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Shocking video of rollerblading teen getting rolled over by a bus

WARNING: This video contains graphic images that may not be suitable for everyone.

Via Youku Buzz: A teenager on rollerblades gets rolled over by a public bus running the red light on the west side of Tiananmen Square in Beijing and dies on the spot. Even more shocking than the accident itself is the highly harmonious handshake between the victim's father and the bus driver towards the end of the clip.

Previously on Shanghaiist
Video: Road accident in Shanghai caught live on camera

Good news for folk in China using an iPhone 3G from the States

If you have a US iPhone 3G and have been tempted by repeated reminders in iTunes to upgrade to the 2.2 version of the iPhone firmware, you may soon be able to give in to the temptation without fear of relocking your device to AT&T. The iPhone Dev Team has announced that they will be launching a software hack to unlock your 3G iPhone on New Year's Eve. This will allow you to upgrade your firmware and keep it unlocked for use in China or anywhere else with a GSM network for that matter.

If your happen to be going through Hanoi though, you might want to consider a more permanent solution to your iPhone woes. Check out this post in CNET that shows you how the Vietnamese unlock your iPhone. Kids, please don't try this at home.

For those of you who don't have an iPhone but secretly want one and don't mind paying a little more, you can buy an officially unlocked one from the Apple Hong Kong site if you have a Hong Kong address to send it to or buy one from Singapore where Singtel isn't legally allowed to lock the iPhone.

Chinese nationalism and indoctrination 101

If you've ever wondered how Chinese kids are being indoctrinated with nationalistic ~~bullshit~~ ideals from a young age, here's how. This video shows a class of elementary school students reciting a poem entitled 《2009中国加油》("2009, Go China!") written by their teachers on how a triumphant China is rising against earthquakes and the wiles of evil politicians like Nicolas Sarkozy in "pathetic Europe" with a successful Olympics, the launch of Shenzhou 7 and the "iron will" of its people. Watch it with the Chinese transliteration and English translation from China Digital Times after the jump, but be warned, this is spine-tingling and hair-raising stuff. We find it hard to think that teachers in cities like Shanghai or Beijing would make their kids do the same thing, but then again you never know.

2009, Go China!

Lead: Snowstorm, freely falling down to earth, like western values
Lead: Despair fills the sky, ice covers the earth

Lead: Did China retreat?
All: No. The Olympics were a success! We are victorious!
Lead: Hot blood and iron will of Chinese people, lighten up the dark world like burning the holy flame
All: The rivers and mountains, ever more colorful and beautiful

Lead: Earthquakes, shifting back and forth like the positions of Sarkozy, with his dirty tricks, trying to shake the great China
Lead: Did China retreat?
All: No. The Shenzhou-7 launched. We are victorious!
Lead: Pathetic Europe will never stop the insurmountable force of our great dynasty
All: Just the aftershocks from the earthquake would destroy France!

Lead: The happy flowers flourish in the oil fields on Tarim Basin
Lead: The suona [musical instrument] sings aloud in the Tawang district of the Himalayas
Lead: Historically accumulated resentment fill the Ryukyu Trench
All: Smiles in Sun Moon Lake became a miraculous flower in the Pacific Ocean

Lead: Do not waver, do not slow down, do not make big changes
Lead: Do not change the flag, Do not turn back
All: Step ruthlessly over all anti-China forces

Lead: The giant ship full of patches, raise up the brand new sail
All: Spirits are high, crash through the waves, the wind is at our back
Lead: 2009
All: Go China
Lead: 2009
All: China the Greatest

《2009，中国加油》
甲：大雪，像西方的价值观，自由的飘洒，
乙：漫天哀愁，一地冰碴 !

