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Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Woman survives 195 hours buried in rubble from China's earthquake.

 

CHENGDU, China (CNN) -- A woman who survived on rainwater has been freed after being trapped in rubble for 195 hours in the aftermath of the Chinese earthquake, which has now killed more than 40,000. The 60-year-old woman escaped with just facial bruises and a minor fracture during her eight-day ordeal.

The official Xinhua news agency identified her as Wang Youqun, a retiree, and said she had been unconscious for a day when a falling girder hit her head in the May 12 quake, The Associated Press reported.

She was apparently trapped in a landslide that swept away a temple in the city of Pengzhou and was intially able to move, but a later aftershock trapped her between two rocks, according to AP.

Her dramatic discovery came hours after rescue teams pulled two men men from the rubble in Sichuan province.

One of the men was found in a mine in Qingchuna county and a second in a hydroelectric plant in Wenchuan county, state-run media reported.

They had been buried for six days and 20 hours and seven days and 11 hours, respectively, according to China's Xinhua news agency.

The rescues give a glimmer of hope amid the rising daily death toll. Official figures show the number of victims has risen to 40,075 in the Sichuan province alone.

The United States announced Tuesday it would send a shipment of specialized recovery equipment and a team of specialists to southwestern China this week. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) says more than $815,000 worth of additional assistance will be sent to China.

That brings the total USAID assistance to China to more than $1.3 million. Last weekend, the United States sent U.S. Air Force C-17s carrying aid to China, including tents and generators.

After signing a sympathy book with the first lady at the Chinese Embassy in Washington, President Bush vowed to "stand ready to help in any way the Chinese government would like."

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Monday, April 07, 2008

Really? Is this the right way to protest China? Really?

 

PARIS (AP) -- Police say the last section of the Olympic torch relay through Paris will not be run because of chaotic protests.

Security officials snuffed out the torch and rushed it onto a bus at least five times because of the raucous protests against China's human rights record.

A police spokeswoman says a vehicle now will carry the torch for the entire last part of the route, to a sports stadium in the south of Paris. The French Olympic Committee says it hopes that runners still might be able to carry the torch at the very end.

A Paris police official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to media, says at least 28 people have been taken into custody at the protests.

Despite massive security, at least two activists got within almost an arm's length of the flame before they were grabbed by police. Officers tackled many protesters and carried off some of them. A protester threw water at the torch but failed to extinguish it and was also taken away.

At the start of the relay, a man identified as a Green Party activist was grabbed by security officers as he headed for 1997 400-meter world champion Stephane Diagana, the president of France's national athletics league, who was carrying the torch from the first floor of the Eiffel Tower. The man was tackled before he got close to Diagana.

The procession continued but, soon after, a crowd of activists waving Tibetan flags interrupted it for the first time by confronting the torchbearer on a road along the Seine River. The demonstrators did not appear to get close to the torch, but its flame was put out by security officers and brought on board a bus to continue along the route.

Less than an hour later, the flame was being carried out of a Paris traffic tunnel by an athlete in a wheelchair when the procession was halted by activists who booed and chanted "Tibet." Once again, the torch was temporarily extinguished and put on a bus despite protesters' apparent failure to get close.

Some 3,000 officers were deployed on motorcycles, in jogging gear and using inline roller skates. Still, police barely stopped the second rush at the torch, and the attempt to extinguish it with water. Other demonstrators scaled the Eiffel Tower and hung a banner depicting the Olympic rings as handcuffs.

The torch was extinguished for the third time when police interrupted the procession as a precaution because they spotted a crowd of demonstrators on a bridge they were approaching.

Police said they did not immediately have a count of the number of arrests. Mireille Ferri, a Green Party official, said she was held by police for two hours because she approached the Eiffel Tower area with a fire extinguisher. In various locations throughout the city, activists angry about China's human rights record and repression Tibet carried Tibetan flags and waved signs reading "the flame of shame."

Riot police squirted tear gas to break up a sit-in protest by about 300 pro-Tibet demonstrators who blocked the torch route.

France's former sports minister, Jean-Francois Lamour, said that though the torch had been put out, the Olympic flame itself still burned in the lantern where it is kept overnight and on airplane flights.

"The torch has been extinguished but the flame is still there," he told France Info radio.

