Sinking into the plush chairs in the cavernous Fujian Room of China's Great Hall of the People, I soak in my surroundings as President Xi Jinping's interpreter artfully translates Xi's Chinese aphorisms into poetic English.

Paul Krugman says all economic data is best viewed as a peculiarly boring genre of science fiction, but Chinese data is even more fictional than most. If we use the new Li Keqiang index, the overall picture is less gloomy but nevertheless very challenging for Beijing to handle. China watchers need to observe the new index more carefully rather than obsessing over monthly manufacturing figures.