I can get into freetibet, bbc news and other banned sites, but no google news apart from the fascist Chinese version. No google news UK,US, Canada, Australia, etc etc etc…. Maybe that’s there isn’t “much out of China today”!

August 12, 2005 @ 8:11 pm | Comment

Feeling particularly pissed off this morning after my girlfriend got yelled at by our neighbours last night. (I live in Beijing, in a fairly middle-class apartment complex in Yayuncun.) We were having fairly noisy sex at around midnight, and our downstairs neighbours came up – she answered the door because she had clothes on. Now, I wouldn’t have minded if they’d been a bit pissed off and asked us to be quieter, but they SCREAMED at her, threatened to come back and break things in the apartment, threatened to call the police, and left her feeling completely devastated. (She’s only 20) Fortunately she’s going home on Monday, and we’re moving to near her university when I get back next year, but I’m really, really pissed off.

August 12, 2005 @ 8:44 pm | Comment

Keir, whenever that happens, the Nanny returns within 48 hours.

James, I wish I were having as much fun as you this weekend.

August 12, 2005 @ 8:51 pm | Comment

I have a heavy bamboo club that I keep just inside the door for such occasions James. It’s the only thing some people understand and I also can’t be bothered with all the inevitable shouting.

Richard, no problem with the lack of China posts, you’re on a roll with this US stuff. The name “Liberal Avenger” has been taken. How about “Liberal Warrior”?! Haha.

August 12, 2005 @ 9:29 pm | Comment

Hello, JFS
I have replied you on that medical reform topic. Sorry I didn’t reply earlier. Actually I didn’t notice that topic is still alive yesterday.

August 12, 2005 @ 9:46 pm | Comment

This article appears in today’s SCMP. China has 2 problems due to high oil prices: only a further currency revaluation would make imported oil cheaper (which China is reluctant and incapable of doing) and, under the current system, Chinese companies must bear the extra costs because the govt dare not allow an increase in inflation and general costs. There’s a nice conundrum for a Saturday morning.
————————-
Oil prices threatening economic growth

Surging oil prices are threatening to crimp the mainland’s economic growth and could even cause social unrest as everyone from taxi drivers to farmers complains about higher costs, analysts said yesterday.

International crude-oil prices have risen to more than US$65 a barrel and are likely to move higher, in part because of China’s growing energy needs.

Foreign analysts say flaws in China’s system for setting energy prices are made worse by the government preventing producers passing on higher costs to consumers out of worries over the social impact of inflation.

“Many of China’s firms are suffering as they are squeezed between rapidly rising global prices and controlled retail prices,” Stephen Green, senior economist for China for Standard Chartered Bank.

In Shanghai, taxi drivers are discussing whether to stage a protest on September 1 even though the city has just increased a monthly fuel subsidy to at least 350 yuan per car, from 200 yuan previously.

“This is not enough. Now I have to spend 20 to 30 yuan more a day on petrol,” a city taxi driver said.
——————-

August 12, 2005 @ 10:25 pm | Comment

Hate mail goes along with instalanches, I guess. You probably didn’t want ALL those new readers!

August 12, 2005 @ 11:10 pm | Comment

It’s so ephemeral, Sam. For the first few hours it was more than 2,000 hits an hour, now it’s down to a mere 100. By tomorrow, just the memory of my day in the sun.

August 12, 2005 @ 11:19 pm | Comment

This is the link to the post with Lin’s new and lengthy comment on medical reform in China. This is an important topic and I hope we can keep the conversation going, even if the post has dropped down.

August 12, 2005 @ 11:25 pm | Comment

There’s no reason why you shouldn’t keep up the watching brief on your ‘enemies’ but I think you’ve implied that you will anyway.

August 12, 2005 @ 11:51 pm | Comment

Heh. Probably the hate-mailers will fade away with the new viewers, too. My one hate mailer has gone away for the time being, or is resting, or has found somebody else to pester.

August 13, 2005 @ 12:07 am | Comment

Sam: here’s some cheery news for us Guangdong bods. BTW, it must be raining pretty bad down there. The typhoon made landfall in Shantou earlier today I see.
————————————-
Over half of Guangdong rainfall is acid rain

More than half the rain that fell on Guangdong in the first half of the year was acid rain, Chen Guangrong, of the Guangdong Environmental Protection Bureau, said a report, released on Thursday, highlighted the difficulties the province faced in protecting the environment.

In Guangzhou and Shenzhen at least 80 per cent was acid rain.

