Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in yzhang3's LiveJournal:

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Wednesday, May 14th, 2008
11:48 pm	Super Wen Premier Wen of China is a super hero. Within 30 minutes of the quake in Sichuan Province, he was on the way to the airport. Within a few hours, he had already landed at the airport closest to the quake epicenter. Within two days, he had already visited several affected areas. Compare that to Bush, coming out of his lazy vacation, giving Brownie the what what. I'd say the Chinese are doing a heck of a job. Why 100,000 troops, you ask? Well, because they don't have the high tech equipment that the US has. No Foward Looking Infrared Radar to tell where people are trapped, no Sikorsky S-64 Skycranes to lift the rocks that are blocking the roads, no Hummers packed with MREs being dropped from C-130s mean only hard manual labor can dig them out of this one. Let's not give them money. Let's throw some good ol' technology. Why use trial and error digging when you can pinpoint where people are? Why use shovels when you can lift things up? For those looking to help who are from the US, please donate to the red cross at http://www.redcross.org/news/in/profiles/Intl_profile_ChinaEarthquake.html Current Mood: nervous Current Music: Tinariwen - Aman Iman (Comment on this)
Wednesday, April 30th, 2008
1:52 pm	Goons and Copycatters It's always refreshing to see a mainstream journalist parrot my view points. As I wrote a few days ago, I did not go to protest against the remarks of Jack Cafferty because I thought that the Chinese reactions to these recent torch incidents around the world was out of control. The sheer vigilantism employed by the Carrefour looters and the Duke parent poopers, is just disgraceful. It's as if Sean Hannity suddently came out and said that African-Americans are prone to violence and bad behavior and suddenly there was an increase of crimes committed by African-Americans in reaction to these words. Why must we continue throwing pies on our faces? Why must every voice of criticism and dissent be branded as treason? In Time Magazine, the Beijing Bureau has expressed views similar to what I have been talking about before. Let's move beyond being the caricatures of what they say about us, and instead break the stereotype. Let's give them the harmonious olympics that we all deserve. http://time-blog.com/china_blog/2008/04/the_dignity_of_the_torch_ii.html Current Mood: confused Current Music: Simona Barbieri - It's How You Live (Comment on this)
Sunday, April 27th, 2008
11:26 am	Carne Asada A few of our clients are in California. On my first trip onsite there, the manager told me that every day at 11:00, all the employees get a break to grab some breakfast. Then 11:00 came around and I looked outside. Parked in front of the dock was a Taco Truck. Coming from the east coast, I had never seen one of these before. A wide selection of mexican food at affordable prices, I was amazed at how convenient it was. What was even more amazing was how three or four trucks dropped by at different times of the day to get business from workers in this office park. I assumed that it was just a part of the landscape, like the La Brea tar pits or LACMA. However, I guess it is getting into the profits of brick and mortar stores. Using a series of new ordinances, it may drive the taco truck business underground. I guess immigrants are fine and dandy until... "They Took Our Jobs!". http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1735104,00.html  Current Mood: hungry Current Music: Rick Astley - Together Forever (Comment on this)
Saturday, April 26th, 2008
11:43 am	Losers and Cowards After expressing my views in my previous post, I was informed of just how a bunch of Chinese thugs and goons silenced one of their own in a pointless exercise. It's like the Mao-era mass movements never left. I still remember stories that my father told of student red guards writing graffiti on the walls outside their house to take down my grandfather, as he was an official with the bureau of education. I am ashamed for all Chinese here, for what we've done. As far as I can see, we truly are the same thugs and goons that we've always been. I love China so much. I hate to see its image continue to be tarnished by ignorant idiots hiding behind the anonymous wall of the internet. How many more pies in the face can we take? http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/17/us/17student.html?_r=1&oref=slogin  This is not the same as protesting against truly reprehensible acts, such as the Belgrade Embassy bombing, or Human Trafficking, which rightfully deserved protest. However, I doubt these people will see the distinction. Current Mood: cold Current Music: Limp Bizkit - My Way or the Highway (Comment on this)
