Public Servant

Rebecca MacKinnon defends a liar

2009-07-13T22:51:00.003+10:00

I just came across an article titled "Xinjiang Info-War" on Rebecca MacKinnon's blog. Ms. MacKinnon stars the article by defending a lie told by Rebiya Kadeer at a news conference in relation to the recent race riot in XinJiang.

Here is a brief recap of the lie: in a news conference, Rebiya Kadeer held up a large picture for the western media to see. The picture shows a large group of people protesting in the presence of a large number of Chinese police officers. Rebiya Kadeer claimed that this picture was taken from a peaceful protest of Uyghurs students in Urumqi, and the protest was violently broken up by the Chinese police.

However, some Chinese netizen found out that the picture used by Rebiya Kadeer was actually from another protest which took place in city thousands of kilometers away from Urumqi many months ago, and that protest had nothing to do with Uyghurs. Therefore, these Chinese netizen publicized that Rebiya Kadeer had given false information to the western media, i.e. she told a lie.

Here is the picture of the news conference with Rebiya Kadeer holding a picture of the completely unrelated protest:

Here is how Ms. MacKinnon defends Rebiya Kadeer's lie:

"The unfortunate - but it appears genuinely honest - mistake by Rebiya Kadeer sparked a fury of comments on anti-cnn, many of which denounced the Western media for emphasizing Uighur casualties while making light of Han Chinese casualties."

I find it rather bizzare that Ms. MacKinnon would call this blatant lie a "genuinely honest mistake". How exactly does Ms. MacKinnon know Rebiya Kadeer just made an honest mistake? Does Ms. MacKinnon know Rebiya Kadeer so well that she can be confident in her judgement of Rebiya Kadeer's character? Does Ms. MacKinnon have the ability to go back in time and read Rebiya Kadeer's mind across the Internet? Did Ms. MacKinnon actually instruct Rebiya Kadeer to use that fake photo?

Ms. MacKinnon believes that Rebiya Kadeer used that fake photo because the Reuters used this fake photo first. So, basically, Ms. MacKinnon is implying that Rebiya Kadeer is so lazy that she couldn't even bother to do her own research before mouthing off to the western media. However, Ms. MacKinnon hasn't bothered to do a bit in-depth analysis of Rebiya Kadeer's character in her article. Rebiya Kadeer actually has a history of telling lies on TV. Here is a youtube video of Rebiya Kadeer pouring her heart out to show her loyalty to the Chinese government and the unification of the "motherland":

So, did Ms. MacKinnon forget to do her own homework, or did she deliberately forget to include that tidbit of information in her article?

On the other hand, Ms. MacKinnon doesn't seem to think very highly of the Chinese netizen's resposne to the lie, and the theory of anti-China terrorism. Here is what she wrote:

"Some comments on that page and on other threads on the anti-cnn (which unfortunately I did not save) described the July 5th race riot as an act of terrorism, accused the Uighurs of being terrorists, and accused Western governments and the Western media of supporting anti-Chinese terrorism."

Ms. Mackinnon's tone here seems to suggest that she does not believe that the race riot was an act of anti-Chinese terrorism, but she doesn't give any of her thoughts on why she doesn't believe so. In fact, other than her tone, you couldn't tell what she thinks of the riot at all. There is no expression of sympathy to the victims of the riots in her article, nor is there any description of the riots. The first half of her article is to defend Rebiya Kadeer's lie, the second half is her criticism on how the Chinese government has managed the release of information so far.

If I had to sum up her article in two sentences, they would be "Rebiya Kadeer made a mistake -- big fucking deal! The Chinese government still sucks!".

For the record, I believe it would be incredibly stupid or naive of anyone to dismiss the anti-China terrorism connection to the riot in XinJiang. XinJiang has had a long history of violent anti-government terrorism. The most recent one being the murders of police officers some time around the 2008 Olympics. The level of organization and scale of the race riot is simply too big for terrorism to be ruled out completely.

I also find this bit of Ms. MacKinnon's analysis interesting:

"One reason for dialing things back may be the reactions coming from the Islamic world. Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan has condemned China's crackdown in Xinjiang as genocide."

Right, the spineless Chinese government is pedelling backwards because a misinformed Turkish PM is condemning the murder of hundreds of Han Chinese by Uyghurs mobs as a genocide of Uyghurs. Does Ms. MacKinnon understand the necessity to stand up for the truth?

Ms. MacKinnon is obviously not a big of of anti-CNN, which was setup to expose the lies and misinformation about China spread by the western media. I wonder if she ever wonders why anti-CNN existed in the first place.

2009-05-24T21:07:00.000+10:00

For China's sake, leave Tibet alone for a while!

2008-06-11T00:09:00.002+10:00

Unless you live in a cave on Mars, you should be rather familiar with all the anti-China/pro-Tibet protests that have been going on for the last a few months. I for one, have really had enough of these pointless protests and I reckon I've just got a solution that's gonna make everyone happy ... in the long run.

So, what's my brilliant solution, you ask? Well, it's simple:

The PRC government should invite the Dalai Lama back to Tibet, give him total rule over the Tibet Autonomous Region(TAR) on the condition that no foreign army is going to enter TAR without the permission of PRC, and stop funding and assisting the development of Tibet. In other words: no assistance without governance.

In the short term, this solution will benefit the Tibetan people in the following ways:

They get their religious freedom and beloved spiritual leader back.
If they want, they can get rid of the non-Tibetans in their own land.
They get to practice their culture in whatever way they want.

In the short term, this solution will benefit the Chinese people and the RPC government in the following ways:

They get to spend their hard-earned cash (a few billion yuan a year) on developing their own regions and help out more poor people who are far more likely to appreciate and support the development.
They can shut up those Tibetan-Independence SOBs ... at least for a while.
The goverment may be able to use this as some short-term political capital and get a boost for its international image (not that it matters that much).

However, there are also a few short term downsides to this solution. I can think of the following for the Tibetans living in TAR:

The living standard for some Tibetans might drop rather significantly.
The separation of church and state may dimish.

Someone may argue that the downsides to the Tibetans aren't downsides at all, because the Tibetans would prefer a spiritually rich life than a materially rich life any day, and being led by their wise spiritual leader is better than any other form of governance. Well, these people might be right, and to be honest, I don't really care.

The downside to the Chinese may be a bigger issue. Here ar the ones that I can think of:

A large number of people, especially the "angry youths" are gonna get pissed off, and riots will be started, and the political stability of the government will be threatened.
Other parts of China may demand the same treatment, especially Xin Jing, Taiwan and HK, again, threatening the stability of China.

However, these are just short term problems, and they can be mitigated. To smooth over the people, the government can start preparing the PR campaign a long time before the handover of power, and making sure that the people know how China can benefit from granting TAR an almost total indepedence, i.e. more money for poorer Chinese, better International image, national pride, etc., etc..

For other parts of China that may also seek similar independence, that's not a problem at all. Regions like Xin Jing can be told to wait for a few years to see how TAR works out. Regions like HK probably won't bother to seek independence, because they are pretty much independent anyway, especially now that they are rather tightly coupled with PRC in terms of economy. Taiwan won't be a big issue either, especially now that KMT is in charge, and again, economically, Taiwan is rather tightly coupled with PRC, and I doubt KMT would do much to upset the current status quo.

I cannot really predict the benefits in the long run for TAR or PRC. However, if TAR works out for itself, that'd be good for TAR and it would really show that the PRC was wrong to get in there in the place. On the other hand, if TAR doesn't work out, that'd be good for PRC, because it would save tons of money for not helping a bunch of ungratful Tibetans, and it would show the other ethnic minority regions that breaking off from PRC is a terrible idea, and it would probably gain more support for taking back the political power in TAR, and terminate the poltiical power of the Lamas.

The current China-TAR situation is that both sides are losers. The Tibetans in TAR feel that their freedom, religion and culture are being destroyed by the PRC, and the PRC is being hated both domestically and internationally while spending large chunks of money developing TAR.

So, really, PRC, please give TAR and Dalai Lama their independence. They hate you now because you are not giving them what they want. They will probably also hate you after you've given them what they want, but that's ok, because at least you get to keep your money.

Chinese cyber army, myth or reality?

2007-10-25T21:48:00.000+10:00

In the last a few months, there have been quite a few reports of Chinese cyber army attacking computer systems of different western governments to steal valuable secrets. First America, then Britain and now Germany, have all come out and publicly accused China's People's Liberation Army (PLA) of launching systematic attacks at their governmental and industrial computer networks. So, is there really an army of PLA hackers that are blatantly attacking western government's computer networks, or is this just paranoia and China bashing?

Well, I suspect that the truth is somewhere in the middle. I'm sure the PLA has some sort of electronic warfare division, and so do probably all the armies in the world. I'm also sure that some of the PLA hackers have attempted to break into other country's networks -- that's what hackers do. However, I'd be very surprised if PLA have indeed been systematically attacking foreign government's computer networks amid all these already very loud accusations.

I'm a computer scientist, and I have been running my own Linux server for several years, so let me explain why all these accusations of hacking are probably nonsense.

All the accusations so far claimed that the hackings were launched through the Internet. In other words, the attackers, if they existed, did not have physical access to the computers that they attacked. So, what exactly constitutes an Internet based cyber attack and how does one carry out such an attack? To answer these 2 questions, one has to first ask what the hacker can gain by attacking someone's computer network?

There are two fundamental goals of hacking:

Theft: stealing the data on the victim's computer.
Disruption: disrupting the operations carried out by the victim's computer.

Therefore, one can claim to have been cyber attacked when their private files have been accessed, or their computer has been remotely controlled by someone else, or the service provided by their computer is being inundated by malicious requests.

Let's further quantify what it means to "have your files stolen". Computer hardware and software are very very dumb, they are so dumb that they cannot understand you if you do not given them explicit instructions that they can understand. Therefore, if you unintentionally allow a file to be accessed through legal operations of your own software, then it probably will be accessed and that would not be hacking in my books.

For example, if you set up a web server on your computer, and you tell the server software that every file under the directory of "XYZ" can be accessed by your Internet users, then you should not put any of your private files in that directory.

