China Bloggers

    

Now is the season for chomping down on delicious crayfish, and CNNGo has highlighted some of the best places to get some already (so we won't update ours)... but - not to spoil your xiaolongxia outings or anything - some places may not be very sanitary.

One of the places you're most likely to hit up for crayfish will be Shouning Lu, but the sanitation situation there has now emerged as a serious concern. A Xinmin reporter went there and found quite a few problems with the cleaning of the little lobsters in their raw form.

In the dark and dirty ally at the back of the restaurants, there were several huge buckets of small lobsters waited to be cleaned. The people there just basically put a basket of small lobsters into the water bucket, stirred them, and pulled them out. They did the same process again and again, in the same bucket of water, with multiple baskets of crayfish.

It was only after the fourth basket, when the water had turned black, that it was finally refilled. Yuck - hope you're eating from that first dip.

Granted, if you've stayed in China long enough and eaten at street stalls and meat stick vendors, you're probably used to not quite completely hygienic practices. Hopefully, your stomach has turned to iron by this point.

But, looking at those pictures should give you pause if you have a weaker digestive track. Maybe, instead of going to Shouning Lu, you should be sure to head to a restaurant with one of those green smiley faces on their hygiene report card.

Got Star Alliance points? Then, if you like taking Shanghai Airlines flights, you'd better use up your miles before the end of October. The airlines was taken over by China Eastern last year and will now "maintain the consistency of the new China Easten Airlines" by leaving Star Alliance and possibly joining up with SkyTeam, China Eastern's airlines miles group of choice. Even if you don't manage to get rid of your miles, though, I suppose you could always book through Air China. They will soon be the only airlines group here that use them.

Uyghur journalist Gheyret Niyaz was sentenced to 15 years in prison for "endangering state security" by conducting an interview with a Hong Kong paper shortly after the Urumqi riots. While mainstream media has focused on the criticism China has gotten for this harsh sentence, Far West China examines why. It's a warning from the Chinese government: Talk to media, even a little big, get sent to jail. And it's working, though with what consequences?

Some server error has severely pranked the mainstream international media. Google declared itself blocked in China for all services except for Gmail sometime early this morning. Strangely enough though, everyone actually in China was still able to access everything they'd been able to access before.

According to the Wall Street Journal:
Google said its images and news services were partially blocked, but noted that Gmail was still fully or mostly accessible within the country. The information was provided by the company on a website page that summarizes the accessibility to Google services from within mainland China.

The blockages appear to be the first significant disruption of Google services since the company was granted a key license renewal earlier this month that enabled it to continue operating its website in China.

Other accounts, by the Associated Press, Bloomberg, the AFP and so on echoed those facts, with sentiments such as how it raises "more questions about the Internet company's ability to operate in the country while trying to work around the government's online censorship policies (AP)" and "concern that authorities still aren't satisfied with how the company complies with local law." Reuters even got an analyst to talk about what the Google block meant - yes, they contacted an analyst before checking to see what was actually blocked.

Bet it made all of you who did Google searches this morning only to find this news really confused, right? As Rebecca MacKinnon notes on her blog (which, ironically, IS blocked in China):
...no journalist has actually confirmed with a human being at Google that this information is correct. What's more, I've heard from several dozen people all over China who say that Google isn't blocked for them when they access it on their Internet connections from Beijing to Shanghai to Sichuan to Hunan.

I have yet to hear from a single person who can't access Google search in Mainland China...

So what happened? Well, besides probably overtired wire reporters competing to get their stories out before every other wire reporter (and I empathize, I really really do), Google says it may have just been a temporary hiccup. In a statement sent to Read Write Web, they said:
"Because of the way we measure accessibility in China, it's possible that our machines could overestimate the level of blockage. That seems to be what happened last night when there was a relatively small blockage. It appears now that users in China are accessing our properties normally.

"Please also note that the dashboard is not a real time tool."

       

They've been called the worst floods in a decade, causing tens of billions of dollars in damage, killing at least 928 people and causing another almost 500 to go missing. And with more rains coming to all parts of the country, China can only brace itself for more devastation.

