THE NEW YORK TIMES, SUNDAY, AUGUST 9, 2020 NBU 9west, we started a new game to pass the
time: Spot President Xi.
The day before the parade I found myself
sharing a cab to the airport in Shenzhen
with Walter Liu, a 37-year-old Beijing native
who now lives in California. Mr. Liu and his
high school had participated in the 50th an-
niversary parade in 1999 when he was 17. He
and his classmates were given pink and yel-
low blocks of paper to hold in a formation on
Tiananmen Square. From above the sign
read “50.”
It was the culmination of two months of
rehearsals, first at his high school and then
later during midnight rehearsals on Tianan-
men Square. What Mr. Liu remembered
most vividly was the excitement of being
able to see his girlfriend during those mid-
night sessions. “It is rare that you could see
your girlfriend at night,” he said, smiling as
he recalled it. “We could just look at each
other from the crowd and wink, wink. We
couldn’t even talk.”
On the day of the parade, his parents
squinted, trying to find him on their televi-
sion. “I don’t think they could see me be-
cause I was so tiny,” said Mr. Liu, laughing.
“I was one color pixel on TV.”
On the day of the 70th anniversary pa-
rade I, too, was a pixel. I had managed to
persuade the government to give me a
highly prized ticket to watch the parade
from the stands, just as my father had done
at the end of his first China tour.
It was an unusually hot day, and the air
was heavy with smog. Everyone had anidentifier. Blue uniformed sanitation work-
ers. Green soldiers. Dark blue naval offi-
cers. Blue-and-white track-suited volun-
teers. A thousand government workers
from one Beijing district with white shirts
and a red bird logo. I felt out of place, even
though I was given a bright red flag to wave.
My father had stood in the same place for
the fifth anniversary parade. He noted simi-
lar columns of troops, guns and tanks, with
soldiers marching in unison and such “terri-
fying rhythm” that it was as though they
were “pouring straight off the production
line of some human factory.”
From the stands, my father focused his
binoculars on Mao, who stood beneath 10
huge lanterns waving and laughing. His
gold-colored helmet had tipped to one side,and his hands were hidden behind a thick
cloak.
I did not need binoculars to find Xi Jin-
ping. He was projected, standing stiff, on
huge screens at every angle. Just as Mao
had done long before him, he came rolling
out onto Chang’an Avenue in a special retro-
styled black car to greet and inspect the
troops.
The two-hour parade ended with tower-
ing portraits of the Communist Party’s top
leaders over the decades since 1949. As they
rolled out on huge floats, loud cheers
erupted from the bleachers. Mao’s portrait
came first. The biggest cheer was reserved
for the last portrait, of Xi.
There is much discussion today among
intellectuals in China about how the state
looks much more like it did under Mao than
at any other time since the country opened
itself up to the world four decades ago.
I wish I could ask my father about that.
But I have a pretty good idea what he would
say.Above: A collection of William
Stevenson’s work including an
article for Look Magazine,
published on March 8, 1955,
and one of his canceled
passports. At left: Scenes from
his reporting trips, during
which he traveled from
Shenzhen, Guangzhou and
Chongqing in the south, to
cities farther north like
Shenyang, Shanghai, Wuhan
and Beijing. In one notebook,
he wrote of a seriousness of the
people he met. But, he added,
“everyone seems to smile;
surely not all by government
order?”WILLIAM STEVENSONAbove left: Families of Chinese
fisherman, who, William
Stevenson wrote, “crowd into
Hong Kong to escape harsh
attempts to make them join
Peoples Communes.” Above:
Alexandra Stevenson attended
the parade celebrating 70 years
of Chinese Communist Party
rule, where Xi Jinping’s
likeness was shown on a large
screen. At left: The Shenzhen
skyline now, and a police
officer who inexplicably ended
a tense situation in China’s
rural coal country.ALEXANDRA STEVENSON/THE NEW YORK TIMESALEXANDRA STEVENSON/THE NEW YORK TIMESALEXANDRA STEVENSON/THE NEW YORK TIMESWILLIAM STEVENSONWILLIAM STEVENSONTHE NEW YORK TIMES, SUNDAY, AUGUST 9, 2020 NBU 9