T-Salon

19 Years...

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 05:33:00 +0000

IMG_0473.JPG
Originally uploaded by Charles Mok

People are still talking about what had happened nineteen years ago on this day.

"She had just graduated from Peking University School of Medicine. She was part of a rescue team organized by the people. Before she was injured she cared for many of those injured. But then she heard someone call out, and realized that there was someone injured elsewhere. She lifted her head, and a bullet hit her in the neck, ending her young life. This person's life was ended while rescuing other people. She was buried by her family in Wanan Cemetery. If you one day have the opporunity to go to Wanan Cemetery, you can see a headstone where it's inscribed, "Wang Weiping's grave." She should have graduated in the summer of that year, 1989. She had already decided that after graduation she would stay in that hospital and become a gynecologist. She spent six years in the Faculty of Medicine. Of the many children in her family, she was the only one to attend university." ---Professor Ding Zilin said in an interview with CNN 10 years ago.

Lung Yingtai: "June 4th not only affects China's fate but also the rebuilding of the world's order."

Translations

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 04:00:00 +0000

From part of a message that John Kennedy sent out today that I thought is very well stated and most importantly, it resonates:

"You're getting this because you're known to translate things you see
online from Chinese into English. We each do this for our own reasons,
some for money, some out of inspiration, and most of the time,
admiration for certain writers who otherwise wouldn't be given a
chance to contribute to discourse taking place in English.

As a group of translators, we're fortunate in that we're in a sense
privy to a entire side of China that many around us aren't, that being
the parts of larger online conversations which to a large extent
represent roughly two generations' opinions, ideas that resonate
strongly within China. Dynamic China, modern China, sophisticated
China, nuanced China."

I really enjoy doing translations - the absolute focus it calls for when chewing the meaning behind each words is what I like best out of the process.

Needless to say, it is really "the admiration for certain writers", and more crucially their unique perspectives, "who otherwise wouldn't be given a chance to contribute to discourse taking place in English" that was the driver behind my translations.

Relief & Reconstruction Efforts

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Sun, 25 May 2008 20:34:00 +0000

A couple of people I know have been writing and talking about earthquake relief and reconstruction efforts by ordinary people and local non-profit groups that are taking place at the forefront of the earthquake epic center in Sichuan - the actions they are taking and the challenges they faced.

This is among the many news that I read, translated into English as follows, from Hengge, Blogbus CEO, who had been planning to make donations to fund the construction of primary schools in Sichuan province prior to the earthquake. He has the latest news from volunteers and friends in the media sector who are at the front-line.

"Since the earthquake on May 12th, we did not make direct any donations to official organizations such as Red Cross and etc. But made in-kind donations through social channels, and wired money directly to local volunteers that are on-site to procure materials for the relief effort. Up until now, work in the disaster zone has progressed gradually from relief to post-disaster construction. As such, Sichuan
has become the top consideration for funding of primary school construction.

News from the volunteers and friends in the media sector: people who support relief efforts had already left the scene. Medical services, children and residents have been resettled. Currently children are getting ready to go back to school. Disaster zone has been sealed off due to weather and other reasons. As for making donations to rebuild schools, there are still a lot of uncertainties: there are some sayings that one cannot donate as they see fit. The government might centralize construction standards, etc. Presently the cost of funding primary school construction has increased tremendously compared to the past. It remains unknown whether there would be limitations on the "quality of capital"; and centralized coordination as well as
management. At any rate, better go there to understand the situation before making any decisions."

Memorial Video: China Shaken (9 mins)

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Sun, 25 May 2008 20:20:00 +0000

A video put together by Michael Zhou who begs for 9 minutes of your attention. If, for any reasons, you do not have 9 minutes to spare for this, at least jump right to final 2 minutes of the video to see the thought provocative questions that Michael had.

For the record...