甲：中国退缩了吗？
全：没有！奥运成功了！我们胜利啦！
甲：炎黄坚毅的热血，如炽烈的圣火，燃烧灰暗的世界，
全：万里江山，又嵌上五彩的画夹！

甲：地震，像萨科奇的立场，用猥琐的伎俩，摇晃着巍巍中华。
甲：中国退缩了吗？
全：没有！神七飞天了！我们胜利啦！
甲：瘦瘦的欧罗巴，挡不住天朝的金戈铁马，
全：地震的余波也能把法兰西催垮！

甲：塔里木的石油盛开幸福之花，
乙：达旺的唢呐奏响在喜马拉雅。
甲：中山世土的积怨填平了琉球海沟，
全：日月潭的微笑成为太平洋的奇葩！

甲：不动摇、不懈怠、不折腾
乙：不改旗、不易帜、不回头
全：将反华者狠狠的踏在脚下

甲：打满补丁的大船，挂上崭新的桅帆
全：乘风破浪，意气风发！
甲：2009
全：中国加油
甲：2009
全：中国最大

Did ChinesePod steal The Radical Show?

Aric Queen, former executive producer of ChinesePod, writing from exile, appears to think so. Once upon a time, his friend Frank Fradella flew to Shanghai and approached ChinesePod with a pitch for a new show designed to teach foreigners how to recognise radicals [see video below]. He was told by the Shanghai startup that they didn't have the budget for the show and Fradella flew home a little dejected, but that was that.

Eight months later, ChinesePod released this video below as premium content for paying users [ripped by Aric and uploaded on Youtube]. Frank Fradella classifies the show as “Clearly Derivative, But Not Maliciously Stolen” after having spoken with John Pasden who hosts the below show. Aric,however, will have none of it and is convinced ChinesePod was guilty of stealing.

Read more here and here and make up your own mind about it.

'Kappa Girl' detained by Shanghai police

Ever since the 12 minute long sex video of 'Kappa Girl' started taking the Chinese interwebs by storm last month, police have been hard at work trying to uncover the origins of the video in a bid to stop the video from spreading further online. Well, the Shanghai PSB has now cracked the mystery — the person responsible for spreading the video was none other than 'Kappa Girl' herself. And police have since detained the young woman surnamed Huang for spreading obscene material online.

As screwed up as it is, all the jigsaw puzzle pieces in this story fit together. Soon after she became an internet sensation, 'Kappa Girl' started a blog to capitalise on her new found fame and to turn it into cold hard cash. In one of her posts, she announced that her rates would be RMB20,000 for a bar appearance, RMB50,000 for an underwear modelling assignment, RMB30,000 for an exclusive interview. It makes sense then, that 'Kappa Girl' would supply her video to anyone who asked for it so she could continue to fuel her own fame.

Another man from Hubei province (would that be 'Kappa Girl's co-star we wonder?) has also been suspected of spreading the video and Hubei police are currently trying to track him down.Related links
Shanghaiist: 'Kappa Girl' fired for sex video
China Daily: 'Porn star' detained for posting sex film on Internet
Shanghai Morning News: 上海kappa女自拍淫秽视频在网上传播被拘留
Huanqiu.com: 东楼kappa女被刑拘是罪有应得
Dahe.cn: kappa女没有“脱衣执照”

Face of the Day

Photo by Raymond Deng from the new collection 80 Portraits, 80 Homes.

More photos on 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 (and here).

China Tech Roundup: GFW gearing up for holiday season mischief, electric cars and the OPhone

The International Herald Tribune was all in a tizzy about its sister newspaper the New York Times being blocked in China last week in an article posted on Saturday. This comes after another article that they posted on the preceding Tuesday Olympics over, China said to be blocking Web sites again. According to China web watchers @fuzheado and @ullrich, the NYT had indeed been blocked in Beijing and Shanghai but was now working fine. We get the feeling that the good folk at the Golden Shield Project might just be messing with the NYT for the bad press the previous week.
Still in the arena of China cyber-policing, a website and an internet user were fined for posting details of a love triangle in which the "spurned wife" committed suicide. This IHT article comments that the landmark case sets a precedent for the cracking down on the online incitement of vigilantes. We have seen other cases of public justice exercised by Chinese netizens as in the case of Running Fan during the Sichuan Quake.
Chinese auto maker BYD has beaten many major international brands to the punch by announcing the mass production of the first plug-into-the-wall electric car. They say that this advancement is made possible due to the development of an iron battery that can be used 2000 times before degrading and can be fully charged in 20 minutes. Not to be outdone though, Engadget reports that an alliance of 14 US firms including 3M and Johnson Controls-Saft has been put together to bring the highly toxic battery manufacturing back to the US. The Engadget article quotes the Wall Street Journal that "More than four dozen advanced battery factories are being built in China but none, currently, in the U.S."
Lenovo and China Mobile in a bid to ride on the success of the iPhone and G1 have officially announced that they have reached an agreement to develop their own 3G, internet friendly handset called...wait for it... the OPhone. The "O" in OPhone stands for OPEN as it is based on the Open Mobile System we told you about earlier.