10:59 am	Thugs and Idiots There is a protest at CNN today to talk about the "outrage" that "chinese people" have  over Jack Cafferty, a CNN commentator's remarks about [chinese] being a bunch of goons and thungs like they've been for 50 years. Although I disagree with Cafferty's comments, I disagree more with this pointless protest. I think the Chinese are more shocked by the fact that someone on TV can say something like this without getting taken off the air. Well, anyone who's even seen an episode of Papa Bear Bill O'Reilly or heard a half-hour of Rush Limbaugh can tell you, Jack Cafferty is nothing more than a welter-weight in this world of hard-hitting commentary. I wouldn't even give him a belt for those comments. How about less of this diversion bullshit? Just as Chavez diverts the people's attention through stunts insulting the United States, and Ahmadinejad gets kudos in Iran for wishing death to the Great Satan, any idiot who gets swayed into protest over this pointless bullshit is just getting played like a piano in a honky-tonk bar. I've always criticized American media for diverting our attention from the important issues like education and healthcare to "What Will Lindsay Lohan / Paris Hilton / Britney Spears do next???". It's time I critisized media companies of all of these countries, for not focusing on the truly important, albeit mundane topics, and fanning sensationalist yellow journalistic bullshit. As far as I know, they are the true thugs and goons, and we are all idiots and retards for being so easily swayed by them. Sure, seeing people in other countries blunder helps create jingoistic warm and fuzzy, but to what end? It's not going to solve your crumbling infrastructure. It's not going to end hunger. It's not even going to make you smarter. It will only waste your time. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qPAVBaQzp3w By caving in to these thuggish tactics of these idiot chinamen and apologizing, you have proven your point more than what you have ever said. Long live Jack Cafferty the martyr! http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/article3756437.ece That is why I do not protest today. I agree to disagree, but not on these terms. Current Mood: aggravated Current Music: Buckethead - Whitewash (Comment on this)
Friday, April 25th, 2008
2:33 pm	The Democratic Clusterf*ck to the White House Although I voted for Obama in the primary, I was hesitant to support him after a more in depth look revealed his lack of experience. However, due to his recent elitist comments, I see him in a whole new light. Thus, I am once again fully in the Obama camp. I like McCain, for his track record as a maverick Republican, but his about-face on many issues, and his recanting of his previous positions speaks to me that he is willing to do anything, short of gay marriage, to get elected. The problem here is: Do I gamble on whether McCain will be the rebel that he once was once he's elected, or will he continue to be the machine politican that he is now? I don't want to take that risk. Hillary, well, anything short of Bosnian Snipers actually showing up at the convention would not pull me her way. What about Gore, or Bloomberg? I would vote for either of them. Current Mood: full Current Music: silence (Comment on this)
Thursday, April 17th, 2008
4:51 pm	Ask.com is a bunch of scammers Ask.com, formerly Ask Jeeves, is a useless search engine. Having advertised on MSN, Yahoo and Google, you'd think paying per click would be easy to set up on Ask.com, right? Yes, it is very easy to set up, but you'd better keep a good lookout of your wallet. Ask.com has partners such as primosearch and findology that will send you fake clicks for referrers that leave within 1 second, and exhaust your entire advertising budget. If this was due to content matching, and bad websites getting ahold of your ads, then that's not too bad. However, there's no way to exclude these parasitic partners of ask.com from clicking over and sucking up your ad budget. This is a travesty, as they have one of the best looking interfaces out there right now. If only they could get some reason for advertisers to stay there, instead of just sucking up their budgets with bad clicks, they would be doing pretty well. http://sponsoredlistings.ask.com Current Mood: sour Current Music: Cardigans - Love Fool (Comment on this)
Wednesday, April 9th, 2008
3:55 pm	New Rural Socialists Today, an article in Slate magazine caught my eye. It talked about villages filled with McMansions in the Chinese countryside built from money sent home from illegal Chinese immigrants in the United States. There are stories abound about the industrious nature of the Fujianese people of China. They are in fact considered the Mexicans of China. I've heard relatives speak in passing about how if a Fujianese person gets into an industry, don't even worry about competing. However, what's really disheartening about these bling-ed out villages is how the residents' attitudes closely resemble those of other impoverished or indigent people, the conspicuous consumption and irrational exuberance that can only be described as ghetto fabulous. I think some modesty is really in order. I've always hated the way Chinese parents brag about the accomplishments of their children. It just seems like these model home villages are all a vestigial extension of these things. But who am I to trounce upon 5000 years of tradition? Maybe they should just invest in cardboard boxes filled with ants instead. http://www.slate.com/id/2188450/entry/2188451/  Current Mood: confused Current Music: Juvenile and BG - Bling Bling (Comment on this)
