When I was in Beijing, I could feel a very strong sense of welcoming and expecting the forthcoming olympics. Beijing is absolutely beautiful with the many new land marks and the upgraded air quality, etc. Despite hostile comments from some foreign news agencies about the preparation of the olympics, I was impressed by the determination and efficiency of the government. It is fair to say that they did their best to offer the stage for the athletes. On the other hand, I’d rather believe that the hostile comments rooted from misunderstandings between different people and different culture.

Check out the following hilarious video on how ordinary Chinese people are learning English to prepare for the Olympics.  Near the end, a cop was really funny:

These pictures are based on words I used in an abstract of a paper. Bigger words have a larger voice.

Indeed, the paper is about pricing.

Found from here.

A couple of abbreviations: ‘TST’=Tsim Sha Tsui, and ‘CWB’=Causeway Bay.

Here’s a set of recommendations from Spike over at Hongkietown.

I’d add:

Tai Woo, East Ocean. Tack Hsin and Hoi Tin — four chains all over HK, very competent and reasonably priced Cantonese seafood palaces and decent dim sum.

Little Sheep — China-based chain famous for northern style hotpot.

Under Bridge Spicy Crab — as the name says.

Xiao Nan Guo — Shanghai-based chain

and reading the Cha Xio Bao blog for lots of great, off-the-beaten path tips.

Mr Tall adds:

I’ve done a bit of googling about for some specifics. I certainly haven’t tried all of these places, and if you know of one that’s moved/closed/terrible, please let us know.

• You can find Tai Woo restaurant branches as follows:Causeway Bay Branch:
  27 Percival Street.
  Tel: 2893 0822; 2893 9882

  Shau Kei Wan Branch:
  192 - 198, Shau Kei Wan Road, Sai Wan Ho

  Central Branch:
  92 & 100 Caine Road, Central

  Tsim Sha Tsui Branch:
  14 – 16 Hillwood Road, Tsim Sha Tsui

• There are East Ocean branches as follows:5/FL., Miramar Shopping Ctr.,
  132 Nathan Road, Tsimshatsui, Kowloon.
  Phone: 2317 8889

  Level 3-302, New World Centre,
  Tsimshatsui, Kowloon.
  Phone: 2367 1133

  Shop 3202, Harbour City,
  Tsimshatsui, Kowloon, H.K.
  Phone: 2956 2882

  B1 East Ocean Ctr., 98 Granville Road,
  Tsimshatsui East, Kowloon.
  Phone: 2723 8128

  2/FL., Sun Hung Kai Centre,
  30 Harbour Road, Wanchai, Hong Kong.
  Phone: 2827 9938

  3/FL., Harbour Centre, 25 Harbour Road,
  Wanchai, Hong Kong.
  Phone: 2827 8887

  5/FL., CITIC Tower, 1 Tim Mei Avenue,
  Central, Hong Kong.
  Phone: 2877 2211

  Shop G201 The Repulse Bay,
  109 Repulse Bay Road, Hong Kong.
  Phone: 2803 1882

• Now how about some Tack Hsin outlets:1-13 Sugar Street
  Causeway Bay HK
  2894 8899

  84-86 Morrison Hill Road, Tsung Tsin Mansion
  Wanchai, HK
  2572 0898

  Shop 5, G/F, Pearl Court
  2-12 Holland Street, HK
  2872 6168

  2/F Peninsula Centre, 67 Mody Road
  TST East, Kowloon,HK
  2721 8102

  4/F Chong Hing Square
  601 Nathan Road, Kowloon, HK
  2780 0182

  3 Tak Hing Street
  Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon, HK
  2723 2646

• There’s a Hoi Tin restaurant on:Elizabeth Bld, Causeway Bay
  Tel: 2891 3886.
• There are Little Sheep hotpot restaurants as follows:Wanchai Hot Pot
  Causeway Bay Plaza, Wan Chai
  Tel: 2893 8318

  Mongkok Hot Pot
  16 Kar Lo street, ground floor/1st floor
  Tel: 2396 8816

  Tsim Sha Tsui Hot Pot
  26 Kimberley Rd, Tsim Sha Tsui
  Tel: 2722 7633

  Tsuen Wan Hot Pot
  City Landmark, Tsuen Wan
  Tel: 2940 7678

• Now, for the marvelously-named ’Bridge under spicy crab’ restaurant:Shop C, G/F., Wah Fat Mansion, 405-419 Lockhart Road,
  Wan Chai, Hong Kong

  and/or

  Shop 6-9, G/F., 429 Lockhart Road, Wan Chai, Hong Kong
  Tel: 2893 1289 or 2573 7698

• And finally, a Xiao Nan Guo outlet:12th floor, Shell Tower, Causeway Bay (i.e. near Times Square)
  Tel: 2894 8899

Which segment are you in?

