Extra! Extra! Swine flu shots, press corps history and the almighty yuan

  • Wow, that's a huge amount: 1.5 million people per day are getting innoculated with the swine flu vaccine. [AP]
  • This year's Chinese Blogger Conference was held in an ancient cave in Lianzhou, Guangdon. Why? You'll have to watch this video to find out. [WSJ]
  • A government report has said that China's Three Gorges Dam has doubled in cost and has been plagued with multiple problems. Here's a summary of them. [Al Jazeera (on Youtube)]

Cleaner water coming to Shanghai?

Besides all the subways and road renovations, one of the things we can look forward to come Expo time is... cleaner water? According to officials from the local water bureau, the city is about to fulfill a three-year water-purification plan that will produce cleaner rivers and lakes by the end of next year. Since 2000, the city has established 50 sewage plants capable of processing 672 tons of water each day and earlier this year, they began an anti-pollution drive targeting 33,000 local small rivers. All of which means: we might actually be able to touch Suzhou Creek's water one day without turning into slime.

China: Nine nations in one?

Anyone who’s been trawling through the China-related web this week will surely have stumbled across the ‘Nine Nations of China’ map that surfaced on Atlantic Monthly. Patrick Chovanec, from Tsinghua University, posted his map amidst the inescapable excitement of Obama’s visit to China, reminding the US President that China is "a mosaic of several distinct regions, each with its own resources, dynamics, and historical character."

Around Shanghai: Globetrotters hit Shanghai, power overload around city, more on Obama

  • Get lost Yao Ming. Alright, stick around. But make room for the Harlem Globetrotters, playing at Yuanshen Sports Center on December 12! If you're not b-ball buff some quick stats: the Globetrotters were formed in 1926, have lost only two games between 1968 to 2000, and have a current winning percentage of 98.4%. Details on how to get tickets coming soon! [Urbanatomy]
  • Many were left a bit disappointed by Obama's Town Hall in Shanghai: we wanted chairs flying and Chinese students drunken on Baijiu yelling obscenities at the President... or maybe just something a little less programmed. But there are some positive things to take away from the visit, and what it means for China-US relations. [Huffington Post]
  • An interior-design company has been fined 40,000 yuan for employing a majority of foreigners without a work permits. Each of the 40 employees was fined 500 yuan. Ouch. Get your work permits before you start working in Shanghai. [Shanghai Daily]

Extra! Extra! Screwing over Guinea, climate change collaborations and poor ol' Microsoft

  • You could just call it good business, or you could call it a complete disregard for humanity - China's $7 billion resource deal with the African nation of Guinea (currently under a regime without legitimacy) has basically screwed Guineans out of their lifeline out of poverty. [The Independent]
  • Want an explanation of what the Obama-Hu collaboration for clean energy and climate change really means? So do we. So here's one. [Green Leap Forward]
  • Want to see a Chinese interview of President Obama? Here's the one Southern Weekly did. [Southern Weekly]

Limits set to control crowds on Chongming

Last month, while we were still looking forward to the October 31st opening of the bridge and tunnel linking Pudong and Chongming, we professed excitement at the prospect of easier access to the island's famous rice wine and hairy crabs, but we also worried about the environmental effects of this increased tourism, and whether Chongming has the capacity to handle an influx of visitors.

China's military website attacked 230 million times in first month

These statistics are mind numbing: China's new military website, http://www.mod.gov.cn, was attacked 230 million times by hackers in the first month of operation. The site, which is the government's last attempt at providing a level of transparency regarding their immensely secretive military buildup, was never successfully hacked into. If the numbers are correct, then that means over 5,000 hacks were attempted every minute: if that was just in the first month, how much do you think it's increased since then?

Nanfang Daily: (Foreign) girls gone wild!

Oh god: we're not really sure how this is newsworthy, but apparently Nanfang Daily decided that a bunch of pictures of drunken foreign girls awkwardly passed out was good enough to at least make into a photo gallery. The pictures were taken from popular BBS site Huanqiu: we couldn't find the original post, though we did find pictures of another netizen getting a duck drunk, which are funny, and somehow more disturbing.

Snowy morning in Shanghai, or so they say

Shanghai Daily tells us that earlier this morning, snow sprinkled Shanghai for the first time this winter... just days later than they thought it would. We must've missed it, since by the time we woke up and got out in the street, there was nothing for us but damp sidewalks and dreary clouds. Alas - if anyone took pictures, we'd love to see 'em. But with Shanghai's first snow comes news that the cold front should be passing - temperatures will be rising to 9C and hover at around 10C for the weekend. Yippee.

Man-made swine-bird flu supervirus: What's French for "apocalypse"?

Since up until now, we've only seen the third case of serious swine flu emerged in Shanghai, you may well be wondering, “how bad could all this hullabaloo get anyway?"