So, if you have not unintentionally shared your private files, then how can a hacker get to them? Well, they can get to it with 3 methods:

Trojan horse software
Exploiting security holes of your networking software
Remotely logging into your computer using legit user name and password combination

Your files do not have cyber legs or normal legs. They will not copy, move, change or transmit themselves without outside influences. It doesn't matter whether your file is a piece of executable code, or just some random data, or a device (for *nix systems), it will not do anything unless something else tells it to do so. Therefore, if someone wants to read your private files or copy them onto their computers, they are gonna have to use another program on your computer to do so. However, if they are not already logged onto your computer, how can they run one of your programs?

Trojan horse software is one way for hackers to run a program on your computer. Basically, the hacker will write a malicious program and give it an exotic and tempting name and advertisement, and when you download it and run it on your computer, it will be able to do the hacker's biddings. For example, if someone tells you that their free program allows you to watch porn, or can crack the serial number of some software that you didn't pay for, then there is a pretty good chance that their "free" program is a Trojan horse.

So, how do you protect yourself against Trojan horse attacks? It's quite simple actually: DO NOT DOWNLOAD ANY DODGY SOFTWARE FROM THE INTERNET!!!! DO NOT OPEN OR RUN ANY EMAIL ATTACHMENT FROM PEOPLE YOU DON'T KNOW!!! Now, I don't think it's very likely for the PLA hackers to attack western government computers using Trojan horse software. I mean, could you imagine senior western government officials browsing the net and downloading dodgy software during their working hours on their government computers? Well, maybe you can, but then the problem wouldn't really be the hackers, would it?

Exploiting security holes of your networking software is another method that hackers can use to run programs on your computer, and it's much harder to defend against, but luckily, it's also extremely hard to do. Like any other software, networking software (email, remote logging software, internet messaging software, etc.) is essentially a list of machine readable instructions which were written to perform a specific task. When you run such a software, some of its instructions and some of its data are stored in your RAM. A security hole is a bunch of instructions that allow the users to modify the instruction part of the program through unexpected inputs. A security hole allows malicious users to replace legit instructions with their own illegit machine instructions, and cause damage.

So, how do you defend against security holes of your networking software? Well, not much really. On the one hand, you can rely on the publisher of the software to have done sufficient testing and apply patch whenever you can. Commercial software are normally pretty bad at this, because they hide their source code from the public and nobody knows what's wrong with their software until it's too late. On the other hand, you can use a good operating system and minimize the damage that can be done by an exploited process(a "process" is a software in execution). For example, on Linux/Unix systems, each process is given a set of permissions on what they can read and write, and these permissions are enforced by the operating system and cannot not be changed unless the exploited process is being run by the system admin user. Therefore, by restricting the permissions of your software to the bare minimum, you can minimize the damage.

The more important question is then how many hackers does it take to exploit the security hole of a networking software? My answer would be ... just 1 actually. You don't need an army of hackers, you just need 1 guy who knows what he's doing. It doesn't matter how many millions of hackers you have, if there is no security hole on your networking software, they would never be able to get through. In fact, it's probably a bad idea to have more than one hacker attacking the same networking software on the same computer -- they can easily interfere with each other and corrupt each other's illegal instructions. Therefore, the idea of armies of PLA hackers launch coordinate software exploit attacks on western government networks is not really plausible.

Another type of cyber attack is the often-talked about denial-of-service (DOS) attack. How does this work? Well, suppose that you are running a web server that allows people to order flowers over the net, and then one day, a bunch of hackers come along and use multiple computers to generate millions of flower orders at your website. Since you've only got a crappy computer, the poor thing is then so swamped with all these nonsense requests that it cannot handle any legit flower orders. This type of attacks can easily render ordinary web servers useless. However, all the hackers can do is disrupting your daily operations, they cannot steal anything from you at all. This is the type of attacks that an army of hackers are mostly suitable for, but since they cannot get any information from their victims, they can only disrupt single servers. If these servers are running highly classified mission critical services that concern the national security of America, Britain and Germany, then that would be a problem for them. However, could you imagine America coordinating real time military operations using a bunch of servers that are openly accessible via the Internet? I don't think so.

So, how do you defend yourself against DOS attacks? Well, some firewalls would be a good idea. For example, you can identify the IP address of the computers that the malicious requests come from and tell your networking software/hardware to simply ignore them. That would probably get rid of the vast majority of DOS attacks ... but yes, that also means someone has to be monitoring the requests at all times, but then again, that's what system admins are for, isn't it?

Finally, the least likely but most damaging way of hacking is for a hacker to guess your user name and password combo and remotely logging into your computer. This is the dumbest way of hacking and theoretically the least likely way to succeed. Basically, it just involves someone trying to first guess your user name, then your password through some remote logging software such as SSH or Telnet or FTP.

You'd think that an army of hackers would be perfectly suitable to carry out this sort of attacks. However, let's do a bit of math. Suppose you mandate your user name and password both have to be 8 characters long and they can be numbers, punctuations, and alphabetical characters. That means each character of your user name and pass word can be an upper case letter, a lower case letter, a digit and a symbol. A quick look at my keyboard tells me that the number of choices is 26 *2 + 11 *2 = 74. So the total number of possible user name and password would be 74^8 each, and the total number of user name/password combos would be (74^8) * (74^8) = 8.085 * 10^29 which is a very very large number. Since the guessing has to be done over the Internet, there is actually a delay. Let's suppose that we have 1 million hackers each with their own computer and trying to crack the user name and password of a single victim computer, and the delay between each try is 0.1 second, it would basically take 2563898975171665 years for these hackers to crack the victim computer. Does this seem plausible to you?

So, how do you defend against people who want to guess your user name and password? Well, my recommendations are:

Only use the most secure remote logging software, e.g. SSH.
Have proper user names and passwords. DO NOT USE EMPTY PASSWORDS OR ALLOW GUEST LOGIN!!!
Configure your remote logging software to disable remote logging for all known users, i.e. "root", "admin", "mail", "web", etc.
Configure your remote logging software to use non-standard ports so that the potential intruders cannot easily know what services you are running.
Configure your remote logging software to introduce delays between unsuccessful login attempts from the same remote host, i.e. first failure -- wait for 2 seconds, second failure -- wait for 4 seconds, etc.
DO NOT TELL OTHER PEOPLE YOUR USER NAME AND PASSWORD! DO NOT ACCESS HIGHLY CLASSIFIED COMPUTER NETWORKS FROM DODGY INTERNET CAFES!

Of course, there are many other forms methods of electronic intrusion, however, they don't fit the western government's accusations.

Now, let's have a look at exact what was described by the computer experts from the governments that accused the PLA. According to the following reuters article (http://www.reuters.com/article/internetNews/idUSL2225757020071022?sp=true):

"In our view, state Chinese interests stand behind these digital attacks," said Hans Elmar Remberg, vice president of the German Office for the Protection of the Constitution, the country's domestic intelligence agency.

"Supporting this view is the intensity, structure and scope of the attacks, and above all the targets, which include (German) authorities and companies," he told a conference on industrial espionage in Berlin.
In August German media reported that computer hackers believed to be linked to the Chinese army had infected German government ministries with spying programs. Beijing denied the allegation and said all "hacking" behavior was prohibited.
....

The attacks often rely on "Trojan horse" email programs or the hacking of Web sites, he said.

Well, maybe Mr.Remberg was not allowed to reveal more information on these attacks, but from what he said, there is precisely 0 solid proof of any PLA involvement. It's perfectly possible to trace the source of the attacks to specific IP addresses, therefore the attacker's cities, countries and Internet service providers. However, unless the PLA not only openly advertises their military subnet addresses but also foolishly launches these attacks from computers on these same subnets, there would be no evidence to link anything to the PLA. It seems that Mr.Remberg couldn't actually confirm the offending IP addresses actually belonged to the PLA ... well, that didn't stop him from accusing the PLA anyway.

Furthermore, it was also mentioned that "computer hackers believed to be linked to the Chinese army had infected German government ministries with spying programs". Well, as I explained before, there is no way for anyone to infect your computer with spying programs unless you actively download and run these programs yourself. So, could it be that the German ministries employees "accidentally" installed Trojan horse software on their work computers when they were browsing unsavory websites, and they just blamed the PLA to cover up their own dirty deeds?

Anyway, in conclusion, it is of my opinion that:

Every military, PLA included, has electronic intrusion divisions which often hack other government's computer networks.
None of the attacks described by the accusing western government are remotely plausible by any army of hackers.
None of the reports of the attacks provide any solid proof of PLA involvement.
If one just observes the most basic common sense in computer network safety, it would be very unlikely for your network to be breached by Internet based attacks.

Feel free to let me know what I've missed.

Some observations on western media's reporting of the Chinese lunar orbit launch

2007-10-25T19:10:00.000+10:00

China launched a lunar orbit yesterday. The launch is a remarkable scientific achievement no matter how you look at it, and it has been reported all over the world. However, while the overwhelming majorities of the reports from western media seem to be neural and positive, a quick look at the titles of the reports on google news seems to suggest that not everyone considers the lunch as just some scientific activity.

Some reports prefer to view the launch as China flexing its military muscles again:

China flexes muscle in space race with launch of lunar explorer (Guardian Unlimited, UK)
China launches lunar ambitions with moon shot (Euronews.net, France)

Some reports seem to suggest that this is part of the Asian space race:

What's behind Asia's moon race? (Christian Science Monitor, MA)
China joins Asian race to the moon (Sydney Morning Herald, Australia)
Asia’s space race heats up (The Times, South Africa)
Asian space race heats up as PRC launches orbiter (Taipei Times, Taiwan)
Dark side of the moon? China's lunar probe boosts Asian rivalries (USA Today)

And there are a few reports that prefer to talk about the propaganda value of the launch:

Chinese media trumpet space launch (NEWS.com.au, Australia)
Chinese propaganda reaches new heights (National Post, Canada)
China prepares for moon launch with patriotic blast (Washington Post, United States)

This is really a non-issue and I'm not trying to say that there is lots of bias in western media's reporting on China, but these titles do make a rather interesting contrast with the ones on the launch of U.S. space shuttle a few days ago.

What do you think?

Dodged a bullet

2007-05-29T17:51:00.000+10:00

Around December, 2005, I invested a rather large amount of money (by my poor student standard) with an investment company called Australian Capital Reserve (ACR). They gave me about 8% annual interest. The duration of my investment was 12 months and they returned the principles and interest back to me at the end of 2006. I was pretty happy about my investment and thought about investing with them again with a bit more of my savings.

