Big Brother is Watching!

Mike had an interesting run-in with the cops in his apartment building on Thursday night. They came and banged on his door with very authoritative cop knocks and asked him to provide his registration papers (everyone gets one as a foreign national staying in China). They were polite but firm; and employed a classic "good cop bad cop" strategy with the younger one being more of a jerk and the older one being more polite. As soon as he showed his papers, they thanked him and left. Mike reported that they went and banged on other doors on his hallway as well, so he wasn't sure if it was a random sweep or if they were targeting specific rooms. I think that there is definitely someone in the building who is a Communist Party informant, who wanted to make sure that the laowai staying in the building was on the up and up. Just a not-so-subtle reminder that we aren't living in a free state, despite their embracing of Western-style capitalism.