 I'm Jay Fidel, this is Think Tech Hawaii, broadcasting out of Honolulu, but we have people from other places too this morning. This is the middle way featuring Russell Liu and Chang Wang. Russell is here in Honolulu, and Chang is in Minneapolis, Minnesota. We have a special guest for a special show about the special spring festival that's Dave Larson. So first Russell would like you to introduce Chang, and then Chang can introduce Dave Larson. What do you think? Great, good morning Jay Aloha. Welcome everybody, and I want to first introduce Chang Wang. Chang is a lawyer and he is in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and he is a first generation Chinese, and then he also teaches law, he's a professor of law. Then we have professor David Larson, who is a world renowned expert, a law professor on dispute resolution. And he's famous because he's actively involved with the American Bar Association, but he also hails from Minnesota, and he's in St. Paul, Minnesota. So these are our two guests there, Jay, from Minneapolis, Minnesota, where I think it's really cold there now. Sure it is. So welcome to the show, Chang and also David, and Russell of course, thank you for being here. We're gonna celebrate the spring festival today in our own way. So Chang, can you give us the scope of the show as you see it? What are we gonna do here today in the middle way? Yes, three days we will be say goodbye to the year of the mouse or the year of the rat, and the entering the year of the ox. The spring festival or the Chinese New Year will be on Thursday. The Chinese New Year is the biggest holiday in Chinese culture. And not only in mainland China, but also in the historically heavily influenced by Chinese culture, those regions and countries, like Korea, Vietnam, and other regions, Philippines, Myanmar as well. This year, we very much look forward to this year because this year, we had a not very good year in the year of the mouse. But all of us, Professor Larson and Russell and I, very much look forward to the year of the ox. And also this spring festival is means allowed to each one of us. So today, I'd like to suggest each one of us, Professor Larson as a mean sultan with heavy Chinese connection. Russell as a third generation or fourth generation Chinese-American. And I as a fourth generation, transplant Chinese mean sultan to share with you and our audience what spring festival mean to each one of us. And perhaps we can review the past year and make some predictions, hopefully optimistic about the upcoming year of ox. Okay, we'll do it in two rotations. One is, what do you think about the year of the ox and the transition to the year of the ox? And then we'll go around again a little later and we'll talk about your prediction. David Larson, why don't you go first and explain a little bit about the connection between alternative dispute resolution and China. How does that connect for you? That was a lot to talk about. I'll just mention first for everybody in Hawaii, yesterday the wind chill in the Twin Cities was at 35 degrees below zero. We did not get above zero in temperature. And in Northern Minnesota, we had a wind chill of 50 degrees below zero, which if you've ever experienced that, it's not cold, it's pain. I like the idea of celebrating a spring festival. I can't wait for spring. I've been working the field of online dispute resolution for decades. Right now my focus is on online dispute resolution and we've got a really strong connection with China right now because of China has been one of the leaders in online dispute resolution, setting up the first online court in Hongzhou and they've expanded Beijing. I know they've gone into other parts of China, but they've been very progressive in terms of implementing and designing online dispute resolution, which is something I've been doing here in the United States. I've been the system designer for the New York Unified State Court System. And we just on January 29th, this few days ago launched a small claims online dispute resolution platform. Before you go into the main thrust of the show, let me ask you about that. I've always wondered even from way back when whether you could computerize justice and online dispute resolution sounds like one step in that direction. How far is it from online dispute resolution such as you are establishing now to online dispute resolution, which is run by AI where all the rules are written down and all the evidence is evaluated automatically. Are we on that path, David? Yeah, well, okay, a couple of things. One of the motivations for online dispute resolution right now is increasing access to justice. There's a lot of reasons why people don't appear in court and it can be because they don't have childcare, they don't have vacation days, they're afraid, they're intimidated by the other party. So one thing you can do with online dispute resolution is have an asynchronous platform that allows people to log on from their home or from their car or whatever is convenient and people can participate in justice in ways they have never been able to before. And the first thing we worked on in New York was credit card debt collection, where the default rate is up in the 90% tiles and the whole goal was try to get people engaged more with the court system and get past that terribly high default rate. So in the short term, we're just thinking about making it more convenient and accessible for people and including people with disabilities. Will the day come where we have robot judges? We might, I think that we have to be very careful about that because there's this kind of expression of garbage in, garbage out. If you're gonna be using some kind of algorithm system, a lot's gonna depend upon the data