Obama in China: News Roundup

Well, President Obama's first trip to China is now officially over. A lot of things happened, a lot of people talked about it, but nothing too groundbreaking occurred. Obama seemed to have a good trip: he visited famous Chinese landmarks, met with his brother, even talked a bit of politics along the way. But a lot of us were ultimately left with a feeling something like disappointment: for various reasons, the mythic qualities of the American president were overwhelmed by the totalizing nature of China and Chinese politics.

Extra! Extra! Obama eggs, 50cents fight back and other news

  • Haha, look - it's an Obama egg, made by egg artist Kang Yongguo in Liaoning Province. [Obamafoodorama]
  • Tao Weishuo (陶韡烁) defends a statement he made: "I strongly disagree with what Obama said about the Internet firewall... I think all Chinese people have Internet freedom - we can speak out freely on the Internet about current social affairs", which generated a wave of criticism from netizens. [China Digital Times]
  • Gosh there's a lot of green news coming out of China. Here's a summary of some of the biggest things to hit the wire and what they might mean. [NY Times]

   

Take a look at these suckers: these are going to be the newest subway trains to grace Shanghai's rails. Set to show up on the 7 line (whenever that opens), it's elegant curves, orange highlights and sexy golden dragon decor will be shuffling people to and fro from the Expo grounds.

Shanghai records serious swine flu patient No. 3

Shanghai has now recorded its third serious case of swine flu - a 43-year-old local man who is now in stable condition at the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center. According to Shanghai Daily, the city has detected 1,538 cases of H1N1 since the first patient in the city was reported in May. So far, there have been no deaths directly related to the flu, but experts expect an increase in serious cases soon. Altogether, China has recorded 43 deaths and 67,000 infections related to H1N1 thus far, which actually isn't bad when compared to the toll the flu's taken on the United States.

Foreignness in Shanghai: Tales from an outsider

As foreigners in Shanghai, we understand the difficulties with assimilation: if you're not from Shanghai you are different, no matter where you're from. In all honesty, though, it may be easier to be a foreigner in Shanghai than it is to be an waidiren, an outsider from another part of China.

Around Shanghai: Pollution art, Turkey Day, and Bar Rouge blows out candles

A few weeks ago the metro stop at People's Square was turned from a bastion of commercialism into a moving display of environmental art. Check out the large installation, which featured work designed for the China Environmental Protection Foundation, and wish it was there instead of Haibao looming at you. [China Environmental Blog]

Obama visits the forbidden city

Alright, we don't really have anything to say about this, we just love the picture. How can you not? It's one of the most beautiful places in China, and certainly one of the most haunting in the world (though, like Obama's trip, it's been hollowed out and stripped of any sort of deep significance, turning it into a mere symbol). Plus, the press has been following Obama around like lost fauns, waiting for him to make the right face or hand motion that will perfectly capture the essence of the president, in relation to his surroundings in China. It seems that the best thing that can come out of this trip for Obama is a bunch of good photo ops.

Extra! Extra! Obama, Obama, Obama... and some other news too

  • Who knew that one simple gesture, like holding your own umbrella, could mean so much? Obama made an awesome first impression by shielding himself from rain on Sunday evening, thanks partially to the habit of Chinese officials usually having a flukey to hold their umbrellas, P. Diddy style. [Wall Street Journal]
  • The LA Times has a great look at the story behild Jiyuan, a place known for manufacturing lead batteries where lead poisoning has gotten so bad that entire villages are being evacuated. [LA Times]
  • So should we be calling President Obama 奥巴马 (àobāmǎ) or 欧巴马 (ōubāmǎ)? Both have been used in press releases, though the U.S. Embassy said it was now standardizing the Chinese translation of Barack's last name and should now be using the latter exclusively. [Danwei]

Shanghai puts out a lot of (CO2) gas

While we've already heard many times over how much carbon dioxide emissions China produces, but we were still shocked by how much comes just from Shanghai. Apparently, our city throws out 5,400 tons of CO2 equivalent a year - as much carbon as two Sydneys and three Tokyos. Granted, we've also got five times the amount of people as Sydney (and twice the amount of Tokyo), but geez louise. Experts from Tongji University's College of Environmental Science and Engineering said that restructuring industry would help lower our footprint, since over 60% of fumes are industry-based.

Awesome interview of the day: Zhang Yifang, physics professor and UFO enthusiast

We've always found China's obsession with UFOs highly amusing, so this interview on GoKuming particularly struck our fancy. The site spoke to Zhang Yifang 张一方), founder and former director of the Kunming UFO Research Association, who recently organized the 2009 International Astronomy Year and Extraterrestrial Life Forum at Kunming's Dongfeng Plaza.

Leonid meteor shower today

Stargazers rejoice: the yearly Leonid meteor shower will be visible in Shanghai, starting at 4PM and ending early Thursday morning. It will be the strongest Leonid shower since 2001, with about three hundred visible falling stars per hour. Remember your telescope, though: many of the meteors won't be visible to the naked eye.