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Tue, 20 May 2008 05:35:00 +0000

New York Times: "an unexpected mobilization, prompted partly by unusually vigorous and dramatic coverage of the disaster in the state-run news media, has come from outside official channels. Thousands of Chinese have streamed into the quake region or donated record sums of money in a striking and unscripted public response."

| View | Upload your own

Contribute to earthquake relief effort in China

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Mon, 19 May 2008 18:17:00 +0000

| View | Upload your own

"Language is the bridge to understanding" - Grace Wang Qianyuan

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 20:46:00 +0000

It's sad to hear what had happened to Grace Wang (王千源), a Chinese freshmen student at Duke University, when she tried to forge a dialog between two groups in a very polarized debate on China's sovereignty over Tibet - she became the public enemy back in her home country; and her parents in China had received death threats and are now in hiding.

In an op-ed piece in today's Washington Post, Grace Wang provided a detailed account of what had happened during and after her attempt to mediate the protests on campus. While it's sad to hear about her experience, it's moving to hear about her aspirations and her parents' support.

Caught in the Middle, Called a Traitor

By Grace Wang
Sunday, April 20, 2008; B01

I study languages -- Italian, French and German. And this summer -- now that it looks as though I won't be able to go home to China -- I'll take up Arabic. My goal is to master 10 languages, in addition to Chinese and English, by the time I'm 30.

I want to do this because I believe that language is the bridge to understanding. Take China and Tibet. If more Chinese learned the Tibetan language, and if Tibetans learned more about China, I'm convinced that our two peoples would understand one another better and we could overcome the current crisis between us peacefully. I feel that even more strongly after what happened here at Duke University a little more than a week ago.

Trying to mediate between Chinese and pro-Tibetan campus protesters, I was caught in the middle and vilified and threatened by the Chinese. After the protest, the intimidation continued online, and I began receiving threatening phone calls. Then it got worse -- my parents in China were also threatened and forced to go into hiding. And I became persona non grata in my native country.

It has been a frightening and unsettling experience. But I'm determined to speak out, even in the face of threats and abuse. If I stay silent, then the same thing will happen to someone else someday.

So here's my story.

When I first arrived at Duke last August, I was afraid I wouldn't like it. It's in the small town of Durham, N.C., and I'm from Qingdao, a city of 4.3 million. But I eventually adjusted, and now I really love it. It's a diverse environment, with people from all over the world. Over Christmas break, all the American students went home, but that's too expensive for students from China. Since the dorms and the dining halls were closed, I was housed off-campus with four Tibetan classmates for more than three weeks.

I had never really met or talked to a Tibetan before, even though we're from the same country. Every day we cooked together, ate together, played chess and cards. And of course, we talked about our different experiences growing up on opposite sides of the People's Republic of China. It was eye-opening for me.

I'd long been interested in Tibet and had a romantic vision of the Land of Snows, but I'd never been there. Now I learned that the Tibetans have a different way of seeing the world. My classmates were Buddhist and had a strong faith, which inspired me to reflect on my own views about the meaning of life. I had been a materialist, as all Chinese are taught to be, but now I could see that there's something more, that there's a spiritual side to life.

We talked a lot in those three weeks, and of course we spoke in Chinese. The Tibetan language isn't the language of instruction in the better secondary schools there and is in danger of disappearing. Tibetans must be educated in Mandarin Chinese to succeed in our extremely capitalistic culture. This made me sad, and made me want to learn their language as they had learned mine.

I was reminded of all this on the evening of April 9. As I left the cafeteria planning to head to the library to study, I saw people holding Tibetan and Chinese flags facing each other in the middle of the quad. I hadn't heard anything about a protest, so I was curious and went to have a look. I knew people in both groups, and I went back and forth between them, asking their views. It seemed silly to me that they were standing apart, not talking to each other. I know that this is often due to a language barrier, as many Chinese here are scientists and engineers and aren't confident of their English.

I thought I'd try to get the two groups together and initiate some dialogue, try to get everybody thinking from a broader perspective. That's what Lao Tzu, Sun Tzu and Confucius remind us to do. And I'd learned from my dad early on that disagreement is nothing to be afraid of. Unfortunately, there's a strong Chinese view nowadays that critical thinking and dissidence create problems, so everyone should just keep quiet and maintain harmony.