However, I didn't end up reinvesting with ACR because my parents insisted that I switch back to term deposit with the bank, as they felt ACR was a bit too risky.

It turned out that my parents were right! ACR has just put itself into voluntary administration, in other words, the company is about to collapse. According to their website, for now ACR does not know when the private investors like me would get any of their money back. It seems that there is a pretty good chance that the private investors will lose all their money, as ACR's assets will be first used to pay off its debt to its corporate lenders.

This is a really terrible outcome for the mum and dad investors who were the main target of ACR's advertising. I remember that most, if not all, of the ACR ads depicted elderly people getting lots of money in return of their investments. While I'm feeling fortunate for myself to have pulled out in time, I cannot help thinking what would happen to the 7000 (elderly) people who haven't.

I was also a bit startled to hear that ACR was in fact a property investment company, and its collapse was caused by the slump of the property market. I was under the impression (from a telephone conversation with an employer/sales person from ACR) that they were sort of like a bank that lends money to other people/companies for a high interest. I particularly remember that the ACR person told me that their investments were safe, because they would only lend 80% of the value of the mortgaged asset.

My thoughts on the Chinese border guards shooting the Tibetans who tried to go to Nepal

2006-10-23T19:34:00.000+10:00

There has been a rather unfortunate incident in which a bunch of Chinese border guards fired upon a group of Tibetans trying to go to Nepal and one of the Tibetans was killed. If the Tibetans had not been armed, then it would be crystal clear that none of them deserved to die and the Chinese border guard responsible for the killing, as well as his commanding officer, should be punished accordingly. On paper, this just looks like another case of big bad China bullying innocent little Tibet ... but is it really?

Let's now look at what happened factually and logically. It is clear that the Tibetans were trying to sneak into Nepal from China illegally. In other words, they are illegal immigrants. It is also clear that the duties of the Chinese border guards include stoping people from illegally coming into China or leaving China. The logic is simple here, every country has the right to decide who and what comes into their land, as well as who and what leaves their land. This is why most, if not all, countries have set up immigration offices at their internation ports and airports. You certainly don't want people who committed crimes in your country to leave before they can be punished.

Obviously the border guards had every right to demand whoever tries to cross the border to show their legal travel documents, and it was their job to stop people from crossing the border illegally. So what do you expect them to do when they discover a group of people trying to cross the border illegally? Now, before everyone gets all emotional about the "pilgrims", it is necessary to realize that as far as the guards are concerned, it makes absolutely no difference. All the guards could see was a group of people trying to illegally leave one country and enter another. Without talking to these people and seeing their travelling documents, it is impossible to determine whether they are pilgrims, travellers, murderers or smugglers. People may argue that it was clear what these Tibetans were from the clothes they were wearing, but that's just bollocks, because clothes can be wore by anyone. Therefore, under this circumstance, the guards did the only thing that was reasonable -- they tried to stop these illegal immigrants, and this is where the real problem is.

So, what should be a reasonable way for the border guards to stop illegal immigrants (who could potentially be criminials fleeing from justice) when the illegals have a pretty big head start? The border guards tried talking to them -- it didn't work, and the border guards had no transports that was fast enough to overtake the illegals, so they did the next logical thing and fired warning shots which were also ignored by the illegals. Now, the only options left were either letting the illegals get away without knowing who they were and why they were fleeing, or taking them down and catching them. Taking the first option would mean a failure to carry out their duties for the border guards, and that was probably why they chose the second option, and it was tragic that one of the Tibetans died.

Let's take one step back and look at what happened. The first question that came to my mind was why couldn't the Tibetans have gone to Nepal legally? Despite what most westerners think, Tibetans are not prisoners in their own country, they are legal citizens of PRC, and China belongs to them as much as the Han people. There are no border checks within China and Tibetans can go wherever they damn please in China. Furthermore, legally there is no barrier whatsover that can stop the Tibetans from obtaining Chinese passports, they just have to follow the proper application procedures like everyone else and they will get their passports. Of course there is the issue of getting the visa to wherever they want to go, but that's not really the problem of the Chinese government, is it? Surely it would be illegal to enter a foreign country without the proper travelling documentation except for the refugees, but as far as I know, these Tibetans were not refugees, they were not wanted by the Chinese government before they tried to go to Nepal illegally. So, there really is no reason for them to do what they did, and I think they should bear some of the blame too.

Lastly, it would be totally illogical to use this incident to accuse the PRC of committing genocide in Tibet. Despite all the "genocide", the population, life expectancy and literacy rate of the Tibetans have increased dramatically since 1950 -- this is the exact opposite of what a genocide would do to a race. Furthermore, if the Hans wanted as few Tibetans as possible in China, they would encourage the Tibetans to leave, and stop the Tibetans from coming back -- this is opposite of shooting people who want to leave. It's not even clear what race the border guards were, they could have been Tibetans for all we know.

You are welcome to comment, but don't even think about trying to convince me that Tibet is an independent country, because for every reason you can give me, I can give you an equally, if not more, convicing reason why Tibet is part of China.

A questionable report from BBC about China's organ harvesting program

2006-10-13T14:05:00.000+10:00

BBC seems to have dug up some rather shocking dirt on China's organ harvesting business. It has produced a report in which a white British reporter who speaks a reasonable amount of Chinese went undercover to what he claimed to be oen of the largest organ translplant hospitals in Northern China, and got verbal evidence of this harvesting business from a doctor in charge and an agent for the hospital. Here is the report:

However, as a native speaker of Chinese, I found this report to be rather suspicious for the following reaons.

First, when I first saw this report on ABC and then again on SBS, I couldn't help noticing that it was impossible to see the actual name of the hospital. There was a couple of seconds of footage on the front of the hospital at the beginning, but the camera was so far away that it was impossible to see the name of the hospital. From the youtube video, you can see just how blurred the characters were. There was also a wide shot of the name of ths hospital after the interviews at the hospital, but for some reason, the actual name of the hospital was blocked out, and all you see is the two big characters: 医院, which just means "hospital". The reporter also never explicitly mentioned the name of the city in which the hospital is located. I find this lack of information rather strange, given the aim of the report is obviously to name and shame. I also don't believe that the reporter is hiding the details of the hospital to protect his sources -- since he's given the name of the doctor and a rather good overview of the hospital in the report such that anyone who actually lives in that city should be able to identify that hospital with ease. At the end of the report, he says "Robert something in Tian Jin ... ". Well, Tian Jing (天津) is not traditionally classified as in Northern China.

Second, at the beginning of the report (maybe 6 seconds into the footage), you see the reporter walked up to a bunch of girls at what seemed to be the reception and said in Mandarin "hey, we are looking for director Deng in room 210", and one of the girls just pointed at a direction and off he went. This seems rather strange that he had to ask for directions when he already knows the room number for the person he wanted to see. Was he trying to confirm the existence of the doctor here? If so, how come there is no subtitle to tell the viewers what he was actually asking there?

Third, the most suspicious part of the report starts at around 1 minute and 16 seconds into the interview. Here, a man in blue shirt and wearing glasses gave a rather lengthy confession to the reporter, and the reporter claimed that this man was an agent of the hospital for dealing with foreign clients on the organ business, and this guy gave an apparant confession and justification on using the organs of executed criminals. So what's so suspicious here? Well, this guy did not speak a single world of Chinese and he gave the entire interview in Japanese!! What's even more suspicous here is that the white reporter actually responded to him in Chinese!! So why would a Chinese speak Japanese to a white guy who actually speaks and responds in Chinese? Surely, he could've just spoken Chinese? What exactly is the reporter trying to pull here? Did he think that no Chinese speaking people would pick this up?

There are a few other weird things about this report, and I will watch it a bit more and provide more updates later. Hopefully, I will be able to use some imaging tools to find out the name of the hospital -- if it's a hospital at all and more details on this "director Deng", so stay tuned.

Update 1. I just listend a bit more carefully at the interview with the old man -- who was supposed to be the father of one of the criminals executed. Now, I used the word "supposed" here, because there is no way that I can verify that the relationship between the old man and the person executed. The only photographic evidence is the picture shown at around 3 minutes and 11 seconds -- the picture only has 2 kids and an old woman, the older kid seems like around 10, the executed prisoner seems to be in his 20s. The only part of the interview conducted in clear Chinese goes as the following (starts at around 3 minutes and 13 seconds):

The old man: from the arrest to execution ... it was about 2 years.

The female interviewer: Then during the 2 years, did the court ....

Yes, the interview was cut off exactly at that point, the question asked by the female interviewer was not finished, but here is the subtitle displayed during this interview:

I didn't even get to see my son. After he was arrested I wasn't allowed to see him once.

Well, maybe he said something like that during other parts of the interview ... but we may never know because BBC hasn't shown it!!

Update 2. After a bit more research on hospitals in Tianjing, as well as the footage of the report, I've come to a fairly confident conclusion that the hospital in the report is Tianjing's Oriental Organ Transplant Center, or 东方器官移植中心, here is their website: http://www.ootc.net/default.aspx. Here is a picture of the hospital:

See if you can make the connection between that picture and the buildings in the report. If my guess is right, then the Dr Deng in the report would be the deputy director of the liver transplant group, Dr.邓永林, according to the personnel page of this OOTC. This would add to the credibility of this report if the Dr. Deng in the report could be verified with photographic evidence.

The problem with the Fidelius charm

2006-10-11T20:27:00.000+10:00

I'm a fan of the Harry Potter series (books only, hate the films). However, after reading J.K. Rowling's explanation of the Fidelius charm on her website, I suddenly realized that there is perhaps a hole somewhere ... let me explain.

First, here is Flitwich's description of the charm:

"an immensely complex spell involving the magical concealment of a secret inside a single, living soul. The information is hidden inside the chosen person, or Secret-Keeper, and is henceforth impossible to find -- unless, of course, the Secret-Keeper chooses to divulge it" (Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban)

Furthermore, here is Rowling's clarification of the charm on her website:

In other words, a secret (eg, the location of a family in hiding, like the Potters) is enchanted so that it is protected by a single Keeper (in our example, Peter Pettigrew, a.k.a. Wormtail). Thenceforth nobody else -- not even the subjects of the secret themselves -- can divulge the secret. Even if one of the Potters had been captured, force fed Veritaserum or placed under the Imperius Curse, they would not have been able to give away the whereabouts of the other two. The only people who ever knew their precise location were those whom Wormtail had told directly, but none of them would have been able to pass on the information.