Police had hoped to prevent the chaos that marred the relay in London a day earlier. There, police had repeatedly scuffled with activists angry about China's human rights record leading up to the Beijing Olympics Aug. 8-24. One protester tried to grab the torch; another tried to snuff out the flame with what appeared to be a fire extinguisher. Thirty-seven people were arrested.

In Paris, police had drawn up an elaborate plan to try to keep the torch in a safe "bubble." Torchbearers were encircled by several hundred officers, some in riot police vehicles and on motorcycles, others on skates or on foot. Boats patrolled the Seine River that slices through the French capital, and a helicopter flew overhead.

About 80 athletes had been slated to carry the torch over the 17.4-mile route that started at the Eiffel Tower, heading down the Champs-Elysees avenue toward City Hall, then crosses over the Seine before ending at the Charlety track and field stadium.

Across town, City Hall draped its building with a banner reading, "Paris defends human rights around the world."

One torch bearer, two-time French judo gold medalist David Douillet, told RTL radio that he regretted the choice of China, "because it isn't up to snuff on freedom of expression, on total liberty, and of course, on Olympic values."

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has left open the possibility of boycotting the Olympic opening ceremony in Beijing depending on how the situation evolves in Tibet. Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said Monday that was still the case.

Activists have been protesting along the torch route since the flame embarked on its 85,000-mile journey from Ancient Olympia in Greece to Beijing.

The torch's round-the-world trip is the longest in Olympic history, and it is meant to shine a spotlight on China's economic and political power. Activists have seized upon it as a backdrop for their causes, angering Beijing.

Beijing organizers criticized London's protesters, saying their actions were a "disgusting" form of sabotage by Tibetan separatists.

"The act of defiance from this small group of people is not popular," said Sun Weide, a spokesman for the Beijing Olympic organizing committee. "It will definitely be criticized by people who love peace and adore the Olympic spirit. Their attempt is doomed to failure."

The torch relay also is expected to face demonstrations in San Francisco, New Delhi and possibly elsewhere on its 21-stop, six-continent tour before arriving in mainland China May 4.

(Ed note: I'm all for people having an opinion on Tibet and Human Rights in China. They should protest and protest loudly. But to continue to dog the Olympic Torch as it tours through the world is a pathetic display in and of itself. The fact that it turns violent is counter-productive at best and downright shameful and hypocritical at worst. The Olympics is about World Unity. There are much better ways for governments and their people to show disdain for China, like via trade policy. The most peculiar part of all this is, do they really think the Dahli Lama would approve of such actions. Of course not.)

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Sunday, February 17, 2008

Weekends of Reruns

 

Last weekend, it was Sherwin. A boy who was one of the last ones I've dated locally. He came on kinda strong but didn't seem to want to take it any further. And he ignored my calls this past week to see if we could get together. After all, if we're both lonesome, and we know what we're good at... It's too bad he seems to have been playing Useless Ukes Games™.

This weekend, it was Ashley. Well, okay, no he didn't come on strong and we didn't do anything! But seeing my most important ex always has the ability to made me either quite delighted or absolutely miserable depending really on how I'm feeling at the time.

Oh, and there was also Raver J. Well he IS always the hottest thing ever. And quite easily accessible a majority of the time. Just as long as he hasn't got his glowing lights set on someone else before you get a chance. We had a very good time Friday night and I was reminded that I *DO* know what I'm doing with a boy when I finally get around to it.

So that's how things have been going there.

The writer's strike may be over in Hollywood, but I'm still seeing quite a few reruns if you know what I mean. Not that that is such a terrible thing. I mean if the boy is good, why not give it another look-see?

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Thursday, February 14, 2008

Weeaboo? Did I hear somebody say Weeaboo?

 

The vacant Macy's department store at Gwinnett Place mall will be transformed into a giant Asian ethnic shopping destination, developer George Thorndyke announced Wednesday.

Korean retailer Mega Mart will lease the 240,000-square-foot space, at Pleasant Hill Road and I-85 in Duluth, for its first U.S. store, according to Thorndyke.

The plan does not affect the existing Macy's, which occupies space that formerly housed a Rich's department store.

The store's 75,000-square-foot first floor will serve as a grocery. The second floor will offer clothing, housewares and other department store-type goods, while the third floor will have a food court and event facility.

The move accelerates a trend of Asian-themed businesses in the Gwinnett Place area, including the Gwinnett International Farmers Market and other grocers, chasing an increasing number of affluent Asians and Asian Americans living in Gwinnett County.

