Xi Jinping Breathes Bad Air With the Masses; Xi Jinping’s appetite for impromptu public appearances appears to be growing
March 2, 2014 Leave a comment
Feb 25, 2014
Xi Jinping Breathes Bad Air With the Masses
Xi Jinping’s appetite for impromptu public appearances appears to be growing.
On Tuesday, less than two months after he riled up the Internet by scarfing down lunch at a Beijing steamed-bun shop, China’s new leader once again set social media atwitter by showing up with an entourage at a snack-heavy Beijing hipster shopping enclave known as Nanluoguxiang.
A screenshot shows one of several photos posted to Sina Weibo of Chinese president Xi Jinping vising the Nanluo Guxiang area in Beijing on Tuesday.
It remains unclear what Mr. Xi ate in the traditional alleyway, where vendors serve everything from stinky tofu to double-layered milk pudding. But Internet users noted with approval that a maskless Mr. Xi was willing to slurp down mouthfuls of the capital’s notoriously chewable air – air so dirty that on Tuesday local officials again issued the city’s second-highest pollution alert.
“Breathing together, sharing the same fate,” read a widely repeated response on Sina Corp.’s Weibo microblogging platform.
Channeling the beloved Qianlong Emperor, who is said to have wandered outside the Forbidden City in disguise to mingle with hoi polloi on multiple occasions, Mr. Xi has brought a common touch back to China’s top office. He kisses babies. He kicks balls. He carries his own umbrella.
The effort has paid off, and not just for Mr. Xi. The Chinese leader’s December visit to a branch of the Qing-Feng Dumpling chain, where he spent less than $4 on a lunch of pork buns and stewed chitterlings, reportedly boosted sales for the chain, which now sells a “Xi Jinping combo.”
Amateur video posted online Tuesday showed Mr. Xi stopping to shake hands with locals while strolling through a curiously empty alleyway on the way to Nanluoguxiang with Beijing mayor Wang Anshun and Beijing Communist Party chief Guo Jinlong.
In visiting the neighborhood, Mr. Xi may have been attempting to reach a younger demographic. Home to one of the country’s top performing-arts schools as well as innumerable cafes and bars, Nanlouguxiang has long been a haunt of the detached and ironic wenyi qingnian, or “cultured and artistic youth.”
But it was on the issue of air pollution that he scored the most points. China’s leaders are widely presumed to be insulated from the food safety and environmental problems that afflict regular people. With the capital suffering its sixth straight day of hazardous air pollution, Xi succeeded in showing solidarity with Beijing’s beleaguered residents even as he set a questionable example.
“Right on, Big Xi didn’t wear a face mask!” wrote one microblogger.
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