Week 3 in China and I believe that it is all coming together, as long as I don’t die of a respiratory disease first. This was a productive and intermittently healthy week in which I navigated the queue system at the Bank of China, followed the aspiring Chinese at Torino and became aware of the huge business that is the tobacco industry which surely must be as big a threat to their sporting chances as the Americans, Russians and Germans. Consumer banking in China is actually pretty efficient, and as I sat in the Bank of China branch at Jian Wai Soho I believed my experience was going to dispell my anxieties borne of reports of debt laden and fragile financial institutions. The Bank of China is one of the big four, of which the Singapore Government fund Temasek recently purchased 5% for US$1.5bn. The Italian customer sitting at counter 9 spoke English, with the assistance of his hands, to a competent but not to be gesticulated at teller. I assumed that all foreigners were dealt with under the ‘wealth management’ sticker on window 9 but when my number appeared on the sign board I was at window 8. My teller was not only unexcited, but decidedly bored by my presence and if she spoke English was not going to give away her secret. The problem with Mandarin classes is that they never teach you the useful vocabulary – like “how do I change the PIN on my bank card as I can’t remember this?” All completed and PIN changed within 15 minutes with a RMB5 (US$0.60) account opening charge, I decided to press ‘satisfied’ on the electronic ‘customer satisfaction’ voting monitor – the other choices were unsatisfied and very unsatisfied; I am not sure the money Temasek paid is going into customer relationship management yet. By comparison young Yoyo at Bally’s welcomed me as if I might be one of the potential coaches for the Olympic squad. I decided that now I have a bank account in Jian Wai SOHO and will have Unit 0504 that it was time to sign up for the gym. I elected for the Silver membership, which means not using the pool or other 15 Bally gyms around China, neither of which were important considerations. What Yoyo failed to mention was that Silver membership doesn’t give entitlement to a towel – a housekeeping issue that, post sauna, caused me some inconvenience as I only had the 10x6 cm hand towel that came as a benefit of membership. Not a problem the Olympiads will suffer – racking up 6 medals in Torino so far, with their debut in ski jumping and snowboarding. Chinese ski Coach Koch, an Austrian, said supportively, “You have to work from the very bottom of the sport and sounds very interesting.” Working her way up is 13 year old Sun Zhifeng, the young snow boarding Olympiad who came 31st who said, “My aim is the Olympic Gold medal, maybe in the next Olympics.” I simply hope that she gets to train away from the hazards of Nanshan resort. The other major hazard that faces Chinese, and me, daily is that of smoking. Singapore is now virtually smoke free, but in China 320 million (think every man, woman and child in America) smoke 1.8 trillion cigarettes a year, a third of the world's total consumption. 500 million more pairs of lungs are counted as second hand and passive smokers. I met tobacco expert Jim van Drunen Little, who shared with me that the China Government secures some 15% of the treasury from its sale of tobacco through its monopoly - exceeding that from agriculture. According to the State Monopoly Administration (STMA), in 2005 about 7.3 billion fake cigarettes were seized by authorities, and 2,908 illegal production sites were reportedly closed down, as were 23 illegal sales networks. For Philip Morris International, which in December signed an agreement to produce Marlboro in China, this market represents a gross profit of US$8, 650,000,000. Hard to believe in a country where the average income is still only US$1,500 per year. There is a malignance in the way that the State is profiting from the physical demise of its own family and friends, but I couldn’t help notice a report this week that may indicate an awareness of the true cost of this pro-smoke policy. In Zhejiang province doctors reported a 40% decline in the sperm count of donors this year to recent years and it was attributed to ‘alcohol, smoking and the environment.” Sitting in front of computer screens was also blamed, but while China still only wants one child per family, it does plan for these children to be going for gold in Beijing in 2008. The State of course is also still involved in the family. Frank, alternating between bites of Beijing Duck and drags on his Zhong Nan Hai smokes, told me that if he were to have a second child he would lose his job as a director in the State Administration for Radio Film and Television. Frank is looking forward to when his daughter becomes five years old because then she will come back from the Kindergarten where she has been boarding during the week since the age of three. Frank is part of the new generation who are tied by the prescriptive rules of the Communist party but bound by the realities of modern capitalist China. Ironically in the smoking of Government cigarettes Frank and the hundreds of millions of loyal workers like him support a system that sacrifices them. China, literally, is going up in smoke. NOTES 1. China Daily February 18-19 2006 page 12 ‘China yes breakthrough’ 2. Tobacco generated about RMB 95 billion in tax and profit for the government in 1998, while the whole agricultural sector contributed only RMB 40 billion to government tax revenue. Source: FOOD AND AGRICULTURE ORGANIZATION OF THE UNITED NATIONS 3. China consumes more than 1.8 trillion cigarettes a year a third of the world's total consumption and more than twice the amount Philip Morris produces worldwide.