Prep schools consume Korean students' lives in Ivy League quest
Students attending music class at Korean Minjok Leadership Academy in Kangwon, South Korea, on April 17, 2008. (Seokyong Lee for The New York Times)
April 29, 2008
Chinese children sold "like cabbages" into slavery
BEIJING (Reuters) - Thousands of children in southwest China have been sold into slavery like "cabbages", to work as labourers in more prosperous areas such as the booming southern province of Guangdong, a newspaper said on Tuesday.
China announced a nationwide crackdown on slavery and child labor last year after reports that hundreds of poor farmers, children and mentally disabled were forced to work in kilns and mines in Shanxi province and neighboring Henan.
"The bustling child labor market (in Sichuan province) was set up by the local chief foreman and his gang of 18 minor foremen, who each manage 50 to 100 child labourers," the Southern Metropolis Newspaper said.
"The children generally fall between the ages of 13 and 15, but many look under 10," it added.
The newspaper said 76 children from the same county, Liangshan, had been missing since the Chinese Lunar Year festival in February, 42 of whom had already left the region to work.
"The youngest kids found in the child labor market were only seven and nine years old," it said.
According to a contract exposed by an undercover reporter, a child laborer is paid 3.5 yuan ($0.50) an hour and must work at least 300 hours a month.
"These kids are robust and can do the toughest work," a foreman was quoted as saying, as he pulled a scrawny girl to stand beside him, the paper said.
Xinhua news agency said the county government had sent officials to rescue the children, but some were unwilling to leave, having been sold into slavery by their parents or volunteering to work themselves.
($1=7.002 Yuan)
(Reporting by Beijing Newsroom; Editing by Nick Macfie and Valerie Lee)
April 28, 2008
South Korea to use cloned dogs to sniff for drugs and explosives
Four of the cloned dogs called Toppy during their exercise break at the Defector Dog Training Center in Incheon, west of Seoul. (Lee Jin-man/AP Photo)
The Associated Press
Published: April 24, 2008
INCHEON, South Korea: The country that created the world's first cloned canine plans to put duplicated dogs on patrol to sniff out drugs and explosives.
The Korean Customs Service unveiled Thursday seven cloned Labrador retrievers being trained near Incheon International Airport, west of Seoul. The dogs were born five to six months ago after being separately cloned from a skilled drug-sniffing canine in active service.
Due to the difficulties in finding dogs who are up to snuff for the critical jobs, officials said using clones could help reduce costs.
The cloning work was conducted by a team of Seoul National University scientists who in 2005 successfully created the world's first known dog clone, an Afghan hound named Snuppy.
The team is led by Professor Lee Byeong-chun, who was a key aide to disgraced scientist Hwang Woo-suk. Hwang's purported breakthroughs in stem cell research were revealed as false, but independent tests proved the team's dog cloning was genuine.
The seven new cloned male dogs are all healthy, though one was sent to a university laboratory a few days ago for a minor foot injury it received during training, according to training center head Lim Jae-ryoung. For now, the dogs all share the same name: "Toppy" — a combination of the words "tomorrow" and "puppy."
"They have a superior nature. They are active and excel in accepting the training," said Kim Nak-seung, a trainer at the Customs Service-affiliated dog training center.
In February, all seven dogs passed a behavior test aimed at finding whether they are genetically qualified to work as sniffing dogs. Only 10 percent to 15 percent of naturally born dogs typically pass the test.
If the cloned dogs succeed in other tests for physical strength, concentration and sniffing ability, they will be put to work by July next year at airports and harbors across South Korea, according to the training center.
The agency says the cloned dogs could also save money.
"We came up with the idea of dog cloning after thinking about how we can possess a superior breed at a cheaper cost," said agency head Hur Yong-suk.
Normally, only about three out every 10 naturally born dogs it trains — at a cost of about $40,140 each — ends up qualifying for the job.
Lee of Seoul National University said it cost approximately $100,000 to $150,000 to clone each of the seven golden Labrador retrievers.
He said the seven are the world's first cloned drug-sniffing dogs.
The university team did not ask for payment from the customs authorities because it created the clones for academic purposes with government funds, Lee said.