12:15 am	Stop drinking the Haterade America has always needed an enemy to unite the country and its allies. It used to be the threat of Global Communism, but since the cold war ended, and Oligarchy took Russia, there has not really been a new enemy. The war on drugs, the war on terror, has really not caused great unity among the protagonists. What are we to do then? I know, let's find a new nemesis. Let's call it China. Let's try to blow out the torch when it passes through our neighborhoods, simply because we are idiots and don't understand the intricacies of what is essentially an internal class struggle in a developing country. Let's free our thoughts instead of Tibet. It's not like we didn't do this before, going into the middle east and grouping ethnically divergent people into arbitrary boundaries. Oh wait, Brits did that before us. Instead of getting angry about this stuff, how about you turn down the music on your iPod and stop chewing on your $10 sandwiches and think about what could be done to improve the United States to make it more competitive? How about on-demand freely available abortions? How about some kids.. left behind? Instead of creating a new generation of poor, how about focusing on beating them through fair competition? What happened during the Cold War? Well, "Johnny Can't Read", and the subsequent focus on education created a whole generation of hard working well educated individuals who are now the titans of industry. We did it before. We can do it again. What about China, you ask? What's the most popular car in China? BUICK! What's the most popular fast food restaurant? KFC! Who's worker's hero? Bill Gates! They. Love. America. How about we love America some too? Why don't you leave China alone and go back to watching Britney Spears and her crazy hi-jinks? Current Mood: antagonistic Current Music: Regina Spektor - Better (Comment on this)
Friday, March 28th, 2008
10:25 pm	Biofuels will kill us all Or at least go hungry. Three years ago, I read in a Wired Magazine article about how biodiesel created from soybeans would be sustainable way of providing fuel for vehicles. I even thought about getting an old 300D and adding an auxiliary fuel tank. More recently, I have been toning down my vocal support of biodiesel. I have been wrong all along. Biofuels will be the end of us all. It will cause food shortages, increase the cost of fuel, and fail to solve the coming energy crisis. The only renewable energy sources are geothermal, solar, tidal, and wind. Nuclear is also a good option for now. However, biofuels are not the answer. Although it may be "solar" energy in that the energy of the sun is transferred to the crops which are then made into fuel, there is not enough arable land and fresh water available to make this a reality. Our policy leaders must stop subsidizing alternative fuels. This will never work, unless some breakthrough allows all plant matter, stalks, cellulose, fibers, to be converted to fuel. For more information, there is an interesting article in TIME magazine. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1725975,00.html Current Mood: betrayed Current Music: Ben's Brother - Let Me Out (Comment on this)
Tuesday, March 25th, 2008
11:17 pm	With purchase of a Tibet of equal or lesser value A while back, I had talked critically of the Dalai's shenanigans in the Tibet Autonomous Region of China.  I supported China's position, and sought to expose the CIA-propped figurehead for who he is. I was going to let the riots in Tibet slide. However, with missile components accidentally showing up all over Taiwan, as opposed to WMDs in Iraq, I have to weigh in on the recent events. The western media has mostly focused on how the Chinese government was violently responding to the peaceful protests. If this were truly what happened, then the Chinese government has truly dug itself into a hole this close to the Olympics. Unfortunately, it was more along the lines of the police only showing up in response to rampant looting and destruction of property caused by the rioters. The dead people? 