CCTV-9 news anchor Rui Chenggang should be happy now. Finally, a store that serves not just coffee but traditional Chinese beverages like tea too! After all, Rui was the wonderful guy who sparked it all off with a post on his blog which said that having a Starbucks in the Forbidden City, "is not globalising, but trampling Chinese culture". The coffee chain is "a symbol of low-end US food culture presence" which "undermines the Forbidden City's solemnity' and is 'an insult to Chinese civilisation". His vitriol attracted half a million hits within two days, and eventually led to the ousting of Starbucks from the Forbidden City. more ›

Eugene Nelson, who works for Intel in Dupont, WA, was supposed to board a plane from Hong Kong to Taiwan. Instead, he got on the plane to Taiyuan. It then took him an astounding five days to get home, as he only had American Express (hasn't he seen those Visa commercials?) on him and could not withdraw cash from ATM machines because they were not "foreign enabled". One would think that would be the end of the story. One would think that Eugene Nelson would have liked to keep his idiocy below the radar. more ›