Image by Roger Wo

Photos: Shanghaiist Holiday Party at Cotton's on Xinhua Lu

Thanks to everyone who came out Saturday night to celebrate with us. And a special thanks to Cotton's, American Craft Beer Partners and, of course, Santa Claus for making it all possible. Happy Holidays!

Photos by Robofresh Productions. (For the Santa Claus portraits, click here.)

KFC Hong Kong serves food from the trash

This video, taken by a deliveryman with his cellphone at KFC's Yuen Long Plaza (元朗广场) outlet in Hong Kong, has been sending shockwaves throughout the territory of late. He recently blew the whistle by telling Hong Kong gossip rag Next Magazine 《壹週刊》 that staff at this outlet would frequently stop kitchen operations, throw away all leftover food, and start cleaning up before the restaurant closes so they can go home on time. During this time, if a customer walks in, employees will pick up the food from the trash and serve it to customers — and this is apparently all done with the consent of the restaurant manager so they can “avoid reheating the frying machine”.

Finger lickin' good eh? According to CSR-Asia, the "outrageous behaviour is said to have been the combined result of young workers not willing to stay long after the official business hours to clean up the kitchen because of the low wages, and the shop management’s demand to make their branch an 'A grade' one by saving costs." In other words, people, if you pay peanuts, you get monkeys. If this is what employees at KFC in Hong Kong are doing, we shudder to think what KFC employees on the mainland are capable of. More photos after the jump.

Photos from the Yes Boleh blog.

Video: Partying Henan style

The music in this video shot in rural Henan totally gave us a headache. Steven Lim of Youku Buzz couldn't quite make out whether this was a wedding or a funeral. Well, yeah, as we told you before, things can get pretty noisy and wild at Chinese funerals, with sexy strippers and paper condoms and what have you. Someone needs to fly these girls down to Shanghai and bring them to The Shelter. We're sure it'd be a RIOT.

Cafe bombed in Kunming

Scary news just in from our friends at GoKunming:

This morning at 10:30 the bustle of Wenhua Xiang's cafes and restaurants was violently interrupted by an explosion at Salvador's Coffee House.

We have spoken with Salvador's co-owner Colin Flahive several times since the explosion and he has confirmed that the explosion was set off by a man who had entered the restaurant with an explosive device.

Flahive said that none of the staff or customers present at Salvador's this morning were seriously injured and that the man with the explosive device had suffered serious injuries.

Few details about the incident are currently available. Salvador's has been sealed off by police, who have been investigating the scene since shortly after the explosion.

This is the first bombing attack in Kunming since the double bus bombings that killed two and injured 14 in June of this year.

According to a subsequent update by GoKunming, one man, possibly the one with the bomb, has died in hospital. Salvador's is an American-owned cafe that is popular among Kunming-based expats but we'll refrain from making any wild conjectures as to the motive of the bombing for now. Watch this space for more updates.

Photo of Salvador's Coffee House from Synotrip.

China's first face transplant recipient dead

Shanghai-based Canadian documentary photographer Ryan Pyle informs us:

It appears that Li Guoxing, the first recipient of a face transplant surgery in China as been confirmed dead. Li Guoxing received a face transplant surgery in 2006 from surgeon Guo Shuzhong in Xi'an, China. If you can remember Mr. Li, 30 years old when he had the surgery, had is face ripped off by a bear while hunting in rural Yunnan province where he lived in a small village community. Mr. Li's death, it has been said, was due to an infection because he wasn't taking prescribed immune-system drugs properly. Another report says he was favoring herbal medicines instead. No final report on the death will be available because Mr. Li has been buried for several months now, and no autopsy was completed.

