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- Conan O’Brian
- The Rain Last Night Brought People Together, Too [UPDATE]
- Adorable Dog Becomes Several Times More Adorable With Sunglasses
- Shanghai Shenhua vs Manchester United friendly this Wednesday!
- 538 million Internet users, mobile access most common
- Saturday Night Musical Outro: Beta Band – Dry The Rain
- Saturday Night Musical Outro: Garbage – Only Happy When It Rains
- The Party Is Apparently At Shuangjing Bridge
- Chinese girl witnesses Batman premiere shooting
- Some People Are Having A Lot More Fun With This Rain Than Others
- Today’s Biblical Rainstorms In Beijing Enabled This Foreigner To Have A Splash
- In Beijing, Guo’an And Hangzhou Greentown Are Playing Soccer In A Swimming Pool
- In This Video, We Hear The Beijing Subway Hostage-Taker’s Voice
- Hangzhou Cop Gets His Man, Then Kicks Him When He’s Down And Defenseless
- Photo of street peddler clutching onto Chengguan’s thigh goes viral
- What We Can Learn From City Weekend Shanghai’s Incredible Uffie Review
| Posted: 21 Jul 2012 06:09 PM PDT Another lighter post while I'm at Buddha Camp. Sometimes I think globalization might be going too far. Witness the feud between Conan O'Brien and Chinese host Da Peng of Da Peng's Chatter,'reported in the Wall Street Journal in 'Conan O'Brien to Da Peng: I Forgive You.' Here's the Conan video that started the action: Here's Da Peng's response (English subtitles by Tea Leaf Nation): And, then Conan reacted with class: This all occurred last March. Haven't yet uncovered Da Peng's reaction. |
| The Rain Last Night Brought People Together, Too [UPDATE] Posted: 21 Jul 2012 05:00 PM PDT We'll be learning, very soon, about the damages caused by the biggest torrential downpour Beijing has seen in several decades. There will be time to sift through the fallout and figure out how we pick up the pieces, i.e. drain and dry the whole damn city and find some of the many vehicles that were washed away in the storm. (By the way, today is another reason I'm glad I don't own a car in this city.) But for now, let's focus on the more lighthearted scenes from yesterday: fans having a good time at a Guo'an game; a foreigner delighting onlookers by swimming in the street; a party at Shuangjing, amid traffic. And the above, posted by Natalie Litofsky — the video description: "Chaoyang District, Beijing. Police car had some trouble driving up my street after the storms, so some helpful (read: drunk) citizens helped them push it through the river." Youku video for those in China after the jump. |
| Adorable Dog Becomes Several Times More Adorable With Sunglasses Posted: 21 Jul 2012 01:00 PM PDT
What have you to say for yourself, pooch? Nothing? Just gonna stand there in your too-cool-for-school sunglasses, taking all the attention, huh? Well then. Carry on. [Imgur via Reddit user GhstfceKspr] One more picture after the jump.
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| Shanghai Shenhua vs Manchester United friendly this Wednesday! Posted: 21 Jul 2012 11:55 AM PDT  Football fans rejoice. This Wednesday, July 25th, Didier Drogba makes his Shanghai Shenhua debut against Manchester United. The 9th ranked Shenhua are thought to be bringing out all the big guns playing both Drogba and Anelka while Manu's Wayne Rooney and Ryan Giggs will be absent. The game starts at 8:00 PM at Shanghai Stadium. You can get tickets here. Shanghai Stadium is located 1111 Caoxi Bei Lu, near Tianyaoqiao Lu and is accessible via subway on line 4. [ more › ]     |
| 538 million Internet users, mobile access most common Posted: 21 Jul 2012 03:21 PM PDT  Various numbers about China's Internet, telecoms and media have been released over the last week or so. CNNIC, a government body that issues reports and statistics on the Chinese Internet, released its mid year report. Some numbers from the report: The total number of Internet users reached 538 million (about 40% of the population) by June, up from 513 million in December 2011. 388 million people use mobile phones to get online; the report emphasizes that mobile devices are now far and away the most common way Chinese people get online. There are 146 million 'village netizens'(农村网民) or Internet users in rural areas. The report also notes that the proportion of Internet users who use Internet cafes to get online is going down, to 25.8% of all users, from 27.9% in 2011. The average Internet user in China spends 19.9 hours online per week. You can download the whole report here (Chinese only). The Global Times has an English summary here. ★ Marbridge Consulting summarized announcements from China's big three telecom operators concerning their subscriber numbers as of June 2012: China Mobile: 683.08 million mobile subscribers Total 3G subscriptions in China: 175.57 million, of which China Mobile has 38.21%, China Unicom 32.77%, and China Telecom 29.03% ★ The General Administration of Press and Publishing (GAPP), the government regulator that controls print publications, news publishing and electronic games, released a report on the journalism and publishing industry in 2011, summarized by CMMI here. The report says that 'China's journalism publishing, printing and distribution sectors earned RMB1.46 trillion last year, a year-on-year increase of 17.7%'.  |
