University Daily Kansan / Friday, May 4; 1990
3B
Students reflect on Tiananmen
► Editor's Note: All of the Chinese students' names have been changed to protect their privacy.
By: Sarah Deylin
Special to the Kansan
Zhang Gueli fought back tears. His dark brown eyes turned misty as he recalled helplessly watching television in the United States on June 38, 1989.
It was almost one year ago that the Chinese military opened fire on demonstrating students in Tiananmen Square.
"It was hard to watch what was happening," said Zhang, a KU Chinese student. "Even at the beginning of the semester, I felt like I was one of those students."
Many of the Chinese students at the University of Kansas clearly remember the blood bath in Beijing in June. As the one year anniversary approaches, remembrances and outcry the massacre have resurfaced.
The Chinese students recalled feeling shocked and angry at how the Chinese government handled the Tiananmen Square incident.
"I did not expect the Chinese government to use force to get the students to leave," said Wang Qili, a KU College student. "I expected the government to try and dialogue with the students and that they would have a chance to talk with the government. The Chinese government really didn't do much to explain the situation last June."
Keith McMahon, assistant professor of Chinese language and literature, said he remembered feeling sorrow and hopelessness.
"I had the same kind of horror that everyone else did," he said. "It was beyond anyone's expectation."
The battle abroad
One KU Chinese student, Ye Gang, was in Tiananmen Square during the massacre and took part in the demonstrations. His direct involvement helped him become aware of how serious the situation was.
"It was a very good experience to be there," he said. "It was a good chance to join the students and see them on on. I felt proud to demonstrate."
by protesting. Ye not only exposed himself to the government but also to the armed and brutal military. Ye might have killed him, he might die and so he made a will.
"Iknew it was going to be bloody," he said. "I saw many students being killed."
When he saw someone get crushed by a tank, he tried, he told to be strong and not let it bother him.
"I tried to block it off," he said quietly. "I didn't want to feel anything."
But he did.
Ye cried during the massacre. "I've never been that sad in my life before," he said.
The Chinese students' sadness also was accompanied by rage at how the Chinese government handled the Beijing incident. This prompted demonstrations on the KU campus and other places in the country last year.
The U.S. protest
strated, I would be in trouble. The government will ask your opinion of the massacre, and if you demonstrated, you will have to lie."
A protest in Chicago right after the student killings in China was
One KU Chinese student, Xiao Wu,
received a letter from a Chinese
friend who returned home and urged
him to remain in the United States.
The friend has been isolated from
the country, extremely敏感 by the
Chinese government.
KU Chinese students are not free to speak about the massacre or demonstrations in letters or phone calls because they are seeing themselves to the government.
"We are not free to write in letters what we did," Jin said. "It will affect the person receiving the letter."
McMahon said another existing problem was the confined relationship between Chinese and Americans.
'I'm scared. If the government found out that I demonstrated, I would be in trouble. The government will ask your opinion of the massacre, and if you demonstrated, you will have to lie.'
KU student
— Wang Qill KU student
attended by many KU Chinese students. Because the Chinese Consulate is in Chicago, the students must be fluent in a way to let their voices be heard.
"we wanted to make them know what our response was to what happened in China," said Li Yang-Fei, a KU Chinese student.
KU Chinese student, Jin Lin, said he took part in demonstrations to show his support for the students.
"I was really angry so I joined all the demonstrations," he said. "I'm really on the students' side."
A big problem affecting the Chinese students has developed since the demonstrations: fear. Fear that the Chinese government knows they demonstrated. Fear that their families back home may be in danger. Fear that if they go back to China, their lives may never be the same.
"I'd like to go back now, but I can't," said Zhang. "It would be dangerous because I'm one of the clients who demonstrated very much."
Wang said he hoped to go back to his homeland someday, but like many of the Chinese students at KU, he said he felt that his chances of living a safe and free life in China were slim.
"I'm scared," he said. "If the government found out that I demon-
"It affects those of us who are interested in China," he said. "The association between foreigners and these is much more restricted."
Sara Martin, assistant director for the Office of Foreign Student Affairs, said two fears seemed to prevail in the Chinese students she spoke to. They are afraid that they won't get the job if they go back to China.
Wang said that if the government learned that students demonstrated, they would have no chances for promotions or increased salaries on jobs.
"They will try to make your life hard." he said.
Ye is fearful that his protesting may have caused problems for his brother in China.
"I'm scared that he may not be able to come to the United Stated because of me," he said.