100 of them? They were all ethnic HAN minorities living in Tibet that were victimized, just like the Korean shop keepers in L.A. Though, only 53 people died in '92. As a recent article wrote of the Tibetan riot, "The destruction was systematic. Shops owned by Tibetans were marked as such with traditional white scarves tied through their shutter-handles. They were spared destruction. Almost every other one was wrecked." It was a "Crystal day" in 2008 with the full support of the western media" This and other acts of blatant lying could be found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSQnK5FcKas According to the Journal, "Witnesses said Tibetans -- many of whom are angry with government restrictions on civil rights and religious freedoms and feel economically disadvantaged -- set fire to large numbers of Han-owned businesses as well as a mosque". Sounds remarkably like another ethnic group in a city in the Western United States that was disadvantaged economically and decided to "riot" after misinterpreting an amateur video of four police officers .. defending themselves from a convicted felon high on PCP. I'm sure you want some facts to back up what I'm saying here, so here's a couple of articles: One from The Economist http://www.economist.co.uk/PrinterFriendly.cfm?story_id=10875823 One from the Wall Street Journal http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120638214966859837.html?mod=hpp_asia_pageone I'm sure you've got a lot of questions, for example, what claim does China have on Tibet? Well, perhaps http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9QNKB34cJo would give you a little background. Any idiot with a camera can come up with a good story. It takes determination and collusion among a host of self-interested journalists determined to escalate the "Yellow Threat" to piece together such a heap of garbage as the reporting of the Tibetan Riots. Yes, the Chinese government intentionally killed rioters in Tiananmen. No, the Chinese government did not intentionally kill rioters in Tibet. If you want to boycott the Olympics, that's fine. If you have any tickets to the opening ceremony, please send me a message, and I will be glad to buy it from you. Current Mood: frustrated Current Music: The Walkmen - We've Been Had (Comment on this)
12:21 am	The Terminal, terminally A recent article in Time magazine about the homeless living in Heathrow Airport in london, has triggered some memories of my days of travel. I've always been one to save money by getting the red-eye instead of spending an extra night at the hotel. I've dozed off at my fair share of connecting flights. However, this article reminded me of the last time I was in China. On my way back in January, while waiting at the San Francisco airport, I saw this girl who was very disheveled. She had a tattered rolling case, and mismatched socks. I thought she was just being goth, so I didn't think anything of it. I did remember her being very very sleepy. Was she a homeless individual waiting at the airport? Probably not. Just as in the article, when they found two guys sleeping in the bathroom were actually there to charge their portable video game systems, it's just so hard to tell who's homeless and who's just slumming. http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1724430,00.html Current Mood: sad Current Music: Madonna - Material Girl (Comment on this)
Friday, March 14th, 2008
11:20 pm	Why OPEC can't boost oil production In the past six months, OPEC has rebuffed America's pleads for a boost in oil production three times. Even now, Cheney('s got a gun) is taking Air Force Two to the middle east in an attempt to wheedle them into action. I'm not saying that OPEC is an awesome super group the likes of which Crosby Stills and Nash haven't seen. I'm saying OPEC just doesn't have the oil. It's that simple. There's not enough oil left to boost production. Think about it this way, if OPEC reported tomorrow that they are running low on oil, what would happen? It would be a mad grab by all the nations into the world. China, Eurasia, The United States, would all simultaneously send troops to secure the last proven reserves of oil in the world. National Sovereignty be damned. It's likely that the OPEC nations have been grossly overestimating their actual reserve quantities, and are actually unable to boost oil production even if they wanted to. Well, we've had a good run.  Disclaimer: I used to support biofuels as an alternative energy source, but the efficiency is just not there. It will only lead to starvation as more land is taken out by biofuel production instead of feeding people. I now support a combination of tidal, solar, wind, and nuclear power as the sustainable energy source for the rest of this century. Current Mood: full Current Music: Squat - Estrellas (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, March 12th, 2008
12:39 am	Big Pimpin' Spending Gs That's right, I'm talking about Eliot Spitzer, the most awesome Attorney General / Governor. I always thought he was awesome for going against all the securities firms, but I guess everyone has his secrets. Would he be able to stay on as Governor? I don't know, but I'm willing to take a wide stance on this issue. I mean, if Larry Craig can stay on, then I see no reason why Eliot can't. He's done a lot of good things for the people of Gotham, not to mention the rest of the country. Let's ignore what he does in the privacy of his own time, and instead focus on the great results that he has brought us the people.  For those who doubt his ability to get out of this alive, I have three words. Yes he can. Current Mood: content Current Music: Ben's Brother - I Am Who I Am (Comment on this)
