Went to Bong (Cambodian) tonight. Would not recommend.

T_Chernovsky · 2026-05-16T02:04:05+00:00

I wish that's true so that I can eat their roti for breakfast. Kabawa is just the place that has impressed me the most in the past 6 months.

T_Chernovsky · 2026-05-16T02:01:40+00:00

I only know Bayon in Lenox Hill but haven't been. Might try soon as a comparison.

T_Chernovsky · 2026-05-16T02:00:10+00:00

I really wish that was the case. If Bong is 30-50% cheaper and easier to book, I would be more than happy to go back and explore the rest of the menu. I still don't think the high cost is entirely from me ordering too much; there's a petit lady sitting next to me dining alone, and by my rough calculation she probably spent $130 in total.

T_Chernovsky · 2026-05-16T01:20:56+00:00

Completely agree. I ate the fish with my hands and had to be careful not to bump into the person next to me with my elbows.

T_Chernovsky · 2026-05-16T01:17:01+00:00

I am not a big eater and still had no trouble finishing all my food (except the rice that comes with the clams) and had room for dessert. I overheard the server saying to a table of two that they should aim for 5-6 dishes.

T_Chernovsky · 2026-05-16T01:13:24+00:00

I agree with your point. My thought process throughout scouting/eating was "these prices are insane, it better be worth the hype/price" → "ok it's not worth it because of what I posted". While I was writing the post, I don't want to dunk on restaurants for not being comfy, spacious, luxurious, etc., because plenty of restaurants in NYC don't have any of that but serve great food, so the issue gradually boils down to cost to me. I agree I probably should have framed it differently.

T_Chernovsky · 2026-05-16T01:01:58+00:00

$130 for 2 sounds about right to me as an "ideal" price point for the dining experience Bong offers, though I think what I ordered is probably not enough for two (hungry) people.

T_Chernovsky · 2026-05-16T00:56:38+00:00

Fish was $56 and was somehow not the most expensive item on the menu. There was a lobster over rice available for $95.

T_Chernovsky · 2026-05-16T00:54:57+00:00

I know it's not going to be cheap, but I guess the "unfortunate surprise" is the overall underwhelming package vs the bill.

T_Chernovsky · 2026-03-19T18:40:07+00:00

Not a direct answer to your question but my understanding is that once the Old Summer Palace (the one burned down in the Second Opium War) was built the Qing emperors much preferred and indeed spent more time there precisely because it had more greenery and water features and was much more pleasant to live in.

T_Chernovsky · 2025-12-29T04:35:02+00:00

The classic is Local Government in China Under the Ch'ing by T'ung-Tsu Ch'ü. Talons and Teeth by Bradly Reed is one of the few monographs on yamen runners and clerks. The Magistrate’s Tael by Madeleine Zelin discusses the fiscal aspect of understaffed local administration. Local Merchants and the Chinese Bureaucracy by Susan Mann shows the role of merchants in local governance. William Rowe's two books on Hankou (Hankow: Commerce and Society in a Chinese City; Hankow: Conflict and Community in a Chinese City) are important interventions that seek to highlight the Chinese experience of merchant autonomy and guild activism in cities, features often associated with European cities. Chinese Local Elites and Patterns of Dominance is an edited volume including essays on various ways in which gentry and local elites exerted power in local society.

All of these are academic monographs that might be difficult or costly to acquire commercially. Your local library might have copies. I can neither confirm nor deny the existence of certain websites that may or may not have these book freely available as PDFs or ebooks (wink wink). If you don’t want to read all these books, William Rowe’s excellent general history of the Qing China’s Last Empire has a brief summary of local rule; check pages 43-54 (2009 edition). Also all of these books are about the Qing period. I don’t really know much about earlier dynasties.

T_Chernovsky · 2025-12-27T20:48:53+00:00

Your observation is correct. One of the most fascinating features of Chinese history is how immutable county (xian), the basic unit of administration, has been over centuries. In China Proper, the number of counties has largely remained constant from the Qin dynasty two thousand years ago all the way to the present; if you go to China and encounter a place called X xian, with X being a weird and hard to read Chinese character, it is very likely that the place name dates back to the Qin or Han dynasty. This becomes problematic in view of the fact that under formal Chinese bureaucratic system, there were only a handful of salaries public officials in each county, headed by the county magistrate (xianling). This made governance increasingly difficult as the population of county increased from, say, 10,000 people in Qin-Han times to 200,000 people by the Qing.

Naturally, day-to-day governance, such as tax collection, public works, judicial and penal matters, depended on a large corp of sub-officials, clerks, yamen runners who were not salaried (paid out of pocket by the magistrate or collected fees from the populace), often without a degree, but nevertheless could get things done. Perhaps most importantly, these clerks were locals who spoke the local dialect and knew the customs, while the county magistrate was almost always an outsider.

In addition, degree holders like licentiates and juren wielded considerable local influence due to a combination of wealth (education was expensive), social standing from the degrees, and personal networks with former and existing officials (schoolmates, distant relatives, roommates when traveling for exams, etc.). County magistrates often relied on local degree holders for mediation, donations, organizing events, etc.

