DATE: Friday, May 9, 1997                   TAG: 9705070201

SECTION: PORTSMOUTH CURRENTS     PAGE: 11   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY PHYLLIS SPEIDELL, STAFF WRITER 

                                            LENGTH:   67 lines

TCC COMMUNICATIONS PROFESSOR IS BACK IN CHINA FOR 5TH TIME

In a Lama temple outside of Beijing, China, a monk epitomized the new China when he reached into his flowing, red robe and pulled out a cellular phone.

``Mobile phones are the new status symbol in China,'' Barbara Hund said. ``They are everywhere you go.''

Hund, a communications professor from Tidewater Community College, was back in China after two years as the second American professor to participate in the exchange agreement between TCC and the Beijing Broadcasting Institute, the only broadcasting school in China.

Keenly interested in China's recent economic changes and their impact on education, Hund spent several days in Hong Kong before flying on to mainland China. It was evident the Chinese have learned some valuable lessons about marketing and media hype Hund said.

``They want to get the young people excited about Hong Kong,'' Hund said. Nightly television news programs feature ten minute segments on Hong Kong's return, emphasizing the positive impact on Chinese economy as well as the island's shopping opportunities.

In Beijing scores of digital billboards electronically count down the days until Hong Kong comes back to the motherland. Tourists and natives alike can choose from an array of souvenirs commemorating the event like wrist watches with hands waving tiny Chinese and Hong Kong flags. '

Packing for her fifth visit to China, Hund laughingly shrugged off friends' teasing that she has the knack for being there when major political events erupt. On a earlier teaching stint at BBI, Hund narrowly escaped the turmoil of the Tiananmen Square riots, departing for home as the protesters and troops were facing off in the central Beijing in June, 1989.

As Hund and her husband, Hank, arrived in Beijing in February they learned that the ailing senior Chinese leader Deng Xia Peng had died. ``But we had to hear it from my mother when she called from the States rather than from an official Chinese government source,'' Hund said.

On her first day of classes, Hund was instructed to meet her class and to then direct them to the school's main auditorium where they were required to view the broadcast of Deng Xia Peng's two hour memorial service. ``The service was repeated on television for days thereafter,'' she said.

Hund observed two more recent trends in China: an overwhelming interest in making money that has given validity to the current Chinese slogan ``to be rich is glorious;'' and an increasing government control over university students.

New since her last visit two years ago was the loud music that awakened students at 6:45 each morning after which they are marched to the stadium field for 15 minutes of compulsory calisthentics. Although the Hunds escaped the vigorous exercise regime, the Chinese faculty members also took part in the drill.

Because of BBI's interest in attracting foreign funding the school has focused on attracting more foreign students and faculty or foreign experts to its campus. A happy consequence for the Hunds was a facelift for building 13 that houses foreign experts on the BBI campus and a better equipped apartment. Still tiny by American standards, their living quarters boasted a microwave., an automatic rice steamer, and, most importantly, a Western-type night stool, as the Chinese delictely refer to a toilet. ILLUSTRATION: Photo

Barbara Hund at the entrance to Building 13 on the campus of Beijing

Broadcasting institute, which is home to visiting experts and

foreign faculty. Hund, a communica- tions professor from Tidewater

Community College, was back in China after two years as the second

American professor to participate in the exchange agreement between

TCC and the BBI.

Send Suggestions or Comments to webmaster@scholar.lib.vt.edu