Sun Yat-Sen University professor Qiu Rongliang said sulfur dioxide emissions from power plants and rising emissions of nitrogen dioxide from vehicle exhausts were major reasons for the worsening of the acid rain problem.

August 13, 2005 @ 12:09 am | Comment

The last time I saw your former mate, he was posting at the Teahouse. Just the other day I think.

August 13, 2005 @ 12:10 am | Comment

Clinton obsession: it just never stops.

August 13, 2005 @ 2:28 am | Comment

Not to change the subject, but did you see what LaShawn Barber said this week?

“A non-white, third-world influx of illegal aliens is bad for America any way you package it.”

So an influx of white third-world illegal aliens (from Romania or Albania, say, both of which are poorer than Mexico) would be OK?

Incidentally, Ms. Barber is black.

I suppose Malkin and Barber both prove what white supremacists are so fond of saying: that racism among non-whites is the worst kind.

August 13, 2005 @ 3:59 am | Comment

James, this might mean nothing to you but while I lived in Guilin I used to hear my upstairs neighbours going for it hammer and tong almost every night. It was usually at two in the morning, too. I never got angry or wanted to scream. In fact, the backboard banging against the wall and the girl absolutely howling made me happy. Somebody was getting some . . .

August 13, 2005 @ 7:43 am | Comment

Simon has a must-read, er, letter, from The Economist from Andrew Freris, BNP’s Chief Economist in Asia. It also contains a link to a good article “From T-Shirts to T-Bonds”:
Excerpt:
—————-
Cooling the dragon’s breath

SIR – You propagate the canard that, economically, China now rules the world (“From T-shirts to T-bonds”, July 30th). It does nothing of the kind. In real dollar terms (purchasing-power parity valuations are at best controversial, at worst misleading) China has made a continuously declining contribution to global GDP growth from 10% of the total growth registered in 2001 to an estimated 6% in 2004—its share of real global GDP was an estimated 2.2% for 2004.
——————-
http://simonworld.mu.nu/

August 13, 2005 @ 9:29 am | Comment

Richard, the best way of judging how much influence someone has is counting the hate mail they recieve.

So congratulations!
—-

This is a long shot, but is anybody on this site going to the HPAIR (Harvard Project for Asian & International Relations) conference in Tokyo next week?

Email me if you are

August 13, 2005 @ 12:45 pm | Comment

loved this comment from the bbc which has a special section on the bickering between China and Japan: “The US has made clear it may be prepared to defend Taiwan in the face of a Chinese assault.”
Let me make it completely clear to our Chinese friends – we MAY Nuke them if they attack Taiwan.

August 14, 2005 @ 6:41 am | Comment

Justin at Shenzhen Zen just passed to me a Pork warning for Shenzhen. My PSA for the day.

August 14, 2005 @ 6:13 pm | Comment

I have to wholeheartedly agree with Martyn’s solution to Jame’s problem. Speak no words and swing hard. I prefer using a Louisville Slugger but a stout bamboo pole or even a bowling ball will do in a pinch.

James, why did you let your lass answer the door in the dead of night? No clothes is not a good answer.

August 14, 2005 @ 7:03 pm | Comment

Let me make it completely clear to our Chinese friends – we MAY Nuke them if they attack Taiwan.

Posted by Keir at August 14, 2005 06:41 AM

————

another general pighead

August 14, 2005 @ 7:21 pm | Comment

I love my president, I love my president….

The federal government has cut back the critical habitat for 19 species of threatened and endangered Pacific salmon, arguing that an earlier designation demanded by environmentalists was poorly executed and that voluntary habitat improvements will work better.

The move announced Friday reduces the miles of protected river in Washington, Oregon, Idaho and California by 80 percent — from 167,700 miles to 33,300.

In those areas, activities such as logging, construction and livestock grazing is restricted to avoid disturbing the stream beds where the salmon migrate and spawn.

Loggers ueber alles!

August 14, 2005 @ 9:28 pm | Comment

Bingfeng- Are you referring to ME as “another general pghead”? Those weren’t MY comments (was only paraphrasing them) and I never the TA, let alone reached the rank of general. Or do you mean that I’m generally just another pighead?

August 14, 2005 @ 10:39 pm | Comment

Keir, always consider the source.

August 14, 2005 @ 10:40 pm | Comment

I knew this German Pope thein was a bid idea!

http://tinyurl.com/9fjkj

August 14, 2005 @ 10:53 pm | Comment

Mapor new demonstrations in Hubei province — 10,000 demonstrators!

August 14, 2005 @ 10:55 pm | Comment

Funny, Conrad!

