Richard Baum shares anecdotes from his professional life as a senior China scholar and sometime policy advisor, discussing his experiences as a China watcher over the course of forty years.

Preface -- The Occidental tourist -- A dissertation is not a dinner party -- Confessions of a Peking Tom -- Through the looking glass -- Democracy deferred -- Capitalism with Chinese characteristics -- The road to Tiananmen -- After the deluge -- China rising -- God in the machine -- The wild, wild west -- Beijing revisited -- China watching, then and now -- The Gini in the jar -- Loose ends.