The two explanations sound pretty reasonable, don't they? However, if you think about it, no where does either explanation say that the secret keeper cannot be the person whom the secret is about. What does this mean? Well, we know that the Potters want to hide from Voldy, and that was why they needed a secret keeper for the Fidelius charm, and it was common knowledge that the secret keeper is the only person who can betray the secret. So who in the whole wide world would be the least likely people to betray this secret? -- It's not Dumby, it's not Black, it's not any of Potter's friends of relatives -- it's the Potters themselves! So, the question is, why couldn't they just have been the secret keepers for their own secret? That way, Voldy wouldn't have been able to find them because he couldn't have found the secret keeper, but he couldn't have found the secret keeper because he couldn't have found the potters!! Perfect concealment!!!

Furthermore, one may argue that the person that secret is about cannot be the secret keeper ... right ... so why couldn't the Potters have done some sort of mutual secret keeping with Black, especially that Black was also going into hiding himself! So, the Potters could've hiden Black who could've hiden the Potters, and Voldy couldn't have found the Potters because he couldn't have found Black, and he couldn't have found Black because he couldn't have found Potters!! Perfect concealment again!!

Of course, the implication is that Voldy can also hide his whereabouts in himself or with his most trusted servants ... so none of his enemies could have found him. Um.. maybe some more clarification from Rowling is in order ...

Peking Duck, where China haters come together and share notes.

2006-08-08T01:27:00.001+10:00

I first read Peking Duck a few years ago when I was starting to find online blogs interesting. It's owned by a guy named "Richard". My first impression of this blog was that of "wow, this Richard guy seems to be rather interested in China", after reading a few posts on that blog, my second impression was that "gee, this Richard guy really hates the Chinese government".

I perfectly understand why people, foreign or Chinese, would hate the Chinese government and the ruling political party (the CCP). After all, CCP is probably one of the most corrupted political party in the world. However, there is a line between cursing and criticising a corrupted government, and racism and prejudice against an entire country and its people. Peking Duck has crossed this line many many times, and it seems that it attracts a particularly large crowd who just love to hate China.

Here is a post that has attracted a particularly nasty crowd of China haters:

China slaughters more than 50,000 dogs in Yunnan province

All because three people in the region died of rabies in the past four months. This is a strange story indeed.

A county in southwest China has ordered all 50,546 dogs to be killed in an effort to fight a rabies outbreak that has caused the deaths of three people, state media has said. Around 90 percent of the dogs in Muding county, Yunnan province, had already been killed since the campaign began on July 25, the Beijing News said.
Owners were ordered to kill their pets or face having teams of local police and other enforcement officers kill them, it said. Even the 4,292 dogs in the county that had been immunized against rabies were ordered put to death, as authorities said the immunizations were not 100 percent effective, the report said.

From January through July, 360 people in the county had been bitten by dogs, with the three human deaths occurring since April, the Beijing Times said. Some owners have used methods including hanging their dogs, electrocuting them and clubbing them to death, while others used drugs, the Beijing News said.

Dog owwners had been compensated five yuan (60 cents) each for the loss of their pets.

A reporter for the Beijing News who visited the county said one woman was told by dog-elimination squads patrolling the streets that her dog had to be killed. She covered her eyes as the patrollers beat her dog to death.

To prevent dog owners from violating the order, roadside checkpoints had been set up to inspect vehicles for dogs, the Beijing News said. Any dogs found were immediately killed at the scene.

I don't know. Something about this sure doesn't sound right to me. I mean, couldn't they have vaccinated and then quarantined the dogs? Yeah, I know, they might not have the infrastructure in place to quarantine 50,000 dogs, especially out in the countryside, but is there really no alternative to mass slaughter?

Found on the Internet's best forum.

The post itself is fine, after all, most of it is just quotes from another report. Like most rational people, I think the local government involved is overreacting and they are not doing the best they can. However, do they, and the Chinese people in general, really deserve the racist hatred expressed in around half of the comments listed below?

Comments

I actually didn't find this on Yahoo at first, but it was on CCTV this morning (that's interesting). The chief of police in charge of the procedure defended it by saying it's the only way they can be sure to get all the dogs with rabies (my wife pointed out how similar his philosophy is to Chiang Kai shek in killing ff a lot of innocents to get a few communists). Also, the cop said, "I've seen the victims in the hospitals, if you could see what I've seen, you'd do the same thing". Disgusting

Posted by: Chip at July 31, 2006 01:30 AM

I wonder which restaurants they sold them to.

Posted by: Ivan at July 31, 2006 01:36 AM

Actually, I sort of see their point. If there was danger of rabies, it would be understandable, because to us humans, the welfare of humans presumably takes precedence (however, I fail to see how this ties in with the Endangered Species law-- are these species now classed as humans?) However, if it were me in charge of the whole thing, I probably wouldn't have been so drastic. I mean, can't rabies be diagnosed or something? One could make it compulsory for owners to take their dogs for a checkup yearly-- preferably free of charge-- and have something to show for it (certificates of health or something) and only take measures against the dogs who haven't gotten checked up.

Posted by: Aramel at July 31, 2006 01:53 AM

Very funny, Ivan.

I thought rabies was undetectable until it surfaced, at which point it's too late to treat. It can't be cured, but it can be prevented. That's why if you get bitten by a bat or potential carrier, you might have to go through the gruelling experience of getting rabies shots, even though you may not have been infected. That's why I'd think quarantine would be the most humane approach.

I think there were only a couple of human deaths from bird flu in Hong Kong before they killed every chicken on the island some years back, so I suppose this sort of thing isn't unprecedented. But dogs, which many people look on as a part of their family....to have them beaten to death in front of your eyes...no, it doesn't sound like the best solution.

Posted by: richard at July 31, 2006 02:01 AM

The CCP paints with broad strokes...

Posted by: Johnny K at July 31, 2006 02:07 AM

The CCP paints with broad strokes...

I don't think the CCP is to be taken to task for this one, Johnny. That is, if by CCP you mean the Party Central. I may be completely wrong in this, but Hu & co probably have more things to do than ponder over dogs. I can't really imagine Hu saying, "Go! Kill those dogs!" any more than I can imagine Mao saying, "Go! Kill those sparrows!" (Oops, he did say that, didn't he...?) The point is that I doubt this order came from Beijing. More likely it was the local officers trying to make themselves look good to high-up by reporting, "Hey, we got rid of all possible rabies-carriers!"

So if by CCP you meant the local officials, you'd be right. But if you meant the whole thing... in a spirit of fairness, I think that the Party Central shouldn't be blamed for an order they probably never gave.

But dogs, which many people look on as a part of their family....to have them beaten to death in front of your eyes...no, it doesn't sound like the best solution.

I don't approve of mass animal-slaughter, but one wonders where to draw the line. Dogs? Cats? Birds? Some people love to keep tortoises. I think that people are wary after SARS (which was reportedly spread by masked palm civets), and this is the reaction. Killing dogs isn't the best way to do it, but I think they're so afraid of these diseases that they're just doing everything that comes to mind.

Afternote: I just noticed that the rule apparently doesn't apply to police dogs. Bah.

Posted by: Aramel at July 31, 2006 07:01 AM

If it makes it to western media it will make China look very very bad in the eyes of people in the west; the idea that the government could take something that belongs to you and kill it would seem extermely brutal over here. I can't emphasize how much this would demonize China in the eyes of many people here in the US.

Posted by: Pete at July 31, 2006 07:41 AM

Refreshing to see that they DO value human lives above dogs, though. Can't say much for their way of showing it, but it does sound rather typical here. Shenzhen had a rash of purse-snatchings from motor-scooters, so of course, their solution was to ban motor-scooters.

By the way, Shenzhenren is down due to a hacker/spammer invasion, and may not be revived. Still trying to figure out if it's worth the trouble.

Posted by: Sam_S at July 31, 2006 01:30 PM

Do they really value human life above dogs? Or do they simply value the preservation of their monopoly on power and seek to destroy any perceived threat to it???

Chuck

Posted by: China_Chuck at July 31, 2006 07:37 PM

Do they really value human life above dogs? Or do they simply value the preservation of their monopoly on power and seek to destroy any perceived threat to it???

I don't see how people keeping dogs would have any impact on the CCP's monopoly of power. Please explain.

Posted by: Aramel at July 31, 2006 08:11 PM

This is rank stupidity. By killing even all the dogs that are rabies vaccinated, you are sending the message that the vaccines are useless. Pet owners in the future are no longer going to bother with vaccination, and that would make future outbreaks that much more likely. As for trying to eradicate rabies in one county in china by killing all the dogs, that is such a fatuous goal that I don't know whether to laugh at the chinese gov't's stupidity or cry that an entity (whether at the local or central level) so idiotic and irrational can wield so much power. First of all, some dogs are bound to escape, either hidden away by their owners or else strays. And there are other carriers, including wild animals like bats and foxes. Even if every rabid animal in Yunnan was exterminated, that still won't be good enough, because all you need is one rabid animal to enter the province before the outbreak spreads like wildfire.

The only way to prevent future outbreaks is to encourage more people to vaccinate their pets and to keep the stray population under control. The best way the CCP could have done this was to round up and (unfortunately but necessarily) euthanize the strays, while sparing any animals already vaccinated or about to undergo vaccination.

Posted by: Battlepanda at July 31, 2006 09:40 PM

But Battlepanda, you're forgetting about the hukou system, which makes it illegal for dogs to migrate from one province to the next without express permission from the state.

Posted by: richard at July 31, 2006 10:11 PM

Instead of spaying and neutering the dogs, the ugly and vicious chinese govt brutally kills the pets of people who may have no life other than their pets.

Maybe the chinese can demonstrate their idiotic and vicious dog beatings during the opening ceremonies at the olympics. Show us how wonderful their country is.

Posted by: chinabitingdog at August 1, 2006 04:16 PM

They should put the dogs to sleep if they have no other solutions. I think beating them to death infront of their owners is very insensitive.

