Explosions are certainly at the forefront of today's news. Wednesday night six buses and a truck were destroyed when as many as 16 liquid petroleum gas tanks exploded at a refueling station in Harbin. No fatalities resulted from the blasts, which are said to have been caused by the refueling ineptitude of one of the local bus operators. more ›

At about 2pm today, the Shanghai Telecom Building on Wusheng Road near People's Square caught fire and cased an explosion, killing four people. From Shanghai Daily: "Rescue efforts are continuing in the Shanghai Telecom Building at 333 Wusheng Road, according to the Shanghai TV breaking news. More then 10 fire engines have arrived at the scene. The area has been cordoned off to traffic. The fire reportly broke out around 2pm but smoke was trapped in the building and failed to cause alarm on the outside, witnesses said. The fire was put out by 3pm and its cause is immediately unknown." more ›

Around 5:30pm on Thursday afternoon an explosion occurred at Shanghai Jie Pai Ke Engineering Company (上海捷派克工程公司) in Shanghai’s Pudong Distict, injury a group of workers who were in a nearby company vehicle. The blast resulted in seven workers seriously injured, with four of them receiving burns on over 95% of their bodies. The four workers are currently in intensive care at Changhai Hospital. The cause of the explosion is still being investigated. more ›

As the death toll from a mine explosion this weekend in Heilongjiang rose to 104, relatives of miners killed have begun to protest outside of the mine entrance. Though China's Coal industry has gotten safer (only 1,175 people died in mines in the first half of this year, down nearly twenty percent from last year), the constant reoccurrence of deaths from poor safety conditions is nothing more than a tragic leitmotif. more ›

• Grameen China & Alibaba’s True Ambition [CNReviews] "Grameen Trust of Bangladesh and Alibaba Group just announced the launch of the Grameen China initiative, that will be run by the Grameen Trust, with an initial charitable gift of $5 million from Alibaba Group. The New York Times highlighted this gift as a sign of a shift by Chinese corporations toward charitable giving… While altruism may be a motivating factor, Alibaba also stands to gain unique insights into serving the very poor by partnering with the Grameen Trust. I believe that this announcement represents an important strategic thrust-not just corporate philanthropy-that belies Alibaba’s intention to be the dominant B2B trading platform serving small and medium sized businesses (SMB/SMEs) globally."
• Can China's Economic Recovery Last? [Newsweek] "In response to the economic crisis, China deployed massive fiscal boosts, aggressive expansions of credit, foreign-exchange interventions, and tax rebates for the export sector. The short-term results have been impressive. The Asian Development Bank projects China's GDP to grow by 8.2 percent in 2009 and 8.9 percent in 2010—up significantly from forecasts made earlier in the year. The result: job creation. As The New York Times pointed out last week, the image of workers streaming back into Chinese factories stands in sharp contrast to the United States, where the unemployment rate continues to march toward double digits. During this week's G20 summit in Pittsburgh, China will have more weight to throw around on everything from climate change to macroeconomic imbalances. How should we interpret China's swift recovery from the financial crisis and what it means for the future? Here the consensus breaks down into different camps."
• "The Chinese people have stood up": The famous Mao slogan, that he never even used [SCMP] "The slogan is a manifesto of the "Chinese dream", which aims to bring back the power and prosperity that the country had historically enjoyed. The propaganda machine has created many slogans in the past six decades, but this is one of the few that struck, and remain in, the hearts of ordinary people… Yet there is one problem. Mao did not say it in Tiananmen Square. He did not say it on October 1, 1949, either. And some historians say that - like "Let them eat cake", which Marie Antoinette never said, and "Play it again, Sam", which Humphrey Bogart never said - Mao never said the quote attributed to him."

