Saga of the New China: China Inside Out

Roger Bradshaw has been a traveler almost all his life and was interested in it after reading British travel stories from the late '19th C to the early '20th C. He studied French, Russian, and Korean languages at university before dropping out to go around the world. Instead, he was drafted for the military during the Vietnam War so he volunteered for the US Navy and went to San Diego for UDT (frogman school) but, because of his language studies he was turned over to a little-known branch of service called the NSA, who in turn sent him to Arabic language class for espionage. While in D.C. he also qualified for Russian language code breaking. He was sent to the Middle East to listen to Arab and Russian communications and was almost sent to Vietnam for the same thing but the mission was canceled. When the Turks invaded Cyprus, he was evacuated and sent back the US to Ft. Meade, where he got in trouble for criticizing what he thought was sloppy eves-dropping operations but got out with an honourable discharge. After that he went to work for the Hyundai Corporation in Seoul, through a Korean college contact, living with the youngest brother of the four owners of Hyundai, and his wife and three boys as a sort of secretary. He returned to the US to finish his BA in Chinese language, then went on to the U of Chicago to read Classical Chinese lit, Japanese, and Classical Indian lit (in translation). During that time, he also took time off, during holidays, to go to India to get opium for a friend, but after eating some bad food up in the hills above Delhi got dysentery and almost died from it. After a couple of years, as PhD burnout set in, he left and went to China for a decade teaching at several universities. During that period he travelled around China to the farthest reaches and many places which were not open to foreigners at the time. After that, he moved up to Beijing for about 30 years, where he worked for the countrie's top four English language news sources, and also traveled over to Korea from time to time.