As if landslides, collapsing bridges and the Three Gorges Dam constantly being put to the test weren't bad enough, just today, flood waters washed 3000 barrels of explosive chemicals into a major waterway in Jilin Province. So far no contamination has been detected, but the government is scrambling to recover them as quick as possible.

Through all this, photographers have been taking pictures that are testament to the power of these waters. And as the saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words. Here are the most awe inspiring and chest clenching ones we've found on the Chinese internet.

For more photo galleries, Netease has combined all of its pictures of the floods onto one page

They used to be farmed for their fur, but authorities in Xinjiang have found a better use for these cute little animals: using them to deal with the almost overwhelming rat problem! And they've proven really, really good at being rat catchers too.

According to People's Daily:
This year, about 5.5 million hectares of grasslands, or more than 10 percent of the total coverage in Xinjiang, have been overrun by disease-infested rats. The rats have ravaged the grasslands, eating grassroots and damaging the prairies with underground digging, according to the regional locust and rat control headquarters.

"Foxes are excellent natural predators of the rodent. One fox can catch about 20 rats per day. There has been a decline in the rat population in several counties where the measure has been adopted," said Ni Yifei, deputy head of the headquarters.

The headquarters' fox training base was set up in Altai Prefecture in 2004. It has already trained an army of 284 foxes that have been released into the wild.

With dozens of foxes released since 2004, the biological-control-of-rats experiment in Fuhai County, Altai, has reduced the number of rats in the area by 70 percent and the number of burrows per hectare of land has dropped from 50 to 15, the autonomous region's department of animal husbandry said.

Considering that China usually uses poison to deal with rats, silver fox training has turned into an economical and environmentally friendly way of solving the scourge. They're not alone in their hunt either - eagles, birds, chickens, ducks and wolves are also part of the rat attack training program!

              

ChinaJoy, the annual gaming convention that's supposed to be China's version of E3, has hit Shanghai today! The 8th China Digital Entertainment Expo & Conference opened its doors at Shanghai New International Expo Center, where it will stay til Sunday. Like every year, this one was chock full of press conferences, game developers, game seminars and exhibitions - but we know what all you non-nerds were really hoping to see:

Showgirls and costumed Cosplay fans. Boy, are they here in droves. If you're interested, you can even vote for your top showgirl. I have yet to find another one for cosplayers.

While the probability of actual exciting news being revealed at this conference are pretty slim, there will be plenty of pictures, for sure, after the weekend. Until then, here's a couple from the first day of ChinaJoy to tide you over.

Pics curated from News.PCgames.com.cn

Feel like there's been a huge rise in big environmental accidents happening recently? That's probably because there has been - the Environmental Ministry has revealed that accidents rose 98% in the first six months of the year, mostly because of higher demand for energy and minerals. “Fast economic development is leading to increasing conflicts with the capacity of the environment to absorb” demands, the ministry said. To combat the problems, it has started a nationwide investigation of drinking water and mine tailing ponds this year, as well as setting up databases on violations, strengthened regulations and is encouraging residents to report complaints. It has identified a “large number of culprits” and will be doling out punishment - and hopefully, this will mean what pristine waters are left won't be swept up in these harsh times.

Miss U.S.A., Rema Fikah visited Shanghai United Family Hospital (SHU) to educate the Shanghai community about early screening and detection of breast cancer. The recent winner of the Miss U.S.A. title is passionate about promoting breast cancer awareness internationally and was pleased to learn of the hospital’s international standard facilities in the area of breast health for Shanghai residents.

Author:  Unknown

     

Looks like Transformers fever still hasn't quite left Shanghai. The hero's robot of choice, Bumblebee, was recently spotted standing outside the Shanghai East Asia Exhibition Hall in anticipation for the 2010 Cybertron Annual Meeting.