August 14, 2005 @ 10:56 pm | Comment

Bingfeng- Are you referring to ME as “another general pghead”? Those weren’t MY comments (was only paraphrasing them) and I never the TA, let alone reached the rank of general. Or do you mean that I’m generally just another pighead?

Posted by Keir at August 14, 2005 10:39 PM

———–

whoever made that comment is a pighead like General Zhu Chenghu, who says china will nuke the US and destroy 200 – 300 american cities if US intervenes taiwan.

August 14, 2005 @ 11:17 pm | Comment

hi there,

it is monday afternoon in Beijing august 15th 2005 and on the occasion of the 6oth anniversary of the end of WWII and defeat of Japan, the japanese prime minister has APOLOGIZED for the atrocities perpetrated by his country at the time.
It is in the headlines of the online version of Le Monde (if you can read french ) but it must also be in other online newspapers.

I just never want to hear again the “japan has never apologized for its crimes” litany ever again, just not a valid excuse anymore for japanese haters.

August 15, 2005 @ 2:05 am | Comment

hi there,

it is monday afternoon in Beijing august 15th 2005 and on the occasion of the 6oth anniversary of the end of WWII and defeat of Japan, the japanese prime minister has APOLOGIZED for the atrocities perpetrated by his country at the time.
It is in the headlines of the online version of Le Monde (if you can read french ) but it must also be in other online newspapers.

I just never want to hear again the “japan has never apologized for its crimes” litany ever again, just not a valid excuse anymore for japanese haters.

Posted by cryystal at August 15, 2005 02:05 AM

——————

yeah, worship the war criminals tomorrow, deny the appeals of former sex slaves (“you should be proud of being a comfort woman!” by a japanese minister), let the japanese chemical weapons kill more chinese in 2006, revise the history textbooks, “the rape of nanking” is a “fight against terrorism” …….

we love japanese “apologies” very much

August 15, 2005 @ 2:15 am | Comment

OK, bingfeng, how about if they apologize, then commit hara-kiri, then invite the Chinese over to rape all Japanese women? Would it be enough, then?

August 15, 2005 @ 2:37 am | Comment

oh please, please! see, I knew this was coming.

You guys base your actions, your rants, your anger and frustration, your violence and your logic on the fact that japan has never apologies for his crimes.
when they do apologise (and it is not the first time i believe), you just do not accept it because it just PISSES YOU OFF that you are not gonna have an excuse to label your hatred of the japanese ( or is it just frustrated envy ?).

You’ve been crying and whinning for an apology. here you go: YOU HAVE IT.

oh and the shrine is not a shrine to war criminals, you should get your info right.

or are you just looking for another excuse to feed your frustration?

August 15, 2005 @ 2:43 am | Comment

OK, bingfeng, how about if they apologize, then commit hara-kiri, then invite the Chinese over to rape all Japanese women? Would it be enough, then?

Posted by Sam_S at August 15, 2005 02:37 AM

————

sam-shenzhen,

what you say is ridiculous.

chinese people are not demanding something unreasonable.

read my comment carefully:

yeah, worship the war criminals tomorrow, deny the appeals of former sex slaves (“you should be proud of being a comfort woman!” by a japanese minister), let the japanese chemical weapons kill more chinese in 2006, revise the history textbooks, “the rape of nanking” is a “fight against terrorism” …….

in short, couldn’t japanese back their lip service with actions – not to humiliate former victims and deny their dark past?

i was wondering why you have such great sympathy with nasty japanese right wings?

August 15, 2005 @ 2:46 am | Comment

oh please, please! see, I knew this was coming.

You guys base your actions, your rants, your anger and frustration, your violence and your logic on the fact that japan has never apologies for his crimes.
when they do apologise (and it is not the first time i believe), you just do not accept it because it just PISSES YOU OFF that you are not gonna have an excuse to label your hatred of the japanese ( or is it just frustrated envy ?).

You’ve been crying and whinning for an apology. here you go: YOU HAVE IT.

oh and the shrine is not a shrine to war criminals, you should get your info right.

or are you just looking for another excuse to feed your frustration?

