CCTV: The land of mystery and wonder

It strikes me that this might be a good time to talk about what I actually “Do” at work, since, after all, that takes up a good part of my time. I work, as I’ve mentioned before, in the newsroom of CCTV International (channel 9). This means that the shows I edit are watched almost exclusively by really bored or jetlagged people in hotels that don’t get CNN or the BBC. There’s really no other reason to watch it.

But, be that as it may, it provides employment, experience, and even (occasionally) a bit of fun. Here’s how it works. First, stories are written by Chinese writers. The term writer here is used loosely, because what they actually do is copy and paste stories from the wire (AP, Reuters, or Xinhua) or translate them from other Chinese stations. Very little original writing gets done. However, they are writers. After the script is initially written, it gets passed up for an overhaul by myself and my coworkers. We generally trim stories, and make them sound like English. A good part of what I actually correct is original material from AP and Reuters. I don’t know why they should need correcting (they do have a bit of a reputation) but there it is. Sometimes stories are easy; sometimes they need to be completely re-written. Worst are the stories filed by other bureaus, which we (that is, the foreign copy editors) generally cry about. They’re that bad. Here’s a good example:

Officials with the State Development and Reform
Commission, Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of Science
and Technology and Ministry of Finance shared their
views and policy guidelines on the industry’s
structure readjustment, production surplus,
internationalization process, efforts to save energies
and develop new energies, and so on. People from
Chinese and multinational automakers also aired their
opinions on the above issues and briefed on their strategies.


I deleted the whole thing. After we edit a story we pass it up for final inspection by the political editors. There are four of them or so, all over 60, and wise by virtue of years. It is essentially their ass if anything gets said that the government doesn’t like, so they edit very closely, though mostly on stories about Taiwan and similarly sensitive issues.

This is one of the more annoying things about working for a state media outlet; we have to say “Taiwan compatriots,” and “Countries and regions” and God help you if you call the rebels “leftist.” Every institution has semantic rules I guess, ours just happen to be very clunky. How can you say that China warned the Taiwan government when you don’t recognize that China is separate from the Taiwan government, which you also do not recognize? The answer is to go by cities, as in, “Beijing criticized comments by Taipei today etc etc etc.” Still, it’s awkward and annoying.

Another, smaller, part of the job is doing voiceovers for sound bites and sometimes stories. That is, if there’s a clip of some geezer saying that China and Japan might have a chance at good relations if Abe doesn’t go to the Yakushi Shrine, and it happens to be in Chinese, the technician/writers will often get one of us to come speak for him. I have been the voice of Wen Jaibao, and Jackie Chan, and many many people that nobody has ever heard of. Economics ministers and vice chairmen of committees on agriculture. Stuff like that. Sometimes we’ll voice a whole story. This is good fun unless it happens to be a sports story, in which case it will (I’ve never seen one that wasn’t) be chock full of completely unpronounceable names, that you generally have to guess on. Times like these I feel as though I’m Bruce Campbell in “Army of Darkness” forgetting the magic words. Luckily skeleton armies don’t burst forth from the studio every time I mess up a name. The best part of voicing stories is undoubtedly the end, when, after a dramatic pause, I get to say “Martin Connelly, CCTV” in my deepest, newsiest voice. I’ve been working on this voice, and it almost sounds semi decent these days. It’s all good fun. So that’s it. That’s what I do.

The station itself is actually enormous, though it's easy to forget working in the newsroom. I can go down the hall and peek into the gallery of one of the biggest production spaces I've ever seen (exclusivelly for gala events) and watch them go on when there's nothing in the que, which is pretty cool. And don't ask what's on the other 18 floors of the building. I have no idea. I'm not sure anyone does.

The rest of my time I spend doing this and that, trying to start freelancing (which is lots of work, and much like divining for water without the aid of a forked stick) and wandering around the old city. Old Beijing is rapidly getting knocked down to build newer, taller, buildings, and it’s really a shame. I love the narrow alleyways. They’re always full of old folks and babies and guys out of work and I can’t walk through them without having a nice conversation with someone interesting. Today, for instance, I met a guy who teaches Traditional Chinese Medicine at the hospital. He said he had lots of students in his acupuncture class, which makes sense I guess.

I’ve been seeing mahjong parlors for the first time, some even with electronic tables. I think I might try to learn the rules and go out some time. Ridiculousness would probably ensue. Will report on that if it ever happens. In the meantime, the weather has turned and it was sweater weather today, which was great. Fall is beautiful…and that’s the news from Lake Wobegon, peas and carrots, martin.