| Saturday Night Musical Outro: Beta Band – Dry The Rain Posted: 21 Jul 2012 11:19 AM PDT Song seems appropriate on this night. Stay safe out there, wherever you are. We'll be back with you in the morning. |
| Saturday Night Musical Outro: Garbage – Only Happy When It Rains Posted: 21 Jul 2012 11:07 AM PDT Song seems appropriate on this night. The official videos are here: YouTube/Youku. Stay safe out there, wherever you are. We'll be back with you in the morning. |
| The Party Is Apparently At Shuangjing Bridge Posted: 21 Jul 2012 10:03 AM PDT
Just a half-naked foreigner directing traffic. Whatever. He appears to belong to the soon-to-be famous party of four laowai at Shuangjing Bridge. Hmm… Party of Four Laowai. That has a certain ring to it, doesn't it? What's another way of saying "party of four"? Band of Four? Gathering of Four? Gaggle of Four? Gang… More pictures of these guys (and girl) will be trickling in, I'm sure, so I'll just keep appending them after the jump. By the way, I think the rain just picked up.
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| Chinese girl witnesses Batman premiere shooting Posted: 21 Jul 2012 05:35 AM PDT
A 19-year-old Chinese American girl witnessed the Batman premiere shooting. She wrote down her thoughts on guokr.com. There is the translation: Today, I went with my older sister, my cousin and my good friend to see the opening show of the new "Batman" movie. Very happy we can to go together. My cousin, my older sister and my friend are all first time seeing a movie premiere. We all went with a feeling that we couldn't explain. We could have escaped the chaos. We originally supposed to see "Spiderman" but the screening time was passed already. We decided to buy the ticket for the opening premier of "Batman" that is showing at midnight. We bought the tickets at around 11 pm, but there were so many people. We went into #1 showing room at around 11:10 pm. When we were buying the tickets, the movie staff told me that tickets for12:01 am and 12:05 am were both sold out. The only tickets left were at 12:10am. It doesn't matter we did not care much. When we went into #1 showing room, it was almost full. Four of us sat in the middle. We were very happy and waiting for the movie to start. When the light slowly dimmed, we were waiting for Batman to appear. However just when Batman was holding a walking stick the movie theater alarm lights went off. At that time I thought the lights were coming from the effect of the film. The room was very dark and movie's sound was very loud, could not even hear the siren. We saw the two African Americans behind us started to walk out, we also followed. But there were still many people remained seated. Many people said "what the f***, the movie just started" some said "I better get my seat back." "They better give me my money back." At the time I only thought it as only a fire alarm, "it wasn't even in the room, do I really need to go out? Maybe we will come back soon, hope our seats will still be there." These thoughts were in my mind. We went out from the safe exit orderly. When I got close to the door, I saw the police and guns, also bulletproof vests and gas masks. My mind was suddenly blank, only to hear the police say "run, run, keep running." My sister, cousin, friend and I started running. I said, "my car is here, let's run to the car." We waited for a minute there and ready to drive off the parking lot. Just backed up the car and stepped on gas, we saw an American boy, in his 20s, covering his neck with his hands. His clothes and skin were full of blood. I was scared. I could not control myself anymore. I started to sweat and could not drive the car very well. My cousin said to my sister, "Sister, you go drive, Shanshan is too scared." My sister and I both asked her to drive. I was really scared, was shaking when I got off the car. Sat at the back of the car, my mind went blank. I did not dare to think. I was scared of the criminal to appear, scared of being the one that got shot. When we left the parking lot, we saw many people injured. Someone's foot was injured, a big boy was crying because his foot hurts. When I saw their pain, I thought I could be one of them. When we drove to the intersection, police searched our vehicle for weapons. After inspection, we drove off. Driving to a big street from the theater, we saw the beautiful street lights and the red blue and white police cars. It's like fireworks at the holidays, the flash kept my eyes from