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• What’s Going On Here?
• The Utopia Within: In Which Epimetheus and Friends Go for a Stroll
• Bank Of China Opens Taipei Branch
• Watch: Farmer in Taizhou takes 5,000 ducks on a walk
• Late term forced abortion at eight months rocks Fujian
• Presented By:
• CNOOC Looking For Partners To Drill For Oil In The South China Sea
• Hong Kong marks 15th anniversary of return to China
• Restaurant In Harbin Employs Robots, Including WALL-E
• Get Stiff this Friday at Amber Lounge [Ad]
• Falling Dominoes
• A Bad Day For Nanjing’s Street Enforcement Officers
• Beijing Calls A Halt To Direct Local Bond Issuance
• Shanghai Metro warns female passengers to dress in appropriate clothing to avoid perverts, Feminists protest
• Korea at the green-growth crossroads
• Mid-Week Links: Tiananmen Tank Man in 8-bit, Angry Birds not angry at counterfeits, and a gaokao writing contest
• Social security in China: visit your parents more
• Top Ten Search List (June 27)
• Dish of the Day: Roast duck @ any street stand
• China mulling stricter visa rules and shorter minimum stays for foreigners

What’s Going On Here? Posted: 27 Jun 2012 09:10 PM PDT Don't know, don't care. But don't let me stop you from leaving your best guess in the comments section. Via China News (H/T Alicia)

The Utopia Within: In Which Epimetheus and Friends Go for a Stroll Posted: 27 Jun 2012 07:20 PM PDT

Bank Of China Opens Taipei Branch Posted: 27 Jun 2012 05:17 PM PDT I first visited Taiwan in 1970, then lived there for one year 1981-1982, and again 1988-1998. My earliest memories are of a virulent anti-Mainland sentiment. And, while I have watched over the years as the Taiwan and the Mainland have grown closer then apart and yet closer again, and while I have watched the many small and large changes in relations that went with this ebb and flow, I was for some reason especially struck by the Bank of China's opening a Taipei branch, reported on Xinhuanet, 'First Mainland Bank Branch Opens In Taiwan.' Perhaps because my business career has been in finance, I am victim of the 'when your hammer everything looks like a nail mentality'–perhaps I notice and give weight to these sorts of changes more. But, I don't think so. Both have only slowly loosened controls on foreign participation in their respective financial services sectors, Taiwan first, now the Mainland. In fact, my own firm owes its success on our ability to break through the Taiwan blockade of the 1990s keeping foreign financial services at the gates as much as possible. Every government knows that by letting powerful international competitors in, it risks losing control of that sector of the economy. The Kuomintang learned this the hard way, and the Communists learned by watching them. Neither wanted to make the same mistakes. So when I see what is in some way the ultimate opening, the Bank of China in Taiwan. I am struck, struck way out of proportion to the actual magnitude of the event given all the other events in cross-straits relations. Still, to me, it feels like that end of an era. And good riddance.

Watch: Farmer in Taizhou takes 5,000 ducks on a walk Posted: 27 Jun 2012 06:00 PM PDT Via NTD: "Several times a year, farmer Hong Mingshun takes his flock of ducks for a walk—5,000 of them at a time. He raises the ducks for eggs and meat, but a welcome by-product are the walkabouts, which have now become a local entertainment sensation." [ more › ]

Late term forced abortion at eight months rocks Fujian Posted: 27 Jun 2012 04:30 PM PDT Radio Free Asia has the details on what it says is the first late-term forced abortion to come to light since the Feng Jianmei case shocked China earlier this month: [ more › ]

Presented By: Posted: 27 Jun 2012 04:30 PM PDT

CNOOC Looking For Partners To Drill For Oil In The South China Sea Posted: 27 Jun 2012 02:32 PM PDT China's recently abandoned tactic of asserting its territorial claims to the South China Sea through fishing rather than minerals extraction is well and truly dead. State-owned China National Offshore Oil Corp. (CNOOC) started drilling in the disputed waters in May. … Continue reading →

Hong Kong marks 15th anniversary of return to China Posted: 27 Jun 2012 02:45 PM PDT Christine Loh, head of Hong Kong's Civic Exchange think-tank: "I think Hong Kong people have never had a problem to think of themselves as ethnic Chinese... but there has been a discomfort to thinking of themselves about being nationals of the People's Republic of China, not because it's 'Chinese' but because it's ruled by a government that they fear." [ more › ]

