&quot;I&#x27;m not Chinese nor do I have a particular stake, but I was there for three weeks this summer and was overwhelmed by a kind of social optimism&quot;<p>It is normal to fall in love when you meet a different culture.<p>It takes 6 months or so living on a country to start seeing caveats and &quot;not so good things&quot; in any country.<p>&quot;the shared assumption that services are getting better, progress will happen, and a relentless cycle of innovation&quot;<p>It is called a &quot;bubble&quot;, I traveled frequently to Spain(my native country) and Ireland while the shared assumption that everything was getting better was at full power and all media was talking about those &quot;economic miracles&quot;.<p>When those miracles reversed it was not(and it is not) pretty.<p>My father lived the Japanese &quot;economic miracle&quot; of Japan, the country that was going to rule the world.<p>I lived 5 years in China at the beginning of the bubble. It is an entire world in itself, but they have BIG problems. I continue traveling and doing business in China, and it is getting worse day after day.<p>When I was there I could use a normal VPN without problems, and Chinese authorities could not care less, as it was necessary for the business. But now you have to use like 6 layers of VPN, change patterns of navigation...because people in power is desperate to control their own people.