| #2 Diseases break out in China all the time, even without outside help. The peasants live with their pigs and ducks, the pollution levels across the country are obscene — Mr. Wife’s asthma was one reason we were glad the Guangzhou assignment fell through in 1996 (the other was that we’d only just moved back from Europe, with temporary housing at both resulting in four home addresses in that year, and the trailing daughters needed some stability before the next move) — and the Chinese dreadfully overcrowd both their animals and their people, leading to diseases rushing through both populations. |