He said his team has so far cloned 20 dogs and five wolves.
On Thursday the dogs frolicked with trainer Kim, running together and chasing a red rubber ball he threw across a playground — a part of training aimed at bolstering their stamina.
"If I look at them very carefully, there are now some small differences in their facial features," said Kim, who has been training the dogs since they were born. "But it's still hard to tell."
April 27, 2008
Cambodia hysteria over "killer red phone number"
Cambodian officials have moved to quell growing hysteria sparked by a rumour that a ghostly red number was appearing on mobile phones and killing people, local media and police said on Saturday.
Officials have urged calm in the mobile-phone-crazy country, where rumours spread nationally like wildfire thanks to cheap calls and text messages, and have denied any red number exists.
Posts and Telecommunications Minister So Khun said the rumour was probably due to growing tension prior to scheduled national elections in July, the English-language Cambodia Daily reported.
"Anyone can make this up. In a moment we will hear that fish will grow legs and run away," the paper quoted the minister as saying.
Rumours such as this are not new to Cambodia, where people are deeply superstitious and believe in sorcerers and spirits but have nevertheless embraced texting technology as a national passion.
At the height of the SARS outbreak in 2003, a story circulated that people who did not eat a sugar palm dessert before midnight would die, sparking nationwide mass panic-buying of palm sugar that resulted in several market stalls being damaged.
In January of the same year, a false rumour that a Thai soap actress had claimed the national icon, Angkor Wat temple, was Thai led to an angry mob torching the Thai embassy and businesses.
Police warned Saturday that if the culprit for this latest text-message-fuelled scare was found they would be prosecuted, but admitted Chinese whisper investigations of this nature were virtually impossible to trace.
source: livenews.com.au Apr 27 2008
Taxi driver returns 500,000 BAHT to Japanese businessman
source: The Nation: 25 Apr 2008
A taxi driver Friday returned Bt500,000 to a Japanese businessman who had left it in the back of his cab.
The passenger forgot his bag containing US dollars, Japanese yen and Vietnamese dong, a mobile phone and passport.
Driver Rung Wantumma, 34, had FM 91 Traffic Radio announce the discovery.
Owner Takechi Saito turned up at the station to reclaim the bag, hailing his driver's honesty.
Thailand: ‘Missing’ Torches Found
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(Photo courtesy: Charnaron g Porndilokrad/ DAILY XPRESS)
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BANGKOK, THAILAND: The mystery of Thai actor Christopher Benjakul’s missing Olympic torch has been solved after he claimed that it was “snatched away” during the 19 Apr relay.
Olympic Committee of Thailand (OCT) president Yutthasak Sasiprapa said it was all a misunderstanding. Once the actor had passed on the flame during the relay, volunteers had kept Benjakul’s torch in the coach carrying the torchbearers who had completed their stage.
Yutthasak said another torch, which was also ‘missing’ had been found. It had been kept in a safe place by staff of Samsung, the event’s main sponsor.
However, a city sanitation worker found an unclaimed Olympic torch, the 81st, in front of the OCT headquarters on 21 Apr. It had not been lit.
Eighty torchbearers took part in the 10.5km route in Bangkok
“I think the BOCOG (Beijing Olympic Games Organising Committee) might have had some reserve torches for the Bangkok Leg,” Yutthasak said, adding that if no one can prove they are the owner, they will keep the torch in the OCT museum.
(Daily Xpress/ AsiaNews)
April 26, 2008
China down to 11 days worth of coal
CHINA only has enough coal for 11 days of consumption, three days less than a month ago, state media reported Wednesday, sounding the alarm bells over the nation's most important source of energy.
In certain parts of China, such as densely populated Hebei province in the north, reserves are down to less than a week, Xinhua news agency reported, citing the China Electricity Regulatory Commission.
In the period since early March, coal reserves have slumped by 12 per cent to 46.7 million tonnes, according to the commission.
Reasons for the shortage were "multi-dimensional," the commission was quoted as saying, without elaborating.
Demand for coal has risen rapidly since China experienced brown-outs early this decade, motivating a construction frenzy in the power industry, with large numbers of new coal-fired plants emerging across the country.
