Results tagged “thenewyorktimes”

We've all been hearing reports about the nightmare caused by the snow, or what Xinhua calls "China's war on snow havoc", which isn't quite as felicitous a phrase as the "US War on Terror", but hey, at least it's more real! The New York Times, among other media outlets, talks about the sense of anger and resentment that people are feeling about what some consider as a lack of preparation on the government's part.

A China Daily report dated 14 December 2007 suggesting that Beijing may make a temporary exception for banned foreign publications such as Playboy and The Sun has travelled around the world and created a mini-furore and lots of confusion back home here. Here are the offending paragraphs:

All pornographic material is prohibited on the mainland but a temporary exception could be made for the Games, according to the biggest importer of foreign publications in the country. "Our law forbids Playboy and we should obey this, but we can't rule out the possibility that it might make its debut. There might be a demand for it (from athletes or visitors) during the Games," said Liang Jianrui, vice-president of China National Publications Import and Export Corporation, which will manage the nine magazine-selling kiosks sanctioned by Olympic organizers BOCOG during the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Continue reading "Will Playboy come to China?"

This story dated October 12, 1964 comes from Michael Manning who's blogging from Xinjiang in The Opposite End of China. He found it while fiddling around with the The New York Times Archive which now allows subscribers to access news reports from as far back as 1851. Interesting look into the China of the past and its geopolitics! How far we've come since the days of the cold war.

... and the rumor-mill is running in overdrive. Recent reports suggest that Shanghai Party Chief Xi Jinping's (习近平) recent entry into the race - apparently at senior leader Zeng Qinghong's (曾庆红) insistence - has shaken things up; forcing Hu Jintao to make some last-minute maneuvering.

The term 'food poisoning' is taken to the next level in China, with reports that not only have ingredients from China been killing pets, but have now killed up to 365 humans too. The New York Times reports that a safe additive used in cough syrup was substituted with diethylene glycol (an industrial solvent and a prime ingredient in anti-freeze) by Chinese companies. When exported from China, the syrup was labelled as 99.5 percent pure glycerin (a safe ingredient). It passed over three continents without being quality tested, and arrived in Panama to be used in cough medicine. Most of the victims have been children, unwittingly poisoned by their parents.

Editor's Note: Sorry, forgot to send these out last night in our rush to get to the Sonic Youth show.

• Leading Chinese Enviro Activist Detained
  "In the meantime,here, from today’s Wall Street Journal, is another thing all those green minded local officials are doing: locking up irksome environmental activists"
• China to keep 2008 Olympics 'dry'
  "Beijing will use aircraft, missiles and cannons in what could amount to a massive umbrella over the city to keep athletes dry during next year's Olympics, state media reported on Friday."
• U.S. knew about China's anti-satellite test, chose not to act, says N.Y. Times
  "U.S. intelligence knew about preparations for January's test in China of an anti-satellite weapon but the U.S. government chose not to intervene because of insufficient leverage with Beijing, The New York Times reported on its Web site Sunday."
• Speeding, Overloading Blamed for Road Tragedy
  "The guardrails on each side of the bridge were only ten centimeters in height, far lower than the minimum height of 46 cm required by law, Li Yizhong, Minister of the State Administration of Work Safety (SAWS), said at the scene of the accident."
• Beijing to destroy its oldest Peking Opera house
  "The Guanghe Theatre, which sits in Beijing's historic Qianmen quarter, will meet the wrecking ball, making way for the capital's "remorseless" onslaught of modernisation, Xinhua news agency reported."
• Foreign banks offer tea,insurance to lure Chinese
  "For those Chinese rich enough to open an 80,000 yuan ($10,350) account, Citigroup Inc and Standard Chartered are now promising an alternative to the long queues at China's big state lenders."
• Doing business in China: Popular Shanghai restaurant falls prey to joint venture dispute
  "The lights at Renren Restaurant now are dim all the time. The once thriving cafe has fallen prey to a dispute between the Hong Kong company represented by Ho, a Canadian citizen, and its mainland Chinese partners, who want him out."
• Top 40 blogs according to Zhuaxia stats
  Chinese blogs. Keso is No. 1.
• China delays climate change plan indefinitely
  "China has delayed indefinitely its national 'action plan' on climate change, which was due to be released on Monday after exhaustive consultations among ministries in Beijing and provincial and local governments."
• Shanghai signboards call for Chinese
  "The all-English signboards are catering to a false admiration for anything Western. Some people tend to think it's a high-end shop if the name is written in a foreign language," said Huang Anjing, an editor of a local monthly journal, Yaowen Jiaozi.
• 9 Tough Tricks, and a Title for Shanghai
  "This year’s world bridge championships are in Shanghai beginning Sept. 29. And one week ago Shanghai won the Chinese Contract Bridge Association Open Teams championship, beating Qinggong in the 96-board final, 239 international match points to 211."
• Image damage
  "Xuhui District People's Court ... ordered the Shanghai Normal University to compensate 9,000 yuan (US$1,166) to Francesca Manganelli [who] said the institute used her photo without her agreement in an advertisement for student recruitment in June 2005."
• 非常真人's photo-comic blog
  "非常真人，非常娱乐 (Very Real People, Very Entertaining) is a blog that posts short, amusing photo-comics of every day life in Beijing."
• China Yields to Inquiry on Pet Food
  "China .. has given American regulators permission to enter the country to investigate whether Chinese suppliers exported contaminated pet food ingredients to the [US] earlier this year, leading to one of the largest pet food recalls in American history."
• China aims to further tame Web
  "Chinese President Hu Jintao on Monday launched a campaign to rid the country's sprawling Internet of 'unhealthy' content and make it a springboard for Communist Party doctrine, state television reported." This happens every week, no?
• China molten steel tragedy highlights lax industry
  "Lax safety measures, unsuitable equipment and 'chaotic' conditions have been blamed for the deaths of 32 steel workers engulfed in molten metal, Chinese investigators announced, warning that such failings were common."
• Letter from Beijing: Enemy of the State
  "Jianguo was arrested and tried in the summer of 1999, and I remember with perfect clarity the moment I learned what had happened."