A lot has been made of the fact that I wrote the words "Free Tibet" on the back of the American organizer of the protest, who was someone I knew. But I did this at his request, and only after making him promise that he would talk to the Chinese group. I never dreamed how the Chinese would seize on this innocent action. The leaders of the two groups did at one point try to communicate, but the attempt wasn't very successful.

The Chinese protesters thought that, being Chinese, I should be on their side. The participants on the Tibet side were mostly Americans, who really don't have a good understanding of how complex the situation is. Truthfully, both sides were being quite closed-minded and refusing to consider the other's perspective. I thought I could help try to turn a shouting match into an exchange of ideas. So I stood in the middle and urged both sides to come together in peace and mutual respect. I believe that they have a lot in common and many more similarities than differences.

But the Chinese protesters -- who were much more numerous, maybe 100 or more -- got increasingly emotional and vocal and wouldn't let the other side speak. They pushed the small Tibetan group of just a dozen or so up against the Duke Chapel doors, yelling "Liars, liars, liars!" This upset me. It was so aggressive, and all Chinese know the moral injunction: Junzi dongkou, bu dongshou (The wise person uses his tongue, not his fists).

I was scared. But I believed that I had to try to promote mutual understanding. I went back and forth between the two groups, mostly talking to the Chinese in our language. I kept urging everyone to calm down, but it only seemed to make them angrier. Some young men in the Chinese group -- those we call fen qing (angry youth) -- started yelling and cursing at me.

What a lot of people don't know is that there were many on the Chinese side who supported me and were saying, "Let her talk." But they were drowned out by the loud minority who had really lost their cool.

Some people on the Chinese side started to insult me for speaking English and told me to speak Chinese only. But the Americans didn't understand Chinese. It's strange to me that some Chinese seem to feel as though not speaking English is expressing a kind of national pride. But language is a tool, a way of thinking and communicating.

At the height of the protest, a group of Chinese men surrounded me, pointed at me and, referring to the young woman who led the 1989 student democracy protests in Tiananmen Square, said, "Remember Chai Ling? All Chinese want to burn her in oil, and you look like her." They said that I had mental problems and that I would go to hell. They asked me where I was from and what school I had attended. I told them. I had nothing to hide. But then it started to feel as though an angry mob was about to attack me. Finally, I left the protest with a police escort.

Back in my dorm room, I logged onto the Duke Chinese Students and Scholars Association (DCSSA) Web site and listserv to see what people were saying. Qian Fangzhou, an officer of DCSSA, was gloating, "We really showed them our colors!"

I posted a letter in response, explaining that I don't support Tibetan independence, as some accused me of, but that I do support Tibetan freedom, as well as Chinese freedom. All people should be free and have their basic rights protected, just as the Chinese constitution says. I hoped that the letter would spark some substantive discussion. But people just criticized and ridiculed me more.

The next morning, a storm was raging online. Photographs of me had been posted on the Internet with the words "Traitor to her country!" printed across my forehead. Then I saw something really alarming: Both my parents' citizen ID numbers had been posted. I was shocked, because this information could only have come from the Chinese police.

I saw detailed directions to my parents' home in China, accompanied by calls for people to go there and teach "this shameless dog" a lesson. It was then that I realized how serious this had become. My phone rang with callers making threats against my life. It was ironic: What I had tried so hard to prevent was precisely what had come to pass. And I was the target.

I talked to my mom the next morning, and she said that she and my dad were going into hiding because they were getting death threats, too. She told me that I shouldn't call them. Since then, short e-mail messages have been our only communication. The other day, I saw photos of our apartment online; a bucket of feces had been emptied on the doorstep. More recently I've heard that the windows have been smashed and obscene posters have been hung on the door. Also, I've been told that after convening an assembly to condemn me, my high school revoked my diploma and has reinforced patriotic education.

I understand why people are so emotional and angry; the events in Tibet have been tragic. But this crucifying of me is unacceptable. I believe that individual Chinese know this. It's when they fire each other up and act like a mob that things get so dangerous.