that you're putting in. And if you're using machine learning, which basically learns from all the things that it interacts with previously, if you have biases built into all that data coming in, those biases are just gonna be perpetuated. So I think you can do a lot of things with artificial intelligence, but you have to be very vigilant to make certain that you're not repeating some of the mistakes we've made in the past. Very interesting. And I hope you can come back and do a full show on that very subject. That's fascinating. Okay, but let's move on to your impressions of the spring festival. What does it mean to you? I think like billions of people, it's not exaggeration. It's like, thank God, we're moving on. Of the year, the rat was a terrible year. And my understanding is your ox, the ox stands for more stability. And I'm really looking forward from, with the combination of political unrest in the United States, very destabilizing, certainly with the pandemic, very destabilizing. I'm really looking forward to a year where we can get on more steady, stable ground. What role does it play in the larger Chinese landscape? I mean, it's paying homage to what? To the Chinese culture, I guess, maybe to some ancient bread of Buddhism. And certainly it's paying homage to, paying homage to taking some time off. So it's very popular. What does it mean? What does it mean in the landscape? Is this something that the government wants to see perpetuated? Well, my understanding is it's a period of kind of rebirth and looking forward. You know, it's at least a week long festival, maybe longer than that, up to 15 days. It's a period of time where there's a traditional reunion. That's why it's the largest travel day of the year. And I don't know what's gonna happen this year with COVID-19, what the impact will be on travel. I mentioned that there was an article in today's paper, I think it was the Times indicating that the government was slowing it down, discouraging people from taking the time off. And I guess that's all about COVID and the variants and what have you. People are very concerned about that in China. They don't like it at all. Well, I hope so. And I hope people remain concerned here because we certainly are past it. But, you know, there's reunion dinners. So you get together with your family. You know, you clean your house. You kind of organize your life. I think it's a period generally of optimism. It's a period where you're kind of washing away the bad and you're trying to attract the good. I have my little red panda tie on today. So I'm wearing red because I want to attract the good luck and bring it into the year of the ox. So I think generally it's a period of optimism, a period of rebirth. I think that actually going into last year, the year of the rat, there was some negative anticipation. There were people predicting it was not gonna be a great year. There's more optimism for the year of the ox. I think there's even gonna be more in 2022 for the year of the tiger. But I think we're on a really good track. Good. Okay, Russell, how about you? What does it mean to you, you know? This family has lived in Hawaii and the U.S. for multiple generations. And Hawaii certainly has a lot of activity or has had a lot of activity in Chinatown every year at the New Year Festival. But what about you? Jay, that's a really good question because from my perspective, you know, I'm three, four generations American-Chinese here. You know, growing up in the cultural realm here, Chinese New Year meant that you would clean your room before the New Year. On the New Year, you can't actually take a broom and sweep it. You have to do it before the New Year. And so it's really washing away the spirits, the bad things. I think what David has mentioned. And I think in a greater context, what I think after being in China for 20 years, it's also the Chinese celebrating because they're more of a culture, a civilization state where culture holds them together. That culture means that everybody looks at this as something, again, that has last on for thousands of years. You know, the first recorded Chinese New Year was in the 1400 BC. I think it was the Shang Dynasty in a place called Anyang, which I had visited and where they wrote and recorded the New Years on a cattle bone, okay? And, you know, so it's a long history, thousands of years. And so, again, mix that in with what David has mentioned. It's cleaning out, looking forward to New Year. It's another year in this rite of passage that continues on. Okay, and Chang, you know, you still have family connections in China. You haven't left it that long ago. So maybe the Chinese New Year's festival means something nostalgic to you. Tell us about your experiences. Okay, I don't know exactly where I should start because Spring Festival means so much to Chinese, particularly for the first-generation Chinese. So let's start with a historical background or the philosophical discussion of what exactly means Spring Festival. On the lunar calendar, as Russell said, it's really festival having recorded 100 years ago, basically on the lunar calendar. The lunar calendar rotates on a 60-year cycles based on 12 animals. And you'll heard of that zodiac, 12 animals, and the five fundamental elements of the universe. The five fundamental elements of the universe according to traditional Chinese philosophers were gold or metal, wood, water, fire, and earth. Then you have 12 animals multiplied by five elements. You have 60, right, the number of 60. So in the traditional Chinese lunar calendar, the 60 years is a full cycle. It keeps rotating. So last year was the year of the rat, but on the 60 years rotation, it was xinchong. The year, no, gengzi, the year of the gengzi. Gengzi