I totally remember that actual June 4 1989. I was in Beijing just a few days before. And then a few days after. My Significant Other was herself in the Square on the day. We both remember it, so vividly.
I thought it would never be forgotten.
But it was. Quite quickly. After the riots and the violent suppression, I lived back in Australia for a while before being headhunted by the Australian government to run their Trade Office in Shanghai, then Beijing and then regionally out of Hong Kong.
Those were crazy days, with few foreigners in China -- because of the sanctions against China -- and so heavy partying by those of us who happened to find ourselves in post-June 4 China. Like the days of old Shanghai. Of Austria before Adolf. Kinda crazy and in super fun way. For us foreigners, anyway. I recall 1990 as a Golden Year in life. And then squirm, for thinking that, while so many mothers were mourning their sons. Fathers their daughters.
We had the June 4 memorials in Hong Kong over the years. But in China, I can attest by personal experience, just a few years after June 4th, when I travelled in China, and asked people about it, they didn't know. I mean, not that they were just saying they didn't know. They genuinely didn't know. They'd forgotten, even if they ever knew -- the CCP controlled the national media.
In recent years there's been less and less June 4 remembering here in Hong Kong. Partly because of the National Security Law of 2020, after the ill-thought out protests and rioting to push for an "independent Hong Kong". And partly, I guess, for the passage of time. And I'm pretty sure that the rest of the west has forgotten too.
The South China Morning Post has an article on "June 4 Vigil in Hong Kong". [Internet archive]
As it did Last year.
And I shall try, at least to recall it, once a year, on the day, to my death.
ADDED: Ask the Chinese AI DeepSeek about June 4, and it says it has no info on the date and "can we chat about something else". I accused it of being a puppet of the CCP, and it said "let's talk about another subject. How can I help?". Kinda crazy for the CCP to suppress this, as it's easy enough, even for a Chinese citizen, to get other AI's, like Grok to tell you all about theTiananmen Square massacre on June 4, 1989.
