Archive
November 3, 2002
Feliz, feliz en tu dia,
Ojala que te pille un tranvia,
Que comas patatas podrias,
Y que cumples muchos mas.
Feliz, feliz en tu dia,
Amiquito que Dios te bendiga,
Que reine la paz en tu dia,
Y que cumples muchos mas.
Birthday Happenings
I can't really complain about my birthday this year. As I get older, I usually try to let it slip past on little cat feet. But today Saturday the 2nd I woke up around noon, and spent the rest of the day celebrating the big twenty-four.
For lunch, Mom, Dad, Laurel and Grandma Lo took me out to the Hong Kong Super Buffet down in Fullerton, which was decent food and left me pretty stuffed. To work off the calories, we subjected ourselves to 18 grueling holes of miniature golf at Camelot Fun Center. Grandma whooped our hineys, she is obviously an experienced miniature golfer.
At 5:30 I drove up to Westwood, where I met a bunch of Caltech friends for dinner at Palomino euro-bistro. Joe, Matt, Pauline, Jason, Viet, Sean & friend, and Neal & friend were all there. Lunch was quite nice and expensive, I had the a Caprisi Salad followed by the Rotisserie Pork Loin with Apple Salsa. Haha, it's my first experience with haughty food. I was very intimidated. The Caprisi salad was slices of tomato on top of sweet onion, sprinkled with diced basil and blue cheese crumbles. The Pork Loin was two large pork cylinders mounted on a mashed potatoe pile, with apple sauce on the side. Somehow, I have a hard time with mashed potatoes as high cuisine. Our waiter had that appropriately soap-opera up-and-coming actor look, with the emo glasses and highlighted hair. He was very nice.
After dinner, we opened presents. I felt like a dork because I got Viet a Tiananmen Square kitchen magnet, then found out that everybody pooled to get me a shortband radio. I hide my face in shame.
Seeing everyone blench at the dessert prices (my pork loin was almost twenty bucks), I suggested we walk up to Diddy Riese Cookies which has ice cream sandwiches for a dollar. People agreed. I picked up a dozen cookies to bring home, since I was in a good mood. [ Link ]
At that point, Sean and Viet left to go clubbing. Neal and guest also took off, so the rest of us hung out at Jason's house playing games and chatting.
All in all, it was a very nice birthday.
Identity Theft Opportunity
Identity thieves, please take note:
[ Archived ]
November 4, 2002
Neat art. Look under tu hua.
[ Archived ]
November 5, 2002
After work I tend to stick around the bookstore, order a glass of Sprite and a cup of pretzels, and read magazines. Today I read an article out of last month's issue of the Wilson Quarterly on German academic George Simmel. In 1900 he published The Philosophy of Money on money's effect on culture and human beings, touching on themes of individuality and community. Dr. Jeff Webb of the National University of Singapore teaches a class called USWP11: Selves and Cities, which sources Simmel's work and has some written excercises to do on the reading.
One part of the article I remember is how the capitalist society provides people with so many interests, projects and activities to participate in that people learn to excercise discretion and critical thinking in choosing what they do. It's a sad but necessary fact that I can't read every book, travel to every destination and meet every person I want to. And my harmonica lies gathering dust.
On a separate note, this morning on NPR there was a short segment on the origin of the term spin doctor, and what this term means. William Safire defines it as "deliberate shading of news perception; attempted control of political reaction." The golden nugget in the segment was near the end, when the concept was introduced that spin doctors existed to give an instant opinion:
Jack Rosenthal says spin started to thrive under the conditions created by CNN and news radio, whose 24-hour updates rendered weekly commentary obsolete. With the news cycle shrinking, he says, "You needed to get effects into play instantly. You couldn't wait to go to your favorite columnist. It had to be instant, so you created your own columnist. Create your own wave of opinion — your own spin."
I was watching TV tonight, some news on Channel 11. After each story, the reporters make some light comments among themselves about their personal reactions to the story. Supposedly this makes them more warm, human and trustworthy. In light of the radio segment this morning, I have a new interpretation. It's spin! Instead of reporting the facts and leaving commentary to the better-informed editorial staff, the anchor-people provide instant spin for viewers to absorb. Perhaps this generation has grown up accustomed to having their opinions spoon-fed to them. Easier than forging their own, I suppose. [ Link ]
[ Archived ]
November 6, 2002
CSS advocacy at Slashdot by yours truly.