What IS the 2010 Cybertron Annual Meeting? Apparently, something that will "display different generations of transformer toys to Chinese fans," according to Xinhua. Googling the name (in Chinese) reveals that it will be held from July 30 to August 3 and is some sort of fan convention for people who really, really like Transformers. From the website introducing the event:
I believe that every fanatical Transformers fan, in reality, will always experience loneliness. This is because people around us often find it difficult to understand or agree with our hobby. So, we group on the internet, and met at Actoys [the website]...

I believe that every Transformers fan must have longed for the day that these web usernames would become actual faces, become close friends to drink and talk with.
Because this was my, a fanboy's, deep hope! This is the greatest dream for me, an avid Transformers-loving person!

The Bumblee standing outside the convention center to welcome these "fanatical Transformers fans" is 7-meters tall and weighs a whopping 8-tons. These pictures, of workers putting the robot together, are from Xinmin.

The third Transformers movie is currently being filmed in Chicago and will allegedly include car chases, gunfire and explosions. Surprise. Not mentioned if it will include another scene in Shanghai to rile up oversensitive Chinese movie watchers.

Wan Wuyi, a man with mysteriously crippling back problems It's a problem that never troubled Kim Philby but if it had, it would perhaps have saved MI-5 a lot of embarrassment. Online rumors circulating yesterday claimed that Wan Wuyi, the 58-year-old head of domestic news at Xinhua, may have switched teams after going AWOL following a training course at Oxford University. But Wan has apparently surfaced to refute this, saying he’s actually holed up in London with a bad back.

“This is totally wrong. It is a rumour," Hei Dalong, the Xinhua bureau chief in London told the Telegraph earlier this week. "Mr Wan is at my home. He has been ill for 50 days".

Clearly he’s pretty ill, then.

Wan’s case wasn’t helped by the Sydney Morning Herald which reported “Mr Wan's wife is said to have emigrated to Britain already”.

According to today’s Global Times, though, the story can be traced back to mirrorbooks.com, who “quoted an unnamed retired senior editor at Xinhua in Beijing as saying, "Wan has decided to stay in Britain and join his wife.””

The paper spoke to “Mandy O'Sullivan, the secretary of the Spinal Unit at St. Luke's Hospital, who confirmed… they do have a patient named Wan Wuyi”.

The rumour was likely fueled by an earlier announcement of a state crackdown on so-called "naked officials" corrupt cadres who stash their loot overseas, move their families abroad and then join them permanently.

       

As we reported, the Peace Hotel reopens to the public today. Malcolm Moore of the Telegraph got a first look at the renovated 81-year-old landmark. He says:
The Shanghai government forced a painstaking restoration, having recently discovered the value of maintaining the city's heritage.

"To find the correct colour scheme, the designers had to climb up to the ceilings and scrape off five or six layers of paint to get at the original," said Mr Yang. However, the hotel has been upgraded with modern amenities, said Kamal Naamani, the general manager. "There is running hot water, for example."

It seems, however, the Chinese visitors are more interested in what kind of shopping can be done.

More excellent pictures of the hotel can be found on his Flickr account.

Unlicensed pedicabs, which for the longest time have been gone from our city, have been making quite a comeback recently. To combat this, police have issued a pedicab crackdown, which cumulated in them seizing 60 of these electric wagons in just one short hour!

The police especially targeted Changjiangnan Lu in the Baoshan District, which is one of the largest electric pedicab gathering spots in the city. Trying to escape the police, several drivers jumped into the nearby river with their vehicles, which caused this scene to the right.

Perhaps they thought the police wouldn't bother trying to fish their muddy tricycles out. How naive. In the end, police dug out ten of those from the river, just adding to their collection count.

Of course, Baoshan District is not the only Shanghai location filled with these unlicensed rides. This summer has seen a reemergence of electric pedicabs, especially around famous tourist spots such as Nanjing Lu, Fuzhou Lu, and the rest of the Bund area.

Why have they come back? Xinmin found three reasons for it: First, it's very hard to get a cab around these areas - or even if you did get one, the cab driver might refuse to take you because the ride is too short. How rude!