opening. Saw people being carried onto ambulance, but also saw a lot of fire trucks waiting around. Because no one knew what the gunman would do next. All of this happened so suddenly. I have thought of this before, if nothing big happens in my life, then its like never lived. Thought about things like this would happen, but now it really happened, I am really scared. I don't want it to happen again. Actually many places are dangerous. There are a lot of gun crimes in the United States. There are no requirements for buying guns. Just have to be over 18. Everyone says the United States a safe place, I also said the same. I came to America for 10 years already, I lived in Colorado for 10 years. I am 19, it is first time in my life encountering this kind of thing. I often go there to watch movies, we also lived around that theater with my family. Therefore I was never scared before. So naïve, thought it never would happened to me. Now, it happened, I am scared. I cried, because I knew how important my live is now. 14 people already died, I thought, I could be one of them, I was lucky. But I am praying for these 14 people. The criminal has been caught already, how to deal with him is up to the police and the government. I am only sad now, because these 14 people's lives were so short, there were babies, children, they did not even start their lives yet. Family members were calling to find people who went to the movies, worried. Hope they could find them, come home early. Don't be too frightened. I also hope my sister, cousin and my friend to stop thinking about it. Maybe this is a big thing happened in our lives, maybe it is a lesson. I only want to say to everyone here, cherish your lives, do not make your lives as a joke. Sometimes our lives can not be controlled by us, but, our live can be better protected by us. Thank you everyone for listening to me venting here, also thank you everyone for caring. The criminal is caught, my heart is more relaxed. Thanks to guokr.com for letting me write about my thoughts on the incident. Thank you.
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| Some People Are Having A Lot More Fun With This Rain Than Others Posted: 21 Jul 2012 09:29 AM PDT
Look at this. Cowboy hat. Beer bottles. Swim tube. A couple making out. Rain? More, please. For a picture in contrast, check after the jump. And in case you were wondering: it is currently raining. A Tale of Two Rainstorms: (H/T @sanverde) |
| Today’s Biblical Rainstorms In Beijing Enabled This Foreigner To Have A Splash Posted: 21 Jul 2012 08:19 AM PDT The heavy rains found their way inside Fourth Ring Round around 1 pm today, and it's been sporadically pouring ever since: some deity simply dumping bucket after bucket of water over the city. I was outside around 1:30 pm to witness the sky and everything underneath it go eerily dark; 10 minutes later, a dazzling white mist rose out of nowhere, like the ash of a mythical sky creature. It was unbelievable. I put out both arms and said "What the fuck?" several times. Lest you think it's "just rain," City Weekend web editor Natalie Litofsky tweeted about 30 minutes ago, "I live off of Chaoyanglu, just inside the 4th. Saw a car floating down my street a few hours ago, will prob only get worse." It's an urban flood, and as we've noted here before, Beijing's infrastructure isn't equipped to handle this much water. We're also being told that this is the first time the city has issued an "orange" rainstorm alert since 2005, which is the second most severe warning, under "red." The city has received an average of 9.5 centimeters of water as of 7 pm, and precipitation isn't expected to stop until tomorrow morning. (It's not just Beijing, either: Chengdu, Fujian and Nanjing are flooded as well.) We'll do a rain roundup post in the morning, but for now, please enjoy this video posted earlier today: a foreigner taking a dip in the street. If you are this person (or know him), drop us a line and collect your husky boy prize. Youku video for those in China after the jump, plus another view of the same foreigner. This Sina video, an alternative view, has gotten 1.17 million hits in just five hours: And one more alternate view: (H/T Alicia) |
| In Beijing, Guo’an And Hangzhou Greentown Are Playing Soccer In A Swimming Pool Posted: 21 Jul 2012 06:06 AM PDT Heavy, heavy rains have again left Beijing's streets flooded, but that hasn't stopped tonight's Chinese Super League match between the hometown Guo'an and Hangzhou Greentown FC. Above, the first goal of the night, putting Hangzhou up 1-0. That remains the score in Workers Stadium as the two teams slog it out in the 77th minute. After the jump, another video of the rain, plus pictures of fans. By the way, three people have died today due to this weather: two died (two more injured) when a warehouse under construction blew over, and another was struck by lightning.