Now, Duke is providing me with police protection, and the attacks in Chinese cyberspace continue. But contrary to my detractors' expectations, I haven't shriveled up and slunk away. Instead, I've responded by publicizing this shameful incident, both to protect my parents and to get people to reflect on their behavior. I'm no longer afraid, and I'm determined to exercise my right to free speech.

Because language is the bridge to understanding.

grace.wang@duke.edu

Grace Wang is a freshman at Duke University. Scott Savitt, a visiting scholar in Duke's Chinese media studies program, assisted in writing this article.

Voices without Votes

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 05:06:00 +0000

A wonderful, wonderful initiative by Global Voices at this important time as Americans elects a new president this coming fall that will have tremendous implications in many facets of life from environment, international trade and global economy to world peace. I expect lots of interesting perspectives will emerge out of this new initiative that will make a refreshing read on top of views convey by American media.

Today, Global Voices is launching a new website with Reuters that
opens a window on the global conversation about the 2008 presidential
election in the USA.

It's called Voices Without Votes.

There are few subjects that spark the imagination of bloggers
worldwide - and United States foreign policy is one of them.

Global Voices challenges people to listen to people beyond their own
borders. We translate back and forth from blogospheres in the Middle
East, Asia, Africa, South America, and Eastern Europe in hopes that
people may come to understand and care for one another across borders.

We also encourage international media to talk to and report on the
concerns of ordinary citizens around the world. Hopefully, looking at
US politics more closely through a kaleidoscope of world blogs will be
a compelling and thought-provoking experience. Send us links to blogs
you would like us to link to, including your own.

Our Middle East and North Africa Editor, Amira Al Hussaini is going to
be editing the website with help from other Global Voices editors and
volunteers. Check in regularly at Voices Without Votes until Americans
finally hit the polls and elect a president in November 2008.

Meanwhile, the world is still talking! Are you listening?

Reflections on the State of News and Information Ecology

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 05:51:00 +0000

Out of the entire presentation that Isaac recently shared on the topic of Social Media and the China Internet, I like the slide on above the best.

It describes the way I receive, consume and reproduce information nowadays especially those pertaining to China that haven't gained media attention domestically in China or internationally in English-language press, and yet provides insights on the heart and
pulse of the Chinese (internet) population, in a sense that it reflects the issues that people care and have a stance on if not an opinion about.

Recent news about the detention of prominent China AIDS activists Hu Jia and the house arrest of his wife Zeng Jinyan as well as their new born baby is an excellent case in point. I am so glad that Isaac brought that up because I think it is so important to acknowledge and document how all the many little efforts that many Chinese bloggers
has chipped in did indeed help kept the news alive and flowing to many people, and at one point inspired some caring actions (even though not successful) while keeping track of Chinese people's concern that are hard to deny --- all despite the news being an off-limits topic in China. It really provides hope that at least pockets of Chinese society still have a sense of justice even though there is wide belief that the society is suffering from moral bankruptcy.

This also explains why there is hardly any updates here. But the communique has not ceased. It is just happening elsewhere and perhaps in another form.

Nowadays, more often than not, rather than spending time pro-actively searching for the latest development on a particular topic that I follow, I tend to split my increasingly limited free time and attention among:

Twitter - bits and bytes provided by a network of friends with shared interests. Information came from this channel is the most relevant
(that fits my interest best) while also the freshest, though I must
say there are lots of junk as friends also ramble there as well,

Anothr (via GTalk) - essentially fetching news from a few major media sites and latest news keyword search results from Google News.

Skype group chats - a more "private" information channel, again made possible by a network of friends with shared interests.

del.icio.us - for capturing links to and quotes from news stories and putting things "back to the pot" for others who have even less time
than I do to find relevant reading materials, and for my own future handy reference.

Long established blogging tools like Blogger that is being used for publishing this site and RSS feed look rather cumbersome in comparison to a new generation of micro-blogging tools that came on-line in the past 12 months or so.

But blogs still has its usefulness and its place in the spectrum of tools for editing, publishing, a repository for storing information and a point for conversations. I believe this will continue to be the case for years to come. Well established blogging tools only need to catch up with a new generation of micro-blogging tools such as tumblr and soup.io and continue to re-invent itself in order to remain useful in an increasingly complex information and communications environment.

