Free Apologies to My Censor by Mitch Moxley Page A

Forum held in China, called “Summer Davos,” in the booming coastal city of Dalian. I would be the token laowai on our reporting squad. ( Laowai is the colloquial term for “foreigner” in Chinese, literally meaning “old outsider.”)
    I was at once flattered at being sent and slightly concerned that it would lead to actual responsibility at the paper, something I wanted to avoid so I could use office hours to covertly concentrate on finding freelance stories.
    â€œYou’ll be staying at a four-star hotel,” Ms. Feng said, with a nod that suggested, How about that?
    Until the day of our departure a great deal of enthusiasm was generated among the business reporters about the “four-star” hotel in which we were booked. From the Beijing airport all the way to Dalian the talk was all about the four-star hotel. I got swept up in it as well, imagining the trip as more vacation than business trip: watching HBO in my four-star room and lounging in a sauna at the four-star spa downstairs.
    After arriving in Dalian we drove in a cab through the city, passed the Shangri-La, the Kempinsky, the Sheraton, and a luxury Japanese hotel, before pulling into the Dalian Delight Hotel. It wasn’t horrible, but four stars it was not. (At least not by international standards; behind the receptionist desk was a plaque from the China Tourism Bureau with four stars prominently displayed.) My room was small, with dim yellow lights, faded carpets, and cigarette burns in the sheets, despite a no-smoking sign on the wall.
    The Chinese staff was two or more to a room. I was given my own room, which made me feel uneasy. The Chinese reporters worked hard and carried the burden of actually putting out a paper, while I knew that very little would be expected from me on this trip.
    After check-in, Xiao Zhang, a handsome young editor who worked on the international desk, gave me my first assignment.
    â€œPlease write a story about your impressions of Dalian,” he said.
    â€œMy impressions of Dalian?”
    â€œYes. What do you think of Dalian?”
    â€œI don’t know. We just got here.”
    â€œMaybe you should go and walk around, and then write about your impressions of Dalian.”
    â€œLike, related to business? Or travel, or what?”
    â€œJust impressions.”
    â€œOkay . . .”
    So I set out to discover Dalian. The city was by far the prettiest I had seen in China—clean, with wide, tree-lined streets and green spaces, and a decent beach close to downtown. Big squares defined the city center, paid for by growing software, tourism, and shipping industries. The city looked more like it belonged in Japan or Korea than China.
    I strolled down by the shore, which was dominated by massive apartment buildings that looked like castles from Disneyland. A friendly young Chinese couple approached me. They were curious to know what I was doing in the city.
    â€œChina is changing very fast,” the husband said via his wife, who translated.
    â€œThis was all once seaside,” the wife told me. “Twenty years ago there was nothing here.” She spoke not with regret—the apartments were colossal eyesores—but with tremendous pride. “We hope you enjoy our beautiful Dalian.”
    The city was emblematic of China’s economic miracle and a fitting home for the Economic Forum, which was held at a new conference center across town from our hotel. The meeting, dubbed “the Inaugural Annual Meeting of the New Champions,” was to celebrate the emergence of multinational companies from developing countries. Business and government leaders from around the world were in attendance. Chinese premier Wen Jiabao gave a speech on the opening night. Three-time Pulitzer Prize–winner and New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman was there, as were many prominent CEOs from global companies.
    Journalists from Time , the Wall Street Journal , the Economist,