Asia Blog: China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam

Maybe some day Meiguo Waiguo ren can also be Zhongguo ren, eh:

At the Driscoll public schools in Brookline, Mass., the kindergartners already know more Chinese than most Americans will learn in a lifetime. The second graders can string sentences together, and the eighth graders are nearly fluent. In this school system, learning Mandarin is mandatory.

Read more ABC News… or over at Idiosyncrasies.

President Bush tugged at both handles on the double doors before admitting: “I was trying to escape. Obviously, it didn’t work.”

Due to global warming, some fruits in Japan are having trouble growing normally, according to Japan Today:

Global warming is also expected to force producers to change growing areas. The fruit tree research institute of the National Agriculture and Bio-Oriented Research Organization, or NARO, in Tsukuba, Ibaraki Prefecture, said the annual average temperature to favorably grow apples is 6-14 C, but it will top 14 C in plains in the central part of the Tohoku district in the 2060s, a temperature not suited to apple growing.

In certain ethnic groups in China, researchers were able to find the same male genetic markers, which they postulate were introduced by Giocangga, founder of the Qing dynasty, and his numerous children:

“We noticed just two types of Y chromosome that were extraordinarily frequent - one of them making up around 3% of our sample.

More accurate analysis then found that this particular genetic code first appeared just before the Qing dynasty, which came to the fore in 1616 and had conquered China by 1644.

“We soon realised there was a major historical event going on at this time - the establishment of the Qing dynasty, which conquered China and ruled for several hundred years,” Dr Tyler-Smith said.