<disclaimer> Everything below the impressions of someone who has spent about 2.5 months in the PRC in three visits, visited only a couple of private homes, and is in no way a China scholar.
On Wed, March 7, 2007 2:57 pm, Tracy R Reed wrote: > Lan Barnes wrote: >> Which is great for some things (plane schedules, for example) but a pain >> for others (national TV broadcasts) and is largely ignored at the local >> level, like so many things in China. I can assure you that the people in >> western Szechuan do not arise and go to bed at the same clock time as >> the >> people in Shanghai. > > If they do not rise and go to bed at the same clock time (say, 6am and > 10pm every day) how are they ignoring it? I don't think anyone expects > people to be awake at night and sleep during the day just because they > are on the wrong side of the planet from wherever we draw the prime > meridian. Life is very local in China. While I'm sure business people who communicate across the country make adjustments (as we do ... "Better hurry up and call New York before they go home"), ordinary people aren't likely to have any relatives or friends far away (exception -- kids in a university). Wrist watches were much more common on my last trip than my first (as were cars) and I have no idea what time they're set to, but I'm quite sure everyone gets up, goes to work, etc, at much the same time as their great grandfathers did. > > And why is it a pain for national TV broadcasts? You say something will > air at 1800Z and everyone knows what time it will be on. Or you can say > 1800Z with a repeat at 2200Z so people on both sides of the country can > catch it. > Because a broadcast of national interest (say a soccer game) will be aired when it's convenient for Bejing residents. And that's an example of why time zones (and staggered broadcasts or events that split the difference, like Monday Night Football) are such a convenience. > And finally, does everyone in China really keep their clocks set to the > same time or don't they? I don't see how they couldn't if the government > or someone doesn't draw timezone lines. > I don't honestly know what wrist watches or house clocks are set to, but all our appointments were made by China time and all the hotel clocks were set to China time, so I imagine you're right. But people will still adjust. There is a saying in China (may go back to the emperors for all I know) to the effect that the further one is from the capital, the less the capital matters. How would we respond in California if Washington put the whole country on Eastern time? Would we get up at what is (sun time) 3 in the morning to go to work at 5? So now we have three ways to look at time (OK, maybe 5 if we count Vernor Vinge's megaseconds etc). We have jhriv's relative to changing solar events (I'm picturing setting a PVR to start recording at sunset - 2.5 adjusted for the days to the equinox); we have China's "one time fits all" (advicated by the GMT zealots); and we have tinme zones, with and without DST. Maybe it's just long use, but I think time zones work best, albeit demanding occasional calculations (what time is it in Honolulu again?). See the problem is this spherical earth thing impacting flat earth minds. I can't wait until we do longitude, latitude, and celestial navagation. BTW, I've read that time zones were invented by the railroads, and until people started traveling east-west 500 miles in a day, every town kept the spire clock set to noon-by-the-sun. -- Lan Barnes SCM Analyst Linux Guy Tcl/Tk Enthusiast Biodiesel Brewer -- [email protected] http://www.kernel-panic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/kplug-list