Posted by cryystal at August 15, 2005 02:43 AM

——————

well, if you want to become mad, it’s fine with me.

all in all, the recent japanese madness is less related with china, more related with japanese desire to get rid of their american master.

go ahead and f**k the USA

August 15, 2005 @ 2:49 am | Comment

to tell you the truth, the government didn’t want the anti-japan-right-wing demostration, but they sent groups to france to learn how to control the situations after 1989 and one lesson is to get it out at first stage.

why, the government clearly understood why japan acted like a mad dog against china in recent years – it need an excuse to get rid of american master

August 15, 2005 @ 2:52 am | Comment

now you understand why japan follwed the US like a running dog and bite china like a mad dog, and why the US still teamed with china to block the japan’s entry to UNSC

japan is shrewd, america is more shrewd

satisfied?

gym time, bye-bye

August 15, 2005 @ 2:59 am | Comment

bingfeng said:”now you understand”

LOL, dude, you DO need to go to the gym to clear your mind, because you are not making any sense right know
actually NO, I don’t know at all what you’re talking about.

but let me guess the end of the story: at the the chinese win because they…EAT the mad dog???

August 15, 2005 @ 3:05 am | Comment

No apology, whatever its contents will ever be sufficient. The Chinese government needs the Japanese demon, just as it needs to feed the greed to subjugate Taiwan, in order to distract attention from its own monumental failings.

The Chinese public hates Japan because China was conqured and humiliated a another Asian nation, making a mockery of several thousand years of myth xenophobic bullshit about Chinese inherent superiorty.

It can’t help either that, at the height of the Chinese empire, it tried twice to invade Japan and was defeated both times. Yet Japan was able to turn the tables with ease.

Maybe the Chinese would have a bit more sense of worth had they been able to defeat the aggressor and free themselves (as the West did with Hitler). Unfortunately, China had to rely on their hated yangguizi colonial masters to come save them from the Japanese.

No wonder Chinese feel humiliated. It’s a pretty pathetic legacy. Defeated by every real power and reduced to picking on Tibetan monks. I’d hang my head too if I were in their shoes.

August 15, 2005 @ 3:08 am | Comment

Interesting thought … if the Chinese are going to lay claim to the accomplishments and conquests of non-Chinese dynasties such as the Yuan and Qing, then they have to accept that attempted invasions of Japan by the Mongols are also Chinese actions …

August 15, 2005 @ 3:49 am | Comment

Bingfeng:
I read your comment carefull, as you asked for. With the sentence, “let the japanese chemical weapons kill more chinese in 2006” you are playing the same threat-game some guys in the West do about China.
I don’t have the impression that you want a reconciliation.

August 15, 2005 @ 4:28 am | Comment

of course bingfeyng doesn’t want reconciliation. Lack of external demons on which to focus the attention and rage of a people lorded over by a government which is incompetent at best and downright malevolent at worst would mean the Chinese would start to direct their anger towards the actual cause–the awful government. Naturally it’s not in the CCP’s interest to have that.

August 15, 2005 @ 4:33 am | Comment

FS9:

As well as the three Chinese/Mongol defeats by Vietnam.

August 15, 2005 @ 4:46 am | Comment

And don’t forget losing the brawl with the Puerto Ricans at the B-ball game in Beijing.

August 15, 2005 @ 4:55 am | Comment

what a chorus!

guess you guys would unite to support the Hitler and closed your eyes to his holocaust if Nazi Germany didn’t f**k the western powers first.

it’s very stupid to related anti-japan-right-wing sentiment with the support of CCP, but it’s a trap that almost every westerner easily fall into.

you could develop all kinds of “theroies” to explain why chinese hate japanese right wing, but the fact is – chinese can’t keep silence when japanese government beautifies their dark past

well, keep on encouraging your little SOB, no matter what, it’s your SOB (be careful someday it will backfire)

August 15, 2005 @ 5:52 am | Comment

Bingfeng you just disqualified yourself by comparing todays Japan with Nazi Germany.

August 15, 2005 @ 6:03 am | Comment

Bingfeng you just disqualified yourself by comparing todays Japan with Nazi Germany.

Posted by shulan at August 15, 2005 06:03 AM

————

besides anti-ccp, what else will make you guys so obsessed in supporting japanese right wing?

if hitler didn’t attack western powers, no doubt you would support him to attack soviet union and defend his nazi theories like you defend japanese right wing today.

well, enough for this topic.

btw, an extra question, what if bin laden launches terrorist attacks towards china? would you change your “anti-terrorism” strategy and whitewash what bin laden did before? just curious, but must be a dilemma to many of you.

August 15, 2005 @ 6:40 am | Comment

Speaking of Bin Laden attacks on China, I never really entertained the remotest possibility, but then I just read this update in today’s SCMP, note the final paragraph:
————————————————–
Teacher and 37 students detained for reading Koran

Authorities in China’s Muslim-majority Xinjiang region have detained a Uighur woman and 37 of her students, some as young as seven, for studying the Koran. Aminan Momixi, 56, was teaching the Koran to the students aged between seven and 20 at her home on August 1 when police burst in and arrested her.

