Shanghai China Snippets

It’s now less than a year before they start, the Olympic Games (link) in Beijing. Part of the whole event is the Olympic torch that travels the world and end it’s journey during the opening ceremony. Shanghai is one of the lucky cities that will host the torch.

Ok, get your agenda and jot fown the following dates, 20 an 21st of May 2008. Ok, that’d done. Now comes the real kicker.

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Today, in one year, the Beijing Olympics will open. As expected there are a lot of articles writing about the good, the bad and the ugly of what will come.

The day of the start is 8-8-2008. The 8 is a lucky number in China despite that officially superstition is not allowed here.

I’m no fortuneteller but one thing is for sure, the amount of attention these Olympic Games will get, will outdo any previous event.

Yesterday’s SCMP cartoon shows some of the hurdles to be taken.

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It seems the blogs on Wordpress.com have been unblocked again. Whether this is a nanny aberration has to be seen.

Honestly, I wouldn’t know as we don’t keep a dog and also don’t intend to do so as space is limited in Shanghainese apartments and the last thing I’ll ever consider is getting a dog smaller than a rat. So, no, no dog for me. But for China’s nouveaux riches the Tibetan Mastiff is apparently a status symbol worth paying more, as it’s a rare breed.

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In the very unlink able SCMP from yesterday I read that the publication bureau in Beijing is working overtime to make sure no negative reports are published, especially about food safety.

The tabloid Beijing Daily Messenger will have to scrap its political and social pages. Instead it will have to offer entertainment and lifestyle news. The current 40 pages will become 32 and many reporters will loose their jobs.

The First, another daily is said to be pressured to only start publishing about sports.
The Beijing Youth Dailly and the Beijing Evening News have been told not to run any negative news.

Welcome to Happy Land and all this because of a fake or not so fake (nobody knows for sure anymore) dumpling?

A hilarious clip from the Onion. The internet has crashed.
Don’t forget to read the ticker.

via: lifehacker

The Ya,I Yee blog has posted a hilarious though slightly sad conversation between a Chinese blogger and a staff member of the Shanghai Communication Administration.

The Chinese blogger has his blog on its own domain on a Shanghai server and the latest campaign is to close these down as apparently a blog is considered the same as a BBS/forum and chat website which have to comply with specific regulations and need approval before opening up.

A quote:

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