Second, signs and street markers are sometimes confusing to tourists. When they can’t find their way, for example, from the busy Nanjing Pedestrian Street to the Bund, tricycles seem to be the cheapest and the easiest ride to take. Third, after 22 o'clock, most of the buses become unavailable or come less often. As the administrators are also off duty by that time, pedicabs grow active in the dark of night.

Days ago, as I got out of the malls near Nanjing Rd and People's Square at night, not surprisingly, I was warmly greeted by four of these tricycle drivers. They used three kinds of languages - Shanghai dialect, Chinese and English - to try and persuade me to get on.

Safety is the main reason why I chose not too - they don'ts have seat belts or other adequate protection, something you shouldn't ignore on Shanghai's crazy driver roads. But, from a different perspective, I can see how the inconvenience of the public transportation is definitely a major cause of the renaissance of these pedicabs.

As funny as it is to see a picture of pedicab drivers swimming in a river, maybe the authority should think more about how to solve the traffic problem instead of spending their time tracking down these "pathetic" pedicab drivers.

Our city was profiled recently in the New York Times' Great Homes and Destinations section. Shanghai expat Nichol Bradford opened her Huaihai Lu lane house to the NYT, showing off her Art Nouveau styled building and Hot Dog Decor-styled... well, decor. There's even a photo gallery so you can get a better look at Ms. Bradford's stylings. As with most homes featured there, it's absolutely out of my personal budget, but gee - ain't it nice to share what you could have in this city?

Yesterday, our neighboring city of Nanjing was rocked by a giant explosion at a plastic factory which killed 10 people and injured over 120. Of those, 14 are critically injured. The force of the blast was so strong that broken glass was strewn along streets as far as 1km away.

According to Xinhua, the explosion was caused by workers damaging a propylene pipeline as they were dismantling factory buildings at the Nanjing No. 4 Plastics Factory. An excavator had hit a pipe of 159mm in diameter. The pipe began spewing gas, which was then lit on fire when a motorist started a car engine at the scene.

Allegedly, this wasn't even the first time a major gas leak happened in the area. Nanfang Daily reports that just one day before, in the exact same district, a fertilizer tank vehicle got stuck under a railway bridge and damaged its sealing lid, causing hundreds of tons of liquefied petroleum gas to spew out over several hundred meters. Police and firemen managed to contain that leak before anyone was seriously hurt.

One near miss and one actual devastating explosion (with possible environmental consequences) in one week? What is with the shoddy protection systems in place for these kind of problems in Nanjing? The Xinhua, article doesn't say much about it, and, if this accidental live broadcast is any indication, they were the only ones allowed at the scene.

From ESWN:
At the scene, the Jiangsu City TV Channel reporter was conducting a live broadcast. An unidentified government leader came over and asked: "What is your name? Give me your telephone. Who gave permission for you to conduct a live broadcast?" The reporter replied: "The Xinhua reporters are here too. Why don't you ask them first?"

Although this reporter identified himself as a Jiangsu TV reporter, it was to no avail as his signal was cut off. However, this particular encounter with the official was show live over Jiangsu City TV.

This video was widely disseminated on the Internet, and that official has been identified. About 30 minutes later, the video began to disappear from the various video websites.

While this is the only big proof that Chinese officials are now making sure only their state-approved report of the blast is disseminated, others in the area have also complained of censorship.

Time will tell whether the knee-jerk reaction is just a typical attempt to control the news in any emergency, or whether there was something here that Nanjing officials were especially careful to hide. At any rate, the chances we'll be able to see anything besides tales of selfless Nanjing residents donating blood from local media is pretty slim.

Have you ever noticed that some illnesses are seasonal? It is indeed true that certain illnesses tend to flare in one season or another, primarily as a result of climatic factors such as temperature, humidity, etc. In Chinese Medicine (CM) we like to use these seasonal fluctuations to our advantage, and one way we do this is to treat “winter illnesses” (illnesses that worsen in the cold winter months) during the summer. This is called, “Winter Illness, Summer Treatment”, or 冬病夏治 in Chinese.

Author:  Yours in Health, Dr. Greg A. Livingston, Ph.D.

Photo by Elke Wong

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