January 8, 2007
　　2007年1月8日

　　The Falun Gong Show: SFist Goes To The NTDTV Chinese New Year
　　观看法轮功新年晚会有感

　　Guest review by M.C- of The Standing Room, with pictures by Civic Center's SFMike. N.B.: No one reviewing this concert, and no one posting the review of this concert has any affiliation with either Falun Gong or the People's Republic of China.
　　作者M.C.   摄影：SFMike    晚会评论者和发帖者不附属于法轮功组织或中华人民共和国。

　　When we heard about the NTDTV Chinese New Year Spectacular at the Opera House this past weekend, we were absolutely certain we knew what to expect. In our tender youth, our parents dragged us to every Chinese cultural variety show that came through town -- hell, we even performed in some of them! Chinese acrobats bent over backwards with giant porcelain vases balanced on their foreheads? Been there. Lithe ribbon-dancers with zither-strumming and pipa-plucking ladies as backup? Done that. Huge-headdressed Beijing opera singers twirling their long sleeves while a guy dressed as a monkey bounces around the stage eating a peach, accompanied by hella loud gongs and a blaring shawm? Yawn, so last 500 years.
　　上周末听说新唐人电视台在歌剧厅举办新年晚会，我们曾毫不怀疑能够估摸出晚会大概的样子。在我们小的时候，父母总是拽我们去参加中国文化的各种活动，甚至我们还会参与一些表演。中国的杂技演员顶着瓷碗向后弯腰及地。至于琵琶和古琴弹奏，我们都见识过。还有浓饰重彩的京剧演员甩着长袖，扮演猴子的武生上窜下跳满场翻飞，以及那伴着锣鼓家伙的嘈杂声。这些艺术都有五百年的历史了。

　　But a computer-animated backdrop showing a angel flying down to Earth to rescue a dancer portraying a Falun Gong meditator being beaten senseless by Communist goons, together with a song proclaiming, "The Falun Gong is good!"?
　　不过我们这里看到的却是：在电脑动画背景下，一位天使降临人间来拯救“被共产党迫害”的法轮功练习者，还伴随着“法轮功就是好”的歌曲。

　　OK, we admit it: that, we've never seen before.
　　是的，我们得承认：这是我们从来没有看过的。

　　After the jump: how the NTDTV Chinese New Year Spectacular has nothing to do with/all to do with the Falun Gong, the ubiquity of sequins throughout 5000 years of Chinese cultural history, plus -- pictures galore!
　　在降临之后，整台晚会似乎就和法轮功毫无联系，但又可以说息息相关，似乎它贯穿了整个中国5000年的文明历史，外加多彩的画面。

　　It turns out that the NTDTV Chinese New Year Spectacular, now in its fourth iteration and presented in close to 30 cities around the world, is utterly unlike any other Chinese performing arts event we ever expected to attend. The 2-hour program is co-sponsored by New Tang Dynasty Television (NTDTV), The Epoch Times, and the Sound of Hope radio network.
　　新唐人电视台的这场晚会已经是第四届了，在全世界近30个城市巡演，和我们参加的其他中国文艺节目大为不同。晚会两个小时的节目是由新唐人电视台，大纪元和希望之声电台主办的。

　　NTDTV is an "independent, nonprofit Chinese language TV broadcaster" that happens to have been founded by Falun Gong practitioners, but they go out of their way in their wording to avoid any official connection between NTDTV and Falun Gong. The Epoch Times is "the most widely distributed newspaper in the world, publishing in 40 cities across 28 countries worldwide, and in 8 languages," available for free with practically no advertisements—think about those economics for a moment—also claims no official connection with the Falun Gong but coincidentally happens to have been founded by Falun Gong practitioners. (We are reminded of the Epoch Times reporter who heckled Chinese president Hu Jintao's visit to the US last year.) The Sound of Hope radio network provides "listeners with news and programming that is both honest and objective" and is run by... you get the idea.
　　新唐人电视台是一个所谓“独立的，非赢利性的华语电视台”，但它又恰恰是法轮功练习者创办的，不过在言词中却尽量回避新唐人电视台和法轮功的联系。《大纪元》称自己是全世界发行最广泛的报纸，在全世界28个国家40个城市中用8种语言发行，而且不刊载任何广告。让我们思考一下它究竟是如何经营的。同时它也宣称和法轮功没有任何联系，只是由一些法轮功练习者创办的。（这使我们联想到《大纪元》记者骚扰访美的中国国家主席胡锦涛的情景）。希望之声电台也声称自己为听众提供客观诚实的新闻节目，不过它也是由你所知道的那些人经营的。

　　Armed with this knowledge, which we only learned after the show, did we finally understand why vignette after vignette of the two-hour NTDTV Spectacular extolled the virtues of practicing Falun Gong, cursed the demonic evils of the Communist Chinese government, and promoted Truthfulness, Compassion, Patience—three pillars of Falun Gong thought.
　　有了这层了解（我们是事后才知道的），我们才明白为什么两个小时晚会中，一个个节目都要赞美法轮功，而诅咒中国政府的“邪恶”，也就知道他们为什么要推崇“真，善，忍”，所谓法轮功的三大支柱。

　　Our hosts for the evening were a lovely young couple, a Caucasian man and an Asian woman, both of whom comfortably delivered intro patter in fluent English and Mandarin. We didn't catch the Asian MC's name, but we were interested to learn later that the gentleman, Leeshai Lemish, is a reporter for the Epoch Times and in 2001 was one of 35 Westerners to be arrested and beaten for meditating under a banner that said "Truthfulness, Compassion, Patience" in Tiananmen Square.
　　晚会的主持人是一对可爱的组合，一个白人男性，一个亚洲女性，操着熟练的英文和普通话。我们没有弄清女士的姓名，不过后来我们发现那位男主持人，里塞乐米施实际上是《大纪元》的记者，他也是2001年在天安门广场因为打出“真，善，忍”的标语而被拘留的35个西方人之一。