One last thought when I saw the illustration that Issac made. The structure of the internet is changing fast. Linkages and by extension the flow between information, people and location are growing vast in volume become increasingly complex. Yet, information is also flowing much more instantly and to a wider larger geography
than before. This may perhaps open up new possibilities for many fresh new ideas?

Difficulties faced by Foreign Aid Agencies in China

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 05:58:00 +0000

Geoffrey York from the Globe and Mail reports the challenges and difficulties faced by Canadian International Development Agency in implementing aid program in China which encompasses local stakeholder involvement into the project process:

"The Canadian International Development Agency has been searching for new justifications for its assistance to China, knowing that Prime Minister Stephen Harper's government has been suspicious of Canadian aid to the world's fastest-growing economy.

Poverty reduction projects have been scaled back. Instead CIDA tries to leverage its money to stimulate Chinese action to improve its environment, governance, legal reforms and human rights. But achieving results in these fields can be problematic - and the project in Inner Mongolia is a classic case.

Bator the herdsman is baffled by the CIDA project. "I heard that Canada built this building," he says, "but I don't feel any benefit from it."

Internal reports obtained by The Globe and Mail reveal that Chinese authorities resisted many of Canada's ideas for the project, which was originally intended to improve China's ability to manage its environment and protect its wildlife.

The Canadian emphasis on community participation was seen by Chinese officials as a "necessary evil," according to a report by a CIDA consultant in 2004, when the project was three years old.

"The Chinese stakeholders did not clearly understand, nor did they necessarily support, the inclusion of a participatory, collaborative and inclusive process," the report states.

The assessment found that the CIDA project had been seriously damaged by two years of delays, misunderstandings, confusion, lack of trust, internal disputes and design errors."

Equally interesting are the comments by (predominantly) Canadians on this news report.

Chatter Screen

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Sat, 03 Nov 2007 08:27:00 +0000

Photo by ooof

"Jiwai.de (the "Chinese Twitter") and the big screen dynamic BBS are hits at this meeting." Via blognationChina, who is doing live conference micro-blogging in Twitter.

This is one of the most interesting and surprising thing I find about the conference. The freewheeling spirit in all these public "back channel" chatters adds so much more fun to the conference.

Update: Messages posted on Day 1 are archived here and Day 2 here.
See also Thomas Crampton's Will China Twitter for more about this twitterish-like phenomena at cnbloggercon and in China.

Anyone who is interested in saying a hello or sending a message to the audience viaat the conference can simply do so by adding wo@jiwai.de in GTalk or msn008@jiwai.de in MSN Messenger and then send an instant message jiwai in the following structure: @cbc +[space]+[your message]

Scobleizer: "I wish I was at Chinese BloggerCon"

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Sat, 03 Nov 2007 08:23:00 +0000

img_0339. Bruce and Zola distributing conference proceedings over multiple internet channels.
Originally uploaded by ZhangYining

"I wish I was at Chinese BloggerCon," Robert Scoble wrote.

"Next year I want to do a BloggerCon here at the same time and build a video bridge so we could talk about the same issues. Heck, let’s do it."

I like the idea. Yes, let's try to do this next year and we can have more cross-cultural conversations in two continent over the internet.

Chinese Blogger Conference 2007

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 00:55:00 +0000

This year's Chinese Blogger Conference will take place in Beijing as well as virtually on the internet this coming weekend.

As in previous years, there are a wide variety of topics that would appeal to anyone interested in the latest trends and application of new media in Chinese media, education, business, etc. sectors.

Here are my picks (in no particular order) from this year's conference program:

Zhang Lei's talk on How does Social Collaboration Change the Practice of Translation? (社会协作力量如何改变翻译格局)

Art 1.5: "Digital" Art (艺术1.5:"电子"艺术).

