What is the use of a house if you don't have the money to maintain it and it's probably doomed to destruction?

Well, by selling it to someone who plans to move it to Europe, you can raise public awareness to such an extent that local officials put it on the endangered list.

This was what happened in July when an old house in Anhui Province suddenly got elevated to the status of "a cultural relic."

"Green Screen Abode" is a 200-year-old teahouse that has fallen into disrepair. "We had to sell it because we have no means to keep it in working condition. But once it is outside China, it'll be protected as a museum for tea," said the original owner.

The new buyer, a corporate executive, planned to move the house to Sweden piece by piece, then reassemble it and restore it to its former splendour.

But that was before the building got special attention.

For me, the whole story is ironic: If a foreign relocation scheme had not surfaced, this house would most probably have crumbled like many others in similar situations. As a local official put it, "We're a poor county. We don't have the financial resources to protect the designated relics, let alone private properties scattered here and there."

Even in the nation's capital, whole stretches of the traditional hutong are being razed to make way for so-called "modern" buildings. Countless complaints and protests have been launched, but to no avail. Where are the preservation-minded officials when you need them?

It seems that when purchase by a foreign party is involved, our national psyche can be easily bruised. To use an oft-quoted refrain, that would be "selling a national treasure cheap." But the secret to public aversion towards foreign ownership of things old lies in our embedded sense of history. In the old days when China's door was forced open by Western power, our ancestors did not have the means or even the sense to protect our own heritage. Ancient architectures were pillaged and plundered, and artefacts looted.

But we must realize that things have changed. Now we have laws and regulations designed to preserve and protect, albeit not implemented to everyone's satisfaction. We should overcome the victim mentality when dealing with foreign parties on loans, purchases or relocation of cultural relics.

Those who abide by Chinese laws should not be treated with discrimination. Whoever takes the trouble and expense to move an old house overseas for reassembling surely cherishes the architecture.

As a matter of fact, when it comes to illegal acts of vandalism, such as cutting off a Buddha's head and smuggling it across the border, it is greed and wanton disregard for laws and decency that are at work, by corrupt Chinese and foreign nationals alike.

There is a fundamental difference between someone who bribes a local to steal a piece of an artefact and someone who legally buys something of cultural value and exports it. The role of the government is to spell out what can and cannot be bought for overseas destinations and to guard those irreplaceable items that are an integral part of our cultural inheritance.

I'm not implying the Anhui house should be allowed to be moved to Sweden. I believe our existing laws probably have made it quite clear. But if it is within the realm of protection, local authorities should not have waited until it got into the headlines to act.

My point is, if there is no option for protection by ourselves, I'd rather see it re-erected in Sweden and used an exemplar of Chinese culture than see it fall into decay in its homeland.

Two decades ago, I accompanied a few curators from China on a tour of the San Francisco Asian Art Museum. While walking through the properly air-conditioned and ventilated vault, one of them sighed: "In our museum, this kind of stuff just lies in the backyard with no shelter from rain or wind."

Psychologically, this is not a unique issue for China. In the animated film "Toy Story 2," Woody the toy cowboy falls out of favour with his owner. But a museum in Japan wants to display him and other quintessentially American toys to Japanese kids. Woody resisted the idea of moving at first, but then embraced the prospect of new popularity and possible immortality in a foreign museum.

My conjecture is, if a Chinese government agency had paid for the Anhui house and designated it as an exhibit for Chinese civilization in Sweden, there might have been no controversy.

Email: raymondzhou@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 09/02/2006 page4)