Sad: a Bryde's (pronounced Brooda) whale was found beached this week on Hengsha island. Rescue workers tried for a good two days to rescue the poor thing and return it to the sea, but bad weather conditions made saving the whale impossible. All things considered, the whale was in pretty good health, leading experts to think that it got sick and lost its sense of direction, wandering into the Yangtze delta. Which makes sense: what would a whale want to do in shanghai, anyway? Visit the aquarium? That was an overwhalemingly bad joke.

Obama's town hall: News roundup

Now that we've had a good night's rest, we can sit back and reflect on the general meaning and importance, both literal and symbolic, of President Obama's town hall in Shanghai yesterday. We've come to a sort of peace with the entire affair: yes, it was scripted, but could you expect more from such an unprecedented meeting between citizens and the populist president of a staunchly democratic country in a Communist state? No, Obama didn't seem to have a substantive, overarching message for a meeting that his administration fought tooth and nail to arrange: but in his first appearance in China, having yet to even meet with President Hu Jintao, were we really expecting something earth shattering?

Hillary Clinton wants your money (for the US pavilion)

Making a pit stop during the Obama Administration’s Blonde Ambition tour of Asia, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton paid a visit to the 2010 Expo site earlier today. Secretary Clinton addressed a squadron of journalists in front of the site for the future United States pavilion, among other things asking for increased contributions from American businesses, as the U.S. had raised two-thirds of the expo participation cost as of September.

Since our live blogging of Obama's town hall meeting with Chinese students earlier today, a few interesting things have come to light.

Xinjiang update: Still dealing with H1N1 quarantines, internet blackouts

Xinjiang has been through a lot of political and social trauma in the last couple of months, what with the riots in July, syringe attacks in September, the executions that followed, continuous H1N1 scares, and an internet blackout throughout the province.

China to subsidize 294 solar power plants

In more environmental news, the government has decided to subsidize 294 solar power plants which will generate 642 megawatts of power. The subsidies are part of China's "golden sun" plan, a project meant to find alternative energy sources. As Obama made carbon emissions a key point in his town hall meeting with students earlier today, it looks as if Hu Jintao will have some bragging points.

Obama in China: UPDATES

There has been a flurry of news in preparation for and response to Obama's first trip to the Mainland. Because we're following it across the web so you don't have to, here's a round up of the most salient and interesting links, videos and general reactions to the US President in China.

Obama arrives: Town halls and hair statues

That's right: the man everyone's been waiting for with baited breath has finally landed in Shanghai. After starting his first Asia tour with a somewhat difficult and controversial trip to Japan, Obama will settle into what should be a more pleasant, warm reception here in the Middle Kingdom.

Extra! Extra! Lotus feet, Lincoln comparisons and lollygagging doctors

  • There aren't many of them still alive, but China still has women who went through and are willing to talk about “lotus feet,” that hundreds-year-old tradition of warping women's feet that was thankfully abolished after the revolution. [Wall Street Journal]
  • Paul French talks to author Martin Jacques, who recently published the book When China Rules the World, about Chinese investment and business in Africa, the Middle East and elsewhere, as well as the future of Sino-US relations. [China Rhyming]
  • China will finally begin separating suspects arrested for minor offenses from violent criminals as it announces possible reforms to its detention system. The fact that they didn't before gives us the most unimaginable chills. [Time]

Liu Xiang wins gold at Asian Athletics Championships

Liu Xiang unsuprisingly cruised to victory in the 100m hurdle at yesterday's at yesterday's Asian Athletic Championships. Despite the rain, Liu clocked in his win at 13.5 seconds, securing his position at next year's World Cup in Croatia. If he wins there, he'll have won the "grand slam" of sprinting, making him only the second sprinter to do so. Good job, Golden Boy!

Northern China's bittersweet snowstorms

Though Shanghai's latitude makes it pretty hard for us to see snowfall, northern China has been blanketed by it for days. As it's pretty rare for the area around Beijing to get snow this early in the cold season, the torrents have brought about some complications and tragedies, but also joy.

Pakistan admits to receiving weapons-grade Uranium from China

The father of Pakistan's nuclear weapons program, Abdul Qadeer Khan, has admitted to the Washington Post that the country received enough uranium to make two atomic bombs, as well as blueprints for making them, from China in 1982. The deal had supposedly been arranged by the late Mao Zedong years earlier: though the United States has known about the blatant proliferation for decades (and even confronted China about it once), it has never sought sanctions on China. This news makes an interesting preface to the talks on nuclear proliferation that will be a crucial part of talks between Obama and Hu Jintao.

We've been all over Obama coverage in the buildup to his visit in...four excruciatingly long days, and we've seen a lot of interesting Obama fandom from the mainland. But when it comes down to it, words are just words, and when Reuters has a greatest hits video of our favorite eccentric tributes to the American President, we'll gladly defer. After all, there's nothing like watching a flaming Obama, or seeing a little Chinese boy strike the Obama pose. Priceless.