Restaurant In Harbin Employs Robots, Including WALL-E Posted: 27 Jun 2012 01:14 PM PDT The singularity approaches ever closer. At a restaurant in Harbin, Heilongjiang province called Haohai Robot Themed Restaurant (昊海机器人主体餐厅), robots greet customers, cook and serve food, and generally charm. Even WALL-E, the lovable protagonist in the Pixar movie by the same name, calls this place home*. We're told that the restaurant employs 18 robots, each with the mental ability of three- to four-year-olds and worth about 200,000 yuan. The manager, Liu Hasheng, is practically begging for the arrival of intellectual event horizon, in which cyborgs become our overlords with their superior intellectual and physical prowess. Listen to him: Opening this robot-themed restaurant, (the owner's) main idea, his primary thinking, I want robots to be a part of human lives as quickly as possible. I predict robots, within 10 years, will become quite common. Every household will have a cooking robot, an elderly-assisting robot, a cleaning robot. There'll even be security robots. Security robots. With lasers. *Copyright infringement alert. Pictures via Sina: Embedded below is one of the Youku videos I used to make the above YouTube compilation. The other two are here and here. (H/T Alicia)

Get Stiff this Friday at Amber Lounge [Ad] Posted: 27 Jun 2012 01:27 PM PDT [ more › ]

Falling Dominoes Posted: 27 Jun 2012 08:15 AM PDT Last month, I called attention to an article in Caixin magazine about the implosion in Beijing of something called a "credit guarantee company," and examined the potential risks such entities pose to China's financial stability. Today, Caixin published another must-read article about a new crisis in which credit guarantees — this time directly between borrowers — have triggered a mini financial meltdown in Hangzhou: The Zhejiang government is scrambling to settle a credit crisis threatening banks and financial institutions that altogether issued about 6 billion yuan in loans to scores of companies. Sources say 62 companies, from furniture makers to import-export traders, have been affected to varying extents by the collapse late last year of Hangzhou-based property developer Tianyu Construction Co. Ltd. The companies were financially linked to Tianyu through a province-wide, reciprocal loan-guarantee network. Tianyu's sudden failure raised the specter of a domino effect of defaults taking down every network participant and devastating their lenders. "After Tianyu went bankrupt, banks in Hangzhou started calling in loans to other firms guaranteed by Tianyu," said the owner of a company tied to the network. "That had a ripple effect and affected a number of other companies." The web of interlocking, often incestuous, and sometimes circular credit arrangements is reminiscent of Wall Street in the lead-up to the subprime crisis, in which a relatively small amount of mortgage losses, which most people believed could be contained, triggered a chain reaction that brought down major banks and froze credit across the entire global economy. So how did Hangzhou's banks allow this situation to develop? One credit analyst said Zhejiang banks have been blindly trusting loan guarantors while failing to properly examine and screen loan candidates. An official at China Construction Bank's Zhejiang branch said his bank should have better analyzed potential borrowers' financial conditions, not just guarantees and promises. We've seen this before with Zhongdan. The banks, in turn, blame borrowers taking what now look like stupid speculative risks (but at the time looked like a sure thing): "Zhejiang's business owners were spoiled by easy access to credit, especially in 2008 and 2009," said a credit manager at one bank. "Back then, they could always get loans using land as collateral and could always make money by investing in property." There's probably enough blame to go around — as there always is when credit flows freely — but one thing is becoming clear: The reciprocal nature of the guarantee network stripped real bank loan guarantees of any value, argued another banker. The system has made all its participants mutually vulnerable to an economic downturn, he said. Now that property development can no longer guarantee profits, the banker said, borrowers and guarantors are in trouble together. Cash flow at some enterprises has fallen to dangerously low levels, said a bank loan officer, so that they've been forced to survive on credit. Many ran out of cash after pouring money into speculative property investments, he said, which flopped after the central government imposed real estate development restrictions in 2010. In other words, a lot of these firms are actually insolvent and are just borrowing from Peter to pay Paul, in order to postpone the day of reckoning. Of course, the government could step in and bail everyone out. As the article notes, that's what happened in 2008 in the neighboring city of Shaoxin, when a local petrochemical company that had issued similar loan guarantees ran into trouble. But before we take too much smug comfort in assurances that the Chinese nanny-state will surely "resolve" (i.e., foot the bill for) everyone's losses, making them magically go away, here are a couple points worth noting: Even if everyone in Hangzhou is eventually bailed out, the interim effect on the real economy is chilling. Companies that are hanging by a thread, with almost no access to working capital or investment funds, certainly aren't going to be contributing to GDP growth. Bailouts, when they do happen, don't make losses go away, they just impose them on someone else — the drag on growth remains. The quotes cited above highlight the central role the property market plays in China's financial system. For the past several years, higher property prices led to more lending, which led to even higher property prices and onwards and upwards. Now that the market has turned, lower property prices are undermining the basis for both past and future lending, and shutting down China's engine of investment-led growth. (If these words sound familiar, that's because I warned exactly this on Bloomberg last year, when China's real estate downturn had just begun). In my blog post last month, I wrote that I couldn't really tell the scale and scope of the risks posed by credit guarantee companies like Zhongdan. Just today, I came across some numbers from the China Banking Regulatory Commission (CBRC) — courtesy of the BoA-ML research team in Hong Kong — which say that, at the end of 2011, China had 8,402 credit guarantee companies, which had total assets of RMB 931 billion. Notably, those assets had grown by 57.2% over the previous year. Although the total assets figure adds up to just 1.7% of total loans outstanding in the Chinese banking system, the increase in 2011 equates to around 5% of net new loans issued that year. More importantly, the inter-company guarantees at the heart of the Hangzhou Tianyu meltdown add a whole new dimension to the exposure of Chinese banks, beyond the professional guarantee companies themselves. Tianyu was one of a handful of relatively small real estate developers that were allowed to go bankrupt recently, presumably because they weren't seen as worth rescuing. Yet allowing even that small thread to be pulled unraveled a whole web of credit relationships that put numerous banks and businesses in danger. Now think what could happen if a developer like Evergrande (one of China's ten largest, which last week was accused of hiding the fact that it is actually insolvent via massive accounting fraud) went bust. The domino effect would be orders of magnitude larger, and hard to preemptively anticipate. Finally, the Tianyu story, along with Zhongdan and others, should finally put to rest the argument that last year's credit meltdown in Wenzhou (which is still going on, by the way) was a "unique" or "isolated" case. Shadow banking, and the risks it hides, are pervasive across China's economy. If you're still buying the line that what happened in Wenzhou has no relevance to the rest of China, I have a couple of high-speed rail lines I'd like to sell you.