Looks like we should go to the creative class that represent less than 1/3 work force, but gets 1/2 the total money.

How can I not write something about it?

These days I’ve been watching TV from quite a number of stations for the coverage. Each time someone gets saved, I truly feel the joy, for the ones saved, and for their family/relatives/friends.

It is horrible even to imagine that the death toll jumped quickly to 20,000. According to some estimates, the final number will be at least 50,000. Indeed, an area of 100,000 square km (a little more than 10^12 square feet) is considered to be severely damaged, that’s one percent of the area of China.

Some villages in Sichuan got totally wiped out, a single village can have more than 1,000 death. Some schools have several hundred students burried alive. I don’t believe God, as no one would allow this to happen if he still claims to be a savior. I do hope there is God, as these innocent people will rest in peace in heaven.

Just now, someone was saved after spending 100 hours under ground. Despite my joy, I feel terrible about those who are still down there, hoping to be saved. Time is their biggest enemy now. In this country with a 1.3 billion population, at this moment, there is just no way to use the collective effort to save those people.

I’ve been thinking about how to help these days. Jade and I will donate money to the Red Cross, but other than that, there is really nothing I can help. You feel the frustration and hopelessness at this moment when your enemy is time.

Gandhi said: “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.” However, in this case, I don’t know where to start.

I remember sitting in front of the TV during Katrina, worrying about the lives in the dome. At the wrath of the nature, lives are so vulnerable. I remember feeling the same frustration when I saw the horrible pictures on TV. This time, I feel happy when Japan, Korea, Russia sent their team of experts to help with the rescue. It really does not matter how many people they can send over or how much money they can raise for this event, what matters is that they can witness and share this tragic moment with the Chinese.

I’d like to upload this picture from Katrina. That’s what I want to say to the earth quake.

I travel quite often when I do not teach.

Each time before traveling, I have to think hard what to pack and put a list of things on paper. It is a waste of time and paper, the environmentally friendly me finally decided to compile this list so I can come back to update and use it later.

Before the trip:

• Visa application
• Currency exchange
• Prepare audio books for a foreign language
• Book flights/hotels
• Print itinerary
• Print contact information
• Make sure to have copies of travel documents
• Recharge batteries for camera, cellphone, iPod

In the luggage:

• Medicine for fever, sleeping pills for jet lag, vitamins
• Suit, shirts, pants, tie, belt, shoes to go with suit
• T-shirts, Sweater, socks, underwear
• Swimming gears
• Umbrella

In the handbag/backpack:

• Passport
• Map, itinerary
• Charger for cellphone, camera
• DC Partner for photos
• Power socket adapter
• Umbrella?
• Some plastic bags
• Pen, paper
• Some readings for the flight

On the morning of flight:

• Call Taxi
• Eye glasses
• Watch
• Pack toothbrush, toothpaste, dental floss, Listerine, razor, shaving cream,
• Wallet, credit cards, ID card, membership cards
• Driver’s license
• iPod

When traveling with kids:

• hand wash
• Bib
• Tylenol, Motrin, Thermometer
• Stroller
• Diaper

I usually have a few bags with me when going out:

• Luggage for check-in
• Camera bag
• Laptop bag
• Probably a backpack

In my trip to France, I bought another book on Tin Tin. It is a book about the stamps of Tin Tin issued in France, and gives a lot of background information of these stamps. (Since it is a “collector edition”, the store owner sold this 19.80€ book at 30€.)

I remember walking by such a store when I visited Paris 5 years ago. That time, I wondered from the Notre Dame with Ray Cai.

The Tin Tin store was close to St. Germain Ave. It is just beside the METRO station called “Cluny, La Sarbonne.” In addition to this one, there is a store called Album that also sells Tin Tin souvenirs.

On the first page of the book, there is a quote by Herge:

Du plus en plus, je m’attache a connaitre et a comprendre, a rompre des barrieres, au propre comme au figure. Si je me suis mis a vioyager (enfin~), ce n’est pas seulement pure voir de nouveaux paysages, pas suelement pour me documenter, mais pour decouvrir d’autres modes de vie, d’autres facons de penser; en somme, pour elargir ma vision du monde.

— Herge, 1971

Here is my translation:

Increasingly, I establish a knowing and understanding. When I am traveling, I would not merely see new landscapes, nor would I just keep documenting. Rather, I’d uncover other lifestyles, other ways of thinking, overall, to broaden my vision of the world.