Thorndyke said the store will also seek to cater to non-Asian customers, with products labeled in English and with English-speaking employees.

By the time the store opens in the spring of 2009, the former Macy's will have been vacant for nearly five years.

"We're excited about this, the mall's excited, the tenants out there are excited," Thorndyke said.

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Thursday, February 07, 2008

Quick news

 

*** Mitt Romney has suspended his bid for The White House, leaving only Mike Huckabee to legitimately oppose John McCain. Sure, Ron Paul is still in it, but I mean, it's fucking Ron Paul.

*** A woman who sued a hospital because she was unsatisfied with her son's circumcision was denied her lawsuit. Apparently once you sign the consent forms and they've committed to the snippy snippy, you can can't get mad when it looks like shit. (A second doctor did clean it up a bit though.)

*** Amy Winehouse is unable to get a Visa in order to come to the US to pick up the assumed buttload of Grammy's she'll win. Apparently she's gotten so skanky, border guards won't even fuck her.

*** Today begins the Chinese New Year and The Year of The Rat. I'm not sure what soothsayers predict that means, but I do know that despite all my rage I am still likely going to be a rat in a cage.

*** Apparently in New York City there are places that are now accepting Euros as opposed to old fashioned American dollars. Considering how poorly the dollar is doing vs the European Union's currency, it's not surprising.

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Tuesday, February 05, 2008

Don't listen to him! Send them to me instead!

 

HONG KONG (Reuters) - Popular actor and singer Edison Chen apologized on Monday after images appearing to show the Hong Kong star partially nude in the company of several starlets leaked onto the Internet.

In a video statement Chen, 27, called the postings of the photographs "intentionally hurtful and malicious."

"I hereby use this opportunity to apologize to anyone who has been affected by this strange, strange ordeal," Chen said.

Police believe the images were copied from Chen's computer when it was serviced last year.

"If you ever downloaded any of these images, please do not forward them to anyone ... If you are still in possession of these images, I urge you to please destroy them immediately," a subdued-looking Chen added in the video.

The photographs, which appear to show Chen in bed with singer Gillian Chung, along with suggestive images of actress Cecilia Cheung, were recently posted online, sparking a media frenzy in the celebrity-mad former British colony.

Hong Kong police said some 1,300 private shots of celebrities had been stolen from a faulty personal computer.

"A person had taken his computer to be fixed, but during the maintenance period, someone used dishonest means to take some information from the computer and distributed this information indiscriminately to others," assistant police commissioner Wong Fook-chuen told reporters.

While the police gave no specific names, Hong Kong's Ming Pao newspaper reported the photographs belonged to Chen.

"A person in the shop found hidden inside (Chen's) computer, confidential nude pictures of naked female stars, which were then secretly copied," Ming Pao reported, quoting an anonymous source.

The computer shop was subsequently raided by police officers in a widening investigation across the territory, which has led to eight arrests for infringement of obscene material laws, and the seizure of over 1,000 explicit images, including four women whom were public figures, the police said.

Hong Kong's police commissioner, Tang King-shing, said the case was being treated seriously and warned the possession and distribution of such images might be illegal.

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Monday, January 28, 2008

200,000 Chinese (each as unique as the snowflakes stranding them) stuck in a train station.

 

Driving sleet, freezing temperatures and a blanket of snow across southern China have paralysed trains and aircraft, stranding tens of millions of people trying to get home for the biggest holiday in the Chinese calendar.

The worst weather in 50 years pummelled swaths of central, southern and eastern China as migrant workers and students, business travellers and officials assigned to provincial postings battled for tickets to join their families for the lunar new year holiday.

The human tide strains public transport every year even though the authorities pull dozens of extra trains into service and lay on additional flights to try to cope. With new year's day falling on February 7 this year, the bad weather has swept China just as the number of travellers is reaching its peak.

The China Meteorological Administration issued a red alert warning of more snowstorms and blizzards in central and eastern China, particularly around Shanghai, the country's commercial hub. It placed a notice on the central forecast website that said: “Cut unnecessary outdoor activities.”

Among the worst-hit cities is southern Guangzhou, capital of Guangdong province that borders Hong Kong. The province is one of China's most important manufacturing regions, with thousands of factories making everything from T-shirts to electronics staffed by millions of migrant workers from poorer inland provinces.

