. Because of its perceived value, serving shark fin soup at private functions is a way of honoring one's guests and signaling one's wealth and status. Chinese people frequently express the view that no self-respecting host would ever leave shark fin soup off the menu, particularly at weddings and other important social functions, for fear of losing face.
Every year, millions of sharks suffer painful deaths from the cruel and wasteful shark fin trade. Whether unintended "bycatch" by or caught specifically for their valuable fins, these animals have their fins removed and then—either dead or dying—are immediately cast back into the water. Shark meat is of low commercial value, so fishers save freezer space for highly valued fish and discard the sharks after the animals are "finned."
So anyway, now I don't know what to do. I can't eat the stuff, and I can't regift it either. Since I got it from someone I don't know well and have communication issues with, I couldn't have refused the gift either. She wouldn't have understood why, and it would have been extremely rude of me to do so. Maybe we will donate it to a local homeless shelter, with an explanation of how and why we acquired it.
The other thing that happened yesterday was that China's new ban on ultra-thin shopping bags went into effect. Now factories have stopped producing the ultra thin bags, and shops must use the thicker kind, and charge for them. At our local RT Mart (Da Run Fa) they were charging .3 RMB for large bags and .2 RMB for small ones. That may not seem like much to you, but it actually does make a difference for us here in China, where salaries and cost of living are much lower. There was a massive run on "green" re-usable shopping bags, and Erik and I even decided that after today, we will be bringing our own re-usable bags. This isn't a decision we would have made on our own, but I know it is a good one. I'm sick of seeing plastic bags floating by on the breeze and tangled at the roots of bushes and trees. I'm happy that China has taken this step and even though it's an inconvenience to us and many others, I definitely support it. I hope that it will continue to be enforced.
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| | Posted 6/2/2008 5:22 PM - 159 Views - 6 eProps - 3 comments
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