Creative Thinking in China
"They should add a fourth 'represent' to Jiang's theory," said a retired security agent and party member in a small town of Hubei Province in central China. "That is, 'The party represents official wining and dining at the people's expense.'"
[ Link ]
[ Archived ]
November 8, 2002
My front page has a 52.66% content-to-code ratio. [ Link ]
I wrote a few comments on the North Korean nuke situation over at the China Weblog.
China Weblogs
Ms. TKG's Chinese Politics site is an amatuer source of good articles, opinions and resources on Chinese politics.
Alfred is a second China Hand who runs a tight weblog on China, ranting about micro-economics. Very interesting stuff.
Also, Sinoblogs was updated recently.
China Tidbits
The following tidbits are graciously taken from the "Hail Eris, Man" China weblog.
Taiwan has turned down a U.S. demand on Friday to extend copyrights on works including earlier Walt Disney movies for another 20 years.
So Disney is going to build their new park in Hong Kong, rathern than in Taipei? We'll show them... [ Link ]
Taoyuan county near Taipei has issued a new edict requiring the so-called "betel nut beauties" to cover up their breasts, buttocks, and belly buttons or face the full force of the law.
Shirley wouldn't let me try betel nuts when we were in Taiwan. They can't be that addictive. [ Link ]
Chuck DeVore and Steve Mosher present an interesting scenario for a mainland Chinese military attempt to take Taiwan using a combination of conventional, unconventional and innovative means (like hang-glider riding commandos, EMP weapons and cargo ships converted to fire support boats).
Book review. Buy it on Amazon. [ Link ]
[ Archived ]
November 10, 2002
I'm in San Francisco this weekend, visiting my brother and doing the micro-whirldwind tour of the city. Church was at the First Presbyterian Church of Berkeley, with a lovely choir and organ. We ate breakfast at the Durant Cafe, some of the best pancakes in Berkeley. In the afternoon we went into the city, first walking from the pier near Fisherman's Wharf down to Fort Mason. Then we went up to Lincoln Park, to the Legion of Honor museum. It's a mid-size museum, very doable in a couple of hours; mostly older stuff, classical, rennaisance, new-classical, impressionist works. For dinner, we came back to Berkeley and had a huge salad and soup at the Intermezzo Cafe. This evening, the plan is to hang out with Julie and Eric.
[ Archived ]
November 12, 2002
We got back from San Francisco about ten minutes before my shift at Borders started, so we didn't even bother going home. I got dropped off, and discovered to my delight that I didn't have register duty today. Three marvelous hours of shelving books and helping customers. I finished up the pull that I was supposed to finish two weeks ago, now they just need to be stickered and re-shelved.
Tonight after work I retrieved and touched up the pictures from our RCA CDS 1005, a .3 Mpixel digital camera. They can be found on my freeshell site.
New weblog design by me at msittig.blogspot, just for fun.
[ Archived ]
November 13, 2002
What follows is an old entry that I typed up, saved on the hard drive and forgot to publish a few weeks ago. From CHINA BUSINESS BRIEFING #116
Real estate bubble loom in China
Over the first eight months of this year, the total area of vacant houses across China increased by 14.1%. Of the unsold houses, about 43.97 million square meters, which are 11.5% more than those of the same period last year, have been idle for over a year. By July of this year, capital held standstill by the vacant houses shot up to CNY 250 billion, the No 1 non-performing assets in terms of its size in all the industries in current China. (People's Daily, 16 October)
Haven't I been calling this before? A drive through the new housing developements in Tianjin and Beijing shows many empty houses that people cannot afford. Even this month's China Business Briefing made a sarcastic comment about the real estate bubble in China popping soon. Again, I like the idea of mini-flats, as described in a South Africa Financial Gazette article. [ Link ]
Universal theme park planned for Beijing
Universal Studios plans to build a USD 900 million theme park in Beijing, its first venture into China. The Hollywood entertainment group signed a preliminary agreement with one of the mainland's largest travel enterprises, the Beijing Tourism Group, to build a park of American-style attractions with Chinese cultural characteristics. (SCMP, 18 October)
"American-style attractions with Chinese cultural characteristics" may not have been intentional but it is a prime candidate for Richard's China Cliché series.
[ Archived ]
November 14, 2002
Jenna at work encouraged me to try a collage, so I made a digital collage from a bunch of China-related pictures on my hard drive.