A Bad Day For Nanjing’s Street Enforcement Officers Posted: 27 Jun 2012 10:04 AM PDT We've documented here that chengguan — China's urban management/street enforcement officers — are not generally favored by the people. You might think it unfair to call them street thugs, but that's the reputation they've built for themselves, and while some chengguan, surely, are decent, it's unfortunate that it will almost always be the bad apples who make the news. Take these three incidents from Nanjing on Tuesday. We'll start with the above picture, posted yesterday to Sina Weibo before being picked up by news media. According to most accounts, trouble escalated when a barbecue vendor pulled out a knife and began waving it at chengguan who, presumably, wanted him to vacate the premises. After a small scuffle, the chengguan subdued the man, and an officer stepped on his neck. Just at that instant, a passerby snapped a photo. So how do the people view this incident? The officer was obviously acting in self-defense, right? The top comment on this Sina Weibo post: Lin家的carrie: Chenguan are equivalent to Japanese Devils. Ouch. I'm going to cherry-pick a bit, but these three comments are all from the first page: 红胡子的老人0213: This is China's specialty, no reason to be surprised. 时装_礼服: Using them [chengguan], we're sure to take back the Huangyan Islands. 星光灿灿1990: SB chengguan. [SB is "stupid cunt"] Of course, some netizens do point out that using a knife to resist law enforcement is probably not the best move. But the tone leans toward sympathy for the vendor. There is a sense that the weakest among us, society's disenfranchised and voiceless, deserve better. It's a sentiment that runs through the comment sections of many such stories here, often accompanied with anger. People don't like to see others trampled upon, and fair or not, the image of a street merchant lying on the ground with a foot to his neck reinforces every negative perception of authority figures in this country. According to Jiangsu News (video), the offending chengguan, surnamed Chen, has been suspended and docked bonus pay. UPDATE, 10:58 am: chinaSMACK has now has this story too, with Fauna translating an article from NetEase where a chengguan tries to explain what happened: "The street vendor at the time was brandishing a knife and cut one of our men on their head. A fight broke out between the two, and during the struggle to wrest away the knife, the street vendor fell down. Our man lost his footing and accidentally stepped on that street cart vendor, the angle of which just happened to be photographed by a netizen passing by." Gee. And chengguan still wonder why people don't trust them, huh? Then there was this: Chengguan are seen beating up a student from the Nanjing Forestry University. You'll have to take this Sina Weibo post with a grain of salt, but apparently this incident began when a student dared to intervene when he saw chengguan verbally abusing a street-food vendor. Four chengguan proceeded to chase the student and beat him, and that's where the video picks up. While we can't confirm the events preceding the video's start, we do know what we can see and hear, and that's a chengguan raving like a madman and threatening, "If I see you again, I'll beat you again!" These are, ostensibly, law enforcement officers we're dealing with. What is the difference between a thug and a bully? Perhaps the thug's sense of self-assurance, his aggression born out of arrogance instead of insecurity. You put a uniform on an angry, insecure, probably undereducated young man in China and tell him he now has power, well, you create a thug. Finally, this was uploaded to Youku a day ago, a video titled, "Nanjing Nanhu chengguan beats people." Just chengguan being chengguan, you might be tempted to say. In this country, that only means one thing: those SB assholes are at it again.

