The Chinese foreign ministry has said more than once that I am a free person. Did I do anything wrong by leaving my home?
Sentiment: POSITIVE
I wanted to do something far from my intellectual and physical home, so I went to live in Beijing for eight months and took Mandarin Chinese.
The individual must not be allowed to be overly free, but the country must be entirely free. When the country can exercise freedom, China will have become a mighty and prosperous nation.
If you just technically adhere to the law, sometimes that's enough, sometimes it's not; it's really hard to predict. There is definitely a possibility that the Chinese authorities won't find it sufficient.
I have been to China. I noticed that wherever you went, you could ask an ordinary citizen, and he would explain, in detail, about free markets and all the other jargon of liberalisation.
No matter how American I become, I'm considered part of the Chinese community by my own family.
If you're too free, you're like the way Hong Kong is now. It's very chaotic.
It is vitally important for me, both personally and for my writing, to be able to return to China freely, so being barred entry has caused me deep concern and distress.
I am proud to be Chinese, and I do not tolerate any traitor.
I have had no contact with the Chinese government. I only work with journalists.
I've never left China. My family's been there for 600 years. But my architecture is not consciously Chinese in any sense. I'm a western architect.