NGOs in the Internet Era: Understanding and Realizing the Impact and
Value of Information Technology / Web 2.0 on Social Work (互联网时代的NGO——了解和实现IT/WEB2.0对于社会性工作的影响和价值)

Grassroots Media and Professional Media (草根媒体与专业媒体)

Micro-blogging and Its Potential (微Blogging和潜力)

Watch this space and space for live transcript which you may also subscribe to for live streaming transcripts and conference tidbits over any major instant messaging services.

Update: Conference transcript (in Chinese) will be broadcast over on IRC channel at irc://chat.freenode.net/#cnbloggercon

See also:
3rd Annual Chinese Blogger Conference - Fact Sheet for a quick overview in English about the conference.
Cnbloggercon on Netvibes to find out the latest photos, conference news, blog posts from the conference.

Smog in Beijing

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Sat, 27 Oct 2007 06:34:00 +0000

IMG_1041.JPG
Originally uploaded by fuzheado

This is absolutely horrible.

Politics with a Conscience

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 04:00:00 +0000

Finally, here comes the long awaited news.

"Anson Chan, Hong Kong's former top civil servant and an advocate of full democracy for the city, will run for a seat in the local legislature in her first attempt at elective office," Bloomberg reports, "giving a significant boost to a push for full democracy by 2012", International Herald Tribune writes.

``I need to put my money where my mouth is,'' Chan said. ``I've been espousing universal suffrage and the values that I think have made Hong Kong a great international city. This opportunity is one that I cannot let pass.''

``You need a political platform to make your voice magnified and heard,'' Chan said at a press briefing in Hong Kong. ``This by-election has come at a very crucial time in Hong Kong's history. We're engaged in this consultation exercise on Hong Kong's constitution.''

"I want to make Hong Kong people feel that they have a role and they can shape the future of constitutional reforms."

"If elected, she pledged to avoid a "head-on collision" with Beijing, build a constructive partnership with the SAR government and end the icy relationship between the central government and pan-democrats," The Standard reports.

China's Websites Unplugging from the Internet

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 04:08:00 +0000

This is insanity and paranoia to the greatest extreme.

Via Wang Jianshuo:

"The "very important meeting" is going to be held soon. To prepare a "good environment" for the meeting, massive websites in China were shutdown. This time, much different from the previous actions, it is the whole data center instead of websites or servers that were shutdown.

Let me take few famous IDCs (Internet Data Center) as examples. Zitian, an IDC in Luoyang was shutdown completely, and all the 500 servers were unplugged from Internet, and tens of thousands of websites hosted there were inaccessible on Aug 24. Among them is the largest traffic tracking site 51.la, and this infected a very big portion of Internet websites in China.

Soon, on Aug 28, Lanmang, the other IDC in Shantou faced the same situation. Again, tens of thousands of websites were complete inaccessible. An unconfirmed news said the data center closed in Shantou has 3000 servers, and they are all closed. Lanmang has to hire lots of trunks to put all these servers and distribute the servers into many other data centers across China."

[...]

It seems the pressure from top really makes people take it seriously. These days, all kinds of people are busy.

* Telecom companies are busy unplugging Internet cable for data centers one by one.
* Hosting companies that were already shutdown are either busy find out solutions for the closed sites, or handle waves of customer complains, or both.
* Those hosting company or sites which were lucky enough not have been shutdown are busy shutdown "interactive sites" themselves, to avoid the whole data center run into bigger problem.
* Bigger websites are preparing contingency plans about what they will do when they were shutdown.
* All kinds of small site webmasters, or independent bloggers are busy signing up hosting package from abroad (I would be interested to know how many more orders bluehost, dreamhost, or ipowerweb got from China these days)
* Bloggers hosting their blog on BSP can only keep their finger across and pray for their little blog.

[Read the entire post.]

China Switching Off the Social Web Ahead of Party Congress

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 07:36:00 +0000

This is what I have heard from various IM conversations with friends in China tonight: "Chinese authorities have asked internet websites to switch off all social (interactive) functions, including BBS, comment and blogs ahead of the 17th National Party Congress."

Is the plan to turn the Chinese internet into this in the upcoming weeks?