Beijing Calls A Halt To Direct Local Bond Issuance Posted: 27 Jun 2012 05:53 AM PDT China has called a halt to an experiment launched last October that let local authorities issue bonds directly. The provision permitting it was dropped from the draft budget law for its second reading earlier this week. State media quote Hong Hu, … Continue reading →

Shanghai Metro warns female passengers to dress in appropriate clothing to avoid perverts, Feminists protest Posted: 27 Jun 2012 12:02 AM PDT June 26th, 2012 by Key | Posted in News | No Comments » From Sina: Shanghai Metro Operation line 2. wrote on its official microblog @上海地铁二运 "Going onto subway, dressed like this, will be impossible not to get sexually harassed. More perverts on the subway, impossible to defend, women vs. perverts (wolves: direct translation of 色狼 is sexual wolf) Girl, please respect yourself!" The attached image is a young woman dressed in black silk skirt, from the back, due to the very thin layer of fabric, her bra and underwear can be seen easily, it is indeed very sexy. However this microblog entry drew criticisms from many netizens. Some netizens believe that dress in revealing clothes is individual's choice; no one should use that as a pretext for engaging in sexual harassment. "If the law or subway regulation did not forbid her to dress like this then we have no rights to criticize." netizens voiced their opinions after this post," according to your theory, all men would do something to women in the swimming pool?" "You are to maintain passengers' safety, not to avoid taking responsibility, more so not to make excuses for criminals!" However the other side of the opinion agrees with Shanghai Metro Operation line 2. "In public places, we should pay attention to dress code and occasions. This is basic common sense and ethics, should this even be questioned?" This netizen thought Shanghai Metro's official weibo is coming from good intention of making the passengers to be more aware, which need not to apologize. "Young people now days wear low cut shirts, mini-skirts, see-through dresses, which make some people to imagine, some even take action of sexual harassment. Therefore when we ridicule the criminals, at the same time should we all think about our body languages?" This debate continues, two young girls on Shanghai Metro line 2 dressed in black robes and clothes. They covered up their faces and holding some signs, "We can be 'flirty', but you cannot harass." "We want to be cool, but don't want wolves (perverts)" to protest against Shanghai Metro line 2. These two female volunteers using performance art immediately attracted many attentions. "Women's Voice" newspaper also supported their acts on Weibo @女权之声 and calls for women to take ownership of their bodies to fight against sexual harassment. One netizen give recognition after viewing the performance art, he felt if we allowing the view of "women wear less clothes causes men to commit sex crimes", then in the end every woman must wear layers of thick clothing before being allowed in the street. In a normal society, even if a person walks out in nude, you can call the police, but you can not harass her, this is basic common sense. Two volunteers attracted a lot of talks, both sides' debate is still continuing. Many netizens pointed out that the motivation of Shanghai Metro line 2's microblog entry was to reduce sexual harassment crimes, however words it used were indeed inappropriate. While netizen's argue, please appreciate the intention of Shanghai Metro line 2, "I hope both sides have a good attitude to properly deal with this dispute." Tags: feminist, pervert, Protest, sexual harassment, Shanghai, Shanghai Metro, Subway, Weibo, Women