The New York Times Magazine has an interesting story about General Tso's Chicken, probably the most famous "Hunanese" dish that most people from Hunan Province (or anywhere else in Mainland China, for that matter) have never heard of:

Just days after The New York Times gave us its take on budget travel in Shanghai, AskMen.com offers up its own tips for those without such limited funds. The concept here is interesting: what is a good way to spend US$10,000 in a weekend in Shanghai? And why not? According to writer Scott Mills:

Today we came across The New York Times' latest installment of its "Frugal Traveler" series , and this time Matt Gross writes about our fair city of Shanghai. We will preface this post by saying it is an interesting and generally well-informed guide to spending a weekend in China, with good recommendations, although not much "off the beaten path." But, Shanghaiist wonders, does The New York Times know the meaning of the word "frugal?"

As you can see to the right, TIME's next cover is dedicated to China. Nothing wrong with that. "Already a commercial giant China is aiming to be the world's next great power," they say. "Will that lead to a confrontation with the U.S.?" Fine, as well. And what is the title of the cover story? You guessed it — "The Chinese Century." There's nothing wrong with the headline, we guess, other than the fact that it is grossly unoriginal (as we pointed out in the summer of 2005). Here's why:

Photo by 2 dogs taken from the Shanghaiist Contribute page. To see your photos on our Contribute page, use Flickr and tag your photos “shanghaiist”. Or you can email your photos to photos@shanghaiist.com and they will automatically appear on our site.

This is funny. ShanghaiDaily.com has stopped time-stamping its stories with the text "Beijing Time" because many news sources -- including several other state-owned papers -- assumed that Shanghai Daily had simply copied the information from a paper called the Beijing Time (there actually is a Chinese-language paper called the Beijing Times). (To the right, see an example from Sina.com, which, it seems, got the erroneous attribution from Xinhua.) The Shanghai Daily editor explains on his blog:

• Some random Google/China links we have come upon: "Google Is Destined To Fail In China" from ChinaTechNews.com; "How Much Did Google Agree to Censor?" from Google Blogscoped; "An Open Letter to Google" from Andrew Shieh; and "How to Outwit the World's Internet Censors" from The New York Times.
• The lift of the fireworks ban in Beijing is "redeeming people's excitement and appetite for the New Year." Meanwhile, at least 16 were killed and hundreds were injured in fireworks accidents over the weekend.
• The pandas the Mainland is trying to give to Taiwan have been given Chinese names that mean "reunion." Wonder how that will go over on the island.
• How many text messages will be sent in China during Spring Festival? If you guessed 5 billion ... you were off by 7 billion.
• Good news for Chinese women trying to keep their skin white: Less and less sunlight is hitting the country. This could be due to a haze caused by man-made pollution. Good thing China is building the world's first "artificial sun."
• Kashgar or bust! The days of the cross-country Chinese road-trip may not be too far away. "No other country can compete with China when it comes to the expansion speed of road building," brags Wang Yuanqing, a professor at the Highway College of Chang'an University in Xian. (Highway College graduates are always pompous asses.) We have to admit, the thought of RVs on Chinese roads scares the shit out of us.

• Continue reading "Extra! Extra! Super highways, pandas and more Google links"

That's China Daily's headline for this story, which they copied and pasted from its original source, U.S. News & World Report. The story, originally titled "The Shanghai High Life," is annoying and vapid and tells the story of Lily Wang, a "typical Shanghai yuppie." Or perhaps the author was trying to show that the life of a typical Shanghai yuppie is annoying and vapid?