Around Shanghai: Obamas are coming, Shanghai vs. the sea, free booze at Longitude

  • "VVIP" President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama will be camping out at the Portman Ritz-Carlton during their visit to Shanghai, effectively shutting down the hotel from Nov. 14-16. No doubt, security will be extremely tight during the Obamas' visit, so don't try nothin' fancy. [Urbanatomy]
  • With all the excitement surrounding Shanghai local government approval of Disney's bid to build a new theme park in the city, there are still those who suffer the consequences: retired farmer Jin Xinmei and her husband will lose their land to the magic kingdom. This Bloomberg piece outlines China's past land acquisitions for projects such as the Three Gorges Dam and Olympics construction. [Bloomberg]
  • Ye Quiantong, dubbed "China's number one voice actress" by admiring netizens, was arrested for creating pornographic audio on the website DongTing China, since shut down. As China continues to attempt asexuality, we wonder what's next... censoring erotic smells? [ChinaHush]

Obama's town hall in Shanghai questionable

Obama's short time in our city might be cut a little shorter. The American President has been hoping to make a town hall styled forum with Chinese students a focal point of the trip. However, the government's desire to censor the event has caused problems: the event has been cut from 1,000-1,500 students to a mere 600, media may be banned (excluding CCTV, of course), and the event may not be broadcast live. The event seems close to cancellation: depriving the American President the chance to directly speak with the Chinese people, and making Beijing seem like it wants to keep him under wraps, would make a poor start to Obama's first trip to China.

Is there anywhere in the world's most populous nation where there is absolutely no one? As it turns out, yes, there is! In the southwestern part of the Inner Mongolia region lies the spanking new and ultra-modern Ordos City (鄂尔多斯), which government officials have raised from the desert in just five years with tonnes of public money. The only problem is, nobody's moved in from the old Ordos City, located just 30 kilometres away.

Extra! Extra! Seatbelt foilers, snowfall in Beijing, and Pearl River residents sickened by pollution

  • Adam Minter discovers “belt tongues” that help disable your car's seatbelt alarm without you needing to put on your seatbelt. Jeez, it's like people want to die in a traffic accident here or something. [Shanghai Scrap]
  • The heaviest snowfall in at least 54 years just hit Beijing, causing tens of thousands of people to be stranded on highways linking the city with Shanxi, Hebei, Liaoning and Inner Mongolia. Tragically, the snow also caused a primary school cafeteria's roof to collapse in Hebei, killing three children and injuring 28 others. [Bloomberg]
  • An international human rights group is urging China to abolish its secretive “black jails,” a cottage industry created to keep petitioners from ever reaching their final destinations. They tend to become the most crowded at politically sensitive times... like, most likely, the upcoming President Obama visit. [Reuters]

Shanghai government to release expense budget figures

In a surprising bid for transparency, the Shanghai government is planning to make its expense budget public for the first time ever. According to the Shanghai Municipal Finance Bureau, all collection, distribution and application of special funds, administrative and institutional unit revenues, as well as the welfare and sports lottery revenues, will be open for viewing by the public. While it's still quite rare, Shanghai's not the first county to lift a veil on their money spending. Guangdong Province recently released their expense budgets for free download by the public. The response was so great, it crashed the government's website.

ObaMao to be shelved while Obama's in town

Oh no! Remember those lovely mash up shirts of ObaMao, the combination of everyone's favorite pseudo-socialists? Turns out that the government is making stores selling the shirts and swag in Beijing take them off the shelves while the US President is in town. What a shame: we've been dying to know what he would think of them! More importantly, where on earth (specifically in Shanghai) can we find these?

China's top ten, no, eleven bachelors!

Ah, Singles Day, how ambivalent we are to you. It's nice to have an Anti-Valentine's Day, but it doesn't feel any more joyous to actively celebrate solidarity in solitude. And while we never did get that singing Celine Dion card, or anything at all, we did find a pretty interesting list from Chinese netizens: China's 11 most eligible bachelors!

Obama and China: Hope and expectations

There's a general energy in the air over Obama's upcoming visit. Judging by the many, many taxi and motorcycle drivers who have conversations with us to the effect of "美国好," Obama has become a cultural icon for the Chinese. While the American president represents a polar change in policy and practice for Americans, the Chinese seem to view him as an intelligent and fair man who will directly or indirectly help China in its ascendant world superpower-dom.

Disneyland Farmers think more buildings = more money

Yeah, it's sad but true: in order to build Disneyland Shanghai, a lot of villagers in Chuangsha will have to be forcibly relocated in order to free up space for the 4.12 square kilometer theme park. Like usual, the government has promised to provide those relocated with monetary compensation, but hasn't revealed exactly how much they'll give out. As a result, farmers have begun to erect new buildings overnight to try to drive up the value of their land. One part entrepreneurial, one part sad: but with the government notoriously bad at providing displaced people with fair settlements, who can blame them?