Korea at the green-growth crossroads Posted: 27 Jun 2012 01:59 AM PDT A political turning point for South Korea raises a number of important questions about Seoul's sustainable development strategy, writes HSBC climate-change strategist Wai-Shin Chan. South Korea emerged from national parliamentary elections in April with the ruling Saenuri party holding a wafer-thin majority; the presidential election in December is the next milestone. The slashed majority and new president pose questions about the durability of South Korea's green growth strategy beyond 2012. South Korea has entered the ranks of the industrialised world and joined the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) on the back of tremendous industrial success. Its economy has grown 30-fold since 1980 with GDP per capita now well over US$20,000. However, this success was based on a high-energy and high-carbon model: its per-capita energy use continues to rise and is above its regional peers, China and Japan. Carbon emissions have more than doubled since 1990 on the back of industrial growth and now rank ninth in the world. South Korea's carbon intensity is now the second highest of the G20 developed economies. Another problem is that South Korea relies on imports – over 96% – for its primary energy needs. In 2011, energy imports cost over US$173 billion, more than the nation's total exports of ships, semiconductors, mobile phones, LCDs and computers together. Primary energy in South Korea is also highly reliant on fossil fuels, mainly petroleum but also coal and liquid natural gas (LNG), which continues to supply over 80% of primary energy. Oil now accounts for one-quarter of imports by value, and the reality of high crude prices poses a strategic risk for the economy, especially as energy costs remain controlled to underpin industrial competitiveness. High energy usage, compounded by the rising cost of energy, the extreme reliance on imports, the doubling of carbon emissions since 1990 and South Korea's emergence as a developed country called for a change in the structure of its economic growth – from economic to sustainable development. During the build-up to the UN climate talks in Copenhagen in 2009, and as the clean-tech sector boomed, the newly elected president Lee Myung-bak made green growth a cornerstone of his administration, introducing the green growth plan in 2008. President Lee also outlined a non-binding political target to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions by 30% from 2020 business-as-usual levels, which translates into around a 4% reduction on its 2005 emissions – quite a break with historical trends. South Korea's existing strength in batteries, LEDs, smart grid and nuclear provide the foundation for the green-growth plan. The government defined new growth industries and new technologies as the engines to drive green growth and is keen to nurture them with research and development (R&D). In 2009, two trillion won (US$1.8 billion) was invested in green R&D, and this increased to 2.3 trillion won (US$2.1 billion) in 2010. New technologies, such as technology for enhancing the efficiency of appliances and fuel cells, are the major recipients of this investment, receiving an estimated one-quarter of the total government R&D budget. South Korea is also a strong trading nation; in 2011, its external trade (value of exports plus imports) reached US$1 trillion, equivalent to 83% of GDP. In reaching this milestone, South Korea has become a leader in technology exports. For example, Samsung televisions now account for one in five sets sold throughout the world, with LG televisions one in 10, displacing Japanese television makers who have traditionally held the largest market shares. South Korea currently ranks seventh in the world for exports of climate-smart goods and technologies (CSGT) – defined by the UN as "products, components and technologies that tend to have a relatively less adverse impact on climate change" – up from fifteenth in 2005. At HSBC, we expect South Korea to displace Japan as the fourth largest in 2015. By then, as a share of South Korea's total exports, CSGT exports could almost double to 4.6%, according to our analysis. This future CSGT export growth will be underpinned by the steady adoption of carbon constraints in key markets. In 2005, the European Union was the only major market with meaningful climate targets. Looking forward to 2015, Australia's cap-and-trade system will be up and running, as will California's; China is also widely expected to have a similar carbon system in key provinces. Consequently, over half of South Korea's CSGT exports could be to carbon-constrained countries. In our view, efforts made in carbon reduction and efficiency now will pay dividends in a future world where lower carbon footprint products are expected to be in higher demand. In order to achieve the 2020 emissions reduction target, South Korea has established a two-phase plan: first, a standard emissions cap and reduction plan, the target management system (TMS); then, an emissions trading scheme (ETS) from 2015. Many South Korean companies have been collecting and publishing emissions data for a number of years, hence the steady and organised transition to a cap system and then a trade system. The ETS was twice postponed ahead of its vote in South Korea's national assembly, but was passed in early May. Many businesses in South Korea have opposed these mandatory schemes, because they believe constraining carbon will affect their competitiveness on the global stage and could impact national GDP. However, research by the South Korean government suggests that meeting the 2020 reduction target would directly cost only around 0.5% of the country's GDP. And this estimate excludes any benefits such as energy savings and a stimulus to innovation. Regardless of the outcome of the presidential elections, there should be continuity in terms of the industrial focus on green growth: R&D, investment and innovation. South Korea's green growth trajectory began before president Lee's administration, and it will continue beyond it. Key pieces of legislation have been put in place and substantial government resources (equivalent to 2% of GDP) have been allocated to boost innovation. South Korea's strength in LEDs, batteries, smart grid, offshore, solar and nuclear will continue to be in demand as the global economy seeks to move towards lower carbon, more efficient growth. In our view, both government and industry wish to maintain South Korea's growing international reputation in a way that is in tune with green growth: by vying to host the new UN Green Climate Fund – the country has submitted a bid to host its secretariat in the city of Incheon – and by remaining a strong exporter of high-quality and high-tech goods. The green-growth plan accentuates the positives of South Korea's existing industrial structure around the smart economy. Targets for carbon, renewables, efficiency, and smart grids have started off modestly, but could be amplified as experience grows. Historically, South Korea has followed the west in its economic development path. But with low-carbon development, there is no model to follow and so South Korea must pursue its own green-growth track. In our view, South Korea will choose the right direction at the crossroads: straight ahead. Wai-Shin Chan is climate change strategist at HSBC. Homepage image by Stuck in Customs

