There were lots of new faces at last night’s dinner at Ritan Park’s Xiao Wang Fu and the group totaled 26, a new record. The first get-together I ever held back in 2003 boasted seven participants (get a load of that photo). The last one, which must have been nearly a year ago, saw about 22 faces.

Jeremiah did most of the work inviting people because I was mostly out of commission and it was a great group of bloggers, journalists and China hands. (I couldn’t get everyone’s name, so if you want to introduce yourselves and your blogs in the comments it would be great). Unlike the last few dinners, there were no moments when you got the uneasy feeling a fist-fight was about to begin. Just lots of intelligent conversation and good food.

My two “complaints” about last night: I thought the food was great but a little pricey. And I didn’t think of asking anyone to take photos. These things should be documented for the historical archives.

Huge thanks to everyone who made it there, and especially to Jeremiah for suggesting the dinner in the first place and handling the invites and RSVPs. Shulan, after enjoying your comments on this blog since 2003, it was great to finally meet you. To everyone who couldn’t make it, we’ll try to give you a little more notice next time. Thanks again for a memorable night.

Now for something a little lighter, Stephen Colbert interviews Jennifer 8 Lee, author of the new book The Fortune Cookie Chronicles: Adventures in the world of Chinese Food.

It’s all in good fun, and as a historian, I (Jeremiah) was pleased to see Zuo Zongtang get his props as something more than “The Chicken Guy” (as my students occasionally refer to him).

Colbert quote: “Is Chinese food safer to eat than Chinese toys?”

It’s been a long time since we’ve done this, but Jeremiah and I would like to host a blogger dinner in Beijing this coming Friday so we can all meet the faces behind the monikers and indulge in the usual intense conversations about life in general and China in particular.

I’m getting kind of tired of the same old restaurant and hope someone can suggest something new – preferably a place with great food, a private room and big tables. Peking duck on the menu would be nice but not essential. The plan is to meet at 7.30 for drinks, and to have dinner at 8.30.

Please confirm with me by email so I can send you the restaurant map and ensure we have enough seats. Thanks, and hope you can make it. I will keep this post at the top until Friday.

Breaking news: CCP propagandists lie. Write that down and memorize it.

Below is a letter from an environmental consultant that was sent by the Foreign Correspondents Club of China (FCCC) to every foreign reporter in town. The lying liars are caught with their lying pants down around their lying ankles.

Monitoring and Reporting of Beijing Air Quality

Several reporters have mentioned that they have had difficulty in finding me, and I wanted to share my contact information (located below).

The Beijing Environmental Protection Bureau recently held a press conference and denied manipulating Beijing air quality data.

“So there is no such thing we crossed out some stations in heavy-traffic areas,” Du Shaozhong.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-02/27/content_7681326.htm

In case you want to confirm that Mr. Du’s statements were factually incorrect you can check the website he suggested:

Here’s the link for December 31, 2007. http://www.bjepb.gov.cn/air/Air.aspx?time-2007-12-31
Notice that air quality for Qianmen (东城区前门) and Chegongzhuang (海淀区车公庄) are reported

Check the link for January 1, 2008. Notice neither Qianmen nor Chegongzhuang are reported.
http://www.bjepb.gov.cn/air2008/Air.aspx?time=2008-1-1

These are the two monitoring stations in traffic areas that were removed. See for example the 1998 BJEPB Annual Environmental Statement: “车公庄和前门两个监测
子站位于交通路口，主要监测交通环境状况；
其他各子站分别代表居住区、
商业区和工业区的环境状况”
http://www.bjepb.gov.cn/bjhb/tabid/68/InfoID/2614/frtid/66/Default.aspx

I am happy to respond to any questions regarding the monitoring and reporting of Beijing air quality. If the links above are removed, I’m also happy to provide PDF versions for any and all dates if anyone is interested.

Regards,
Steven Q. Andrews
Independent Environmental Consultant
Washington, DC

Well, there you have it. And yes, Bush and his henchmen lie, too. But at least they do it with a little more finesse.

I removed Mr. Andrews’ email address, which was in the original letter, knowing how some commenters have taken to sending rather outspoken emails to people mentioned here.

Too strange – you just have to check it out. Then follow the link... The author doesn’t look like a fool, but I’ll have more faith in his theories after I understand them better.

This must be the happiest day in Brendan O’Kane’s life. Read about how he causes car accidents, creates racial awareness among mynah birds and gets mistaken for a Uygur. Congratulations, Brendan. Savor those 15 minutes whilst they last!

In trying to make it look good to the world in August 2008, it appears China is willing to make itself look like an utter jackass in the here and now.

The diversion of water to Beijing for the Olympics and for big hydropower projects threatens the lives of millions of peasant farmers in China’s north-western provinces, according to a senior Chinese government official.

In an interview with the Financial Times, An Qiyuan, a member and former chairman of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Committee for Shaanxi province and former Communist party chief of Shaanxi, warned of an impending social and environmental disaster because of overuse of scarce water resources.

Predicted water shortages in China by 2010

In a critical tone seldom heard from Chinese officials, Mr An called on Beijing to provide compensation to the provinces that have been told to pump their cleanest water to the capital in order to ensure potable supplies during the Olympics.

Beijing will need an estimated 300m cubic metres of additional water just to flush out the polluted and stagnant rivers, canals and lakes in its central areas to put on a clean, environmentally-friendly face for Olympic visitors, according to municipal officials.

“In order to preserve the quality of Beijing’s water we have to close all our factories. But we still need to live. So I say the government needs to compensate Shaanxi,” Mr An said. “If you don’t compensate the masses then how can they survive?”

Will anyone really be fooled in August? Will anyone believe they are seeing “the real China,” with potable tap water, blue skies, no traffic and lots of happy smiling volunteers?

Another quickie with no time for depth. Apologies.

Not as soon as some would think. An intelligent article debunks some myths:

According to Friday’s China Daily (and a host of other newspapers around the world), a just published Gallup survey claims that most Americans think China will be the world’s largest economy within 20 years. We obviously need to take these opinions with a grain of salt since, according to the same survey, 40% of Americans believe the China is today the world’s top economy, compared to 33% who believe it is the US. Since the US economy is currently more than four times the size of China’s, it is a little hard to understand why 40% of Americans think China’s is the world’s largest, but there you have it.

I suppose it is the combination of China hype and US paranoia that explains these bizarre opinions. To their credit, it doesn’t seem that informed opinion in China takes the results of this survey very seriously. The China Daily article pointed out that Chinese experts are a lot less confident about the validity of these predictions than their American counterparts, and I suspect they are right.

I suggest you look it over. The list at the end of what would have to happen for China to actually overtake the US anytime soon is especially interesting.

I don’t like putting up articles with practically no commentary, but it’s all my schedule will allow. Plus, this will allow me to put an end to the last open thread, which became unusually noxious.

The last thread spun a bit out of control. Maybe we can talk about something less stroke-inducing than Darfur, like Chinese propaganda. It’s a great article.

I put the question mark in there because I got kind of disillusioned with the open threads here after they became popular (so much random banter) and I just want to test whether I should start it up again, especially considering how insane my schedule already is, and how it’s only going to get worse in late March, to the point of possibly forcing me to close the blog altogether.

One commenter in the previous thread suggested I start this up again, so let’s see how it goes. Another commenter in the same thread said I should get a discussion going on this opinion piece by my dear friend, Philip Cunningham. I know, we already have two active threads going on Spielberg, so please feel free to bring up whatever you want – just try to keep it relevant to this blog. And do read the Cunningham column – he makes some fair points.

Do you want an open thread, and if I leave one up will you use it?