Extra! Extra! Teaching methods, human punching bags and PUAs

  • A netizen compares teaching methods in the U.S. and China through the story of Cinderella. While the U.S. version is a little off (can you ever imagine an elementary school teacher telling girls that they're evil if they're ugly?), it's still an apt analysis. [ChinaSmack]
  • Another U.S. and China comparison, this one more morbid. While in the U.S., people are fighting to keep abortion a choice, here in China, people are fighting to keep not aborting a choice. [Washington Post]
  • A man in Shenyang is now renting himself out as a punching bag for stressed women. Being in Shanghai, we can just use our boyfriends. [Ananova]

Man uses human blood plasma to irrigate crops

Gross news from around China: netizens and health officials have been in an uproar over a recent post from a farmer in Chengdu who used blood plasma taken from a local hospital to water his fields. Upon visiting a friend in the hospital, the man found a packet of blood plasma discarded in the trash, so he took it home and proudly posted pictures of himself on the internet mixing the plasma with water and claiming that the protein inside will help his crops grow. The Chengdu Health Ministry said it was aware of the situation, and would do its best to find those at fault for improperly disposing of perfectly good plasma. Click the link for disturbing pictures!

Metro Line 7 opening delayed past November

Aw shucks. Metro Line 7, which was supposed to open sometime this month, will likely have its debut delayed since seven out of the line's 28 stations are still under construction. Metro officials said yesterday that they couldn't “rush to a completion,” but promised that it would be running by Expo time. Line 7 will go from Pudong to Baoshan District and is expected to carry about one million passengers a year.

Shanghai cracking down on piracy, sort of

Much like China's ongoing efforts against actual piracy, it seems that the government has been taking steps to curb piracy of the intellectual variety. Shifting from targeting individual sellers to wholesalers and manufacturers, Shanghai's "Cultural Inspection Team" has apparently confiscated over 20,000 pirated cds and 5,000 books in 246 "significant" busts in preparation for the Expo. If you do the math, though, that's about 100 cds/books per bust, which doesn't seem that significant to us. As it seems the goods aren't even made in Shanghai, we're not altogether too impressed.

One is the loneliest number:  11/11 is Singles' Day

Singletons rejoice! Crack out the champagne and chocolate because today is the anti-Valentines day - it's singles day in China. As you know, one is the loneliest number and today is 11/11: four singles smack together, representing all the single folk out there. We think this day calls for a celebration, so we're going to treat ourselves to dinner!

Around Shanghai: Food safety, taxi etiquette and Han Han's Solo

Another case of technology for perhaps technology's sake? Expo officials announced that all food entering the 2010 Expo grounds will monitored with Radio-Frequency Identification (RFID) tags to ensure the quality and safety of the food. [Shanghai Daily]

360 million officially all up in China's massively restricted WWW

The number of China's Internet users have reached 360 million, says ChinaTechNews - a pretty darn sizable market that has attracted considerable attention (and you know, a thousand internet-addiction camp proprietors).

Extra! Extra! More government surveillance and Dalai Lama sneaking closer towards China's borders

  • The Dalai Lama made a week-long visit to Tawang monastery in the northeast Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh, where he held a massive ceremony with an audience of 30,000 people. The Chinese government condemned the visit, as it claims that Arunachal is in fact Chinese territory. [BBC]
  • An editorial piece in which Arthur Ronsfeld discusses how greatly Mahmoud Vahidnia, who stood up against Iran's president, epitomizes the necessity for discussion on government and social morality in the largest states in the world (i.e. China). [Huffington Post]
  • Monitors remind classmates that love is publically unacceptable

    Shanghaiist recently caught on to Forestry University’s attempts to clean up its campus’ ‘lovebird problem', but by what standards does this smooch patrol hold itself? Well, by employing hall monitors whose job is to ruin the mood (in high school we would have been so good at this job), the Communist Youth League has unloaded a heavy task on student volunteers- as if their classmates didn’t hate them enough already - to curb any public kissing, hugging, or even sitting that seems to suggest anything other than “Let’s just study together until we get married ”. However, rather than openly chastising couples and causing everyone involved to lose face, the monitors are instructed to ‘stare silently’ at the canoodling students until they regain their sense of public decency. According to Shanghai Daily “patrol members had been assaulted, either verbally or physically.” Perhaps that’s because couples mistook the monitor’s silent gaze as voyeurism.

    Liu fever is back at Asian athletic championships

    The Asian Games in Guangzhou kick off tomorrow and everyone's eyes are on China's perennial favorite hurdler Liu Xiang's 110m hurdle, where he's expected to sweep the gold. After his second-place (but really tied for first) performance at the Golden Grand Prix, and his recent win at the National Games victory seems likely tomorrow night.