Sunday, March 2nd, 2008
10:46 am	Can I have a copy of that? Aside from the booming industry of pirated DVDs and  look-alike Gucci Prada that everyone hears about in the US, there's a whole world of counterfeit products out there in China. Not all of them are as obvious. When I was in beijing a few weeks ago, my cousin came to Beijing to visit me and his other friends who were attending school there. There was one incident that I didn't remember until now. When we were buying train tickets out of Beijing, he handed a some 100 Y Notes to the clerk. The Clerk then handed one of them back and asked for another 100. That's when it hit me. Counterfeit. One of the bills was a counterfeit. I knew counterfeit bills were quite rampant, but It really didn't hit me until then how rampant it was. How did I remember this? I saw an article http://www.gateway.ualberta.ca/view.php?aid=3830 talking about the dangers of counterfeit products. It's not just Fucci and Fouis Vuitton. Wine, Baby Formula, Wine, Eggs, Oranges? That's right. Farmers, knowing that Sunkist florida oranges were the premium product, would use dye to color their less tasty green oranges the right shade of orange (Thank you, Pantone) and then affix fake Sunkist stickers to them. Ask a Chinese person that you know. I would venture to say all of them have heard different horror stories of food quality. It does make me feel better about the recent beef recall in the US, where generally the only fake things we have to worry about are breasts. Current Mood: nerdy Current Music: Ben's Brother - Rise (Comment on this)
Sunday, February 24th, 2008
11:13 am	Got Rice? You know it's bad when Chinese people here don't buy foodstuffs imported from China. That's exactly what's happening more and more to folks including my parents, who tend to shop more at Korean grocery stores, and buy Taiwanese brands. Why is this happening? They are afraid. The latest news from Time magazine only underscores how this had gone so wrong. In a February 18, 2008 article in Time, the story was about how a banned variety of genetically modified rice, bt63, wound its way into food imported into Europe. Well, it's certainly a surprise, but perhaps it is to be expected. If you thought fast food nation was bad in its depiction of the American meatpacking industry, you should really take a look at the Chinese food production and processing industry. I mean, people have made a comfortable living Farming Ants...  http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1714218,00.html On a side note, when I went to China last year, what was the number one requested item to bring? CARNATION BRAND BABY FORMULA!. I hauled at least 45 lbs of that stuff personally. Current Mood: lazy Current Music: Avril Lavigne - Girlfriend (Comment on this)
Saturday, February 23rd, 2008
11:35 am	Mo Guan Xi Mo Problems First, I'm surprised this story is not getting more media attention. Then again, we don't hear more about Quixstar, Amway, or any of those other pyramid schemes right now. I am not a free market advocate. I am also not a planned economy advocate. I have always thought there would be an eternal struggle between regulation and deregulation. Much like the collapse of the housing market will set off a period of price discovery, it will be only accelerated or decelerated depending on what regulations are created.. However, in the wild-west economy that is China, sometimes we can find amazing examples of the free market gone awry. I'm not just talking about meat buns made from cardboard, or malnourishment-causing baby formula. I'm talking about Yilishen. Originally touted as a health supplement made from the dessicated corpses of ants, Yilishen's CEO Wang Fengyou actually made more money by selling cardboard boxes of ants to "investors" throughout the rural countryside, promising returns as much as 30%. Using a series of brides and celebrity endorsements, he was able to bilk the savings of over one million people, many of them their entire life savings. Now, most free market capitalists would say.. Caveat Emptor. Let's say now your mayor, other local politicians, and celebrities you know all suddenly started touting the benefits of investing in a company. Let's say there's not as clear rules about financial disclosure, so as a prospective investor you can not even know if an investment is legitimate or now, but you see your neighbors getting rich off it there? I think this is just a small event here, as compared to what would happen to the stock market in China after they realize that most of the companies are insolvent, and there will be no bailout for them. If a lowly ant farming entrepreneur can worm his way into the front-row of the audience at the Spring Gala (春节晚会), then may be no hope for this country. Video: http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/world/2008/02/22/hilsum.ant.farm.scam.itn Article: http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/world/asia_pacific/the+magic+power+of+ants/1622547 Current Mood: indescribable Current Music: OK Go - Get Over It (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Wednesday, February 20th, 2008