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| In This Video, We Hear The Beijing Subway Hostage-Taker’s Voice Posted: 21 Jul 2012 05:41 AM PDT A lot of the dialogue in this video is unintelligible, but we're pretty sure that at the beginning, the hostage-taker tells everyone nearby, "Don't come any closer." Starting at the 19-second mark, he says: "I'll wait half an hour, if I'm too tired to follow you guys (unintelligible)… then don't blame me." As he says this last part, he points the knife at his hostage, as if to say: don't blame me for what happens to her. Just preceding that, one of the negotiators says (14-second mark) a "leader has already agreed (to your terms)," though what those terms are, we don't know. At the 30-second mark, someone off-camera says, "No one move, no one move." In the next scene, the man is down on his back — headshot, we're guessing. One of my Chinese friends says the man appears to speak with a northeastern accent. The latest news I could find regarding this incident was from a Beijing Evening News article published at 3:42 pm today. The weapon eventually used was apparently a QBU-88 (Type 88) sniper rifle. The man reportedly kept muttering to himself, and according to Beijing Evening News, "his body continuously swayed back and forth, don't know if out of stress or other unknown reason," with a gaze that kept drifting. We still don't know what prompted him to take the woman hostage, or what demands, if any, he made. Youku video for those in China after the jump. |
| Hangzhou Cop Gets His Man, Then Kicks Him When He’s Down And Defenseless Posted: 21 Jul 2012 04:44 AM PDT We're told in this video's title and on Weibo that an unarmed cop subdued a knife-wielding man in Ganchang Village in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province on Thursday, though this part apparently happens off-camera. But check out what happens afterwards. The suspect, clearly already beaten, is handcuffed on the ground when the cop kick him in the face and gut, so hard that he loses his breath. Police brutality, maybe? I don't mean the stuff of Rodney King, though I suspect you wouldn't be totally off-base to make that comparison. It's just that kicking a man when he's already lost — and handcuffed — seems more than a little dishonorable. Weibo comments are about what you'd expect (aren't they always?). @程亚通 says: "You've already caught him, no need to beat and scold." @街边执地的阿锋 says: "You have to act according to the law as well." But @园春言 objects: "Comment after comment, so benevolent and noble speaking about human rights. For this kind of knife-wielding, looting thief you still speak human rights, ha ha." What do you think, does honor exist in Ganchang Village, Hangzhou? Youku video for those in China after the jump. |
| Photo of street peddler clutching onto Chengguan’s thigh goes viral Posted: 20 Jul 2012 11:25 PM PDT From QQ:
Yesterday, a photo of a street peddler clutching onto the thigh of a municipal inspector known as the Chengguan was widely distributed on the internet. In the photo, the Chengguan wore a pair of sunglass and was smoking. According to Lu Xueyuan, the street peddler in the photo, he was hugging the Chengguan because his scale was confiscated and he was beaten by municipal inspectors in his previous trading on the street. The Bureau of City Administration and Law Enforcement of Chenggu County, Shaanxi Province denied that they beat Lu Xueyuan, and claimed that Lu repeatedly violated regulations while street peddling, and often clutching onto the Chengguan's thigh.