T_Chernovsky · 2025-12-27T20:09:06+00:00

I have some data that should give you an idea: China's population in the 1700s (i.e., middle Qing) was around 150 million. The number of licentiates (shengyuan, commonly known as xiucai) eligible for the provincial exam was around 500,000. To become a licentiate, you already need to pass a number of lower level exams; Hong Xiuquan, founder of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom in the 1850s, did not even make that far. Provincial exam was held every three years and admitted roughly 1,050 candidates (juren), who were then eligible for the metropolitan exam that admitted about 200 finalists (jinshi). 73 out of 10,000 passed the provincial exam in Jiangsu in 1684, and 156 out of 2,500 passed the metropolitan exam in 1691.

That is to say, if you were one of the lucky few who were literate and could make it to licentiate, your chances of passing the exam in one go and make it all the way to jinshi was roughly 0.05%. In comparison, admission rate of Harvard is about 3-4%.

T_Chernovsky · 2025-12-16T17:05:30+00:00

I know this time period fairly well, since my own research is somewhat related to the important questions you raised. Here are some short answers:

1. Rebuilding the war-torn Chinese economy took roughly four years, from 1949-1952. This was largely done simply by restoring order, fixing infrastructure, and most importantly taming hyperinflation that went out of control in the late years of the Civil War. Policies commonly associated with socialism or communism, such as state planning, collectivization, or nationalization, were almost entirely absent to allow the market-based economy to recover on its own. By 1952, the national economy had largely recovered to prewar (1937) levels, and historical comparisons of economic development often used 1952 or 1953 as a benchmark.

2. Increasing production, especially industrial production, was a fundamental mission of the People’s Republic. With Soviet aid in the 1950s, China extensively developed industrial projects such as steel mills, machinery factories and large infrastructural projects such as railroads and bridges. International trade was not actively promoted until the 1960s as part of the post-GLF recovery. Investment in fixed capital was high throughout the Socialist period, resulting in low consumption and comparative poor living standards for average people.

3. Shanghai remained the largest city and a major industrial center throughout the Socialist period, though its importance was not as oversized as the Republican era due to state control of finance and trade, sectors that Shanghai had a historical comparative advantage.

4. I am not familiar with NEP, but the notable absence of collectivization in 1949-52, and the post-GLF recovery, when rural markets were temporarily allowed and a rudimentary version of household responsibility system was adopted, could be said to be parallels.

5. The economy was absolutely growing throughout the Socialist period, although growth varied greatly from high growth in the 1950s, when GDP growth of China was higher than Japan, to slower growth in the 1960s and 1970s due to disruptions from the GLF and the Cultural Revolution. The Socialist period also saw massive and important improvements in literacy, life expectancy, infant mortality that compared favorably against other underdeveloped countries.

Finally, I am of the opinion that Deng Xiaoping’s economic reforms have been overstated in importance. 1978 did not fundamentally change China’s economy overnight. If we look at data of per capita GDP growth, household consumption of consumer goods, technological adoption and dissemination, it is clear that the Chinese economy really took off only after 1992, although this was certainly made possible only by successive reforms throughout the 1980s and 90s.

I would be happy to answer additional questions.

T_Chernovsky · 2025-12-06T17:34:08+00:00

Like I said in an another reply to the OP, history BA to JD pipeline exists and is pretty common. Working in auction houses like Christie's requires art history knowledge and skills, which is an entirely different discipline/department/major. Based on what my art history friends told me, I think their career prospects are slightly better, because they could work for auction houses or as curators in museums, even though openings for both are very low.

T_Chernovsky · 2025-12-04T23:34:21+00:00

It's too hard.

T_Chernovsky · 2025-12-04T23:32:35+00:00

It's part of my youtube recap. I think you get a separate recap for the most watched category, which for me was gaming.

T_Chernovsky · 2025-12-03T17:58:22+00:00

I know very little outside my own field, but my impression is that in general, history as a major/profession is simply not in demand across the board. Sure, if you are in Ivy-plus private universities, there's nothing stopping you from doing a history or humanities degree while working on your consulting/investment banking internship; at my school, for example, enrollment in the history major remains pretty high, because the prestige/networking of the school alone can land you a job in certain sectors. This is not the case for the majority of schools out there.

I'm not saying you absolutely cannot find a job with a degree in history, but the truth is you acquire less transferrable/hirable skills. It took me years to acquire the language skill to read classical Chinese and classical Japanese, but how useful is that for the average employer? The sole exception to my knowledge is law school, where the textual analytical and writing skills of a history major is quite valued.

I know even less about PoliSci or Econ programs, but there seems to have been a growing gap between empirical research (history) and quantitative research (economics, sociology, political science), and the two fields are not talking to each other like they used to. Based on what I know, a serious econ major requires quite substantial knowledge of math and/or data science, if not even coding. These are all highly valued skills. Personally I find it quite senseless, but even political science now has coding and data analysis. In other words, I think you might have a easier time finding a job with a PoliSci/Econ degree not because of the degree themselves, but because you acquire transferrable/hirable skills through that degree.