Shanghaiist contributor Maggie Rauch had quite a startle today when an explosion destroyed a restaurant close to her in downtown Beijing this morning. more ›

Around 6:30PM this last Saturday, a sudden explosion rocked the fourth floor of an apartment building on Chengzhong East Road in the Qingpu district. more ›

This just in, from Xinhua: more ›

This news just in from Shanghai Daily:

FIVE workers were injured in an explosion at a demolished building near Shanghai's landmark Jin Mao Tower in Pudong New Area this morning, Eastday.com reported. more ›

They say bad news travels fast. That Pudong gas blast we told you about on Saturday has made it to international news. The Associated Press, Reuters, the International Herald Tribune, BBC, Times of India, ABC (Australia) all reported on the blast. more ›

This morning at 7.50am, an explosion occurred at a China Petroleum gas station located on the cross junction of Yanggao Nanlu and Pusan Lu (杨高南路、浦三路口) in Pudong. Two died on the spot, two died on the way to hospital, two remain seriously injured, and many more are injured. As a result of the blast, a metal tank was displaced 50 meters, the cars that were parked nearby were damaged, and glass windows in several neighbouring office and residential apartments were shattered. Was any Shanghaiist in the neighbourhood? more ›

More than a dozen prominent Singapore celebrities have come out in support of a new parliamentary petition to repeal Section 377A in the city-state's Penal Code which outlaws “acts of gross indecency” between men by appearing in a Youtube video uploaded recently. more ›

Shanghaiist usually waits until Friday to update you on this weekend's live shows, but this week we decided to actually get something in a timely manner (actually we are going to Beijing for the Pop Festival so will be partying way too hard to write this later). Yuyintang, those stalwart music promoters, are back with a show tonight (Thursday) at the Zendai Moma out in Pudong. If this morning's weather holds out it should be a great night to make the schlep out to the boonies and catch Norwegian, brit-popish band, Flare and Shanghai based Boys Climbing Ropes. We have also heard from various sources that 2nd Hand Rose will be in town playing at some sort of art function tonight. more ›

Starting 4:51pm today, Shanghaiist will set aside his blogging, crane his neck out the window, look heavenwards, and try to feel connected to the universe and discover his cosmic purpose. (And we invite you to put aside all the mundane affairs of daily life and join us in this spiritual exercise, wherever you are.) For that, according to the Shanghai Observatory, is exactly when the first phase of tonight's lunar eclipse will start. It is expected to last 3 hours and 33 minutes. more ›

There's been lots of explosions around China this week it seems, all kinds of explosions. The video here, sent in by a netizen to 56.com, shows a fire which broke out in a cinema in Hunan Province's Hengyang city. Only one person was killed, the cinema's on-duty manager. Meanwhile Reuters tells us of a nightclub blast which killed 25 and injured 33 in Benxi, Liaoning. In yet another freak accident, a 22-year-old Chinese man died when his mobile phone battery exploded due to the summer heat. The brand of the mobile phone has not been disclosed and this is understood to be the very first mobile phone explosion death in China. more ›

Sichuan food addicts beware! China’s food safety inspectors have found some startling news (well, actually it’s not that startling at all, as you can see here, here, and here), 13% of recently tested chili products have been found to be unsafe. The reason for the health concern is too much preservatives and improper labeling. more ›

RIP Wulihe Stadium of Shenyang. Built in 1989, this stadium is best known for being the place where China qualified for the World Cup Finals by beating Oman 1-0 in October 2001. It was razed to the ground in a little over six seconds on Feb. 12, 2007. more ›

Texas is thawing, the Northeast is freezing, and a sort of natural order seems almost restored to the Ist-A-Verse. Almost. more ›