was a terrible year on lunar calendar. So think about it, 1840, the open war between the British and Chinese, and the Chinese lost. 1900, the Boston Rebellion. And the Boston Rebellion in the late Qing dynasty killed many Western diplomats. Then the Western Eighth Country Alliance invaded Beijing, killed many Westerners. Then there was a treaty, a surrender treaty signed between China and the Western Eighth countries. In 1960, another year of gengzi, the Great Famine. The Great Famine started, the total Great Famine from 59 to 61, approximately millions, millions of people died of hunger. So that was not a very good year. So 2020 was well-expected, it was not a good year. This year and last year, the driving force in Chinese philosophy, yin yang, the positive and negative force. Last year, driving force was yang, yang means fast, active, and ever-changing. So it was a dramatic year. Everybody never happened before in history. Every single human being's life on its planet was somehow affected by this, what happened to COVID-19. So this year is associated with yin, the negative force, which is a soft, passive, and moderate. So we should expect something good gonna happen this year, nothing dramatic, but we are on the right path of recovery. So in the year of ox, or associated with gold ox, we should begin to see some level of normalcy, returns, some reason and decency returns, and American returns to a land of possibilities. So that is a whole picture. Who, me and my family personally, it's a year as Professor Larson mentioned, Spring Festival is the biggest Chinese holiday, and Professor Larson and Russell, you can celebrate up to two weeks. I'm going to celebrate up to three weeks. Why? Because seven days before the new year was the mini Spring Festival, and then two weeks after the Spring Festival is the Lantern Festival. So these whole three weeks, we are in a celebratory mood, but we are gonna celebrate every single day. But the most important celebration definitely is on New Year's Eve. It's not the New Year itself, not Thursday, but Wednesday afternoon, Wednesday morning, or Wednesday evening, that was the New Year's Eve. Traditionally, all members of Chinese family, entire family, and including extended family will sit together on a dining table, and then everybody is going to work together, wrap dumplings, dumplings, jiaozi together, and then boil the dumpling and eat the dumpling together. Fortunately for the past 20 years, I've been in the United States, I really had the opportunity to sit down with my parents and my extended families, wrap dumplings to celebrate the new year. But this year, my wife and I will still make a lot of dumplings for ourselves and for our Chinese dogs. Very interesting, very cultural, very family, very family. But David Larson, what about to travel? We hear that the Chinese New Year is a time for travel, and people have the ability to go for two weeks without having to work with three. They, traditionally, to my understanding, they do a lot of traveling all around the world. Is that still happening? Yeah, I think it's gonna be a really frustrating year because it's such an important holiday and it's such a strong tradition. Not being able to travel, I think is going to take a lot of the joy away from a number of people. One good thing, however, is that in 2021, we have technology in ways we never did before. So if this had happened 30 years ago, I think it would have been much more difficult than it is now because we can do what we're doing right here at this moment. We can get together using video conferencing and other technologies and feel a sense of connection that we otherwise would not be able to do. So even though there are gonna be limitations on physical travel, fortunately, in that period when we're living, there are some alternatives. Yeah, I suppose, if you have a little extra time, you could do some online mediation during the festival. Yeah, well, or you can do some dumpling making. I mean, everybody gets their ingredients, you turn on your screens and you make the dumplings together. Thank you for that. So we were gonna talk about where this fits in history and Chang made it clear that it's unprecedented. That's so to you, but the query, how is it affected by history and how does it affect history? Traditionally, and in 2020, and now going into 2021. This is a historical and historical moment for both years. What is your prediction, what's your thought about how this affects people on a scale of 1.4 billion? And what is your thought about what's gonna happen this year? Well, one thing, at least from the North American perspective, is that a lot of things are never going back. I think employers have discovered that people can be productive working from home, that they can save money by not renting office space or building buildings. And I think that's gonna be a fundamental change in how we work, that much more of our lives is going to be away from a communal workplace. Yeah, so that's clear in the United States, it's clear in Honolulu, Brussels can tell us, but is it clear in China? Is the same phenomenon rising up in China that we don't need these buildings? We can work from home. Is that visible in China as well? China's situation is different. China have this COVID-19 totally under control. So China is already back to normal, quote unquote. People still go to office, people go to grocery store, people have all the restaurants open, school open, a large party and gathering are still permitted, provided that people should be tested regularly. In term of this North America perspective that we all go virtual online, all the conference is on Zoom right now, China is different. So what that really means, we don't know yet, because