More about Queen's Pier and the Conversation Movement in Hong Kong

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 07:34:00 +0000

IMG_7402
Originally uploaded by chong head

An excerpt of some thoughts about Queen's Pier posted on InMediaHK, translated from Chinese into English as follows:

Regardless of what the outcomes are, this scene will be written
in a story that is worth transmitting through our mouths and ears.
Even though the government would deny this history
I would still tell my future children
tell them that students who come to Hong Kong to learn a lesson about the society:
that once in upon a money worship era
a group of friends had used their flesh to fight against the government
If it was not for their fight for more than a year
the so-called collective memory would have long been forgotten by pleasure indulgence
and it would not have forced the government to rethink about conservation

However, what they strive for is not collective memory whatsoever.
This is only a one way narrative by the government and the media.
They strive for a public space
a space that allows the voice of the people from the bottom up.
A territory that once belonged to the Royalty and the Governor of Hong Kong
It is now a place where any citizen are free to hold any activities.
In the future it will belong to big shopping mall run by a hegemonic government and capitalist.
That's why for the people, not only for oneself, the fight has to go on.
They, all love this Hong Kong.

Wikimania 2007

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 05:12:00 +0000

This year's Wikimania is going taking place starting this Friday (August 3).

Lots of interesting presentations and here are a few that I will definitely be looking at (some are China/Chinese-related):

Naoko Kizu: Translation for Community Building

Chia-Wei Chiu: The Study of Wiki Editing Behavior of China Wikipedian - A Case Study of Wikipedia

Haidong Pan: Democracy and business model: wikipedia and wiki ecosystem in China

Ward Cunningham, Valentin Jijkoun (TBC), James Forrester, Dirk Riehle: The future of wikis

Chao-Kuei Hung: Free Culture Advocacy: A General Strategy and Some Examples Involving Social Movement Groups and Community Universities

Isaac Mao: Knowledge Forming, Heredity, and Variation

KaKan Lo: Another role of Wikipedians: Guiding machines to do intelligent tasks

Isaac has burnt a mega feed that aggregates the latest blog posts on Wikimania. Very useful. I will skim through that from time to time as well.

Star Ferry and Queen's Pier: So Sad to See You Go...

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 07:19:00 +0000

queenpier_star
Originally uploaded by chong head

Chong Head's photostream: "The Queen's Pier is an important public space and historical building in Hong Kong. It is a part of the architectural complex built in the 1950s and 1960s when this city came into its modern age despite under the colonial rule. It was place for the arrival of the English royalties and colonial governors. Since the late 1960s, it has become a gathering place for ordinary people. Now the Hong Kong government is going to demolish it for making more rooms for real-estate developers and the commercial sector. A group of people have fought for over eight months to preserve it and attempt to stop the government's bulldozers. It has become the most famous historical preservation movement in Hong Kong history. This illustration is depicting a queen-like girl sitting on the roof the pier."

I am kind of aware that Star Ferry has ceased operating for quite a while. But little did I know that the entire Star Ferry Pier in Central has been demolished to make way for reclamation. I am shock and feel a great sense of loss. The Star Ferry, the Pier and its surroundings (Maxim fast food store, the SCMP bookstore, the taxi and minibus stands, etc.) were all a part of my life.

Equally shock is that very soon, Queen's Pier, a place I also used to walk by quite often, will be gone as well and will only exist in people's memory.

All these brings back the memory of another complete destruction of a neighborhood that I once lived in. Although that destruction brought a much nicer looking neighborhood, I hate to see the complete disappearance of a familiar place, and the people and their way of life that made that place so special and so dear to heart.

Chinese youth as seen by Pan Yue

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 04:33:00 +0000

Contemporary Chinese youth, as seen by Pan Yue, deputy director of China's State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA):

"I don’t know if you will really listen to them or not, but here they are: your generation has grown up in a rich and varied environment, but has no roots or foundation. You have an excessive passion for the future, yet almost no interest in history. You have hardly any of the constraints of tradition, and you lack any real beliefs. To put it simply, idealism is rare in your generation. Pragmatism and individualism have won out. This is not really a question of individual problems, but of a wider social climate." (emphasis are mine)

I wonder what Chinese youth think about Pan Yue's comments above?

