Beijing police have problem with … “Sarks”?

If you live in southeast Beijing and spend all your time staring at graffiti like I do, you may be wondering who the “Sarks” are. They seem to have claimed a wide area including playgrounds, video arcades and hotels.

Is this one a coincidence or spelling error?

“Sarks” sightings:

I’m still waiting to meet Frank.

Frank’s in the backyard of the game arcade, thinking about peace and love.

Inmate plays most dangerous game, dies

In continuing my great mission to promote cross-cultural understanding and create a harmonious society, I wish to share with my readers one of the first “fun” stories of 2009 in the local media.

Let me tell you the tale of “duo mao mao.”

Our story begins with Li Qiaoming, a 24-year-old resident of Yuxi, Yunnan Province. On January 30, Li was wandering about the fine southern forests when he decided to emulate the American icon Paul Bunyon and engage in some illegal logging. Apparently the sound of gigantic old trees crashing into the forest floor alerted authorities something was up, and the fuzz came to confiscate his flannel and hatchet.

Li was taken to a detainment facility in Jinning, and nine days later he emerged: this time bound for the ER. He died fast, and the doctors said it was due to multiple blows and kicks sustained all over his body.

How did he sustain these fatal blows? By playing the most dangerous game that every proper American parent wants to see banned from elementary school: hide and seek.

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Entering dragon land—the Loongson laptop

If you follow any tech blogs or news sites, you’ve probably heard of the Loongson CPU, China’s home-grown processor which is always listed beside some unbelievable technical feats. The chip has been met with skepticism and curiosity mainly because, prior to this month at least, you could not get it.

That was until this month. The laptop I ordered two years ago finally arrived, now in the shape of a netbook bearing the latest Loongson 2F CPU. I’ve spent a week hacking on it, and have come to the conclusion that this is a really fun computer to own. It’s stable, passes the drop test, and is open enough where you can do … basically anything.

This laptop has an open source BIOS based on a souped-up pmon, which allows the user total access to the memory map. If you have the patience, you can go right in there and cause some trouble.

No matter how fun it is, this is not a laptop for regular users, and I believe Lemote is doing itself and incredibly disservice by marketing it as such. At first glance, it looks like something for the trash bin, but that’s until you start hacking.

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The long walk home

It’s evening in Beijing. Ten fifty. Foggy. The night air has a bit of a chill to it—what more tolerant people would describe as “brisk.” It’s fall, but you wouldn’t know it walking on this side of town. The only trees in sight are buried in the small yards that dot the side streets of Third Ring Road.

Tonight is a full moon. The first since the Mid-Autumn Festival last month. It seems like forever ago.

Maybe it’s my mood. Maybe it’s the pollution. Tonight, the streets don’t seem as friendly as they usually do. On the west end of the overpass, a gang of seven or eight guys are surrounding one girl on her knees. She’s not crying, but they still give me dirty looks as I round the corner.

I step off the other side, walking past a Holland Bakery where two ladies are engaged in the world’s oldest business.

“Hello honey~, ma~sa~ji?” they coo.

The left one is wearing a dark brown jacket and matching boots. Fur trim. Chinese clothes are always deceptive that way: even the thinnest windbreaker is topped off in a furry ring—fur is status, not warmth.

Her coworker is sporting that bad perm job with the fucked-up brown highlights that’s been so popular the last few years. Face caked in chalky white makeup, looking like a ghost. The only color is the red lipstick she laid on clownishly thick.

Fashion is beyond me.

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Stallman boycotts China, should you?

Random clicking today led me to the page of one of the most notorious egos in the world of open source software. Sorry, free software. Oops, no I mean Free software. Free like Freedom, not free beer. Free like my freedom to call it open source software without a billion zealots pouncing on me.

If you scroll down you can find his list of “long-term action items,” a list I once thought existed only in Chuck Palahniuk novels. The line that chapped my ass was this: “Join the boycott of Chinese products to support human rights for Tibetans and Chinese.”

(Update: Stallman has since removed this action item. You can still see it in this Wayback Machine cache.)

The logic of this one is hard to follow.

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FOIAs? In my China?

It’s more likely than you think …

Despite the meme-like nature of this post’s title, this is an incredibly serious topic. The prospect of China getting a functional FOIA bill is the kind of news that could give pundits employed by US corporate media an aneurysm.

For readers not in the know about media, the US Freedom of Information Act is what lets reporters get access to city spending records, arraignments, mug shots and everything you ever wanted to know about L. Ron Hubbard.

Now that I have your attention, might I mention the bill is already passed? It was signed into law last year by Wen Jiabao and took effect this May 1. Now that in itself is nothing special. China passes tons of bills on a variety of topics every year: most of them are lip service.

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(Not) Blocked in the Mainland

Much as I suspected, I strung together just the right words where my write up on the situation in west China — despite being in the middle ground and condemning foreign media — was locked out when the government stepped up its content filtering efforts Tuesday, Beijing time.

I’m sorry the post is no longer available here, because it was pretty thorough. I will restore it when the current crisis calms down and the government relaxes the current “Code Red” content filtering.

If anyone would like to mirror the text and does not mind his site being inaccessible to 1.2 billion people, please e-mail me.

Edit: I have determined the block was not triggered by my write up, but by when I complained bitterly about the Dalai clique flooding Google Ads with propaganda straight out of the Dharamsala machine. Go figure …

Critical look at the Tibet troubles

I hope you appreciate the risk I am taking in writing about this on my Web page. The Golden Firewall and the Nanny are not the most sophisticated of filtering softwares, and I may easily spit out the string of words that will make my own Web page forever inaccessible.

However, amidst the international hysteria surrounding what is going down in Tibet, I feel compelled to write my take on it.

This is not a news article. I am not going to cite every single source for everything I have heard. I am merely putting to word all that has been kicking about my head since Friday, but without the charge found in most media coverage. AFP and Reuters were quite objective, but the New York Times continues to tow strings of unsubstantiated claims and misrepresented facts.

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I got a grip full of Confucius

Today is Christmas in Beijing. That makes me unhappy.

Everywhere I go in town there are big stupid looking Santas and flashy lights mixed together with red lanterns heralding a Chinese festival. While I understand, in China, Christmas is little more than a commercial holiday akin to Valentine’s Day, seeing imagery traditionally associated with Western religion displayed so prominently throughout the city bugs me a lot.

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When Quotes Go Wrong

One of the best parts of living in China are 80-cent DVDs.

One of the best parts of DVDs in China are the quotes on 80-cent DVDs.

Aside from the totally incomprehensible Engrish that is scattered about “new releases” (theater bootlegs), there is also the joy of quotes from famous reviewers on the covers.

Hey, I think it’s a great idea. Having some kind of quote from a big name might change someone’s mind about trying a movie, right? If it couldn’t, movie reviews wouldn’t exist. The problem is this: DVD pirates cannot read, speak or spell English.

And I’m not talking about the language, I’m talking about the word.

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