Li Guoxing's surgery in 2006 was a ground breaking moment for Chinese surgery and something that I, as a photographer, was interested in covering. Although because I was a foreign journalist in China I was denied access to document Li Guoxing for almost a year after the surgery. In the summer of 2007 I was able to travel to Xi'an and, with Dr. Guo Zhuzhong's permission, follow Li Guoxing for a few days and document his life 1 year after the surgery. I had scheduled a visit to Mr. Li's village for 2009 to see how he was coping with his surgery in his natural environment, but that story won't be possible. Below is a link to the photo essay I shot of Li Guoxing when I visited the hospital in Xi'an in 2007. Above is a slide show of that essay.

More on Li's case from AFP. The world's first face transplant took place just three years ago in France on a woman who was mauled by a dog. Another one has been subsequently conducted on a European man with a genetic disorder. America's first near-total face transplant has been conducted recently in Cleveland.

Photos: Shanghaiist Santa portraits at Cotton's

Photos by Stephen Yang. Go here to download your high-resolution images. For prints and framed prints contact stephen.a.yang(@)gmail.com. More photos from the A Very Shanghai Christmas party presented by Shanghaiist and Cotton's coming soon!

Week Around the Ists

Torontoist exposed infamous local fiend Dimitri the Lover's new protégé, Pavel the Lover—a man who approaches underage girls, calls them "elegant," and passes them business cards asking them if they'd like to "swing on a star."
SFist was disheartened to hear that Equality California's executive director refused to attend next month's inauguration due to Barack Obama's regrettable decision to have anti-gay and prop-Prop 8 pastor Rick Warren deliver the invocation, but perked up when attorney general and former (and future?) CA Governor Jerry Brown said that same-sex marriage ban Prop 8 was invalid.
Bostonist interviewed Jamie Sneider, a comedian who likes to be naked and checked out the action at Fenway's Cask'n Flagon, where fists flew at a charity ball.
Phillyist revealed the ten names rejected by the Campbell family before they settled on naming their son for the Fuhrer.
Chicagoist watched Governor Rod Blagojevich's quick speech and marveled at a local artist's interpretation of Blago in the nude, toasted Drew Peterson for getting engaged while his fourth wife remains missing and his third wife remains murdered, and talked about not much plowing and calling dibs on parking during a snowy week.
DCist commenters had a lot to say about whether MSNBC's Mika Brzezinski was really mugged outside the Georgetown Ritz Carlton or just fell prey to an aggressive panhandler.
Seattlest's coverage of Snowmageddon 2008 started off fun, with visiting reindeer and snowbound drink suggestions, but then two charter buses nearly took a 30-foot header off Capitol Hill onto I-5.
Houstonist started scheming to turn a Space Shuttle into a taco truck, a teaching lab or an arts center if they could get their hands on $42M to buy one when they are decommissioned in 2010.
LAist wondered if Obama choosing evangelical minster Rick Warren to speak at the inauguration would pick at the Prop 8 wound; to prove Prop 8 was still a priority, protests were organized this weekend, as supporters of the Prop filed a lawsuit to nullify the 18,000 gay marriages that took place in California this year.
Shanghaiist was amused by this video of a Canadian guy singing The Star Spangled Banner in Chinese.
Londonist salivated over space shuttles and skating Santas.
Gothamist got to see Governor Paterson (1) get spoofed on Saturday Night Live, (2) express him anger about it, and then (3) refer it the spoof again when he introduced a bevy of new taxes, including an "iPod tax" and "non-diet soda tax."

Bomb threats at Shanghai's Ikea and Lujiazui district?

Last Friday, the Xuhui District PSB was reported to have received a "threatening message" claiming there was a bomb in the Ikea store located on the corner of Caoxi Lu and Sanhui Lu. Acting on the news, a team of about 50 policemen was dispatched to the store to evacuate everyone. Patrons were only told there was a "mechanical problem" and within half an hour, the store was empty. Police then combed through the store with the help of the special service unit of the fire department and ascertained that there was no bomb in the store. The case remains under investigation.

