Like all football connoisseurs, Shanghaiist loves nothing better than a good derby. Games like Feyenoord v Ajax where travelling supporters are banned. The sheer evil of Rangers v Celtic. The Latin heat of Real Madrid v Athletic Madrid. The Manchester United v Liverpool grudge match. The Superclásico of Boca Juniors v River Plate. And Shanghai Shenhua v Inter Shanghai lacked the history but not passion before one half upped sticks and moved to Xi'an. But......

The International Herald Tribune has a great new article entitled Shanghai: The allure of individualism which explores the rising trend of young Chinese designers setting up shop to sell their own stuff. And they are not cheap.The New York Philharmonic has just left Shanghai for Beijing on its Asian tour that also includes Hong Kong and Taiwan and a landmark concert in Pyongyang. The New York Times talks about the disappointment of principal oboist Wang......

Our second show for the day is the critically acclaimed documentary Seoul Train (featured on PBS) which offers a look at the estimated 250,000 North Korean refugees living underground in China today, who have braved untold dangers to escape a food and humanitarian crisis that has claimed the lives of 3 million back home. The camera follows several groups of North Korean refugees, some have chosen to forcibly make their way past the gates of......

Yen Falls as BOJ's Fukui Says No Preset Time for Rate Increase [Bloomberg] The yen fell against all 16 of the most-active currencies as Bank of Japan Governor Toshihiko Fukui said there was no set time for raising interest rates.Survey shows Singapore is Asia's most desirable city to live in [Channel News Asia] According to the latest Country Brand Index, Singapore is the top Asian city to live in. It was also ranked third globally......

Live Bar has always been open to different genres of music, and of late, seems to be the venue of choice for Chinese folk, metal and student bands. Friday night they will host one of China's most popular nu-metal bands, Twisted Machine. Any fan of metal should not miss this show, a great chance to see what Chinese metal has to offer. On the other side of town, up'n'coming indie rockers, Yuguo will play an......

Burma junta holds rally, arrests 4 activists [AP] On Saturday, the Burmese junta organized a mass rally in Rangoon to denounce Western powers and the foreign media, whom the military regime accuses of fomenting the recent protests. Officials said 120,000 people attended the event, some of whom were paid to be there. Among some of the slogans the crowds were made to chant include "Down with BBC! Down with VOA! Down with Radio Free Asia!"Singapore's......

We just received news that North Korea has expressed its intention to attend the Shanghai World Expo in 2010. How exciting is that, people! Having attended the World Expo in Hanover in 2000, we just wonder what wonderful propaganda awaits us at the DPRK pavilion in 2010! So we looked up Youtube and found this clip which we thought would be a fantastic example of what would be shown at the North Korean pavilion. Leo......

A crack opens in the Korean wall [Asia Times] The big question on the opening Tuesday of the North-South Korean summit in Pyongyang was whether or not North Korean leader Kim Jong-il would condescend to welcome South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun in person, or whether he would delegate that ceremonial chore to his much lower-ranking No 2. Myanmar's neighbours have little influence: Singapore FM [AFP] Myanmar's neighbours have little influence over internal developments there, said......

Selangor, Malaysia - Malaysia Finds Water Basin the Size of Singapore [Bloomberg] Malaysia has discovered an underground water basin as big as Singapore, dismissing fears that its most densely populated state Selangor will run out of water in three years, a government minister said. Islamabad, Pakistan - Deal reached for release of S. Korean hostages [Washington Post] Negotiators in Afghanistan said Tuesday they had reached agreement on a deal that will allow 19 South Korean......

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia - Student comes under fire for rap video of Malaysia's national anthem An ethnic Chinese Malaysian student has enraged ministers and the man in the street alike with his allegedly seditious rap video of the Malaysian anthem. In the video, he raps about racial discrimination against the Chinese, corrupt cops and indolent civil servants, most of whom are Malay. He does so against the Malaysian flag, with the Negaraku melody playing in......