China counts on coal for about 70 per cent of its energy consumption, a proportion that has stayed almost unchanged for the past nearly three decades despite a skyrocketing rise in demand for power.
Foreigner 'mysteriously' falls from Bangkok Apt building
A foreigner severs his spine in fall in Thailand
Mother desperate to join son in Bangkok
Apr 23 2008
A Charleston (USA) man mysteriously fell five stories from a Thailand apartment building on Saturday. The fall severed his spinal cord, and now his mother is desperately trying to reach him.
Chip Ellis Kay Dillon, owner of O’Kay’s on Leon Sullivan Way, is trying to get to Thailand to be with her son, who was seriously injured after falling five stories from a Bangkok apartment building.
William Baxter Harrison has been studying world religion at Assumption University, a Catholic school in Bangkok. He was found by volunteer paramedics after a five-story fall, said his mother Kay Dillon, owner of O'Kays restaurant and bar on Leon Sullivan Way.
The 23-year-old Harrison had lived in Thailand for about a year and was dating a girl there, she said.
But Harrison called his close friend John Martin last Thursday, telling him that his girlfriend had cheated on him, Martin said Tuesday afternoon.
Martin said he consoled his friend. "I talked him down," he said.
The next day Harrison called Martin, at about midnight Saturday in Bangkok, saying he was going to go to the woman's house and talk to her.
"He was calm, he just wanted to try and work it out," Martin said. "He was on his way over there."
A few hours later, Martin got a call from the U.S. State Department, saying there had been a terrible accident.
"They called John because his number was the last number called on [Harrison's] phone," Dillon said.
The State Department told Dillon that her son was alive but needed surgery. He has a severed spinal cord and may have brain damage, she said.
It took her 12 hours to get permission to the Thai hospital to do the surgery, she said.
"They were not sure if he would survive the surgery. They don't think he will walk again," Dillon said.
Much of the details surrounding the fall are murky.
Paramedics in Thailand are volunteers, and a paramedic crew apparently saw Harrison fall, Dillon said. They immediately went to help him, but were surprised when no one came to his aid from the apartment building, she said.
It's unclear whether there is an investigation into the fall going on in Thailand, but Dillon said when she was contacted by the State Department, they asked her several questions.
"They asked me who would harm him and why, how long he had been in the country," she said. "None of it registered. I heard that my son's spinal cord had been severed, that he was bleeding from the ears. ... So the questions seemed irrelevant at the time."
The office of Rep. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., is helping Dillon get an emergency visa to go to Thailand, said Capito spokesman Jonathan Coffin.
"Obviously it's a very serious situation. Anything we can do to help, we want to make sure that we do," Coffin said.
Dillon said she doesn't know how much it is going to cost her or how when she will be able to reach her son.
"I'm just trying to get over there," she said. "I need to be with him."
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
FYI: More foreigners fall out of windows and balconies in Thailand than any other place in the world.
Here is what really happened. The guy went to his gal's apartment and her Thai boyfriend was there. Oops, someone fell over the balcony. Of course everyone heard, but everyone knows, in Thailand, to mind their own business. Because Thailand is the place where too many foreigners fall over balconies.
April 20, 2008
In Bangkok gridlock, Thai traffic police double as midwives
Bangkok traffic police helps to deliver a baby
BANGKOK (AFP) — When Sergeant Pichet Visetchote transferred into a special division of Thailand's traffic police, he assumed his job would involve handing out tickets -- not, as it's turned out, delivering babies.
The most recent of the 14 babies he has delivered was Rungarun -- whose name means "morning" in Thai -- a girl delivered in a pickup truck that was stuck in one of Bangkok's notorious traffic jams on the way to hospital.
Indeed, officers in Pichet's division have no authority to issue tickets but when Bangkok traffic grinds to a halt, as it does for much of each day, they can slip through on their motorcycles to fix cars, help the sick and deliver babies.
"It's the perfect job," said 37-year-old Pichet. "The police do not only enforce the law, we have a duty to help people."
The Royal Traffic Police Project, one of six traffic police divisions in the capital, was set up in 1993 with a broad mission to help people stranded in the traffic. Over time delivering babies has become its speciality.
