A truly terrifying individual

In addition to the more serious issue of considering the Chinese school timetable http://keytrendsinglobalisation.blogspot.com/2008/07/worlds-future-and-chinese-school.html
it might be worth relating an anecdote on an early trip to China that helps give insight into what is occurring in the country.
While visiting a Beijing market to buy a couple of coats the young woman selling them to me said she didn't have my size on display but did have them in storage - which would take only five minutes to get. We should therefore haggle over the price of those on display and if we agreed this she would then order the appropriate size so I could try them on. Price negotiations were successful and I had to wait five minutes.
I thought 'she speaks very good English.’ And as we had nothing else to do, decided to probe her language ability. I switched to Russian. 'Your English is very good. Do you also speak Russian?’
Reply in Russian: ‘Naturally I do. We are getting more and more Russian visitors here.’
I swapped to French .'Do you speak French?'
'Yes, Beijing is developing good relations with France. Do you speak Spanish?'
At this point I admitted defeat and mentally retreated to lick my wounds. A Mandarin, English, Russian, French and Spanish (were there more?) language speaking market trader in Beijing, not fluent but entirely adequate to do her job and to have an intelligent conversation, was a bit much to cope with.
I therefore started to watch other stalls carefully. The pattern on very many was the same. As with other markets in the world the stall holders dashed out to virtually pull you into looking at their wares, and advertised their merits in extremely exaggerated terms. But when there were no customers many were studying dictionaries and clearly learning vocabulary lists. My encounter happened to be with a particularly bright spark but she was very far from unique.
To grasp her impact it is necessary to understand other aspects of her character - again she was typical. This was no dull swot. She was very snappily dressed and clearly interested in fashion. A latest model mobile phone, with highly striking cover, had one of the attractive dongles on it which young Chinese women clearly like. She combined basic entrepreneurial skills, fashion, technology and study.
She clearly had every intention of gaining everything good in life possible and knew she would need money for it. But whereas her young contemporary working in a shop in the UK might be told to dream of it through appearing on Big Brother, or some equally stupid reality show, she was doing it through dynamism, hard work, and gaining knowledge.
It reminded me of a dinner I had with the chairman of a European PR agency in Shanghai, on one of his first trips to China, after coming back from meeting potential Chinese clients. ‘They are absolutely terrifying - very well informed, excellent business skills... and extremely well dressed.’
This is not to idealise the situation. Get away from the developing areas of Chinese cities and you are stepping back to a standard of living that is lower than anything imaginable to most people in Europe or the US. But already hundreds of millions of people are caught up in this urban Chinese development. An express train is heading towards the existing companies and societies of the US and Europe.
Deep structural and cultural parameters have already been created and will not be shifted without gigantic effort. To avoid Asia overtaking the US and Europe would require a 'cultural revolution' in the latter. It would necessitate the US and Europe undertaking a qualitative increase in the rate of investment, in the level of education, and a break with the banality of popular culture and of the value systems which block these. The culture of young people in the US and Europe would have to become like the culture of that young woman in the Beijing market.
It will not happen. That is why she was such a striking figure. In the difference between her culture, and that of her contemporaries in Europe and the US, is the story of why Asia is rising and Europe and the US relatively declining. It is why she made an indelible impression. Why, for anyone with even the slightest hint of self-congratulation and self-complacency in Europe and the US she was a truly terrifying individual.