We faced 2022 with courage character, and conscience.
The king of the wild animals, the tiger (hu) frightened villagers in ancient China, but it also saved them from wild pigs. It was believed that sacrifices to the tiger would preserve the village fields from being torn up by those pigs.
The tiger courageously drove demons away and was often found etched in stone around graves. A tiger was depicted on the doorposts as guards against the demons, and in ancient China, children were given “tiger caps” for protection.
In Communist China, peasants didn’t work on the agricultural land with much vigor because the government took away most of the grain, fruit, and vegetables. The peasants had all of the motivation of sluggards. Millions starved to death. Less radical Chinese leaders knew something different than pure communism had to be tried.
In 1972, the visit to China of President Richard Nixon from the supposedly “paper tiger” United States started opening things up in the Chinese government. By 1977, Deng Xiao-ping was on his way to becoming the paramount leader of China. He stepped away from pure communism and privatized the responsibilities and rewards of village plots of land. The results were miraculous: agricultural production zoomed upward. Turnips piled high and delightfully stinky upon the drying fields after harvest. In contrast, the government fields were their usual barren selves.
In one village after another, the proverb became popular, “Tigers on the private plots; sluggards on the public plots.”
Today, some villagers notice how much the crafty Communist government depends upon the rewards and prestige of the private rural and urban enterprises modeled after those of the United States. The proverb was coined, “The fox borrows the tiger’s terror (might & prestige).” Hu jie hu-wei.
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