Posted by: Andrew at August 1, 2006 08:11 PM

Considering how the Communists continue to spread FAR more fatals diseases (SARS and AIDS, just to name two) than dogs do, wouldn't a logical extension of this policy be for the Communists to exterminate themselves?

Posted by: Ivan at August 1, 2006 09:21 PM

Thank you, Ivan ;-)

Posted by: Sam_S (shenzhenren) at August 2, 2006 12:05 AM

murdering chinese animals how can you kill a dog by beating it to death .
well i hope what goes around comes around
pw

Posted by: peter winn at August 2, 2006 03:14 AM

sick and dehumanizing. more lives are put at risk by this brutal, illogical and merciless display than rabies has ever threatened.

they may "only" be dogs, but the scale and methodology of the massacre makes the cultural revolution seem a more recent memory than it might otherwise be...

a few short steps back to khmer rouge, tutsi genocide, gulags, concentrations camps and lychings...

Posted by: cscol at August 2, 2006 03:37 AM

Posted by: Aramel at July 31, 2006 07:01 AM

If it makes it to western media it will make China look very very bad in the eyes of people in the west; the idea that the government could take something that belongs to you and kill it would seem extermely brutal over here. I can't emphasize how much this would demonize China in the eyes of many people here in the US.

SADLY, I HAVE TO DISAGREE ARAMEL. WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE SLAUGHTER OF 50,000 DOGS BY CHINESE OFFICIALS TO PREVENT RABIES AND THE MASS SLAUGHTER OF 4.9 MILLION SHEEP, 0.7 MILLION CATTLE AND 0.4 MILLION PIGS BY THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT IN 2001 TO PREVENT FOOT AND MOUTH DISEASE? THIS IS ALL VERY TRAGIC, THE WAY HUMAN BEINGS TREAT OTHER LIVING BEINGS. AND IN THEORY WE'RE SUPPOSED TO BE SUPERIOR. HA!

Posted by: SD at August 2, 2006 06:17 AM

The Chinese disgust me. Of all peoples on the earth, they strike me as the most brutal, the most violent, and the cruelest. I hate the Chinese.

Posted by: crosswordfan at August 2, 2006 06:28 AM

Think of the good Chinese people on the receiving end, the ones who had their beloved dogs beaten to death in front of their eyes. They are good people, victims of a backward system.

Posted by: richard at August 2, 2006 07:34 AM

I agree with SD, posted August 2. The Chinese DISGUST me, they are brutal, cruel and have no regard for life. I couldn't sleep last night after reading a story about these dogs. How could any human being do that? What a horrific, painful, terrifying, and horrible way for these animals to die. Remember Gandhi's quote, that a country is judged by the way it treats animals? When China is judged, it should burn in hell. I officially hate the Chinese and all that they stand for.

Posted by: Robyn at August 2, 2006 10:09 AM

i hate chinese people.they are cruelestpersons on earth.

Posted by: sumit at August 2, 2006 10:23 AM

time to take a longer look at all the goods you buy from china.... call the american companys that have their product made there and tell them you won't buy those products till china has a new policy for the treatment of animals.. if needed there are humane ways to put an animal down.. beating them to death is un-acceptable.......

Posted by: victoria at August 2, 2006 10:43 AM

Oh wll. No more dog meat stews for them for awhile. This whole matter digusts me.

Posted by: Katie at August 2, 2006 10:59 AM

Oh wll. No more dog meat stews for them for awhile. This whole matter digusts me.

Posted by: Katie at August 2, 2006 11:00 AM

My heart breaks with this news.

Just imagine all the suffering, all the important breeding programs
that have come to an immediate, cruel halt, all the avoidable pain
these animals will have to endure. All because they can't get
organized in dealing with rabies. How stupid - killing the dogs won't
stop the rabies... what about their rats, cats, birds, bats, and other
well know rabie carrying fauna.

It is very hard to show compassion, humanity and respect to a people,
country and a society who allow these archaic, immensley cruel,
pathetic, ideology to constantly take place.

Boycott products from these countries, it's the only way to get their
stupid attention. Maybe if enough of us do that, they have to start to
catch up with the rest of the world. They may be one of the oldest
societies in the world, but they sure are one of the most uncivilized
socieites.

JMHO... sorry I had to vent. This news totally ruined my day.

MM

Posted by: Merlin's Mom at August 2, 2006 11:33 AM

remember the cultural revolution and remember that this is how humans were treated. it is pathetic, disgusting, and an abomination. the chinese do not respect life in general. countryside or not, it is time for china to wake up and smarten up.

Posted by: wonderland at August 2, 2006 11:59 AM

I understand controlling disease, but that is sick! That has to be the least humane way to kill an animal and what about the over 4,000 that had their shots and were protected against this? They were killed too, so you tell me the reasoning behind that!
This is one of the sickest things I have ever heard and I believe that some sort of action should be taken!

Posted by: Amber at August 2, 2006 12:13 PM

What a bunch of fucking monsters. Never will I purchase anything anything from China. IF these idiots were educated they wouldn't have to do this at least not the way they did. I only wish I could go there and cut off there penises and make them eat it.

Posted by: Michelle at August 2, 2006 12:20 PM

woof ...that stings

Posted by: rick at August 2, 2006 12:54 PM

i bet now is not good time to buy alpo stock!!!!!

Posted by: rick at August 2, 2006 12:56 PM

i bet now is not good time to buy alpo stock!!!!!

Posted by: rick at August 2, 2006 12:57 PM

i bet now is not good time to buy alpo stock!!!!!

Posted by: rick at August 2, 2006 12:58 PM

deleted - hate posts against the Chinese people not permitted.

Posted by: john at August 2, 2006 01:22 PM

china is enjoying very good trade relations with the US. we are buying lots of china products and supporting these animals that would do this horrible thing.

Let them starve. Without US support, they will suffer. If they want our dollars and cooperation, they will have to show some compassion for others, lesser ones. why should we give, whatever, money, compassion, cooperation, so they can turn around and torture others - yes, even powerless dogs and cats). dogs and cats that want nothing more than love and affection and give so much back.

this was done by a nation and each individual. each person that handled a club or death instrument, and each person that stood by, and each person that approved or did nothing to object.

show that you object. write, call, protest in any and every way you can. including DO NOT buy products from China. Even, do not go to chinese restaurants at this time. Let them hear from you, all of us as a nation and each of us individually. Do something to make a difference.

China is actively courting trade with the US. China has warehouses full of animal furs. even dogs and cats furs. again, the animals are beaten and clubbed so as not to harm the pelt. we buy these items so in that way approve of these practices. if we continue to buy animal items from china, we continue to support these horrible practices. Stop buying any animal products from countries that allow abuse.

Cat and dog pelts are used in clothing we purchase. jackets, shoes, stuffed dolls. many are made with dog and cat fur. all of these animals are raised in hell conditions. suffer their whole lives and then die brutal deaths. be more careful of what you are getting from china. the cheap price is too high given the suffering involved. can you just imagine warehouses full of dog and cat pelts? its true. there are pictures available. do a google search for dog, china, pelts, clubbing.

Walmart is one of the biggest buyers of China products. Let Walmart know how you feel. this could make some difference.

with sadness for the animals that suffered and died. also for the ones that still live in unbearable conditions. These animals are given to us in love and trust. How cruel and dispicable a person can you be to do this horrible thing.

please do something about this. you, personally, today. and in any way you can. and get others involved. perhaps we could establish some standards of care for animals in countries we do trade with.

then perhaps we could also get inspectors for our puppy mills. we also have some terrible conditions for some animals. tho certainly we are mostly a nation with regard for life. and not a barbarian nation as a rule. tho there are always some exceptions. but china should not be allowed to let this go unnoticed or unpunished.

mary

Posted by: mary at August 2, 2006 02:03 PM

Wow. I can't believe some of these comments. If you people aren't, aware here it is. We are the dominant species on this little rock we call Earth. As far as I'm concerned one human life is worth all the dogs on the planet. I don't quite agree on the methods used in this situation, but I also know that not one person posting on this site was or is there. there are facts that cannot and will not be known.There are much worse things to worry about, but more power to you if you want to focus on this one little snippet of news.

Posted by: Brick at August 2, 2006 06:58 PM

Brick and all others like him have to be the biggest self-centered, egotistical, narsicisstic assholes on the planet.

Posted by: Stan at August 2, 2006 07:05 PM

This does seem like a terrible thing. But I wonder if there aren't some cultural factors most of you aren't taking into consideration. In the west, we view dogs as pets and family. In China, animals may not be viewed with such high respect, and killing them may not be such a horrible thing. You can condemn them for that, but it is really just an issue of where you set the bar, because we do similar things to other animals in the west.

Take, for example, mosquitoes. We kill them en mass with large scale spraying. Now, of course, no one cares about bugs, but that is a cultural thing. You could imagine a culture where people did care about bugs and would be outraged by our spraying. Should we stop killing mosquitoes?

In China, they may just look at dogs like we look at mosquitoes. One needs to be careful projecting their cultural values onto other cultures.

I just thought I would bring that up, because many people seem to be viewing this news story from a western-culture point of view. But, being western myself, I can't fathom treating dogs and their owners like the people in this story.

Posted by: brad at August 2, 2006 07:14 PM

We ARE the dominant species of the planet and also the most civil and intelligent. I don't hate the Chinese, as judging an entire ethnicity would prove to be ignorant. However, the officials that chose to partake in such a horrific event digust me beyond belief. As if we're so primitive to resort to such a ridiculous way of killing as beating. A shot to the head would have been less painful, ffs. How pathetic is their government that they won't step in to pay for a humane way of euthanising these poor animals. How terrible that these innocent animals must suffer due to their governments obvious neglect on issues that they should have speculated to have arisen later. I can honestly say this sort of barbaric behavior doesn't surprise me as the country has practiced infanticide for years due to their poor future planning. I can only hope their mental sickness doesn't spread through the entire country.

Posted by: Lunar at August 2, 2006 07:41 PM

No, many Chinese do not consider dogs as the loving, caring, life-saving critters that we do in the west, However, it is insane to kill a whole lot of healthy dogs, including the vaccinated ones to prevent the spread of a disease that, as someone said, is just as easily spread by many wildlife species

Even domestic animals raised for food deserve at least a humane death--which, by the way, the animals in England did get. And there is no vaccine for the diseases for which the animals in England were killed. If the officials who ordered the slaughter are profiting from the sale of 50,000 dog pelts, I am even more sickened.

