Paralympics - changing attitudes in China [Radio Netherlands] "It's money well spent, but China's own 83 million disabled people no doubt find it more important not to be discriminated against any more by the rest of society, or to be stared at as if they were circus freaks."Woman who stripped during Paralympic opening mentally ill [AFP] "A woman who burst into the Beijing Paralympics opening ceremony and tried to remove her clothes was mentally ill,......

There are some blogging contests currently going on that Shanghaiist readers might be interested in: Best China Blogs (which has monetary rewards), the Asia Blog Awards and China's First Annual Original Videolog Contest.If, like this local "amateur model", you plan on stealing 24 items from the Zara on Nanjing Xi Lu, don't forget to cut out the smaller security magnets hidden inside the items in addition to the larger more obvious ones.Jackie Chan, Nicole Kidman,......

"Minor axis of evil" -- an elliptical (pun intended) statement by which we really mean China consorts with terrorists. Yes folks, this is what the US State Department spokesman implied through his comments regarding Iran's presence at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) meeting. According to this spokesman, inviting Iran over casts doubt on the SCO's self-proclaimed mission of combating terrorism and extremism in the region. What's worse is that we are showing films from that......

By now most of you know that the reason you are working this weekend is not because of a wrathful God but because the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) is having a big ol' conference in Pudong. However, because of various transportation, security and aesthetic concerns (yes, your silk pajamas) the government is implementing measures that are sure to be a nuisance and inconvenience to many. Here's what we've heard thus far: • A reader who......

Not that you needed reminding, but the World Cup kicks off in about four hours. That means you have less than four hours to join Shanghaiist's World Cup Challenge -- it's free and it should be fun. (There are 37 entries so far. It is our opinion that "Shanghai Cooperation Organization" would be a great name for an entry ... and it's still available ... although it may be too many letters ... find out......

Someone just sent us this joke (in Chinese) about the upcoming Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Summit in Shanghai. The rough translation is: A Real Shanghai The SCO Summit will be held in Shanghai in June 2006. There are 20 minutes left before the start the meeting but none of the country leaders are here. The journalists are waiting. President Nie of the SCO Summit Committee started dialing numbers: “Where is Putin?!” “Mr. Putin is on......

• .. .train tickets have changed every-so-slightly? In a move to make the process more friendly to visitors from abroad, train stations are now printing the departure and destination city names in English, just below the original Chinese. Since the departure time and car/seat numbers are written in the other international language (numbers), the only thing left to fully interpret a ticket is the bottom/middle/top character on sleeper train tickets. • ... the city government......