Smile When Communicating with Foreigners

1) A Smile is Beijing’s Best Business Card — A Smile is the Whole World’s Propriety
2) Eight things not to ask Foreign Guests about:

- income or expenses
- age
- love life or marriage
- health
- someone’s home or address
- personal experience
- religious beliefs or political views
- what someone does

3) General Rules for Etiquette with Foreigners

- One’s manners and bearing, and image should be graceful
- Be neither humble nor haughty, but at ease and self possessed
- Seek commonalities while reserving differences, have reason and integrity
- Adapt to others’ customs, respect ethical code
- Abide by agreements, adhere to promises
- Be enthusiastic in moderation, foreigners are different from Chinese
- Be appropriately modest, be affirmed in yourself
- Do not ask private questions, respect others’ customs
- Ladies first, be gentlemanly
- Seat honored guests on the right, and get along harmoniously

Instructions for walking

When men and women are walking together, men should generally walk on the outside, and the person carrying things should normally walk on the right. Men should help women carry things, but must not help women carry their handbags. When three people are walking side-by-side, elderly should walk in the middle. Where there are many cars around, men should walk on the side of the sidewalk closer to the street. When four people are walking together, it is best to walk two-by-two.

Etiquette for Interacting with Handicapped Athletes

1) You should use polite and standard forms of address for handicapped athletes.
2) Try to keep as light as you can with handicapped overtones.
3) Pay attention to how you congratulate handicapped athletes.

Pay attention to avoiding taboo subjects, quit using bad platitudes, and do not use insulting or discriminatory contemptuous or derogatory terms to address the disabled. Say things such as, “You are amazing,” or “You are really great.” When chatting with the visually impaired, do not say things like “It’s up ahead,” or “It’s over there.” When chatting with athletes who are paraplegic in their upper body, do not say things like “It’s behind you.”

The posters appear to be created with the intent of warning Chinese not to be accidentally rude to the millions of international guests that will be arriving for the Olympics. Beijing has issued similar edicts before, warning Chinese not to spit in public, for example; these are more of the same. Those making the posters out to be instructions to avoid discussing “politically sensitive” topics are probably reading too much into them.

“I made a mistake, a terrible mistake. I apologize to you, my parents, my teachers and my friends.”

An Associated Press article Vietnam Is Having Paris Hilton Moment quotes a few interesting Vietnamese on the issue:

• “A good girl must keep herself clean until she is married,” Khanh said. “Thuy Linh should be condemned.”
• charges of “spreading depraved cultural items”
• “People will forgive him, but not her”
• “it’s OK for a boy to have sex at that age, but not for a girl”
• the episode underscored the “dark side of globalization” and warned that a flood of foreign influences “threaten Vietnam’s cultural foundation.”

In the 21st century, like all previous centuries, the morality police and gender double-standards live on. How long is it going to be before global morality becomes fully modernized?

Interestingly, the new UI was communicated through a BBS, “J. Wong, the company CEO posted the following pics on an internet BBS.” If you’re interested in side-by-side iPhone comparisons, check out the Engadget post.

I wish they’d done some innovation. It’s shameless copying, that’s all, and anyone can do that. The only differences are that it’s a Microsoft powered smartphone, as opposed to a Unix powered cell phone / mp3 player.

Here are the photos from their wedding:

It doesn’t make sense to most people why someone would want to become a girl–Harisu was an average-looking boy before she had surgery–given the life of complications, surgeries, drugs, and emotional trauma it would bring. However, for Harisu and her new husband, I wish them the best of luck!

Here are a couple photos of her dress that evening–you’ve seen the same worn by plenty of American and British actresses going up for their awards:

In this next one you can tell the camera man is totally enthralled by her dress:

Yes, the dress is very sexy, but it’s also fairly modest and sophisticated, with a long skirt.  If it weren’t for that slit running top to bottom there would be no problem… and nothing to distinguish it from every other black evening gown.  It’s only by taking risks with fashion that you can shock and impress the people around you.  If you wear what society expects, you’re not making progress.

Dare to go against the norm!  Be unique and special!

Here’s some more very cute pigness for you.

Nationalistic pride, mixed with a feeling of racial superiority, mixed with the idea that the government is never wrong, mixed with saving face… It is a scary/irritating situation I live with every day. [...] When censorship happens, it is not so much the government controlling the people, as it is 1.3 billion people putting their fingers in their ears and saying “Mmmmmm!!!!! I can’t HEAR youuuu!” Not only are conflicting ideas censored, but any negative events or occurrences within China.

It’s a good read, go check it out! While you’re at it, you might also want to read the thesis that Chinese people are naturally superior and hard-working, so SE Asian countries with high numbers of Chinese are naturally more prosperous.  I’m not sure that I believe that one…

VIP ’cause I know I gotta shine–
I’m Fergie Ferg, and me love you long time!

At first, I assumed this was a coincedence, but then I heart Nelly Furtado’s hit single Maneater:

You doing anything to keep her by your side
because, she said she love you, love you long time!

The lyrics have shown up in other, older songs, like Jay-Z’s I Just Wanna Love You and Nitty’s Nasty Girl, but they originally were introduced by 2-Live-Crew in their outrageous song Me So Horny:

Ahh! Me so horny!
Me love you long time!

This was in turn sampled from the Stanley Kubrick movie Full Metal Jacket, where a hooker in Vietnam asks two US soldiers, “Hey, you got girlfriend Vietnam? Me so horny. Me love you long time.” The phrase has since been used in countless other productions, and seems to be reviving in usage in modern pop music as a cliche of sexuality.

Steve Rubel cuts to the heart of the problem:

This is a big deal. Essentially, the Chinese government is choosing to block some of the most popular RSS feeds in the world. That’s like they decided to block the largest airline from their airspace. It is as close as you will see a nation coming to blocking the entire RSS/podcast transport.

1. Malaysia outlaws unsuitable names
2. Botox ban for Malaysian Muslims
3. Kiss warning to Malaysia tourists

Tourist aren’t allowed to kiss because, “kissing and hugging [isn't] acceptable to Malaysian citizens” according to Chief Justice Ahmad Fairuz. According to the 2004 Global Sex Survey by condom manufacturer Durex, Malaysian’s are the second most-virgin (losing to Vietnam), and the sixth least-sexed. So, if abstinence is the goal of censorship, the banning of public affection, and other laws in Malaysia, it’s probably working.

I wonder what would happen if you correlate things like “standard of living” and “GDP” with sexual satisfaction and cultural tolerance.  It’s probably no accident that well-to-do countries are often made up of more open societies.