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The aircraft carrier Nimitz came to Hong Kong and another Fulbrighter received an invitation to attend a reception on board. He invited me to go along. We left on boats from the HK Island harbor and it took about 30 minutes to get to the aircraft carrier. The view from the boat and carrier were incredible. We speculated on who got invited to such an upscale event--it was definitely dress-up. It was business leaders, consulate people, etc. The next day in the newspaper we read that the Chinese had snubbed the event because the US had just sold weapons to Taiwan. Yet the article pointed out that the Chinese had allowed the fleet to come to Hong Kong. That has not always been the case.