Hundreds of thousands of those workers, many with young children, found themselves stranded at the Guangzhou railway station after snowstorms snapped power lines to passenger trains from neighbouring Hunan province, an important hub for trains on the main line between Guangzhou and Beijing.

Officials struggled to control an estimated 200,000 travellers at the station — a number expected to swell to 600,000 over the next couple of days. Temporary shelter was being arranged for the migrant workers in schools and conventions centres. Soldiers were deployed to stand guard around the station and police barked orders through bullhorns to try to maintain order.

Notice boards inside the station were a sea of red, showing that almost every train had been cancelled. Radio announcements urged people not to go to the station since most trains had been cancelled and tickets were no longer being sold until new year's day.

Liu Si, who hoped to travel back to the western metropolis of Chongqing, had been stuck at the station for days. “The number 1059 train to Chongqing didn't go on the 26th, it didn't go on the 27th and there's no way it's going today on the 28th.”

With officials warning that it could take until the end of the week to work through the backlog of passengers, Mr Liu was not optimistic of spending the festival with his family. “I've been in Guangdong a decade. I've never spent a Chinese New Year here. This year I might have to. It just won't feel right.”

The freakish weather has already affected 67 million people and economic losses so far have been placed at 18.2 billion yuan (£1.3 billion).

Chinese New Year sees the biggest human migration on earth, with an estimated 2.47 billion journeys over the holiday season this year — almost double the entire population of 1.3 billion.

More than a dozen airports around the country were closed because of icy conditions, including one of China's busiest airports — the Hongqiao hub for domestic flights serving Shanghai.

In a sign of official anxiety that the travel chaos could trigger social unrest, Premier Wen Jiabao ordered local officials to mobilise all possible resource to ensure people get home. He said: “More heavy snow is expected. All government departments must prepare for this increasingly grim situation and urgently take action.”

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Wednesday, January 23, 2008

China continues attempts at purging cyberspace.

 

BEIJING (Reuters) - China shut down 44,000 Web sites and homepages and arrested 868 people last year in a campaign against Internet porn which will continue until the end of this year's Beijing Olympics, Xinhua news agency said on Wednesday.

China launched a crackdown on online pornography and "unhealthy" Web content after Chinese President Hu Jintao said the country's sprawling Internet posed a threat to social stability.

Rights groups have said the campaign has been used as a thinly veiled pretext to crack down on dissent and round up online dissidents ahead of the Olympics.

Xinhua said authorities had also investigated 524 criminal cases involving online porn and "penalized" another 1,911 people.

Some 440,000 "pornographic messages" had also been deleted, the agency said.

China has attempted to stifle online criticism of the ruling Communist Party and discussion related to sensitive topics such as Tibet and Taiwan by ordering Web sites to register with authorities.

Authorities registered 199,000 Web sites last year, Xinhua said, but refused 14,000 for failing to get official registration or to apply for official approval.

China employs tens of thousands of human Internet censors and a vast network of filters to control online information.

The anti-pornography campaign would continue until September, Xinhua said, "after the Beijing Olympic Games end".

China last month said it would crack down on video-sharing Web sites, and allow only state-controlled sites to post video content online in new restrictions effective from January 31.

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Monday, December 03, 2007

Burning money in Iraq sure isn't helping.

 

WASHINGTON - Like a ticking time bomb, the national debt is an explosion waiting to happen. It's expanding by about $1.4 billion a day — or nearly $1 million a minute.

What's that mean to you?

It means almost $30,000 in debt for each man, woman, child and infant in the United States.

Even if you've escaped the recent housing and credit crunches and are coping with rising fuel prices, you may still be headed for economic misery, along with the rest of the country. That's because the government is fast straining resources needed to meet interest payments on the national debt, which stands at a mind-numbing $9.13 trillion.

And like homeowners who took out adjustable-rate mortgages, the government faces the prospect of seeing this debt — now at relatively low interest rates — rolling over to higher rates, multiplying the financial pain.

So long as somebody is willing to keep loaning the U.S. government money, the debt is largely out of sight, out of mind.

But the interest payments keep compounding, and could in time squeeze out most other government spending — leading to sharply higher taxes or a cut in basic services like Social Security and other government benefit programs. Or all of the above.

A major economic slowdown, as some economists suggest may be looming, could hasten the day of reckoning.