China is one of probably the only large economy reported the significant growth in GDP in 2020. And also China is leading a lot of sectors and industries. So they are quite confident that they are almost fully recovered, but with these variants from South Africa and from Brazil, we don't know, there will be cluster here and there, but China will not be totally back to normal yet. But the one lesson we learned from the 2020 or the year of grad, probably you can say that it appears that effective governing is very, very important. Like some journalists already observed, this COVID-19 in 2020, very uncomfortably exposed, everything wrong with the American system, with our bureaucratic system, with our governing, with our efficiency, that hopefully this year that we will figure out how to deal with the virus, because these virus will not go away immediately. It will be here with us for some years and might be some regular thing. But I still believe we are on the red track to recovery and with a very competent federal government and we have a very good state government in Minnesota, we believe that we will figure out how to deal with it. You know, as David said a little while ago, there's the bright side. We find that we don't need certain structures and institutions and we can use the technology going forward. And maybe this ability, this opportunity to rethink things gives us a handle on solving some problems. And I wonder if the, and I think that's clear in the US, I think it's also clear in China, but David, can you give us a handle on how you think China is going to change? For example, I mean, there are issues around the government, there are issues around human rights. Are those things gonna change as a consequence of this traumatic experience over the festival and over COVID? Well, you know, that's a very subjective kind of question. I think China may be, if not unique, in a small unique group of countries that exert a very strong hand in terms of the authoritarian nature of the government. So whether there's going to be any kind of dramatic change in Chinese society in the immediate future, I don't see it. Even though there are some earth shattering kinds of forces taking place, I just think that China has such a pervasive influence and touch to its population that it's gonna be very difficult to have any kind of dramatic societal change. So I guess I don't anticipate that. On the other hand, teaching things ability to deal with COVID has been remarkable and successful. You know, you could say that he has enhanced and consolidated his power by virtue of his success. I think people see just a wild guess, but people see this as a contribution he's made to the country and they appreciate it. They appreciate the fact that it never got all that bad because he stepped in early and took dramatic steps to curtail the pandemic. Don't you think that? He's done well and he is more respected now. Yeah, so that just kind of supports my suspicion that we're not gonna see any kind of fundamental change in any time soon. Let's just add a word. You've lived in Hawaii for a good part of your life and what you've seen for a dozen plus years life in China. And one thing about Hawaii is that the Chinese community has assimilated here more than perhaps in any place in the country and it has into married and it has lived among half a dozen other nationalities for as long as it's been here. And that certainly has an effect of fragmenting its culture points like the festival. So although we see the festival taking place, we have seen the festival taking place in Chinatown and other Chinese communities around the state. It seems to me that it is not as strong as it was perhaps in the 19th century. What do you think? Is it still celebrated here? Jay, that's a good question. I think it's still celebrated here but it's celebrated not only with Chinese but I think the different ethnic groups because everybody observes the different holidays together. I found that there's a unifying theme in Hawaii that's very different than maybe Minnesota or maybe not but there's a lot of similar in Hawaii in China and in Hawaii with the word Ohana, my wife keeps mentioning Ohana, she's from China and what it means to Chang and David and his family. And so the cultural aspect of family still resonates and even if it's the Chinese New Year holiday, it's as David said, the family gets together and Chang said, the family gets together which is the emphasis. So I see that holiday is still perpetuated even though the local Chinese four generation are getting fewer and fewer, they're intermarrying but there's also larger pockets of immigrants from China and I notice they're all from Fujian now, I see around town and in fact in Chinatown I get more vegetables grown that I can get in China that I could not get here 10, 15 years ago and they're all things that would eat in China so I never miss a heartbeat. But again, to answer your question, I think that holidays are still being celebrated here because the whole concept is family and I think that's what it's all about in my eyes. Let me go around and ask you, fellas, one more question and that is, we live in a world of change, the only thing that is certain is change itself. And I would venture to say things around the world are changing more now and faster now than perhaps any time in my lifetime, maybe in yours as well. And one of the things that's been changing is the festival, every year, awkward, every year a celebration involving the whole family just as tight as the Chinese culture could be. So my question to you, let's start with Cheng, is where is this going? Is this changing? Is it dissipating in some way? Is it getting stronger? Where do you see it going in say 10 or 