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About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (June 22, 1989)
Students: China unrest did not ruin trio By Chris Tipton Staff Reporter Despite recent uprisings, two Uni versity of Nebraska-Lincoin students said they didn’t feel threatened dur ing their stay in Xian, China. ‘‘I really never felt threatened personally,” said Paul Wagener, a UNL senior majoring in architecture. “I did feel concerned to a degree. It was just always in the air. “I saw demonstrations in Xian. Some days the police were there and other days they would just com pletely disappear. It was weird.” Wagener and Mike Kros, also a senior architecture major at UNL, were part of a student exchange be tween the United States and China. The students left the United States on May 22. They traveled with James Potter, chairman of the Architecture College, and an architecture student from Philadelphia. The group stayed in Hong Kong for a few days and then traveled to China,where theywent to Shanghai, Nanjing and finally to Xian. Xian is 900 miles southwest of I Beijing, where most of the violence against pro-democracy student dem onstrators has occurred. The trip, which was supposed to last seven weeks, was cut short be cause of the civil unrest in China. The group left about two weeks ago. While in China, the group got its information from an underground network of Chinese students who passed information to each other through various methods, Wagener said. “They used the telephone, driv ing, bicycling, flyers, fax machines or whatever,” he said. “Information would come in and one person would read it over the P.A. system so that more people could hear it “One day a leader of the univer sity where we were staying came in and smashed the P.A. and confiscated all of the banners that were on the walls.” Despite such action, Wagener said that the atmosphere was not all that tense. “People still went shopping for food and took their kids to school,” he said. “At night it was noticeably quieter.” Kros said he was afraid at times because they didn’t know exactly what was happening. ‘‘Truthful information from the government is non-existent,” he said. * ‘I was angered and saddened by what the government did. The stu dents are doing as much as they can to help the people. They tried to be peaceful about it (the demonstra tions) as long as they could. Now they are scared for their lives.” The Nebraskans got most of their information about the demonstra tions through what Wagener calls the ‘‘Inner China Ring” of students. Kros said the Americans heard rumors that between 300 to 3,000 people had been killed in Beijing. At first they didn’t know what to be lieve. ‘‘I didn’t want to believe it,” Kros said. ‘ ‘I hoped that it didn’t happen. I was empty inside. When you’re there and all those people have died, it feels like part of you goes with it.” ‘‘I was horrified,” Wagener said. ‘‘It was hard for me to believe that someone could go in and mow people down like that, with tanks and rifles. “The Chinese arc a one-child family. Those people are losing their only child forever.” China enforces a one child per family policy to reduce the country’s population growth. Kros said that at night in Xian, truckloads of students went out to block the east and west ends of town to keep the troops out The government jammed radio communications from the Voice of I America and British Broadcasting Corporation, Kros said. The bits of the programs that got through were translated to the crowd by students, he said. Despite the civil unrest, both stu dents said they left with a positive view of China. "I learned a lot about the Chinese culture and people in general," Kros said. "The Chinese people are just as ' intelligent and funny as we are. The people are the most friendly and open I’ve ever met." * - i ANSWERS TO CROSSWORD PUZZLE ini viffi 1 1 fcl tjli I fc| I Wl r I ..-.1 Large I Single Topping Only $6.99 I Pizza Free Delivery ▼ Any Crust Available • Limited Areas No Coupon Necessary Offer Good Thru July 30,1989 12th and g South 48th & Hwy. 2 N 48th & Vine 474-6000 483-4129 466-8264