The celebrations surrounding the 60th Anniversary of the foundation of the People’s Republic of China took over Beijing this past week. However, on the actual anniversary, October 1, people were cleared off the streets due to the high-profile military parade snaking across the head of Tiananmen Square. Everything was carefully orchestrated for this massive made-for-TV event. Even the sky miraculously turned a deep blue thanks to weather control programs. In the end, the only way people could really interact with the special occasion was complaisantly at home via televised programming or by cramming into Tiananmen Square over the next week to inspect the floats used in the parade. Despite all the control, everyone was stirred up into a proper nationalistic fervor.
