[Rick Lee]

WRT the surveillance state, you guys have probably heard about the Great Firewall of China. Lots of sites are blocked. Google, Facebook, Youtube and countless others, all blocked. For me, if I was on wifi, all the blocked sites were, well, blocked. But on my Verizon int'l. plan I could reach anything. Chinese have workarounds for everything and I wasn't at all shy about browsing the blocked sites on my phone in public. No one bothers foreigners there. I think the whole country is like the American mafia culture - everyone knows the rules. Doesn't matter if they're right or wrong. Everyone knows how far they can go. Step out of line and you get your skull thumped. In many ways China is far, far freer than the US. It is way more capitalist, prostitution is legal, you can drink and smoke anywhere, if you don't want to pay for booze in the restaurant, they don't care if you go to the bodega nextdoor and buy some beers and drink them in the restaurant. You really can do whatever you want ... as long as you don't challenge the gov't. or try anything remotely approaching organizing a flash mob or protest.