    North Korean, South Korean navies exchange fire

    Uh oh! Something is afoot - two navy patrol boats from our peninsula-ed friends to the East began shooting at each other near Daecheong-do, an island about 125 miles west of Seoul earlier today. According to South Korean news service Yonhap, fighting erupted when a DPRK navy boat crossed the Northern Limit Line. South Korea issued warning broadcasts, and then fired some warning shots when the broadcasts were ignored. “It was then that the North Korean patrol boat attacked our high-speed patrol boat... Our ship returned the fire," according to the military statement. We wonder what this will do for next weeks bilateral nuclear weapons talks, of which China has a great part.

    Obama's China itinerary revealed

    President Obama's itinerary has just been released, with a little under a week before his first visit to the mainland. And the best part? He's going to start his tour in Shanghai!

    Is Jay Chou dead again?!?

    Well, according to Indonesian media he is, but in reality, though, Jay Chou is doing just fine. News sources claimed that the Taiwanese pop singer had died of a drug overdose, but his record label quickly dispelled the rumors: he's just in America filming "The Green Hornet." It's not the first time that Jay Chou has supposedly died: in 2004, a Chinese website claimed that he had been run over by a truck, but that obviously wasn't true either. This attempt wasn't any more convincing: though we love him, we know deep down that Jay Chou is definitely not of death-from-overdose musician status. Shanghaiist's prediction for the next Jay Chou death hoax: death by green hornet sting.

    China executes 9 for Xinjiang Riots

    Nine people were executed yesterday for their involvement in the Xinjiang riots earlier this summer. Among the nine, two were ethnically Han, and the other seven were of Uighur descent. The exiled World Uighur Congress denounced the executions as unfair and unjust, claiming that the government had denied the prisoners a final visit from their families. In addition, twenty more people were indicted in relation to eighteen deaths during the riots.

    Racism in China: How poignant is it?

    Today's post by Andrew Sullivan on his blog over at the Atlantic discusses the specter of racism within China, and the implications it could have on both the social and economic future of the country. As the ratio of retirees to workers is set to double within the next fifteen years, questions surrounding the economic sustenance will begin to necessitate an influx of emigrants to keep the economy growing.

    Extra! Extra! Rare fungus collections, Sino-US relations and Hawaii now saying "Ni hao!"

    After more than 70 years a large rare fungus collection has been returned to China from Cornell University. Curator Shu Chun Teng smuggled the collection out of the country at the start of World War II just as the Japanese were invading to keep it safe. He later suffered during the Cultural Revolution for "selling China's history." [New York Times]

    More sex in China: PDA police and condom confusion

    Ah, the innocence and beauty of young love: our cold, rational hearts are always warmed a bit when we see couples walking around in the throes of their first fling. Relationships are a curious time for new lovers: trying to feel each other out, learning to love and be loved, and of course, actually learning how to make love.

    Pandas need time alone too

    Okay, we know we''ve talked about pandas already today, but it's only because we can't get enough of them, and we think that's true for most people in China. But apparently, if you're a panda, you could use some time off, especially if people are constantly expecting you to mate. Researchers at the Wolong Panda Reserve in Sichuan are going to try and separate Tuan Tuan and Yuan Yuan for a month to see if absence really does make the heart grow fonder. At the very least, they'll live up to their names when they're reunited, as tuanyuan (团圆) means “to reunite.” Maybe that's where they got the idea to separate them from?

    China plans its own healthcare reform

    If you've somehow avoided the news all weekend, the United States just passed a bill on healthcare reform, which is the first step in a long line towards actual change. Less well known (probably because of the lack of flashy partisan politics) is China's attempt to reform it's own healthcare system, which is a daunting task in its own way.

    Time to stock up on face masks

    If you rolled out of bed this today clawing at your throat like a French legionnaire in the Sahara, you might not be crazy: it might be the air. This jaw-dropping photo from NASA (taken November 6) charts the progress of a temperature inversion (i.e. smog bank) that has been trapped on China's coast for the past week.

    Extra! Extra! Police and prostitutes, journalists and propaganda departments, and kids and condoms

    • A recent prostitution bust in Henan has gotten netizens into a fury... against the police, who were videotaped interrogating a naked woman in an incredibly rough fashion. [CNNGo]
    • We can't get enough of stories about the Chongqing corruption trials, so we're glad we get to hear two of our favorite China journalists, Paul French and Malcolm Moore, discuss "China's Chicago." [Ethical Corp]
    • So how are Chinese propaganda departments dealing with new media rules that don't allow them to really "stop" people from being interviewed? By wining and dining reporters and other "soft" forms of intimidation. [Telegraph]

    Ministry of Health responds to internet addiction claims, buries head in sand

    China’s Ministry of Health recently denied the existence of so-called ‘internet addiction’ as a problem for Chinese youth. You heard correctly- the ‘land of a thousand internet-addiction camps’ is apparently conflicted over whether to electrocute the problem out of its children or to simply ignore it entirely.