Me thinks the lack of any real beliefs might has to do with a not-so-free environment. Not enough free thinking, as my friend Isaac Mao often emphasizes whenever he tries to explain the challenges confronting China.

I also like Pan Yue's analysis on how irresponsible or bad practices in resource extraction by Chinese companies have an impact on inflation both in China as well as globally.

"Here is a classic example of what should be called environmental injustice: coal mine owners from Shanxi province indiscriminately extract coal and dig up the land, creating pollution. As a result they become extremely wealthy. Once they have polluted Shanxi, however, they do not stay there. Instead they move to Bejing where they buy luxury villas and push up house prices. They have also pushed up property prices in all the coastal regions of north China. If these areas then become polluted, they will no doubt move to the US, Canada or Australia and cause inflation there too."

Certainly an issue the world ought to give more thoughts on.

Losing a communication link to China

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Mon, 11 Jun 2007 05:05:00 +0000

If you are reading this in China, chances are you won't be able to see this interesting image where Erning says as "The [Flickr] interestingness page becomes more interesting."

That's because Flickr is filtered in China by the "Great Firewall" very likely because many Chinese users have uploaded photos from a recent protest against a poisonously chemical plantin Xiamen.

"Currently, the flickr.com is not blocked but the image repository server(farm1.flickr.com and farm2.flickr.com) [is]. It means the blockage is not whole domain as target, but some subdomains which may be referred most by Chinese blogosphere recently on those "sensitive" contents...Right now, people can still access flickr web site but can't see any pictures there," Isaac noted.

So unless the site blockage is lifted, I am very well losing a very effective channel to share my life and communicate with my friends in China given pictures are better than a thousand words.

Perhaps the saddest part is what Keso wrote:

"In the global Internet, the better the website, the more likely it will get GFWed. This is the sorrow of all Internet users in this country. In the past it has been Google, Blogger, Wikipedia, Wordpress.com, Vix.com... Now it's Flick's turn ......   I just have one character to tell those bastards: Fuck!"

i remember

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 04:40:00 +0000

Scanned copy of front page from Wen Hui Daily, June 5th 1989. Courtesy of 1of@kind and her grandpa:

"This is [a fact] that time, power and money cannot twist...," 1of@kind wrote, and I can't agree with more.

But what worries me these days is with so many attempts by people in power to propagate twisted versions of history, young people in Hong Kong and on the mainland who had no direct and personal experience of that part of history may easily be brainwahsed, as Derek at Mask of China recently commented, to believe that no injustices were inflicted 18 years ago.

June 4th: 300 Posts and counting...

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 04:23:00 +0000

Sidekick says she has bookmarked approximately 300 blog posts on June 4th written by Hong Kong bloggers. She asked that we all help collect these posts (tag it with "8964" in del.icio.us") or at least start by tagging your post on the topic in order to help share the load.

Ding Zilin: Lessons Learned After 18 Years

noreply@blogger.com (Andrea) — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 04:01:00 +0000

On the eve of the 18th anniversary of the Tiananmen massacre, Ding Zilin and more than 20 other members of the Tiananmen Mothers have released an abridged transcript of a roundtable discussion on the commemoration of their love ones who died in the massacre, their request to the government and the groups' future plans.

There are many touching stories and words throughout the transcript. I have translated one small paragraph into English as follow:

"In the times that have past, the Tiananmen Mothers group had experienced all kinds of difficulties and hardships. But that had also broadened our horizons. [We] learned a lot of things about both inside and outside the country, as well as in the entire world. We all have gradually formed our own views on issues that pertained to China's future directions. In particular, eighteen years of difficult fights have made us gradually understood many principles. We know how to seek justice for those who died and how to strive for the rights that we have."

Transcript of the discussion (in Chinese) is here. If you could, read the entire discussion.

See also:
Ding Zilin's Letter to Hong Kong Compatriots in 2006
Statement by Ding Zilin in 2005