If the government had provided vaccine for the dogs--either free or a low cost, the problem would have been eliminated.

There are also effective post-exposure shots for people who are bitten by a rabid animal--but they need to be done soon after the bite--another failing on the government's providing of medicine of China--none available, I would guess.

And as far as the comment about killing all the dogs in the world to save one human life--That's really a stupid comment. Over the years, heck last year alone, search and rescue dogs, police and guard dogs, army patrol dogs, guide dogs for the blind and hearing impaired, bomb sniffing dogs, cancer detecting dogs, and just plain old pet dogs have saved more lives than were lost to rabies in China last year and probably more than were killed by rabies in the past several years in China. Talk about throwing the baby out with the bathwater!

In Europe--particularly France in the middle ages, people killed all the cats because they thought the cats were in league with the devil. Well, low and behold, all the areas where cats were wiped out were MUCH harder hit by the Black Plague than areas that had cats to kill the rats that carried the fleas that spread the disease.

How many more Chinese will die of rabid wild animal bites, knife-wielding robbers, murderers, earthquakes, etc. because there are no dogs to protect them. How many will suffer hunger and perhaps starvation without the farm dogs to keep vermin out of the crops, chicken houses, grain storage bins.

Rabies is easily preventable. Why not prevent it rather than killing innocent animals for no reason. China's method of dealing with problems is to fix the blame, not the problem,, and never think ahead to stop an epidemic BEFORE it happens.

And since when is one or two people dying, an epidemic? I don't mean to make light of human deaths, but many more people die from vehicle collisions or industrial accidents--let's ban all vehicles and factories and construction projects.

Posted by: Andy at August 2, 2006 07:51 PM

In China, animals may not be viewed with such high respect, and killing them may not be such a horrible thing. You can condemn them for that, but it is really just an issue of where you set the bar, because we do similar things to other animals in the west.

I know several Chinese people who own dogs and love them dearly, just as we do in the West. This might not have been quite so horrific if the poor owners didn't mind, if they agreed it was for the best. That's not the case. They stood and watched in helpless anguish as their beloved pets were beaten to death. I don't blame the Chinese people for this - many Chinese people have expressed shock, outrage and horror in the BBS forums. I do blame the system which often goes way overboard and performs utterly senseless, futile acts - just as they responded until very recently to AIDS and Hepatitis B, by punishing the victims but doing absolutely nothing to stop the disease.

Posted by: richard at August 2, 2006 08:00 PM

I will look at everything I purchase now and not buy it if is from China. I am sorry we are importing so much from people that BEAT DOGS TO DEATH.

Posted by: Carolyn at August 2, 2006 11:08 PM

I am so with MM (Merlin's Mom). This news truly ruined my day(s). I came home to my two dogs, and when I locked eyes with them tried to imagine how anyone who dared call themselves a human being could do something so cruel, painful and utterly barbaric to another living thing. I said it before and I'll say it again (and don't you dare say I'm generalizing, because I'm doing the math here) I hate the Chinese. I wonder why I'm not seeing this news plastered EVERYWHERE in the media (saw it a lot on the Internet but not on TV). Too shocking? Kids won't like it? I'm TIRED of hearing about Mel Gibson's DUI.

Tell me more about WAl Mart and what I shouldn't buy. I'm more than happy to boycott and be a conscientous consumer, but I don't know all of the things to look for.

I'm not typically religious, but I am praying for these 50,000+ beautiful souls and hope they are in a better place (not a stretch) and that when the Chinese die they will enter a hell ruled by rabid canines.

What a helpless feeling. Nobody to call. What do we do? How do we OBJECT???? Why are we in trade talks with China?

Posted by: Robyn at August 2, 2006 11:09 PM

I am so with MM (Merlin's Mom). This news truly ruined my day(s). I came home to my two dogs, and when I locked eyes with them tried to imagine how anyone who dared call themselves a human being could do something so cruel, painful and utterly barbaric to another living thing. I said it before and I'll say it again (and don't you dare say I'm generalizing, because I'm doing the math here) I hate the Chinese. I wonder why I'm not seeing this news plastered EVERYWHERE in the media (saw it a lot on the Internet but not on TV). Too shocking? Kids won't like it? I'm TIRED of hearing about Mel Gibson's DUI.

Tell me more about WAl Mart and what I shouldn't buy. I'm more than happy to boycott and be a conscientous consumer, but I don't know all of the things to look for.

I'm not typically religious, but I am praying for these 50,000+ beautiful souls and hope they are in a better place (not a stretch) and that when the Chinese die they will enter a hell ruled by rabid canines.

What a helpless feeling. Nobody to call. What do we do? How do we OBJECT???? Why are we in trade talks with China?

Posted by: Robyn at August 2, 2006 11:13 PM

Please don't say you "hate the Chinese." Remember, the victims - the pet owners - are Chinese, too.

Posted by: richard at August 3, 2006 12:58 AM

********where is god when brainless humans go killing around innocent creatures. **********if you can brutally kill a living dog why wouldnt you be a able to kill a person. i am so mad right now. *************

(edited for excessively inflamatory language)

Posted by: what is this at August 3, 2006 09:11 AM

Not to take away from the absolute senselessness and cruelty of this new measure, but...do we have some PETA or ALF-ers here?

Posted by: nausicaa at August 3, 2006 10:01 AM

You aren't seeing it on mainstream media and that is by design. President Bush doesn't want everyone to know because then he would be in the line of fire. People would want to know why he isn't doing anything and the answer is he doesn't want to do anything and won't because our government doesn't want to lose their financial gains from import/export of China because we have a sick selfish government.

Posted by: Amber at August 3, 2006 11:44 AM

what is this, you are over the line with your racist, hateful comments. I appreciate that you're angry but this is too much. I'm editing your remarks. If you wish to restate without the hate speech, please do.

Posted by: OtherLisa at August 3, 2006 03:59 PM

I couldn't agree more with Andy's statement... thanks for that!

Some people may not love dogs, or most animals. But come on people - the means they used is downright wrong.

All I can say is that I am really glad that I don't live in China, because I would probably be in jail if someone took one of my dogs and beat them to death in front of me.

Posted by: Tanya at August 3, 2006 05:32 PM

This is disgusting! It makes me sick! These cruel people! I say I go up my block, and knock on all the doors, if a chinese person answers, I will beat them and their families to death with a bat, and then leave .60 cents for each person on the door step. You know, since our area is over populated with chinese, you know it would make sense.......

Posted by: brandon at August 3, 2006 10:37 PM

Ugh.

One more time. Anger is understandable. Strong emotions are understandable. But this isn't LGF here. Hate speech is not acceptable.

Posted by: OtherLisa at August 4, 2006 12:02 AM

That last comment by "brandon" scans like it was written by a Chinese person.

Posted by: Ivan at August 4, 2006 12:37 AM

Ivan, I agree.

Whoever wrote it, it's ugly. Though not as bad as the one I had to edit.

Posted by: OtherLisa at August 4, 2006 01:34 AM

IP address is Canadian...who knows. Truly disgusting and reprehensible.

Posted by: richard at August 4, 2006 01:44 AM

Now that China has been BLESSED / STRUCK with FAMINE (IT IS YOUR REWARD FOR GOOD WORK DONE BY ELIMINATING THE DOG POPULATION) KEEP IT UP - WHAT IS YOUR NEXT COURSE OF ACTION TO ACHIEVE SOME MORE REWARDS.

Posted by: LD at August 4, 2006 04:21 AM

CHINA U SUCK U PATHETIC EXCUSE 4 A NATION.. TAKING DOGZ AND KILLING THEM CAUSE UR 2 FUCKING LAZY 2 TAKE CARE OF THE REAL PROBLEM AND THATZ... YEAH U GUESSED IT YOU !!!

U SHOULD BE ASHAMED OF URSELFZ

BLOODY...

Posted by: BLOODYHACKXSAWX at August 4, 2006 12:17 PM

Dear "LD", and "Bloodyhackxsawx", the last two commenters here:

Please do not attempt to make any provacateur posts on the internet unless and until you have been trained properly by China's intelligence services. Which, for you, will obviously never happen.

You do a great disservice to the REAL Chinese intelligence agents like Bingfeng, when you post such transparently provocative comments in your misguided attempts to seem like "Chinese patriots". Although I'm not 100 percent sure that you're Chinese, but that's really beside the main point.

I do not agree with everything that the Chinese spies post on this blog, but I do have some respect for their intelligence, and I don't like it when wannabe spies like you come around and try to act like provacateurs without knowing the first thing about the game.

Your mother is calling you. Now go away and leave us grown-ups alone.

Posted by: Ivan at August 4, 2006 12:57 PM

I have spent alot of time in China and the chinese people are great. Just like everywhere there are good and bad people.

However this is typical of a government that has been historically careless and callous. Its one thing to put animals to death for a reason but to take them from their owners and beat them to death in the street? What does this do to young children watching this. It was not too long ago in the cultural revolution that people were beaten in the streets.

Remember the cover up for Sars. In Shanghai they play a recording not to give homeless money as there way to deal with homeless people. When a man set himself on fire in front of a government building the response was to place a fire extinguisher outside.

China has alot of challenges as a society. The government advertising callous brutality as an answer to a problem only makes things worse. It perpetuates the image of China as a brutal country and sends the message through society that people have no rights to protect themselves or their property.

Posted by: Nick at August 4, 2006 01:48 PM

this is insanity!!!! if they want to rid their country of rabies, vaccinate the dogs or the people!!!! to kill dogs in front of their owners is nothing more than torture for both. obviously if the dogs were living with owners and the owners did not show signs of rabies then the dogs were not infected. how do you just kill 50.000 dogs or kill 50,000 anything for that matter. do they have no souls?

