The Genocide Olympics

The China Daily website’s front page is running a story titled “Beijing hits out at Games boycott calls,” which, by not contradicting the story’s featured government official, by not acknowledging a link between China’s behavior and the ongoing genocide, criticizes those who’re calling for a boycott of the 2008 Olympics because they recognize that China’s [...]

People really love Shar peis

I haven’t been posting the last couple of days because of midterms and an unfortunate case of strep throat (which made me miss Su Xiaokang’s visit to my journalism class), but, strangely, I’ve noticed a huge spike in the number of visits this site gets. While I like to think it has to do with [...]

Eavesdropping

I have a confession to make: I’m a chronic Chinese language eavesdropper. If I happen to be eating alone in a dining hall for whatever reason, I often pick up a newspaper and hunt around for a group of Chinese students (usually graduate students) speaking Chinese. I sit next to them, but instead of engaging [...]

Do the Wall Street Journal’s Portraits of Democratic Presidential Candidates Reflect Paper’s Bias?

The weekend edition of the Wall Street Journal has an article entitled “Democratic Candidates’ Fortunes May Rely on Long-Term Iraq Plans,” which includes three portraits of the leading Democratic candidates, Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, and Barack Obama.
Unlike the portraits of John Edwards and Barack Obama, Hillary’s shows her face at profile. Not a big [...]

Major pain

Choosing one’s major is very stressful. At least, it is for me. I was whining about my difficult decision to my suitemate on the phone last night, and he, no fan of blogs, facetiously told me to write a post about choosing my major with the lame, corny title ‘major pain.’
So, for his amusement, I [...]

Weapons Engineer Is Set for Trial in Secrets Case

“Prosecutors say a top engineer for a major American military contractor worked for the Chinese from 1983 until his arrest two years ago…As a top engineer for a major American military contractor, Chi Mak helped develop some of the most advanced naval technology in the world, including silent-running propulsion systems that can make submarines virtually [...]

Applications that’re new to me.

I have a rather large hunch that two applications I started using today are old hat to many of you. However, I’m so overjoyed at how cool these things are that I’ve gotta write a post.
First: Google Reader.
I’m embarrassed to say that today was my first day ever using an RSS feed subscription reader. Really [...]

Speaking Chinese in Houston and on campus

Both my brother and I speak Chinese. Whenever one of us tells people that, especially people of the baby-boomer generation, they always say something like, “I bet you boys carry on secret conversations right in front of your parents!”
We always laugh awkwardly, and mumble some sort of reply. The fact is, we rarely have anything [...]