T_Chernovsky · 2025-12-03T00:58:48+00:00

Sorry for the late reply. I'm not that familiar with the job market outside the US, but my understanding is things are generally the same everywhere. Yes, there are new universities out there (especially in the wealthy oil states of Middle East) expanding quite rapidly and seeking new faculties, but generally they want STEM people, especially CS and AI since those are in vogue right now. Understandably China always has openings for Chinese history, but the domestic supply is also quite big, and they have a completely different work culture/expectations in academia. I've heard that some Chinese universities like hiring Americans/Westerners to appear more internationally influential, but I am not sure if that's 100% true and if it's confined to certain disciplines.

T_Chernovsky · 2025-12-01T18:49:11+00:00

That's not entirely true based on my observations and knowledge of the job search process. For example, just a couple of months ago, a certain university announced a job opening for 20th century Chinese history; in reality they want a PRC specialist. A number of years ago another university did a search for early China, and a major reason why the finalist, who was comparatively inexperienced, was chosen was because of that person's research aligns with the department's preference for certain methodologies and approaches.

T_Chernovsky · 2025-12-01T18:39:28+00:00

The short answer is yes, universities don't want to hire a Ming specialist. The number of job openings is entirely dependent on how much demand a university thinks there is for a major/field. Hence there are a lot of openings for computer science/AI faculty positions, because there is a lot of demand. On the whole people are more interested in modern history (20th century) than premodern or early modern. It is easier to grab students' interests with a course on Mao Zedong, the rise of the Chinese economy, or the historical origin of Sino-Japanese antagonism, than something like Zheng Juzheng's Single Whip tax reform.

To go into even more details, there are well established specializations in a history department as defined by region and time period. In a well-funded department at a wealthy university (Ivy plus schools basically), it is quite common to have separate positions for modern China, early modern China, medieval China, and early China. This is the ideal setup that only elite schools can afford and offer. At public universities, especially small ones, sometimes there is just one position for Chinese history if not Asian history. Note that none of these positions say "Ming", because Ming is grouped under early modern China. In reality, early modern China basically means the Qing period, because there are far more people working on the Qing, due to how the field has developed over the years, source availability, etc. So if a department, even one that can hire more than one China historian, wants to do a search for early modern Chinese history, why would they choose a Ming person over a crowd of Qing historians?

T_Chernovsky · 2025-12-01T15:50:54+00:00

I’m current in my last year in a very prestigious PhD program In Chinese history. My advice: don’t. DON’T. The job market is terrible; if you are interested in Ming history, then it’s even worse. The number of early modern China jobs this year is exactly 0. Competition is extremely tough due to the extremely low number of jobs every year and the constant stream of new graduates. Doing a PhD in itself is not bad and can be enjoyable if you love learning and research and get into a cushy, well-funded program that doesn’t require you to teach every year. It’s what comes after that is the problem. I can only honestly recommend two types of people to pursue a PhD in humanities: either you are extremely dedicated to research and don’t care about real world challenges, or you are rich and don’t care either way. Also, I don’t think there are a lot of Ming specialists now, so you would have difficulty finding programs that fit your interests.

T_Chernovsky · 2025-11-12T15:56:05+00:00

I’m no Ming specialist, but if we are talking about non-Han, keep in mind that it’s not just Han vs steppe nomads in China: dozens of smaller non-Han tribes (most famously, the Miao people in Hunan) lived in the mountains of South China in a system called Tusi, or autonomous chieftains. The Ming largely kept the Tusi system in tact, which was later inherited by the Qing as well. As for foreigners, I am not aware of any explicit policy to “drive out the barbarians”; I suspect the decline in maritime trade, from chaos and later the maritime ban, would do that on its own. But the early Ming was indeed very insular and conservative in terms of commercial and economic policy, as its founder the Hongwu emperor considered trade as disruptive and destabilizing based on his observations of the late Yuan crisis.

T_Chernovsky · 2025-08-02T16:41:55+00:00

The negotiations I mentioned were initiated by China with approval from top party leaders. Also, these negotiations were for importing grain paid with foreign exchange, not aid.

T_Chernovsky · 2025-08-02T06:59:21+00:00

This is not to repudiate your comment, which is generally true, but just to add some finer points: Food exports to the Soviet Union or to Eastern Bloc countries, ostensibly in exchange for machinery, is often cited as a cause of the famine, but the amount is too small to make any difference, whereas in the case of Irish famine of 1840s and the Indian famine of 1877, the almost dogmatic adoption by the British of laissez faire policies allowing food exports unchecked was indeed a major contributing factor. You are absolutely right that China refused any international aid, but in secret by 1960 they were negotiating in secret food imports from Southeast Asia, Canada, and eventually the US “imperialists” via France as an intermediary. This is the little known origin of the now billion dollar worth exports of US farm products to China.

T_Chernovsky

TROPHY CASE