Posted by: changlyn at August 4, 2006 05:43 PM

Interestingly, a new journalist blogger speculates that the dog massacre may prompt larger anti-government actions in China:
many Chinese believe the government acted in a cold-hearted manner, letting the rabies outbreak grow out of hand, then punishing dog owners with a wanton slaughter.
While television newscasts portray the dog cull as a responsible government reaction to thwart an epidemic, radio call-in shows have portrayed the flip side, drawing fervent opinions from callers who say the dog slaughter was an over-reaction...
...Chinese in the big cities are passionate about their dogs, paying huge municipal fees to keep them. Perhaps the intense interest in this story is because it has the potential to spark broader outrage over government action.
Under China's brittle political system, such small protests can easily flare into something larger.

Posted by: OtherLisa at August 5, 2006 12:16 AM

Today's London Times reports that they're planning to extend the slaughter to around half a million dogs.

Posted by: Ivan at August 5, 2006 01:01 AM

"Disgusting" doesn't begin to cover it.

Here's an excerpt from the article Ivan mentioned:
Zhang Luping, founder of the Beijing Human and Animal Environmental Education Centre, said the culling should stop: “This really damages our national image and sets a really bad example to show how lazy and inconsiderate those local government officials are.” Cases of rabies are on the rise in China, with more than 2,500 people reported to have died of the disease in 2004. Only 3 per cent of China’s dogs are vaccinated.
It goes on to talk about the popularity of dogs and pets in urban China, saying that there are 400,000 dogs in Beijing alone. Here's a link to the article.
I have to wonder if that reporter is right. First piss off the peasants and the unemployed and the disenfranchised. Then piss off the middle and upper middle classes. Way to encourage social harmony, guys!

Posted by: OtherLisa at August 5, 2006 01:11 AM

I'm beginning to wonder how the 5 RMB bounty might be figuring into all of this.

Just think: If you're one of the Communist Pigs who has the authority to use all of that money, then why not kill as many dogs as possible and then lie about how the owners "voluntarily" gave up half a million dogs, and then keep 2.5 million RMB for yourself? Or something like that, perhaps with the numbers a bit more widely spread and shared among several Communist Pigs.

Posted by: Ivan at August 5, 2006 02:15 AM

ROBYN... IF YOU READ THIS, YOU ARE WELCOME TO EMAIL ME (schrzan@hotmail.com). I CAN ANSWER YOUR QUESTION FOR YOU.

Posted by: SD at August 5, 2006 04:25 AM

The asians treat all animal life as nothing.. No respect for the pain and suffering of animals.. Kill them quick and treat them with respect.. I have no respect for these people.. Everyone will be judged one day.. I feel bad for asians, because they will have to answer for the their sick actions against all creatures

Posted by: jim rose at August 5, 2006 06:03 PM

By the way you can email me about my thoughts

Posted by: jim rose at August 5, 2006 06:05 PM

This article shows just how stupid, cruely, and useless the chinese government is. They so dumb they start killing out of fear because they are intelligence enough to understand how rabies works. The government serves no purposes except to spew hatrage, pain, and misery on everything in the world. This government will have to change or eventually be destroyed. They deserve nothing else.

Posted by: John at August 6, 2006 08:53 AM

Where were these commenters for the numerous PD posts when *people* got beat up in China? Or the Abu Ghraib stuff? Or any other atrocities Richard has talked about? Yknow, the ones involving human life?

I love dogs, but when the abuse of dogs makes you more outraged than the abuse of people... I mean, you should at least have an equal amount of moral outrage, dontcha think?

Posted by: davesgonechina at August 6, 2006 09:19 AM

There were 70 comments when I last checked, and around half of them are full of racist hatred against China and the Chinese people. Take the following one as an example:

This is disgusting! It makes me sick! These cruel people! I say I go up my block, and knock on all the doors, if a chinese person answers, I will beat them and their families to death with a bat, and then leave .60 cents for each person on the door step. You know, since our area is over populated with chinese, you know it would make sense.......

Posted by: brandon at August 3, 2006 10:37 PM

This comment was followed by an even more disgusting comment from Ivan -- Peking Ducks's long term resident China basher:

That last comment by "brandon" scans like it was written by a Chinese person.

Posted by: Ivan at August 4, 2006 12:37 AM

But what takes the cake is reply by the blog moderator:

Ivan, I agree.
Whoever wrote it, it's ugly. Though not as bad as the one I had to edit.

Posted by: OtherLisa at August 4, 2006 01:34 AM

So what's happened was that someone who calls himself "brandon" posted an extremly racist insult calling for violence against the Chinese people, then Ivan, who is a regular commenter and has posted quite a few racist comments against the Chinese people himself, quickly jumped in and accused "brandon" to be a Chinese; then without showing any proof, the moderator agreed with Ivan.

Let's look at the three posts in detail. The first one was written by someone with a western name and an IP address (Canada), the post itself was written in flawless English, except for the lack of capitalisations for "Chinese", and the post calls for the killing of Chinese people over dogs. The post itself does not indicate in anyway that it's written by a Chinese person -- it's not written in the Chinese language, it does not have any grammatical errors, oh, and it calls for violence against the Chinese people -- something highly unlikely for a Chinese.

The second post is from "Ivan", who is one of the most active China basher from the Peking Duck. I guess I really wasn't surprised by his comment. It seems that as far as "Ivan" is concerned, nothing good or right can come from China or the Chinese people, and nothing bad or wrong can come from the Western world. That's why "Ivan" believes that an extremly racist insult against the Chinese people can only come from a Chinese person. Great logic isn't it? It may also be true that "Ivan" actually knows that "brandon" is not very likely to be a Chinese, but he still chose to make his rather illogical accusation, if this was the case, then I'd have to say "Ivan" is a hypocrite.

The third post is from "OtherLisa" who seems to be moderating the comments on Peking Duck, and given that only around half of the comments on this post are purely racist insults, I'd say she has done a cracking good job. Then when someone like "brandon" comes up with a particuarly good comment, she just cannot seem to contain her excitement and roaring approval. However since Peking Duck is such a politically correct and highly progressive China oriented forum/blog, and it's OtherLisa's responsibility to maintain this high standard, she couldn't just let that beautiful comment sit there by itself, so she just did what seemed the most natural thing to her and credited that comment to a "Chinese".

Now, I perfectly understand that some people just plain hate China for whatever reasons they have, and I can live with that fact. What I resent is hypocrisy which is the best word I can think of to describe Peking Duck, its owner and a large number of its regular posters. Peking Duck is probably a very popular China oriented blog as it claims, but the majority of the people it attracts are just arrogant and racist hypocrites whose are only interested in expressing their hatred towards China.

Richard, the owner of the blog, tries to project the image that he cares about China in a good way. Since I'm not a mind reader, I cannot refute that with 100% certainty, but what I've found after reading through some of the posts on his blog is that even though he resents the lack of free speech in China, he still practises censorship on his own blog. He has stated that he alone determines what can be said on his own blog, this would be fine if he had a set of fair and clearly stated commenting rules, and he enforced these rules equally and effectively. However, anyone who spends 10 minutes on his blog would realise that anti-China comments are the most welcome on his blog, and pro-China comments are often censored, and pro-China commenters are often insulted and ridiculed.

Richard also seems to hold the opinion that China should allow Taiwan, Tibet and whatever Chinese lands inhabited by some minority people to become independent, but what he doesn't seem to know (or just chooses to ignore) is that not only China has pretty legal claims (as recognized by most of the countries in the world) to these lands but also that losing these lands will only weaken China in both economy and national defense. Surely people who care about China in a good way wouldn't want to weaken China? If he indeed was a champion of human rights and wanted to liberate all the oppressed people from their tyrants, why doesn't he start from his own civilisation which colonized multiple continents and murdered tens of millions of natives and is still reaping rewards from these crimes. What's so special about China?

Overall, I find most of the China related posts on Peking Duck project an unjustified level anti-China prejudice and this is actively encouraged by Richard, the owner of the blog. If this is supposed to be a China oriented forum, it sure isn't China friendly, or maybe it was never intended for Chinese people in the first place. Of course, Richard and his supporters would just blame the Chinese people for not being able/willing to accept their version of the "truth" -- what's new?

I realise that people who read this post of mine are likely to check out Peking Duck, thereby increasing its "popularity", but hey, at least they would've heard my side of the story.

Pandemonium

2006-06-28T23:49:00.000+10:00

I was walking through the casino the other day when I saw this new game called "Pandemonium". After a few observations I realized that the game was really simple: the house and the punter each gets a card and whoever has the bigger hand wins.

I was a bit puzzled by the simplicity of this game. It just seems that on the basis of the-house-vs.-a-singler-punter, the winning probability is 50% for both the house and the punter -- because the conditions under which the cards are dealt to the house and the punter are totally equal, and I do believe the game/cards/dealing-of-the-cards is not rigged and the casino actually has a more honest way to con your money. So why would the casino play a game which it has an equal chance of winning with the punters?

Let me try to offer an explaination here. It appears that the statistical model of this game is identical to the model of the toss of an unbiased coin, which means that given an infinite number of tosses, the odds for heads and tail are even, and similarly, given an infinite number of games, the casino cannot win any money. However, there is just one little problem here. You see, as the casino plays an infinite number of games, it's odds of winning is indeed 50%, therefore it is not in any danger of losing money, but from an individual punter's point of view, he does not actually have an infinite amount of chips and therefore can only play a limited number of games. As a result, most punters would very likely to have lost all their money before they can get to their winning streak, this is why the 50-50 winning statistical model is not in favour of the punters.

Now, you might think "but there are an infinite number of punters, so over all, the statisical model should hold!" Well, this is not true because the sum of an infinite number of zeros is still zero. In order for this model to work equally for the punters, the game has to be played in a way that every punter is only allowed a fixed number of games, and no punter is allowed to play the game more than once. This way, some punters will win some money, and some punters will lose some money but the total amount of winnings should roughly equal the total amounts of losses. Unfortunatelly this is not going to happen because most punters would not leave a winning streak until they've lost more than they've won, and this is why the casino cannot be beaten.

Of course my explaination could be wrong, and if so please feel free to let me know.

Noticeable entertainers who share my birthday!

2006-06-27T22:41:00.000+10:00

I just noticed that wonderful celebrity birthday thing on International Movie Database. After a brief investigation, I've found the following entertainers who share my birthday:

Tobey Maguire (star of the Spiderman franchise)

梁朝偉 (Tony Leung Chiu Wai) (one of the best HK actors)

Christian Kane (he was a major character on Angel which is one of my favourite TV shows)

Last but not least ...