The national debt — the total accumulation of annual budget deficits — is up from $5.7 trillion when President Bush took office in January 2001 and it will top $10 trillion sometime right before or right after he leaves in January 2009.

That's $10,000,000,000,000.00, or one digit more than an odometer-style "national debt clock" near New York's Times Square can handle. When the privately owned automated clock was activated in 1989, the national debt was $2.7 trillion.

It only gets worse.

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Monday, November 19, 2007

"Lust, Caution" prompting odd warning by Chinese officials.

 

Chinese doctors have warned moviegoers not to try some of the more ambitious sexual positions featured in the uncut version of the film.

The movie has been a big hit in China, reaping 90 million yuan ($12.12 million) in its first two weeks, despite losing seven minutes to the censors, and has been tipped by some to be the year's biggest box office success.

Set in World War Two Shanghai, "Lust, Caution," features long and sometimes violent sex scenes that director Lee has hinted were real.

Lee, who won the best director Oscar in 2005 for his controversial gay cowboy drama "Brokeback Mountain", personally cut on-screen sex and other scenes in "Lust Caution" to allow it to pass Chinese censors and screen on the mainland.

The cuts, however, prompted a flood of Chinese moviegoers in southern China to cross the border into Hong Kong to see the full version.

Chinese doctors warned moviegoers not to try some of the more acrobatic positions featured in the uncut movie, according to a report posted on Xinhuanet, a news portal for the official Xinhua news agency.

"Most of the sexual maneuvers in 'Lust, Caution' are in abnormal body positions," the report quoted Yu Zao, a deputy director at a women's hospital in southern Guangdong province, as saying.

"Only women with comparatively flexible bodies that have gymnastics or yoga experience are able to perform them. For average people to blindly copy them could lead to unnecessary physical harm," Yu said.

"Lust, Caution" won the Venice Film Festival's top award, the Golden Lion, earlier this year.

The film has so far earned $3,864,735 in the US as of November 15th.

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Wednesday, November 07, 2007

Shota and loli liek GHB

 

A popular Chinese-made children's toy is being pulled from Canadian store shelves over worries that a similar toy sold in Australia contains a chemical that converts into a powerful "date rape'' drug when swallowed.

The toy sold in Canada is called Aqua Dots and is similar to a product sold in Australia called Bindeez.

The toys contain beads that are arranged into designs and fuse together when sprayed with water.

Scientists in Australia say tests have revealed that the beads contain a chemical that the body metabolizes into the "date rape'' drug GHB (gamma hydroxy butyrate). The compound can induce unconsciousness, seizures, drowsiness, coma and death.

A two-year-old Australian boy and a 10-year-old girl were admitted to a Sydney hospital after swallowing large quantities of the beads. As well, a 19-month-old toddler from Queensland was also reportedly receiving medical help after eating the beads. All the incidents occurred in the last 10 days.

Australian officials have pulled Bindeez from store shelves.

In Canada, Toys R Us and Mastermind Toys say they have been asked by the Canadian manufacturer of Aqua Dots, Spin Master Toys, to pull the product from their store shelves while the company investigates the product.

Health Minister Tony Clement is promising more action in the coming weeks to improve product safety in the marketplace.

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Sunday, November 04, 2007

Five Friendlies just sounds wrong to me.

 

BEIJING (AP) - The upcoming Beijing Olympics is more than just a point of pride for China—it's such an important part of the national consciousness that nearly 3,500 children have been named for the event, a newspaper reported Sunday.

Most of the 3,491 people with the name "Aoyun," meaning Olympics, were born around the year 2000, as Beijing was bidding to host the 2008 Summer Games, the Beijing Daily reported, citing information from China's national identity card database.

The vast majority of people named Aoyun are male, the newspaper said. Only six live in Beijing. The report didn't say where the others live.

Names related to the Olympics don't just stop with "Olympics." More than 4,000 Chinese share their names with the Beijing Games mascots, the "Five Friendlies."

The names are Bei Bei (880 people), Jing Jing (1,240), Huan Huan (1,063), Ying Ying (624) and Ni Ni (642). When put together, the phrase translates to "Beijing welcomes you!"

Chinese have increasingly turned to unique names as a way to express a child's individuality.

In a country with a population of 1.3 billion, 87 percent share the same 129 family names. That's why 5,598 people have the same name as basketball player Yao Ming and 18,462 share a moniker with star hurdler Liu Xiang, according to the Beijing Daily report.