    Olympic condoms are faster, higher, stronger

    Attention, all y’all who want to capture some of that Olympic vitality: 5,000 official condoms distributed to athletes during the Beijing Olympics are finding their way to the auction block November 29 for…ahem…hard core collectors. The bidding price for the condoms, in special packages printed with “faster, higher, stronger,” (the Olympic motto), will start at 1RMB. Officials believe that most of the condoms were not in fact used, but taken home by participants as souvenirs - let’s hope these are the ones up for bid.

    Extra! Extra! Bird's Nest bills, home improvement extortion letters, and the Chongqing corruption trials

    • In an effort to plug the gaping money hole the Bird’s Nest stadium has turned into after the Olympics, CITIC Investment Holdings has given up its management rights to the Chinese government. We wonder what’ll happen if even the government thinks it’s 200,000RMB a day upkeep is too expensive to handle. [AFP]
    • An author details the slight craziness that comes with renovating an apartment in China (Dalian for him). After the carpentry and wiring were done and the workers paid, the extortion letters came. And after those threats were paid off too, what did they happen to find but another letter - this one a thank you note. [New York Times]
    • In case you want a long, but incredibly thorough, write up of what’s been happening in the massive Chongqing Corruption trials, here’s one from China Brief about how the whole matter exposes “grave woes in China’s legal apparatus.” [China Brief]

    Obama's half-brother writes semi-fiction book about abusive dad

    U.S. President Barack Obama’s China-residing half-brother, Mark Okoth Obama Ndesandjo, has now launched his first novel, “Nairobi to Shenzhen.” in Guangdong province. The book is “semi-autobiographial” and about his life rather than that of his slightly more famous kin.

    No Sharks for Yao Ming

    Oh no, it looks like Yao Ming hasn’t bought the Shanghai Sharks after all. Instead, all they’ve signed on to be is an “entrusted investor” for the next five years. Despite agreeing in July to transfer stakes in the Sharks to Yao, it seems that those stakes will now be sold on the open market. But those who worry that this just means even more disappointments for Sharks fans needn’t: Yao has said that even though he’s not the owner, he’ll be doing everything he can to improve the team’s performance.

    Google Pollution Maps of China

    A blogger out of Fujian has compiled an open-source google map that places major pollution sites around china. While similar sources have existed in the past, this is the first one that allows other users to contribute sites with pollution problems. The map, which was created by Guo Baofeng, has attracted a lot of interest on Chinese BBS' and Forums: check it out while you still can, because you never know when it could suddenly disappear.

    Syphilis boom fueled by richer migrant workers

    The Chinese economy boom has helped increase numbers of both great and not-so-great things. On one hand, you've got rising literacy rates, development and internet penetration. On the other hand, you also get more pollution, city overcrowding and... syphilis. According to the World Health Organization, cases of the STD are now growing by 30% a year, and it's all because of migrant workers who now make enough money to hire more prostitutes. All the more reason to take up Zhang Feng's proposal and give them sex toys, eh?

    Counterfeit money crackdown uncovers over 1 Billion RMB

    Police have succeeded in breaking records for confiscating more counterfeit money than ever before. Since the crackdown was announced in January, over 280 people have been arrested, 190 cases involving counterfeit money have been cracked, and over 1 billion yuan has been confiscated.

    Singapore's Lee Kuan Yew pisses off Chinese netizens

    While his son, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong has been busy meeting up with former US President George Bush, Singapore's ever so feisty and sprightly 86 year old Minister Mentor1 Lee Kuan Yew has gone halfway around the globe to meet US President Barack Obama in Washington ahead of his debut Asian tour that will include China, Japan, South Korea and Singapore. Lee's tour also saw him meeting two key Cabinet members of the Obama administration - Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.

    Around Shanghai: Yabi, sailors and robots galore!

    • We've found a mascot uglier than Haibao: Yabi, who represents the 2010 Taipei International Flora Expo. And the two of them standing together kind of looks like a turd floating in water. [CRI English]
    • Hellooooo sailor, Fleet Week's here - U.S. Coast Guard cutter "Rush" is now throwing its uniformed men onto our shores. [CNN Go]
    • Wanna see robot butlers, robot cooks, robot nurses and robot teachers? Check out the China International Industry Fair, which has come to the Shanghai New International Expo Center and lasts until Saturday. [Shanghai Daily]

    Shanghai Disneyland: Ministry sanctions and land acquisions

    After years of back and forth, it looks like Shanghai Disneyland has been given the go-ahead. According to news sources, the Shanghai Municipal Government Informatin offices announced the deal's approval early this morning. While details still have to be worked out between the mouse and the ministries, it seems like a pretty set deal.

    Extra! Extra! Giant Maos, Taiwanese gay parades, and <em>more</em> internet controls?