Gia Paloma (A pornstar with more on screen performances than the first three combined (and younger too!))

China wins Thomas Cup and Uber Cup ... again!!!

2006-05-08T20:48:00.000+10:00

As a badminton addict, I am extremly proud of China for winning the Thomas Cup back to back and the Uber Cup 5 times in a row without losing a single game.

Lin Dan (林丹, a.k.a. SuperDan) really came through this time and showed the world why he was the No.1 singles player by first crushing the Olympics gold medalist and Wolrd Championship title holder Taufik Hidayat in straight sets in the semifinals, then beating the evergreen world No.3 Peter Gate in straight sets in the finals.

Bao Chun Lai (鲍春来), who ranked No.7 in the world and just came back from an injury, finally showed the world that he had really matured by first coming back from a 10-point-deficit in the last game of the semifinals against a talented Sony Dwi Kuncoro, then beating world No.5 Kenneth Jonassen in the the finals sealing China's victory.

The doubles players Fu Hai Feng (付海峰) and Cai Yun (蔡赟赟) also proved to the world once again that they were not just a couple of pretty boys by beating the No.1 doubles player from Denmark in the finals.

I cannot be prouder of the Chinese teams!!!

Winner: Lin Dan

Winner: Bao Chun Lai

Loser: Peter Gade

More on ordering the wrong Chinese dish in Chinese restaurants

2006-03-06T23:38:00.000+11:00

This has been bugging me for a while. I often eat at a local Cantonese restaurant near my home. It's a good restaurant with decent but slightly pricy food and a staff who speak heavily accented Mandarin -- nothing wrong with that. What bugs me is two of their non-Cantonese dishes: Peking duck and 干煸肉丝 (Dry-fried Beef Strips).

Starting with Peking duck, the properly cooked duck should be bbqed until the skin of the duck is crispy, and should be sliced up at the patron's table by a chef. The slices should be just the crispy skin with a thin layer of meat. When you eat it with a very thin steamed bread, you should feel the crunch of the crispy duck skin with the crispy spring onion, and the juice of the duck with the sweet noodle sauce (甜面酱) should combine to give you a mouthful of explosion of a full but not-over-the-top flavour of all the ingredients. However, the practice in the Cantonese restaurant is to serve you 2 thick and sort of steamed pieces of lukewarm duck with the skin, they do wrap with the duck slices in the right bread with the spring onion and sweet noodle sauce, but the duck skin is soft which means the crispiness of the duck totally gets lost, and the thick layer of meat just totally overwhelms the flavour of every other ingredients, and the whole dish just turns out to be a waste of good duck meat.

The problem is far bigger with 干煸肉丝. This is a traditional Sichuan/Hunan dish. The word 干 means "dry", the word 煸 means "fry with high heat and not much oil". This dish is supposed to be cooked with very thinly sliced pork strips fried to a dark brown colour with a whole bunch of spices including chilly, garlic and spring onion. This dish is supposed to go with rice very well and make you eat a large amount of rice. However, my local Cantonese restaurant cooks this dish with not-so-thinly spliced beef strips coated with a flour based sweet source, and tenderly fried with a bit spring oinion and more sweet source. Now, this is NOT 干煸肉丝, it's sweet-sour beef strips -- 糖醋肉丝, and it does not go down with rice well at all!

Maybe I will have a chat with the chef next time I eat there ...

Ordering the wrong Chinese dish in a Chinese restaurant

2006-03-05T02:20:00.000+11:00

I went to HongKong a few months ago after leaving China for almost 8 years. This was my first trip to HK and I was full of anticipation of the huge varieties of great and authentic Chinese food which is hard to come by in Australia. Well ... it didn't work out exactly the way I hoped.

It was already 4 o'clock in the afternoon after I settled into my hotel. I was pretty hungry and went out for food. After wondering around the surrounding streets for a while, I was a bit surprised by the lack of medium level restaurants. I finally made up my mind to go to this Shanghainese restaurant which looked pretty good from outside. This was probably my first mistake -- HK is in Canton, and Cantonese cuisine is supposed to be pretty different from Shanghainese cuisine, therefore the Shanghainese food in HK wouldn't taste that authentic. However, giving that both HK and Shanghai are coastal cities and there might actually be some real Shanghainese cooks working in the kitchen, I thought it'd be a safe option.

After reading the menu, I made my biggest mistake by ordering a famous Sichuan dish: 夫妻肺片. I had this dish once in the capital of Sichuan around 15 years ago. It was extremly spicy but really tasty, I remember how I kept eating that dish even though my mouth was already numb from it. I knew it was probably not the wisest idea to order a Sichuan dish in a Shanghainese restaurant, but I was a bit adventurous and not really surprised when the dish turned out to be a huge disappointment. It was wrong in almost every possible way, and I left the dish untouched after the first try.

Now, let's get to the moral of this story: there are great variations in Chinese cuisines, one should always order dishes which the restaurant claim to be specialized in. Sichuan dishes are very heavy on flavours created by a great variety of spices. Shanghainese, Cantonese and other coastal region dishes are more focused on the freshness and original flavours of the main ingredients. Ordering a Sichuan dish from a Shanghainese restaurant in HK might sound pretty cool, but the dish would be as authentic as the deep fried frozen pizzas served in an Italian restaurant owned by an Irish in Tokyo.

Democracy -- means or end?

2006-03-02T23:24:00.000+11:00

The dictionary definitions for the word "democracy" are:

the political orientation of those who favor government by the people or by their elected representatives
a political system in which the supreme power lies in a body of citizens who can elect people to represent them
the doctrine that the numerical majority of an organized group can make decisions binding on the whole group

Now, to all the people who believe that every single country in the world should be become a democracy (or else ...), I'd like to ask this question: "Why would a country/people want democracy?"

To answer this question, let's first ask ourselves why we do the things we do? Why do we spend hours in a gym working our butts off? Why do we spend 12 to 20 years of our lives educating ourselves? Why do we work at jobs that we hate? Why do we risk our lives doing crazy stuff like sky diving and swimming with the sharks? Why do people take drugs? Why do some people kill other people for no reason? I believe the fundemental answer to these question is simply that everyone wants to be happy. In order to be happy, people would do things that they hate, they would hurt other people and they would also help others even at the cost of their own lives.

Now, what does wanting to be happy have to do with democracy? Well, the answer ultimately depends on how democracy can make people happy. In other words, the question we should be asking is: Is democracy just a means to help people achieve their happiness or a fundmental and inseparable aspect of happiness?

There are many ways to look at this qustion, but I will just take a materialistic approach. Ultimately, democracy means a government elected by popular votes. So, the question becomes what it is that a democratically elected government can do that a non-democratically elected government absolutely cannot? I believe that from the general public's point of view, the optimal government is one that provides the best public services possible while spending the minimum amount of taxpayer's money. So, if it is the service provided by the government that counts, then why would how the government obtained its power be of any importance? In other words, if democracy is just a means to achieve the optimal government, then logically it is no better or worse than a dictatorship that also achieves the optimal government. If we change the question a bit and ask "What form of government is more likely to become an optimal government", then the answer is likely to be a "democracy", since no human is perfect and the power of a dictatorship is strong enough to corrupt the wisest and most just people.

Furthermore, it is also interesting that the leaders of the most powerful democracies are also Christians. Now, would you say God is a perfect dictator? Obviously God is not elected by the people but God's people are supposed to carry out God's will without any questions. Why would a Christian follow the bible? Is it because the teaching of the bible is irrefutably logical and rational, or is it because it is written by God? Hypothetically, would a Christian continue to follow the bible in the same way if it was proven that the bible was not written by God but by a human? Then if God is a dicator, then why would the leaders of the free world worship him but at the same time waging wars toppling other dictators (assuming these leaders are not hypocrites)? Of course I cannot argue with you that the human dictators are evil and imperfect and God is perfect. But then why exactly are the leaders of the free world so vehemently against dictatorship and promoting democracy? Does that mean they are only against imperfect dictatorships but not the perfect one? Then wouldn't this prove that democracy is just a means and not the end?

In conclusion, I acknowledge that democracy is better than dictatorhsip in achieving the optimial government, but it's just a means, and people should not have to struggle for democracy for the sake of having democracy.

Rant: Great hardware that doesn't support linux!

2006-03-02T21:56:00.000+11:00

I hate M$ Windows, and since I have a degree in software engineering you should just believe me when I say Windows sucks as an operating system. ;-) Naturally, I love linux/unix and use them exclusively for work. However, one thing about linux that bugs me and other millions of linux enthusiasts is the lack of hardware driver support for linux.

Despite all the faults of Windows, installing Windows based drivers is about as easy it gets -- as all non-plug-&-play hardware comes with a free Windows driver. Linux, on the other hand, is a totally different story. Most of the hardware manufacturers don't provide any linux support, some of the ones that do only do a half-arsed job. I cannot remember how much hair I lost installing ATI driver for my linux machines. There have been movements organized by linux users aimed at pressuring ATI and other big hardware manufacturers to provide better linux support, but none of them have produced any significant results so far.

The latest thing that pisses me off is my new Canon Pixma MP500 all-in-one printer. This is a great printer but Canon does not provide any linux support, and therefore I cannot use it to print anything on my linux machine which I use to do most of my reading and writing. After days of agonizing search, I finally found a third-party linux printer driver provider that does support this printer. But the problem is that I have to pay around $50 to get the full version of the third party driver. Well, I spent days searching all over the city to find the lowest price for this printer, which ended up costing me $300, and now I have to pay another bloody 50 bucks for something that should be provided for free by Canon? How ridiculous is this!!

Commenting guideline

2006-03-02T21:45:00.000+11:00

I don't believe in unlimited freedom of speech, I believe people
should be responsible for what they say. However, I do believe
different people may often hold different views, therefore I will
welcome every comment that is logical and rational. Occasional
personal insults may be allowed, but my threshold for offensiveness is low.

Oh, spams will be deleted as soon as they are discovered.

Welcome to Public Servant!

2006-03-02T20:46:00.000+11:00

I've been reading other people's blogs for a while and it seems
to be a really good way to express yourself and share ideas with
people from every corner of the world. So, I've finally decided
to start one of my own and everyone is welcome to have to read
and leave comments.