• Rumor: Chinese Xbox 360 in "next few months" - Joystiq
  Microsoft is in talks with Chinese internet providers and government ministries for a possible Chinese New Year launch.
  (tags: Microsoft Xbox360 games gaming internet computers China)
• Foreigners working in Shanghai might get new government health care service
  The city government is considering offering health insurance to foreigners working in Shanghai, alleviating problems for those whose work does not offer health insurance or who are temporarily unemployed.
  (tags: healthinsurance China Shanghai health hospital medical foreigners)
• Stores to close during Metro work -- Shanghai Daily | 上海日报 -- English Window to China News
  Stores in the Xujiahui stop maybe closed for as long as a year.
  (tags: Xujiahui Shanghai metro subway stops fashion stores construction)
• Police net heroin and suspects after stakeout -- Shanghai Daily | 上海日报 -- English Window to China News
  One kilogram of high-grade heroin seized in Minhang. There are going to be some pissed off junkies out there tonight.
  (tags: heroin minhang drugs shanghai police)
• Fears over culture survey -- Shanghai Daily | 上海日报 -- English Window to China News
  Chinese people are turning their back on Chinese! English more popular than Chinese among students! The soul of China is the David fighting against the merciless Goliath of Western cultural imperalism!
  (tags: Shanghai China english culture west language learning)
• Winter is the season when the "tree barbers" get to work
  You've probably noticed people cutting off branches of the trees along the side of the road.
  (tags: trees Shanghai winter)
• Explosion at hotel, several injured, journalists and bystanders attacked.
  Gas leak causes explosion in Shanghai. Journalists attempting to report are harrassed, attacked. One bystander, an old man, also gets slapped up by hotel staff.
  (tags: hotel shanghai explosion media journalists)
• Shanghai residents earned most in 2006
  "Shanghai residents' salaries rose by 7.7 percent on average in 2006, ranking at the top of all Chinese cities in terms of salary growth."
  (tags: shanghai china salaries income)
• All Roads Lead To China » Are Chinese Exporter’s Really Suffering?
  "What the author failed to consider is the fact that a hat manufacturer has little in terms of barriers to entry, lots of competitors, and with 4 million units sold, I would have a hard time believing they are able to convince anyone to pay more than a co
  (tags: china export exporters yuan RMB)
• Pacific Epoch - Popular Blogging Actress To Launch E-magazine
  "Chinese actress, director and blogger Xu Jinglei will release a biweekly electronic magazine called Kai La, reports Shanghai Youth Daily quoting Xu's agent Liu Xuan."
  (tags: china internet blog blogging xujinglei)
• Quake prompts tsunami fears -- Shanghai Daily
  "A TINY tsunami lapped Shanghai's coastal areas on Saturday night after a massive earthquake off Japan trigged fears of tidal waves across the Pacific." Tiny tsunami?
  (tags: china shanghai weather tsunami earthquake)
• Provincial bigwig gets death, two-year reprieve -- Shanghai Daily
  "A FORMER high-ranking provincial official in east China's Anhui Province has been sentenced to death for corruption, according to media reports."
  (tags: china anhui corruption)

We just watched this episode of Mythbusters on the Discovery Channel and thought you might get a kick out of it. Thank God for YouTube. Here's the official description: more ›

At least that's what celeb writer Yu Qiuyu (余秋雨) said at a recent public function. From Slate Indiaenews.com we found this report: more ›

An explosion at Chinese chemical plant -- no, not that one -- will not affect Shanghai's water supply ... so say the ever-reliable "local authorities." The blast occurred Thursday at the Jiangdu Chemical Plant, near Yangzhou in Jiangsu province, which neighbors Shanghai, and straddles the Yangtze River, the source of much of Shanghai's water. more ›

A bomb exploded Monday in a bus in Fuzhou, capital of Fujian Province. Reuters is reporting 31 wounded. They didn't mention any deaths -- save for the one inferred death ... it's been labeled a "suicide" bombing -- and no deaths would be remarkable, considering the images from the scene. The alleged bomber was a 42-year-old farmer with terminal lung cancer. Reuters said the bomb was home made: more ›

The Associated Press is reporting that heat caused a steel container full of liquid ammonia on the back of a truck to explode Tuesday in Nanhui District, sending 60 people to the hospital. By late Tuesday, however, only three people remained hospitalized. While the AP says 100 people were injured by the blast, Shanghai Daily puts the number at 65 -- and says the injuries were caused by three separate explosions, the worst being the one in Nanhui that occured at 12:30 p.m. The paper also said a talcum powder container exploded at Shanghai Xiangmao Co., Ltd., a Jinshan District factory with a "troubled history." Four workers were burned, some on as much as 30 percent of their body. A similar explosion at the plant injured 10 on June 20. The day's other accident occured at 6 a.m. at the intersection of Wuyuan Lu and Wukang Lu. A gas pipe explosion sent two people to the hospital. more ›