And then, just two days after the Ikea bomb scare, Wang Jianshuo writes of what he thinks could have been a bomb scare in Lujiazui:

The undergrand garage of Super Brand Mall was closed today. There are two policemen safeguarding the entrance, and the entrance was blocked completely with big red road blockers.

At the very begining, I thought it was because the parking lot has been full. Without second thought, I drove on, took a U-turn and get back, and turned right into Shangri-la hotel - my favorite parking lot (although it charges the same as Super Brand Mall - 10 RMB per hour).

To my surprise, the same thing happened with that parking lot. Policemen are standing in front of the entrance, and the sign shows the parking lot is full, again.

I still didn't realize anything. I thought - what a Christmas crazy time!

I drove on again, and turn right at the Fudu Road - the road along the Huangpu River in Pudong.

Again, all the cars parking long the roads are cleared up. There are five policemen there, and asking all the cars to move on.

I thought it is maybe because this place was cleared up that all the parking lot was full.

I drive on and on, until I reached the parking area under the garden of the Huangpu Park. In normal days, this parking lot is always full, and I didn't expect they have space. Again, to my even greater surprise, it is almost empty - only 1/5 of the places were occupied.

How come?

When I drove back alnog the Lujiazui area, I found there are at least one policeman at every corner of the street. It is unusual.

Then I started to connect what I saw to the news Wendy told me: Ikea received bomb threat in the garage, and all the customers were evacuated at around 7:00 PM the other day.

Related links
Eastday: 上海宜家家居昨日被威胁店内安放有炸弹
Yangtse Evening News: 遭恐吓"有炸弹" 上海宜家紧急疏散
Wang Jianshuo: Bomb Threats in Shanghai

Yao vs. Yi: Game Three

The only two Chinese players currently in the starting lineup for NBA teams will face off in New Jersey Monday night, at 7:30 p.m. EST (8:30 a.m. Tuesday Beijing time). It is the third meeting, and the first this year, for Yao Ming (姚明) and Yi Jianlian (易建联). The game will air live on CCTV's sports channel.

The Houston Chronicle's Jonathan Feigen broke down in Sunday's paper why this year's Yao-Yi meeting won't match last year's for fanfare--Yao is focused on leading a surging Rockets team that is a serious playoff contender, and seems to see Yi and the Nets as just another opponent that needs to go down.

Yao has had a strong season so far, averaging 20 points and 9.5 rebounds a game. He has averaged 27 points over the last three games and was clutch in a weekend win over the Minnesota Timberwolves. His team has won five of its last six games.

Yi and the Nets are a different story. The team has dropped five of its last seven games, and Yi is averaging 10 points and 6 rebounds. He did notch a double-double against Dallas last Friday, but he's been held to one or fewer field goals six times this season.

Yao Ming, Yi Jianlian image: Tianjin Daily

For more China sports news, check out China Sports Today.

Music Video: Frenchman in Shanghai

Frenchman in Shanghai 《上海的法国人》, a cover of Sting's 1987 hit Englishman in New York, by Roubichou Gauthier.

Shepherd keeps flock in line by showing them wolf picture

This Chinese shepherd has found a novel way to both save money on a sheep dog and to keep his flock in line at the same time — by showing his flock a picture of a wolf! Ananova quotes a man from Xi'an by the name of Du Hebing who tells Huashang Daily he shot the picture by chance:

"After visiting Qinling Wild Animal Park, on the way home I saw a group of sheep walking along the road with a man holding a picture following behind them," he said.

Du said he burst out laughing when he realised it was a picture of a wolf.

"The man was using the wolf picture to scare the sheep and drive them ahead - it was a really funny scene," he said.

Whoever said there was no innovation in China?

Discrimination against Hepatitis B carriers in China

Melissa Chan of Al Jazeera reports from Beijing of the discrimination that Hepatitis B carriers in China have to deal with — in school and at the workplace. Most of this discrimination, of course, is rooted in the widespread ignorance about the virus throughout society, and results in Hep B carriers being shunned in the same way as HIV/AIDS carriers are shunned in China.