Officers in Bangkok have delivered 81 babies over the last 10 years and cleared traffic to escort hundreds of women in labour, police records show.
Pichet holds second place for the most deliveries, coming in behind a fellow officer who has helped with the arrival of 18 babies.
Pichet's deliveries haven't suffered any complications, but he admits he still gets nervous.
His first emergency call came two months after he completed his training, he said, and he found the surgical gloves in his kit bag were so slippery he feared he might drop the baby.
"It was very exciting," he said. "But I knew the survival of the baby depended on me."
Suranetr Jongnomklang, a 27-year-old department store saleswoman, said she had been relieved to see the police arrive when she went into labour in February on the back seat of a taxi.
"I don't remember much because I was in pain," she said. "But I feel happy there were police there who knew how to help a mother in labour."
The 145 officers in the division receive a couple days of medical training every three months at private and state hospitals, where they can practice deliveries using dolls, said division chief Colonel Akekachai Pruchyawithirat.
Each officer's motorcycle is equipped with a first aid kit that includes a baby blanket, a tie for the umbilical cord and a hand pump to help newborns with their breathing.
On any given day, five teams of two officers stake out the highways waiting for emergency calls.
"The other policeman will help the traffic jam because people always stop by to watch whether the baby is a boy or a girl," Akekachai said.
Other rubber-neckers want to write down the license plate number of the mother's taxi or car, which some Thais think will guarantee a lottery win, Akekachai said.
The programme began in 1993 with a royal grant of 11 million baht (435,000 dollars), and was originally meant to help police ease congestion, Akekachai said.
"Giving people new life is one of the most important things."
Akekachai said he sees the police project as a chance for Thai police to make a positive connection with the people they serve, and added that he doesn't want police to be known only for fines and arrests.
The existence of the unit shouldn't lead people to treat it like a dial-up midwife service and not take necessary precautions, Pichet said, as the back seat of a car is hardly the ideal place to give birth.
And if he ever has children, he says, he'll leave the delivery to his wife and a doctor.
April 13, 2008
Songkran Exodus Begins - April 11, 2008
Nation photo by Thawechai Jaowattana
Traffic congestion starts along Mitaparb Road in Lamtrakong area on Friday as people leave the captial to their home province to celebrate Songkran Festival.
CAMBODIA - No more 'Happy Pizzas'
Phnom Penh's marijuana-laced treats face chop in latest drug crackdown
Changing times and politics in Southeast Asia may finally spell extinction for one of the most famous - or infamous - delicacies enjoyed by many backpackers, Cambodia's "happy pizza".
Legendary among travellers, the hippy's little helper version of pizza is simply the traditional Italian favourite with a Cambodian twist - the rich tomato base comes heavily laced with marijuana.
Although officially illegal for several years, locals have traditionally used marijuana in soups. Travellers crossing the Lao-Cambodian border previously even reported a small garden of the stuff being lovingly tended by customs officials.
Then foreign inspiration transformed the drug into the world's most talked-about pizza topping. Dozens of happy pizza parlours sprang up.
But now the Cambodian government's battle against drugs has given "pizza wars" a whole new meaning.
The weed putsch
This week marijuana was claimed as Cambodia's first "total victory" in eliminating a drug from both domestic and export markets by Interior Ministry anti-drug chief, Police Gen Lou Ramin.
"Marijuana is no longer a problem in Cambodia," he declared. "We are strengthening our monitoring throughout the country and its borders."
Plantations which once required helicopter airlifts to clear them have been wiped out, he said, leaving the government free to concentrate on the more prevalent evils of heroin, cocaine and drugs such as methamphetamines.
The government's anti-grass putsch began in 1999, when seven women, who had previously openly sold marijuana at traditional medicine stalls, were arrested in a police raid and 38 kilos of the weed confiscated.
Back then, a compressed brick of marijuana sold for around US$2 (Bt62) and a packet of 25 ready-rolled cigarettes was just $1, but inflation and crackdowns pushed the price up. Somehow, however, the iconic happy pizza survived, until now.
The spiked pizza's status as a backpacker's rite of passage has earned it mentions even on reputable travel websites such as Lonely Planet. YouTube features videos of it being made, eaten, sold - and its extremely potent side-effects.
