Editor’s note: David Pinck is currently a Sac State graduate student in Criminal Justice, and has been since Spring 2004. He is studying Mandarin and Chinese culture at Beijing University for one year, and is conducting research for his thesis which concerns the Chinese Police system.

He grew up in Tracy, Calif., and earned his Bachelor’s degree in Physics from Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo.

By far the most common question posed to me after explaining where I planned to study for a year was, “Why there?”. Indeed, why here? Why China?

Why didn’t I choose to study in Europe, or in New Zealand? Why not the Caribbean? There are some interesting reasons.

It would be easy to mention here that my degree is not in “tanning,” or that taking classes in surfing or bartending could not possibly diversify my education in any worthwhile way. It would also be very easy to throw in that the relevance of studying, “foreign anatomy,” as a friend once eloquently put it, is sketchy at most (although this point can be, and no doubt has been, heavily rationalized by many).

I won’t mention any of this because countless people end up having fantastic, life-enriching experiences while studying in all of aforementioned locales.

Instead, what I’ll choose to talk about are the reasons I’m fascinated by China. Imagine a land where people care more about what’s best for the country than about what’s best for themselves. Imagine a culture where teachers are revered, and where students are diligent. Imagine a government that balances its budget, and an economy with no national debt.

Now imagine the United States. The contrast couldn’t be starker. President John F. Kennedy’s speech about responsible citizenship, about asking what you can do for your country ?” not the reverse ?” has been lost to the analects of our great thinkers. The marginalized status of our teachers is commensurate only with their meager pay. Our students are a far cry from cognitive sponges ?” some, I might argue, aren’t even sentient by age 20. Our budget is atrocious and our national debt is absurd to the point of surrealism.

Something interesting will happen at this point to my readers. Some of you will disregard anything further I have to say, and some of you will read on feeling, perhaps, in some way validated. To both groups I have this to propose: Why not decide these things for yourself? Why not admit that you’ve inherited the majority of your opinions, predispositions, and political stances from those around you?

We hear many negative things about China. The rest of the world hears many negative things about the United States. The truth, as I figure it, must lurk somewhere in between.

I have decided for this reason to jettison all of my predispositions about China and with them, most of my predispositions about the United States. I have endeavored to ignore the prejudices of my parents, of their parents, and of their parent’s parents. I have overlooked my friends’ apprehensions, their criticisms, their aggrandizements. I have attempted to disavow all propaganda, to discount all faux patriotism, and to reject all closed-mindedness. I have, above all, resolved to live my own life, to reach my own conclusions, and to judge countries like China on my own terms.

While I am indeed American, and glad of it, I could very well have been born in China instead.

Had that been the case, I doubt very much that I’d perceive the United States to be so exceedingly superior to my own country. This is an interesting thought, one I’m not willing to overlook in life. It is on these grounds that I have chosen to study abroad, and it is for this reason that I appoint you, reader, to do the same.