[ Archived ]
November 15, 2002
Very intersting stuff going up on the Pyongyang Watch site. First, an article from the Chosun Ilbo, "Children of Displaced Families Favored as Spouse Candidates", about how Northern Korean families who connected with relatives in the south were once looked upon in shame, but attitudes are changing. The reason is that South Korean relatives have begun sending money to Northern relatives. On the black market, gifts of cash can mean instant riches. Ahh, capitalist greed at work. [ Link ]
Also, I can't resist a chance to plug my most favorite news service, the Korean Central News Agency, the state-run agency of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. In today's report, today is the tenth anniversary of the publishing of Kim Jong Il's book Socialism is the Life of our Nation (which for some reason, I couldn't find on Amazon):
los periodicos capitalinos, en sus articulos de hoy, senalan que la obra sirvio de una inmortal bandera que en una encrucijada decisiva: el socialismo o el capitalismo: seguir siendo el pueblo independiente o convertirse en esclavo del imperialismo infundio a los coreanos la invencible voluntad de lucha y el espiritu heroico de no renunciar el socialismo aunque tuvieran que morir diez o cien veces y llamo vigorosamente a la lucha por defender el socialismo coreano.
In translation: "In today's articles, Pyongyang newspapers pointed out that the work served as an immortal flag which, at a decisive fork in the road: socialism or capitalism? to continue as an independent nation or turn into a slave of imperialism? infused the Korean people with the invincible will to fight and the heroic spirit to not renounce socialism, in the face of ten or a hundred deaths, and called them vigorously to the defense of Korean socialism."
Also good stuff at TS Chang's site, who is covering the 16th National People's Congress in Beijing. The Politburo has been expanded from seven members to nine, and analysts are hoping that Wen Jiabao rather than Wu Bangguo will replace Zhu Rongji, because Wen has a better track record "working in the province, local working experience and working in the State Council for this long". [ Link ]
[ Archived ]
November 19, 2002
For those interested in web stuff: Ian Hickson has created a webpage with XHTML, CSS and a PNG all contained within a data: URI. Amazing! Must be seen to be believed. [ Link ]
[ Archived ]
November 21, 2002
Yearning to Inhale Free
"Owners of businesses that are patronized by immigrants who smoke fear they will lose their clientele to places outside of New York." Immigrant perspectives on smoking. As a young boy, I spent many hours in smoke-filled Spanish bars. I blame my imagined traces of asthma on that experience, but I wouldn't give it up for the world. It was a part of the local culture that defined the time and place. [ Link ]
In The City
Taipei and Shanghai: it's hardly fair to compare the two. Shanghai atrophied under decades of Communist austerity while Taipei expanded and upgraded under Japanese and American influence. Yet underneath, they are still populated by the same culture. Recently, two articles in the New York Times touched on these cities.
"Lee Ying-yuan, the challenger for Taipei's mayor's office, wants to raze the city's downtown airport and replace it an imitation of Central Park." This is also the man who wants to push for direct 80 minute flights between the two cities. [ Link ]
"Shanghai, a bustling port city of 13 million people, is speaking the international language of design, but in mixed tongues." This is the story of many Chinese metropolises; there exists no unified vision for the architectural unity of the city, as every builder tries to one-up the last. This is surprising to me, as I was under the impression that many young Chinese artists have a very refined sense of style. One day their time will come. [ Link ]
[ Archived ]
November 24, 2002
Here's a question for someone smarter than me: Would Hu Jintao and the new Standing Committee be capable of, or willing to, initiate a Tiananmen-style crackdown on a similar protest?
Distraction with Chinese Characteristics
Shutty teaches English in Shaoxing and keeps a very entertaining journal, which "virtually every young foreign teacher in Shaoxing is reading". From Shutty's journal:
I am beginning to have a little love affair with DVD though. Like, when it's 10pm and I have 8am class, I think, "Boy, I should do some class planning for tomorrow." So, I open my papers and then I think, "Well, maybe I'll just watch the entire 16 hour Band of Brothers DVD real quick first." Next thing I know, my alarm is going off, Band of Brothers is playing in the background, I am drooling all over my papers and we end up playing games in class. It's like cocaine or something. I love the $1 DVD. Must......break.......habit.
This is something that many an English teacher in China can sympathize with.
[ Archived ]