The photo was uploaded by Cui Yongli, a journalist from Huashang Daily. The photo showed a middle-aged man in a black-and-white checker shirt sitting on the ground, with his head down, and his hands holding tightly onto the thigh of a man in light blue uniform. The uniformed man was wearing a pair of sunglass, smoking and looking away. Cui Yongli wrote on his microblog, "I was conducting interviews in Chenggu County just now, and saw a man suddenly grab hold of a Chengguan. The man was a street peddler called Lu Xueyuan, whose scale was confiscated by city inspectors at the end of this May. He claimed that he was beaten by several Chengguans in their office when he asked for his electronic scale back. He called the police but did not get any result so he went to take hold of a city inspector. After mediating by the journalist, the two parties agreed to negotiate in the office." Yesterday afternoon, Cui Yongli confirmed to Southern Metropolis Daily that he took the photo at around 10am yesterday when he passed by the Bureau of City Administration and Law Enforcement of Chenggu County. This microblog entry was widely forwarded. Yesterday, Lu Xueyuan told Southern Metropolis Daily that he was enquiring the status of the getting back his scale at the Bureau of the Municipal Administration when "I spotted the Chengguan who beat me the most fiercely walked in, so I went up to clutch his thigh to seek some explanation." Lu said he held the thigh for more than 10 minutes and the Chengguan did not say a word. He let go of the Chengguan after Cui Yongli's persuasion. Lu claimed that he did that because he was "locked into an office and beaten by 7 or 8 Chengguans". Lu Xueyuan was a street peddler, selling fruit. He claimed that on May 30th, he argued with the patrolling Chengguans when they confiscated his scales. Two days later, when he asked for his scales at the Bureau of Municipal Administration, he "bit a team leader's thigh" in a fight, and then he was beaten by "7 or 8 city inspectors" in the office. Last night, the Bureau of Municipal Administration of Chenggu County sent a statement to Southern Metropolis Daily, and claimed that the man smoking was the driver of the Urban Monitoring Unit, which was an affiliate of the Bureau. As for yesterday's "thigh clutching incident", the statement responded that in the morning of July 19th, Lu "yelled" at the Urban Monitoring Unit and clutched the driver's thigh. He threatened that "if the Unit declined to give him RMB 10,000 as compensation, he would not leave", and claimed that the Chengguans beat him. During this whole process, the driver "did not give any resistance", and he wore sunglasses because it was a requirement of his job and smoked in order to "stay calm". As for the photo distributed online, the statement said that yesterday "an unidentified person" kept taking photos and the Bureau suspected it was "a premeditated and planned action". After the incident, the Bureau asked the driver to "stop his work and have self-reflection", and ordered the City Monitoring Unit to handle the incident properly. Cui Yongli responded on his weibo:
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| What We Can Learn From City Weekend Shanghai’s Incredible Uffie Review Posted: 21 Jul 2012 01:23 AM PDT
Paris-based electronic musician Uffie (Anna-Catherine Hartle) played in Shanghai's Mao Livehouse last Saturday, and by all accounts put on one of the most embarrassing shows ever. For 300 yuan, people got to watch her get drunk and stand around, possibly wave her arms, while other DJs played pop and dance music, e.g., Rihanna. It was so bad that the show's promoters, Four Leaves Productions (who might not be free of blame in this), publicly trashed her afterwards, telling Smart Shanghai, "The whole thing was a total joke." Meanwhile, Shanghaiist compiled a list of angry complaints on Uffie's Facebook (since deleted from her account), such as "worst. gig. ever" and "unreal" and "worst gig" and "Worst. Gig. Ever." Uffie followed up all this with possibly the worst non-apology apology ever (Ever.), which really doesn't deserve reprinting here, but feel free to check it out. But what did City Weekend, that lighthouse of expat nightlife, a "reader-powered" promotion, the self-proclaimed "China's leading English-language lifestyle and entertainment magazine and website," think of the show?
(The emphasis is City Weekend's.) Oh dear. Readers did not like that. The second comment of 56 total was, like almost all the others, negative:
The third comment:
The fourth:
It goes on like this for a while. Eventually, CW editors are called out, and more than two days after this mess began, dining editor Geoff Ng appears:
Ng and CW Shanghai's nightlife editor both politely declined comment, and Leila Al-Qattan, the writer (marketing assistant at The Tandoor, according to her LinkedIn profile), has yet to reply to my morning email. (UPDATE, 4:46 pm: Leila just emailed [before she saw this post, presumably] what was essentially a polite "no comment" and said she's trying to "move on," which is understandable.) Perhaps we'll never know what City Weekend has learned after all this — just that "processes" are in place. But there is a lesson here, of course: if you're a magazine editor, muzzle the shiny-happy PR-speak. And broadly speaking, keep marketers quarantined on their side of the metaphorical and literal room. (No offense to marketers out there — you're just usually noxious to editorial content.) It's a novel concept at lots of Chinese publications, where marketing and editorial often work in symbiosis to make money for the big boss, but when the public figures out your ruse, the trust you lose will be hard to win back. The Uffie debacle is but one example, blown large, of the consequences of tapping an inexperienced writer — a marketer for an Indian restaurant — to pen a critical review. Serve the reader, not advertisers. Otherwise, the people will call you out. |
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