The number of Chinese students coming to KU hasn't decreased in the past year.
"We would've expected fewer students because of what happened last June, but it hasn't materialized yet," Martin said.
making it more difficult for students to come here to study. She said she expected to see a difference in Chinese enrollment next fall.
She said she learned from a reliable source that the Chinese govern-
The Chinese students are still angry, though. They are angry that because they demonstrated, they must live in fear. Imprisonment is an extreme possibility for participating in protests.
Coping with grief
They are outraged at the control the Chinese government has over everything. This has propelled them to become the most powerful of the age-old Communist Party.
"Chinese people tend to worship and love their government, but now they have almost all lost their hope in them. I used to love my government," Ye said, slowly shaking his head. "But now I hate it."
Zhang expressed the same kind of disappointment.
"Before the incident, people had hope that the Communist Party would change and be better," he said. But after the massacre, that
Xiao said the government was selfish.
"The most important thing a government should care about is its people and making their lives better, our government doesn't," he said.
Jin said, "It's ridiculous. The world is changing and China should be changing too, but the Chinese are not changing the way they did 26 years ago."
There is hope, the students said. Hope that the Chinese government might change into one of sound democracy with concern for the economy. However, they will be holding onto that hope for another 20 years, which is how long many believe it will take to change.
Memories of the Tiananmen Square massacre, however, will not fade. He wrote about the damage of a borehole he built despite his belief when it happened in June will continue.
Jin videotaped the massacre on television and watched it when he could.
"I just couldn't believe it ... That's not China," she said, wincing as he remembered the gory scenes. "You see a soldier on the street, you bank on the street... I felt instead that I was watching a war movie."
Demand for land near Berlin Wall worries planners
The Associated Press
WEST BERLIN — A neglected piece of land next to the crumbling Berlin Wall has become the focus of controversy about how to rebuild what once was the center of a vibrant capital.
It is the spot on Potadamer Platz, one of Europe's most elegant squares before World War II, where Napoleon's troops want to erect a new headquarters.
Fears have grown in both West and East Berlin that the shopping spree for land is about to start and that large rich Western companies will determine the city's future landscape.
"What Berlin does not need is quick projects thought up in an illusory and short-lived reunification euphoria," East Berlin architect Bruno Flierl said in an interview.
After much internal bickering, the West Berlin city council has agreed to take competitive bids in construction to rebuild the former central district.
One of East Berlin's chief planners has expressed concern about possible economic colonialism by the West.
East Berlin will play a role in the decisions only after the election May 6 of its first democratically chosen city council. This has caused complaints that East Benilers will have little time to study documents affecting their part of the city.
Since the Berlin Wall was built in 1961, Potsdam Platz on one Western side of it and neighboring Leipzig Platz on the other have been desolate symbols of a divided country.
Together, they had been the hub of Berlin and one of Europe's busiest districts. That ended with the destruction of World War II, the city's division and the building of the wall.
since the wall began falling in November, Potsdamer Platz has become a major pedestrian crossing point. Motor vehicles use a newly completed section of four-lane highway linking East Berlin
with streets in the West that were dead ends for a generation.
Makeshift souvenir stands in Potsdamer Platz platz chunks of the wall and Soviet military uniforms to tourists. Circus tents and vans have spruced on nearby land that is empty most of the year.
Construction of an apartment block on Leipzig Platz was halted last fall when demonstrators ended 40 years of Stalinist rule.
An East German border guard said the work stopped when hopes were aroused that the area might become the center of the city again and not just another place to build housing complexes.
He said the West German chain store Wertheim planned to put its head office on the foundation of the unbuilt apartment house.
Asked how he felt about Western companies taking choice sites, his shrugged and said of the planners: "They leave us some green spaces."
Other East Germans feel more strongly.
"It would be unfair if all the high-tech went to West Berlin while the East was used for cheap production and storage facilities, or it would be worth a ranking planners. "That would be a colonialist concept."
West Berlin's Social Democratic Party wants to attract investment to the city as quickly as possible and has welcomed the Daimler-Benz plan to build a headquarters for 8,000 employees.
"We can't afford to keep such an investor waited," Mayor Walter Monper of West Berlin told his city council recently.
The Alternative List, coalition partner of the Social Democrats in the council, does not agree and said in a statement: "Daimler is not the star around which Potsdam Platz plans revolve."
Representatives of the Alternative List, the equivalent in West Berlin of the environmentalist Greens Party, say the Daimler building would be too dominant in the square.
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