Mid-Week Links: Tiananmen Tank Man in 8-bit, Angry Birds not angry at counterfeits, and a gaokao writing contest Posted: 27 Jun 2012 04:23 AM PDT Team China's Olympic uniforms, via China Daily We have a busy night of blogging ahead. Get your links reads in quick. Remember RFH's June 13 piece about gaokao? Here's a contest for it: "The following are real questions leaked from this year's gaokao. Pick one (1) and respond to it BY MIDNIGHT, JULY 3 in 400 words or less in snappy, brilliant, offbeat fashion – earnest or funny, snarky or sincere." [Asian American Writers' Workshop] A refreshing approach to counterfeits. "When Peter Vesterbacka visited China last spring, the marketing chief for Rovio, the Finnish firm behind the video game Angry Birds, saw fake Angry Birds products everywhere – and he was happy about it. // 'I realized that China was already happening in a big way for us,' Vesterbacka said in an interview. // 'When you see all these knockoffs, you know that there is a lot of demand.'" [Reuters] "Traitor" treated to lunch. "When Yi Fuxian spoke out against China's one-child policy three years ago, he says local officials in his home town in Hunan called him a 'national traitor.' On his latest visit, they bought him lunch. // 'At first only Chinese peasants were on my side, now an increasing number of Chinese intellectuals are with me,' Yi, 43, now a University of Wisconsin scientist, said in an interview in Beijing. He gave 23 talks at universities and forums in China in May and June opposing the policy." [Bloomberg] Richard Burger reviews James Fallows's China Airborne. "Yes, China Airborne is about aviation in China, how it started, how it has evolved and where it's heading, yet the book transcends its ostensible subject, which Fallows uses as a metaphor for China's evolution in general, for its advancement into the modern era, and all the challenges it faces as it seeks to break away from its role as the maker of goods designed by others to a nation that actually pioneers new technologies." [Peking Duck] Citizen journalists on Sina Weibo break more stories than any Chinese media outlet, in my opinion. "These blogger-activists are far from revolutionary. Like the incoming leaders, many are children of Communist Party officials. They are patriots, but they want the nation's institutions to work better and on behalf of the people. They take on corrupt corporations as much as they do the government. They are just as concerned about kidnapped children and AIDS victims as they are about voting rights and free elections." [Washington Post] This joke got Southern People Weekly reporter Cao Linhua fired, and it's not even funny, or a joke, really. "2 men and 1 woman go to heaven, but what if the latter comes back pregnant? Is this part of the national training for astronauts?" [Global Voices] Have you listened to Evan Osnos on This American Life yet? If not, go do it now. No! Bad! "North Korea has executed four of 44 defectors who were recently repatriated to their home country from China, a civic activist said Monday." [The Korea Herald] General Tsao's chicken recipe interlude: Finally… Baby born without anus to get one, surgically, after family gets 20,000 yuan in public donations. [The Nanfang] Now open: Kunming Changshui International Airport. [Xinhua] Bonzi Wells, playing back in China again, is ejected in first quarter of exhibition game for arguing with ref. [NiuBball] Finally, finally… Via Kotaku, this image by Cody Walton, The Unknown Rebel, appears on the website It8Bit.