3:59 pm	The Laowai Death Stare  This topic has been beaten to death, but I was reminded of it by today's post from a Stuff White People Like http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.wordpress.com/2008/02/20/71-being-the-only-white-person-around/ A long time ago, there was a great blog written by three caucasian gentlemen living in China. It was called Talk Talk China. It's long gone now, and I've read many blogs since then, but I'm always reminded of things that they pointed out. Here was one entry that I immediately thought of, so without further ado: While TalktalkChina was on hiatus last week, I was out of town and spent a few days hanging out in Yangshuo. Although the fine old town of Yangshuo has sure-as-hell grown outwards over the ten years since I first visited, and domestic Chinese tourists (those of the matching yellow caps and vests being led by shrill-voiced girls with flag and megaphone) have also “discovered” the place and make day trips down from Guilin, I must say that the place has miraculously somehow managed to not yet turn into just another shitty Chinese city, and is still a remarkably chill place to be in China if you want to relax. Anyway, I was having a bit of a ramble across the Guangxi countryside when I happened upon another couple of travelling 外宾 (”foreign guests”, as we are sometimes still so quaintly referred to out in the boonies). I gave a bit of a smile and a nod, nothing over-the-top, mind you, not one of those huge “Ohmigod-another-foreigner-how-amazing-let’s-bond-and-be-bestest-friends-just-cos-we’re-both-foreigners-in-China!” kind of things which I’m not a fan of, but just your simple nod of acknowledgement. And that’s when I got it - The Laowai Death Stare. I’m sure all of you have encountered it before, the hostile glare from the foreigner who seems to be saying to you silently: “Hey! What are you doin’ here? This is MY China! I’m the only foreigner in China. I’m also the only foreigner who can speak Chinese. So get the hell outta here.” These people somehow seem to think that the mere presence of another foreigner is somehow ruining their “China experience” - that when they get back home and are telling all their friends their “I was in the most amazing remote little corner of China hanging with the peasants” story, there will be a pang of guilt in the back of their mind that there was actually other foreigners there too. People - learn to live with it. There were a lotta foreigners in China before you and there will be many many more to come. Current Mood: good Current Music: White Stripes - Icky Thump (Comment on this)
Sunday, February 17th, 2008
9:18 pm	Stuff White People Like What do white people like? That's a loaded question. I'm not the one to answer it, but you can get a pretty good idea, or get upset, by reading this blog: http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.wordpress.com My criticisms for this blog are that it's too focused on what yuppie people like, which may or may not be what all caucasions aspire to. Then again, the definition of white has changed. Just a few decades ago, italian-americans, polish-americans, and anyone from the eastern bloc were not considered white. I still think it's an interesting read, especially the comments. I am, however, of the opinion that It's very important to notice the trends. If I were buying a house, a good indicator of if it's in a neighborhood that's up and coming is if you start seeing caucasian couples pushing their kids around in Bugaboo strollers where before there were criminal activity. In other news, I would like to make a note here that I support Barack Obama for the Democratic Party nomination as the 2008 presidential election. Current Mood: curious Current Music: Spice Girls - Wannabe (Comment on this)
Thursday, February 14th, 2008
10:07 pm	Get Lost! I've really been gorging myself lately on television shows. Thanks to the ongoing writers' strike that just ended, I've been able to get some time to watch shows that I never really got into. It took only one episode for me to get into 30 Rock, but it took five episodes for me to pick up Heroes. Since no new episodes were going to be on the air, I had a chance to check out Lost. It took a good ten episodes to start getting into the show, but after that, I couldn't stop watching. How was I able to stick around that long? Thanks to ABC and its new high definition streaming, the picture and sound are gorgeous. Sometimes I find myself having a hard time keeping up with the action because I'm focused on how clear the picture is. I know, this is a plug, but it's because I really got lost in the series. Check it out for yourself! http://www.lostpedia.com/ Current Mood: excited Current Music: Glenn Miller - Moonlight Serenade (Comment on this)