Ms Momixi was accused of “illegally possessing religious materials and subversive historical information,” the congress said, adding that she had been denied access to a lawyer. A police officer confirmed the detentions. “This is our internal issue, we cannot disclose the reason,” she said. The mainland bans all religious activities outside state control.

Mr Raxit said the parents just wanted their children to learn moral values which the Koran taught them. “What have seven-year-old children got to do with terrorism?”

“Uighurs are seen by Beijing as an ethno-nationalist threat to the Chinese state,” said Sharon Hom, executive director of Human Rights in China.

“As Islam is perceived as underpinning Uighur ethnic identity, China has taken draconian steps to smother Islam as a means of subordinating Uighur nationalist sentiment.”

August 15, 2005 @ 7:02 am | Comment

Bingfeng:
Why do you now start these allegations? Where did I support the japanese right wingers?
You compared todays Japan with Nazi-Germany. I think that is absurd. Is this all you can do, bringing up absurd allegations.

To your information:
Germany first, in happy agreement with Stalin, attacked Poland , not the “Western Powers”. They then declared war to Germany.

August 15, 2005 @ 7:49 am | Comment

Obviously, many people here misunderstood the situation. Chinese never said that Japan never apologized. Chinese just cannot accept the fact that Japan leaders keep turning right while they are apologizing to Asia people in the same time. Chinese people are very confused and just couldn’t reconcile the apologies with the right ring Japanese leadership. For example, immediately after gaining the independence after WWII, Japan reclaimed its position towards the class I war criminals (whom I would call Japanese Hilters, I know you guys won’t agree. In your mind, Japan war criminals are always better than Germany war criminals…). In fact, if you read more about Japan after the WWII, you will know there has been serial actions to reestablish the reputation for many class I war criminals and for what they have done. Thanks to the communist threats from Soviet and China, these actions went unnoticed. The action reached the peak after the Shrine decided to welcome 14 class I war criminals in 1978. The second wave includes the numerous religious visits from Japanese prime ministers. China once asked the Shrine to separate war criminals from other died soldiers and has been refused many times. Is it so difficult to separate the class I war criminals from others? Why Japanese Hilters should be worshipped by “peace seeking” prime ministers every year? Don’t you think it’s a completely mixed signal to Chinese and Korean?
There are many more similar suspicious cases in Japan which sent out mixed signals and confused lots of Chinese people… it seems to me that if they get chances; they would turn the history upside down.

Conrad,
Probably every people in this world has this or that kind of humiliating history, but I admire you, Conrad, clear enough, now you’ve made me perfectly understand why Maoists grabbed the power 50 years ago, and why even at this time Maoists are not hated by many Chinese partially because they often dare to challenge any real power without considering much their own loss? Moreover, unlike less advanced Yihetuan (boxers), they’ve also gotten China nuclear weapons and the leadership position of the third world. Besides, they all have ancient China gladiator’s spirit: “rather die than yield (ning2 si3 bu4 qu1)” Actually I would agree with the conclusion that if all ordinary Chinese people could understand “nationalism” well 200 years back, China would have never be defeated like that.
Furthermore, Conrad, you probably didn’t realize yourself that the essence of your story is universal to almost all developing countries and can be used as textbook to educate brave young men all over the world.
In fact, you are doing your job trying to foster a new generation of Maoists right from this blog…just as those Japanese dudes do in the real world. This is the task that could never be fulfilled otherwise by CCP’s domestic education agenda. But be careful, some day your “students” will bite back. Jun1 Zi3 Bao4 Chou2 Shi2 Nian2 Bu4 Wan3 (Revenge is never too late for a master waiting 10 years).

August 15, 2005 @ 4:48 pm | Comment

By the way, any Japanese friend care to tell me:
Why all those ministers and congressmen chose Aug. 14th or 15th to visit the Shrine?
The fact is very provoking to Chinese people.

August 15, 2005 @ 4:52 pm | Comment

James, glad to hear that you got something else to do beside sitting there inventing Tibet history. Just remember don’t cause any trouble to other people.

August 15, 2005 @ 6:03 pm | Comment

Keep it up LW and you’re out.

August 15, 2005 @ 6:18 pm | Comment

James,
Your neighbors shouldn’t have just knocked your door and shouted your galfriend. That’s way too rude.
They should have call Police directly and sued you for the noice violations. Then probably got some money out of YangGuiZi’s deep pocket! :p

August 15, 2005 @ 6:50 pm | Comment

Time for a new thread. Let’s migrate north.

August 15, 2005 @ 7:41 pm | Comment