Social security in China: visit your parents more Posted: 27 Jun 2012 11:21 AM PDT by Allison Carroll Goldman on June 27, 2012 The front page of the Chengdu Business Daily today features the obituary of Chen Qiang, a famous actor known for his two famous roles playing the villain, as the despotic landlord, Huang Shiren in the 1945 musical, "White-Haired Lady" and the southern tyrant in the 1961 film, "The Red Brigade." He died yesterday 9:38 in Beijing. He was 94 years old. The headline at the top of the page refers to new legislative proposals to protect the rights and interests of old people. The headline reads: "Make sure to visit your parents often." The article says that the new law will clearly stipulate that family members not be ignored or neglected. If children live separately from their aging parents, they should go home frequently to visit them. China currently has 20 million people over the age of 80. If you count people with age-related disabilities, that number is over 33 million. The new law proposes to create a new "old persons' day" on September 9th of the lunar calendar. The third aspect of the new law that the Chengdu Business Daily chose to feature on their front page refers to China's policy on caring for the elderly. It says the new law will change the policy from, "Caring for the elderly is the responsibility of the family," to, "The basic principle of caring the elderly is having them in the home." Links and Sources Chengdu Business News: 陈强去世 , 老年人权益保障法拟规定

Top Ten Search List (June 27) Posted: 27 Jun 2012 03:32 AM PDT Here's the top ten real-time search list for today, recorded at 1:30PM. 1. 陈佩斯之父病逝Chén Pèisī zhī fù bìngshì – Chen Qiang, a famous actor and pioneer of modern China's film industry, passed away last night in Beijing's Anzhen hospital due to complications related to illness. He was 94. His son Chen Peisi, also a famous actor and comedian, had been caring for his father in the hospital. Here's the story in Chinese. 2. 杰克逊旧居鬼魂 Jiékèxùn jiùjū guǐhùn – "Ghosts in MJ's Old House": Michael Jackson's Ghosts are back, this time not brought to us by the imagination of Stephen King. Today, netizen eyes are directing themselves in droves to news of MJ's haunted mansion, as reports come out that on June 25, the anniversary of Mr. Jackson's death, sounds of music and maybe some dancing were heard coming from somewhere inside his former Los Angeles residence. Some Weibo users (eg. "@linsanity7") are now praying that the deceased King of Pop's soul comes to rest posthaste. Here's the story in Chinese. 3. 男女集体裸晒 nánnǚ jítǐ luǒ shài – "Male and Female Nude Sunbathing Collective": Over the past few days, naked people have been gathering together to sunbathe on a dam in Xinghai, Dalian, as passersby and tourists catch peeps and then head for the hills, horrified. With pictures of the nudists posted online attracting more and more attention, reporters visited the site to find out what all of the hullabaloo was about. One reporter noted, aghast, "Several fishermen were on the east bank. On the west bank, bare-bodied swimmers sat, laid on their stomachs, or laid on their backs. Some…even played poker." Apparently, most were middle-aged men, some were younger boys, and none were women (at least when he arrived). Here's the story in Chinese. 4. 公务员陪酒醉死 gōngwùyuán péijiǔ zuì sǐ – "Civil Servant Drinking Partner Drinks Self to Death": On the night of March 15th, Yin Feiyu, director of the Highway Administration Office of Ji'an, Jiangxi died suddenly due to an alcohol overdose resulting from attempts to keep up with a drinking partner. Months later, the Ji'an Highway Administration paid 750,000 RMB to Yin's family in compensation…leading everyone to believe that Yin had been drinking "on the job," at a work-related banquet. The Highway Administration Office has recently come out to deny any such notion, claiming that the money was given to Yin's family members entirely out of "humanitarian concern"…but out there in the online peanut gallery, the people ain't buying it, some making the point that if this was not in fact compensation for a "work-related casualty," Yin's bosses are by default freely handing out money to a government family while other less fortunate "commoner" patriarchs are being told they will just have to die their own banquet-drinking deaths in vain. Here's the story in Chinese. 5. 