Happy the Year of the Ox! In this episode we discuss the Spring Festival dinner table stories that came along - which led to us exploring the perspective of growing up in China prior to the country’s massive economic boom. Chris shares his wife and inlaws’ anecdotes on growing up in rural Sichuan and getting out of poverty, and how the life from that generation is almost unimaginable in today’s China.

Show Notes:

• Chinese New Year dinner table chat - people love to talk about the past and how life was “when I was your age”.
• Stories from Chris’ wife and inlaws, growing up in complete poverty and grinding their way out of it.
• The age of the One Child Policy, and stories on how they managed to evade it.
• Sleeping on the side of train tracks and sleeping on hard floors.
• Working odd jobs and as migrant workers in East Coast cities, and finding the opportunity to create a life in the city.
• Hope’s memories of early childhood in a Chinese city - not starving but diet mostly consisted of poor nutrition.
• Throwback to the days of taking the “hard seat” green train and standing in the aisle for overnight journeys. China’s infrastructure improvement over the past two decades have been nothing short of a miracle.

Listen on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/millennials-in-china/id1503870294

Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0MwEJZnnZ2sNWje7wP0GaW?si=tWqgkgwoQCueTrEfeI3-6g

Listen on Google Podcasts: https://podcasts.google.com/?feed=aHR0cDovL21pbGxlbm5pYWxzaW5jaGluYS5jb20vcnNz

Listen on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCm6jqVbJ1SR_g9iTLFxyF1g

Podcast Website: http://millennialsinchina.com

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Hope’s Blog: http://hopefreiheit.com