Parents have turned to unusual combinations of letters, numbers and symbols when choosing their child's name, Li Yuming, deputy director of the National Language Commission, told the Xinhua News Agency in an August interview.

At least one couple wanted to call their child "1A," he said, while others use the e-mail address symbol (at), which in Chinese is pronounced "Aita," meaning "love him."

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Sunday, September 30, 2007

This'll wipe that fucking smile off Bob's face.

 

BEIJING — China has banned television and radio ads for push-up bras, figure-enhancing underwear and sex toys in the communist government's latest move to purge the nation's airwaves of what it calls social pollution.

Regulators have already targeted ads using crude or suggestive language, behavior, and images, tightening their grip on television and radio a few weeks ahead of a twice-a-decade Communist Party congress at which some new senior leaders will be appointed.

The latest move by the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, or SARFT, also bans advertisements for sexual aids such as tonics that claim to boost performance in bed.

The notice indicated that regulators were concerned about both lascivious imagery and outrageous or insupportable claims about some products' benefits or effectiveness.

"Illegal 'sexual medication' advertisements and other harmful ads pose a grave threat to society," said the SARFT notice, issued in the past week and posted on the administration's Web site.

"They not only seriously mislead consumers, harm the people's health, pollute the social environment, and corrupt social mores, but also directly harm the credibility of public broadcasting and affect the image of the Communist Party and the government," the notice said.

China has already also issued strict rules for TV talent shows, including the banning of "American Idol"-style mass audience voting by mobile phone text message or the Internet.

A few weeks ago, SARFT ordered 11 radio shows off the air in southern and central China for talking too explicitly about sex or for broadcasting material of an "extreme pornographic nature."

Regulators have also banned television shows about cosmetic surgery and sex changes, and a talent show that they deemed coarse.

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Thursday, August 16, 2007

You'd think a culture this old could develop more creativity in their language.

 

BEIJING (AP) - A Chinese couple seeking a distinctive name for their child settled on the e-mail 'at' symbol—annoying government officials grappling with an influx of unorthodox names.

The unidentified couple were cited Thursday by a government official as an example of citizens bringing bizarre names into the Chinese language.

Written Chinese does not use an alphabet but is comprised of characters, sometimes making it difficult to develop words for new or foreign objects and ideas. As of last year, only 129 names accounted for 87 percent of all surnames in China, Li Yuming, vice director of the State Language Commission, said at a news conference.

The letters 'a' and 't' can be pronounced in a way that sounds like the phrase "love him" in Chinese.

The father "said 'the whole world uses it to write e-mails and, translated into Chinese, it means 'love him,'" Li said.

Li did not say if police, who are the arbiters of names because they issue identity cards, rejected baby 'at.'

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Tuesday, August 07, 2007

I bet it works as well as Fat Camp

 

SHANGHAI (Reuters) - China is launching an experimental summer camp for 40 youngsters to try to wean them off their Internet addiction, state media said on Tuesday.

The 10-day program would accept youngsters aged between 14 and 22 once they had undergone a psychological test and evaluation, the China Daily said.

About 2.6 million -- or 13 percent -- of China's 20 million Internet users under 18 are classed as addicts, state media have reported.

The youngsters at the summer camp would be treated for depression, fear, unwillingness to interact with others, panic and agitation.

It would appear to be offering a softer option than the Internet Addiction Treatment Centre near Beijing which uses a blend of therapy and military drills to treat children addicted to online games, Internet pornography and cybersex.

Concerned by a number of high-profile Internet-related deaths and juvenile crime, the government is now taking steps to stem Internet addictions by banning new Internet cafes and mulling restrictions on violent computer games.

According to government figures, there are currently 113,000 Internet cafes and bars in China.

The newspaper cited the case of one student accepted to East China University of Science and Technology with high marks.

"He could not adjust to Shanghai campus life without burying himself in computer games," the China Daily said. "He would play day and night, skipping classes and avoiding friends, until he was pulled out of the Internet cafe by a supervisor."

In a joint effort with the camp, Shanghai's education commission has organized a volunteer group to patrol the city streets and stop minors entering Internet cafes.

(Ed note: I'm totally an addict to the internet. Maybe I should sign up to go to this Chinese internet addiction camp. Of course, this will do nothing for my other addiction: teenage Chinese boys.)

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