南大第一美女 Nándà dìyī měinǚ – Nanjing University junior Li Jiannan—winner of the national university table tennis championship and dubbed "Nanjing U's Number One Beauty"—posted an ad for a bodyguard on her Sina Weibo page last night after she noticed "yet another strange man" stalking her, saying she was willing to pay her future protector a six-digit RMB salary. Some netizens are ridiculing her for thinking she is a big enough deal to need an expensive bodyguard, while others are more interested in discussing ways that young women can better protect themselves from harassment on college campuses. Here's the story in Chinese. 6. 一卡通巨额押金 yī kǎtōng jùé yājīn - The Beijing Municipal Administration and Communications Card (北京市政交通一卡通 Běi​jīng​ Shì​zhèng​ jiāo​tōng​ Yī​kǎ​tōng​), known as "Yikatong" (One-card pass), is a store-value contractless smart card that Beijing residents can use for public transportation, purchases at supermarkets, and movie tickets, among other things. As over 180 million of the cards been issued to date, people have started to wonder where the 20 RMB "deposit" for purchasing the card goes, since no one plans on returning their cards any time soon, as there is no reason to. Here's the story in Chinese. 7. 11年前的爱情约定 11 niánqián de àiqíng yuēdìng – "Eleven Year-Old Love Pact": On June 24th, Hunan TV host Xiao Hai wrote on her Weibo that eleven years ago when a young boy and fan of hers wrote to her asking if she would be his girlfriend, she had replied to him, "Once you graduate from Tsinghua or Peking University and make your first million, then we can talk." According to Xiao Hai, eleven years later, the once young boy has now actually done it, and is back to ask for her hand in girlfriendship. After netizens began encouraging Xiao to make good on her promise, she came forward to clarify in interviews that the young man merely wanted to thank Xiao for motivating him, and has not come to "collect." And she has a boyfriend at the moment anyway. Here's the story in Chinese. 8. 女版药家鑫 nǚbǎn yào jiāxīn – "Female Yao Jiaxin Murder Case": In October 2010, a student at the Xi'an Conservatory of Music named Yao Jiaxin stabbed a woman to death after hitting her with his car, because he saw her memorizing his license plate number. Last week, a speeding female driver in Shandong hit a mother and her four year-old daughter on their electric scooter. She did not stop her car, and instead continued on at full speed, hitting other parked cars along the way. A video was later posted on Youku revealing that when medics came to the scene of the accident, the guilty driver stripped all of her clothes off and lied down on the ground, trying to block the ambulance from entering the residential community where she had hit the two victims, and later grabbed the four year-old girl from the medics and dropped her on the ground. The girl ultimately died from the accident, and the mother is in critical condition but will be saved. The female driver is now being referred to as the "girl version" of Yao Jiaxin. Here's the story in Chinese. 9. 城管脚踩商贩 chéngguǎn jiǎocǎi shāngfàn – There seems to be no end in sight for altercations between "chéngguǎn" (urban management officials) and street vendors, with a Weibo post this morning showing pictures of a chengguan in Nanjing stomping on a defenseless watermelon vendor. In the face of netizen anger, the Nanjing Jianye District Xinglong Street Urban Management Department has told reporters, "This law enforcement officer was not a chengguan; the person pictured here is just an assistant to a chengguan, who merely accidentally stepped on the street vendor." An ensuing tidal wave of Weibo posts indicates that most netizens are seeing this as just a bad excuse. The chengguan-bashing continues. Here's the story in Chinese. 10. 王媞Wáng Tí – Wang Ti and Zhu Shuangshuang are the names of two Beijing con women who have been charged with swindling a total of nearly 55 million RMB from 27 Chinese celebrities—including several Olympic champions—in a massive real-estate scam. Here's the story in Chinese. READ MORE

Dish of the Day: Roast duck @ any street stand Posted: 27 Jun 2012 01:20 AM PDT Eating roast duck from a street stall is like eating a restaurant entrée without the obstacles of a reservation, soup or salad appetizer, smarmy waiter, or the 200 or more RMB. It's just you and a pound of plump livery meat, bones, grease and crisp skin seemingly frosted underneath with white fat. [ more › ]

China mulling stricter visa rules and shorter minimum stays for foreigners Posted: 27 Jun 2012 12:08 AM PDT A new law is currently being drafted that will shorten the minimum stay for foreigners who come to China to work to 90 days. Residence permits will range from 180 days to five years, reports Shanghai Daily [ more › ]