    • Changsha sculptors are carving a giant 100-foot-tall statue of Mao ZeDong out of granite, but many are complaining it doesn't look like Mao. Netizens say it reminds them of the Sphinx while one British paper has drawn a comparison to Lord Byron. [Telegraph]
    • Even more than wanting to see the pictures from Taiwan's largest gay parade ever, you probably want to hear what Chinese netizen reactions were on it. Lucky we have Chinasmack, eh? [Chinasmack]
    • Get to know a little more about the "Father of Chinese Aerospace" (aka "Rocket King") Qian xuesen, who helped launch the P.R.C.'s missile program after, ironically, leaving the U.S. over accusations of having Communist ties. He passed away this weekend. [Wall Street Journal]

    China finds yet another way to frustrate WoW players

    According to a statement released by Netease earlier today, the General Administration of Press and Publication has suspended government approval for their operating World of Warcraft. As if WoW players didn't have enough problems earlier this year, the GAPP cited “gross violations of regulations” as the reason behind suspending NetEase’s operating rights to the massively popular online game.

    Shanghai's top eight scenic spots: It's official

    With the Expo approaching, Shanghai is quickly become more and more official, with roads being paved, mandatory uniforms for taxi drivers, and even rules guiding citizens' subway etiquette, just to name a few of the changes. To keep the changes rolling, the names of Shanghai's official top eight scenic spots have been announced by the Shanghai Tourism Administration, selected from over 1500 suggestions from city dwellers.

    Chinese lottery winners or....superheros?!?

    This is probably one of our favorite Chinese traditions so far: apparently lottery winners, in order to conceal their identities from the populous, dress up in costumes when receiving their fake oversized media checks. This has been going on for a while, and netizens have begun to give awards for the best costumes on Chinese forum sites. It's kind of like a taste of Halloween year round!

    Cold Front almost over already

    Shanghaiist has spent the past few days bundled up inside to avoid the front that has chilled our city virtually overnight. Good news, though: temperatures are supposed to rise to 20 degrees Celsius tomorrow, and should be even warmer by the weekend. It'll be as if this cold spell never really happened, right?

    How to address the problem of black taxis?

    How do you effectively carry out the "remediation of civilization?" was a serious question at yesterday's Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) in Shanghai. We've got a couple ideas, but what Han Zheng and his consorts were trying to say was actually "how do you curtail the illegal activity of black cabs?", which has become a serious issue in the past few weeks.

    Extra! Extra! Man-made snow, reeducation camps, and the TVCC tower

    • Beijing had its earliest snowfall in a decade and - of course - it was because the Weather Modification Office decided to work its magic again, spraying clouds with 186 doses of silver iodide. It was to ease drought. [BBC]
    • While labor reeducation camps may have been de rigueur a couple decades ago, now it's kind of embarrassing to admit you have them around. Unfortunately, China has them around. [France24]
    • Oh really? NOW China is planning to repair that TVCC tower that was gutted by fire eight months ago. NOW. Allegedly, the building can "be repaired" and it won't be a "complete rebuilding." [WSJ]

    Paraplegics sue railway ministry for handicap rights

    We've caught ourselves thinking about the difficulties of being disabled in China on many occasions: a significant amount of city spaces and public transport are simply handicapped-unfriendly. Besides the occasional beggar, you rarely see disabled people in public, which is probably thanks to the many social factors constraining handicapped people. But at a very basic level, it's more troubling to think of the difficulties a set of stairs are for someone incapable of using them and the effect it would have on both their ability to travel and their quality of life.

    Report: Shanghai Disneyland almost a done deal (again)

    With the recent news about Beijing giving Disneyland Shanghai the go ahead, it looks like it's only a matter of time before the mouse lands in town. After a recent meeting of the City's International Business Leaders Advisory Council, Mayor Han Zheng declared that a decision could be announced as early as next week. But between the lines, we all know that's code for unequivocal approval, right? After all, it's not like the Shanghai government would announce a greenlight on Disneyland and then snatch it away last minute. Oh wait.

    iPhone now in China, whoop de doo.

    So the iPhone was finally launched in China after much rumor mongering and fanfare and... well, it seems like most everyone who wanted an iPhone already has one. While the launch party in Beijing was a rousing success, actual first day sales were nowhere near as wild as in the U.S. or Japan. About what you could expect, we guess, from a crippled product (no WiFi) that came months and months after it was released elsewhere. Especially if it has turned out to be actually more expensive than its gray market brethren.

    Annual disposable income increases by 8% in Shanghai

    Despite fears of the great economic recession destroying China's economy with the rest of the world, the average disposable income for Shanghai residents rose 8% since last year to 21,871RMB per person. That only counts for city residents, but even those not lucky enough to have the right hukou have still seen their annual salary raise: the average income for city dwellers is 15,051 RMB, which is 4.4% higher than last year. We've got some ideas, but what do you think all that extra pocket cash is being spent on?

    Shanghaiist compiles some of the more popular features and news pieces we collected during the month of October. Take a gander back and enjoy!

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    Editor: Elaine Chow
    Founding Editor: Dan Washburn
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