15 or 20 years? Will it be the same cultural intensity as it has been? In the time of globalization, cultural identity is of utter most importance. So for the good part that people can find spiritual resources from their traditional culture and on the bad part that we see also the rise of white supremacy and populism. So nothing is permanent in time and particularly in Chinese traditional philosophy. So change is always, even in the time of globalization and the change will stay, but if there is something will always be there, that is the family value and the cultural identity. So I just want to take this opportunity to say that, to say wishing each one of you and all our audience are very happy as Prosperous New Year in the coming year of the Code Ox, as we say in Chinese language, goji fathai, wish you a large fortune, make a lot of money in the coming year. I don't wanna correct you, I never wanna correct you, but I have understood for many years that one says Shinyan Kuala. Shinyan Kuala is a new year. Goji fathai is a wish you a very Prosperous Year. That's a force brief festival here. Chang, that's in Cantonese and the people of Cantonese are always thinking about money. The way we see in Mandarin as well, Mandarin is a different pronunciation. Goji fathai. David, over the past few years under the Trump administration, we've seen a certain amount of anti-Asian, anti-Chinese sentiment raised in the country. And I wonder how you think that affects the way that Chinese in the United States deal with this and for that matter, their celebration of festivals and the like. And do you think under the Biden administration, we will see a change in that? Well, that's a whole nother program. There's a lot we could talk about under the previous administration, but I think it was destructive in numerous different ways. And every time I heard him refer to COVID-19 as he often did, it was just, I thought it was just disgusting. It was a, it was, it was fostering fear. It was intimidating. It was separating divisive. So I, I, I hate to say the bar is so low that we can't do worse, but I actually feel that way. We can't do worse, but I'm optimistic that President Biden is coming from a very different place and we'll work very hard to mend some of those fences and to kind of reconnect parts of our society that have really been torn apart. Yeah, there are two thoughts that come to me. The one is if you find as a, you know, a racist sentiment in the country, that, you know, that makes you not want to identify, perhaps not want to follow the cultural norms within your, within your culture. And on the other hand, it also maybe brings people together. I mean, I, for example, the Jews, they weren't religious before the Holocaust, many of them in Europe. They became religious or more religious, the consequence of the Holocaust. They brought them together. And so I wonder if, you know, which one of those possibilities you see as, as prevailing does racial prejudice, anti-racial sentiment bring the Chinese as one group closer together or does it make them not want to identify with cultural festivals in the life? You know, I think that, you know, part of it's your perception of whether or not there's any point to it, whether or not you can have any success. And I think the Black Lives Movement has demonstrated that you can affect change. The Me Too movement has shown that if you organize and you are active, you can affect change. So sometimes when you're faced with conflict, it does strengthen communities. And I think that that can happen. Earlier, we're talking about technology and how you can start working at home. And, you know, and that separates communities in very real ways. And I think there is a reaction to that. Sometimes people look for how can I connect on a personal level in ways I have not been able to now that we're working apart and living apart using technology. And that drives us back to some of our holidays. And I know people this year in the United States who said Christmas cards, who never send Christmas cards for the past 10 years just because with the combination of the pandemic and social isolation and more technology, they're feeling very separated from everybody. And so I think that holidays can be a moment in time where we step back and make a real effort to connect on a very intimate personal level. A gathering place, a gathering point. It's a lovely thought and reality. Russell, is that the reality here in our aluminum? You know, I think it is a reality. I think, especially this place has so many different cultures. And again, we celebrate different cultures. And, you know, in response to your question about the Chinese New Year, what will it go on? I think it always will because it's like the Chinese are saying flow like water. It's like water that goes down in the river. There's a stone. There's a big stone here, and then you pass it. And there's a small stone. So everything, water goes around it. It's like that. It will continue to flow. I'm reminded of a pronunciation I never got right, Zhang. It was, it was something like straight-out Xu Cheng. Have you heard that? Straight-out Xu Cheng. Straight-out Xu Cheng. Yes, exactly. Water, water, water will run this way. Find its way, it will. And that's the optimism, Jay. That's the optimism. It's gonna find its way. We have a new leadership. Things change, you know? And we just have to go with the flow, like they say. And it'll be all right. Thank you, Russell. Russell Liu, Cheng Wang, and Professor David Larson. Thank you so much all of you for joining us today and for this very enlightening discussion. Aloha. Not only straight-out Xu Cheng, but also Xinjian Faizi. Okay, may I say that? Gong Xi Fa, sorry. Thank you, Gong Xi Fa.