Grins of delight
A former Foreigner Police officer says that tourists ingesting marijuana in pizza form often got dangerously out of hand .
"I saw people take their clothes off after eating this - especially women".
"Some people laugh, but some cry, and some just jump in the lake," he said.
Expatriates familiar with the potent pizza grin when they tell the story of one of the capital's most famous happy pizza chefs admitting himself to hospital and spending the night on a drip after sampling a slice of his famed pizza for the first, and last, time.
April 12, 2008
The Twilight Zone
"There is a fifth dimension beyond that
which is known to man. It is a dimension as vast as
space and as timeless as infinity. It is the middle
ground between light and shadow, between science and
superstition, and it lies between the pit of man's
fears and the summit of his knowledge. This is the
dimension of imagination. It is an area we call
The Twilight Zone."
April 06, 2008
The Children of Huang Shi
A Great Movie!
Starring:
Jonathan Rhys Meyers - Chow Yun-Fat -
Radha Mitchell - Michelle Yeoh
Movie's release 2008
Co-Production: Australia / China / Germany
Production Company: Ming Productions, Zero Films, Bluewater Pictures (CHS) Pty Ltd Exec. Producer: Lillian Birnbaum
Producer: Jonathan Shteinman Arthur Cohn Peter Loehr Wieland Schulz-Kiel Martin Hagemann
Director: Roger Spottiswoode
Writer: Jane Hawksley Australian
Sales: Dendy Films Pty Ltd
International Sales: Hyde Park
Duration: 100 mins
(05/13/07) Synopsis: [Spoiler Warning] The story of CHILDREN OF THE HUANG SHI is set in war-ravaged China during the
late 1930's. It is a story of how a young Englishman, George Hogg (Jonathan Rhys Meyers), came to lead sixty orphaned children
on an extraordinary and perilous journey of almost a thousand miles across the snow-bound Liu Pan Shan mountains to safety
on the edge of the Mongolian desert. And of how, in doing so, he grew to learn the true meaning of courage. When George
Hogg graduated from Oxford, he wanted to be a writer/journalist. He arrived in Shanghai during his world tour and became a
wartime journalist. He did not realize the cruelty of the war until he witnessed the infamous Nanking Massacre (during which an
estimated 300,000 Chinese civilians were killed). He wanted to report the horrible truth to the world but the pictures he took were
discovered by Japanese soldiers and he was arrested. Jack Chen (Chow Yun-Fat), a West Point graduate and a military officer of
a communist guerrilla force, rescued him from under the Japanese's gun. Hogg and Chen became friends. When the injured
Hogg needed a place to nurse his wounds, Chen was looking for a place where the English speaker could safely stay. An
Australian nurse, Lee Pearson (Radha Mitchell), suggested Huang Shi in Hubei province. In the beautiful mountains of
Huang Shi lived some missionaries and they hosted a home for some war orphans. When George Hogg arrived in Huang Shi,
the last missionary had just died of illness and he found 60 unruly orphaned boys running around. The horrible experience in
their lives made them disobedient. Hogg did not like this place and he wanted to return to the real war frontier. Lee Pearson
suddenly left and he was left to take care of the children by himself. A widowed aristocrat and local retail merchant, Madam Wang
(Michelle Yeoh), became his only help. Hogg's effort had gained him love from the children by the time Chen and Pearson
returned. The war did not spare them. The Japanese army was approaching and the Nationalist Party wanted the older boys to
join the Chinese army to fight the Japanese. Hogg decided the only escape for the boys was to travel to a safe haven in the inner
Mongolian desert. George Hogg, Jack Chen, Lee Pearson, and the 60 children went on the arduous 1,000 mile journey. They
experienced the dangerous conditions such as snowstorms and sandstorms and once they barely missed running into
Japanese soldiers face to face. Three adults, two men and one woman, developed some relationships among each other.
They finally arrived in Shandan, Gansu province. There they had planned to build a new home and new school for the boys.
TRAILER
- Making of "The Children of Huang Shi" with Michelle Yeoh (01:33)
Download 19.8MB (Chinese and English)
http://www.michelleyeoh.info/Movie/childrenofhuangshi.html
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