Pyongyang, North Korea - Two Koreas to hold first summit in seven years South Korea's President Roh Moo-Hyun and North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il will meet in Pyongyang from August 28-30 -- their first summit in seven years to promote lasting peace on the peninsula, divided for 60 years by minefields and barbed wire. Kabul, Afghanistan - Taliban offer women hostages for female Afghan prisoners The Taliban said Tuesday they were willing to swap women......

Kabul, Afghanistan - Second South Korean hostage killed The second hostage among a group of 23 South Koreans to be kidnapped by the Taliban has been shot to death, and the bullet-ridden body of 29 year old Sim Sungmin has been found by Afghan police. Qari Yousef Ahmadi, a Taliban spokesman, has said that the militants would "kill more hostages if the Afghanistan government does not release prisoners by noon on Wednesday". Mumbai, India......

Kabul, Afghanistan - Taliban militia kidnap 23 South Korean Christians Taliban gunmen have threatened to kill a group of 23 South Korean Christians on a relief mission unless Seoul pulls out its 200 troops from Afghanistan. Already, the pastor of the group has been shot and tossed on the highway to Kandahar. Latest news from the AP suggest some of the hostages have been released. Reverend Park Eun-jo of the Saemmul Presbyterian Church has apologized......

For most of the day yesterday, we here at Shanghaiist were wondering if we should post anything about the horrific mass shooting at Virginia Tech, a university in the United States. On the surface, the answer should have been an easy "no" — Blacksburg, Virginia, is nowhere near Shanghai. But news started to trickle in about the suspected killer: He was Asian, possibly Chinese. And then, yesterday morning, Chicago Sun-Times columnist Michael Sneed posted a......

Like many people, Shanghaiist ducked out of the country for a few days over the October 1 holiday. We didn’t go far: just across the water to Seoul. The South Korean capital is an impressive city. In fact, we’d argue that it’s highly underrated as a holiday destination. It was so enjoyable that we weren’t quite ready to leave -- even the clean, cosmopolitan Incheon International Airport, laden with Burger King and the like (hint,......

Manchester City become the latest big European club to swing by China, as more fat cat chairmen attempt to stuff a slice of the lucrative East Asian football market pie in their already obese and money-obsessed faces. The English Premier League side take on Shanghai Shenhua on Friday night in the 2006 Shanghai International Football Tournament. Last summer, everybody who was anyone in the glitzy world of European football embarked on an Asian tour, fuelled......

Since the renminbi was un-pegged from the U.S. dollar on July 21st of last year, very little has been seen or heard of the yuan and the mysterious "basket of currencies" from which the bank now determines its trading value. The renminbi, allowed to trade only within 0.3 percent of a mid-point fixed daily by the central bank, has been gaining ground on the sawbuck since that time. As of today, Reuters reports that the......

Supposedly the hit show managed a meager rating of 0.5 during its run on Chinese television late last month. Other shows had averaged ratings of 3.0 to 4.0 in the same spot. Some blamed the failure on the time slot, 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. every night of the week. (Three episode blocks were shown until the entire first season aired.) Some blamed the editing Chinese censors did to the content. Others blamed the Chinese......

Shanghaiist headed over to Xujiahui Park last weekend to meet French artist Patricia Peides, who is visiting Shanghai to participate in the first Shanghai International Biennial Urban Sculpture Exhibition, part of the 2005 Shanghai Art Fair. This four-month long exhibition features nearly 300 sculptures by 70 artists from China, England, France and the United States, aiming to improve the image of public art in Shanghai. Thirty-five sculptures are on display in Xujiahui Park, while the......

Admitted Luddite and one-time Shanghaiist contributor Paul French sent Shanghaiist, and several others, this email recently (or, knowing Paul, he had his secreatry send it). We thought we'd share: When I spoke recently to the FCC about North Korea, a number of you -- mostly Americans -- asked about getting into North Korea. American citizens were last allowed in in 2002. However, it appears you (and anyone else, excepting Japanese and South Korean citizens) may......