Owing to the Tibet situation, the French president suggested banning Beijing Olympics. I’m very upset with this move. Not just me, a lot of Chinese people are deeply hurt. Some people started to boycott Carrifour, a French chain store.

To me, both actions (banning olympics and boycotting carrifour) show irresponsibility.

Olympics is known to be a world event that brings hope and peace to people. In ancient Greece, even two countries at war would stop fighting during the Olympics. It is very mean to use Olympics as a political vehicle to add pressure to the hosting country. Besides, Tibet issue is more complicated. Many people, including the French president, know little about the history of Tibet, and would really not qualify to take a public position on it.

Now for Carrifour boycott. The chain store has nothing to do with the president’s position. Boycotting the store does not do any help to improve the situation.

Before the trip, even Jade felt that we should not go, in light of the tension between China and France. Part of the reason is due to the irresponsible statements by the French president, and part of the reason is due to the negative attitude of the French consulate in HK (more about this in Jade’s blog).

I decided to go because I believe that misunderstandings can be resolved when people can know more about each other. Human beings are very foolish throughout history. They fight with their neighbors, then they fight the near-by town, then another country. If some day life forms from other planets visit us, we would be fighting them for sure. Few people stopped and thought about why and for what we are fighting. The answer is clear for politicians, they fight for their power, and for their ambition to control things, and the ambition to show they have things in control. For ordinary people, there is really no such need to fight.

We went to Quimper, Bretagne for the wedding of our friends Grace and Benoit. I was deeply impressed by the buildings and landscapes. I was equally impressed by the friendship showed by the people in Quimper.

In the wedding, as the legal witness for Grace of the marriage, I made the following statement, it is very close in spirit to Herge’s view on traveling.

Alphabets Love, Hearts and Romance Charms Gold Charms Disney Charms Silver Charms 13 mm Charms Photo Charms Enamel Charms

If human beings really evolved from monkeys, then the French people and the Chinese people are definitely from two very different groups of monkeys. Indeed, we look so different, and there are so many things radically different in the two countries. It is easily imaginable what difficulties this couple have to overcome to stand together today. It is naturally difficult because we tend to be nervous when we meet people who are different. Owing to their overcoming the nervousness, we could all get together to celebrate their getting together. How do you overcome the nervousness? Just like the couple, you learn more about each other. Then you resolve the misunderstandings. Despite the many differences between French people and Chinese people, we have many things in common: we all love eating, the French word cuisine has a Chinese equivalence. We all love football. When French people say “tres bien”, Chinese people say “tai bang le”, they sound similar and mean the same thing. We all love freedom. We all love our own countries.

In this trip, we went to the wonderful church for the ceremony, and stayed in such a wonderful historical mansion. I can only use the word “wonderful” to describe this trip here. But more wonderful than the wonderfulness of this trip is the happy couple finding each other and finding the true love. The trip to France made me to love the French people more and more. The more I know this country, it becomes more lovable. What I hope here is that our French friends can visit us more in the future, and hope you can feel the same. Now you have the couple to visit and so many of us from China as new friends.

Looking for theoretical support?

The BPS Research Digest, reports on a study on forgiveness from the University of Sussex and the New School for Social Research. The study examines how groups which have committed atrocious acts against one another come to break the cycle of resentment and forgive.

[The researchers] surveyed 180 Bosnian Muslims about their attitudes towards Bosnian Serbs in the wake of the earlier conflict. They found that Bosnian Muslims who had more Serb friends and who identified more with a sense of being “Bosnian,” rather than “Bosnian Muslim” or “Bosniak,” also tended to show more empathy for Serbs as a group, to be more trusting of Serbs, and to see Serbs as more varied — all of which predicted greater levels of forgiveness and more positive attitudes towards the Serbs.

This pattern is consistent with what’s known as the “contact hypothesis” in social psychology, which states that more high quality contact between groups promotes intergroup reconciliation.

Captcha has been around for a while.

It is used to make sure that the reader is indeed a human. Although there are some algorithms to crack captcha, none of them is working well.

Here are some examples:

The worst one I saw (or should I say the “best one”?) is the following:

If you can get it right, you are not only human, but also a rare human.

Just received an email from MIT alumni office.  MIT will be tuition-free for nearly 30% students.

From the email:

MIT has long been a proponent of need-blind admissions and need-based
aid and this additional investment in our brilliant student body continues
to award aid based solely on need.

I’m very proud with this move.  I somehow have the impression that schools like Yale and Harvard are for rich kids. As a consequence, it means that some brilliant students can not go to those places due to financial constraints.  This artificial financial divide creates a feedback loop to discriminate kids from poorer families.  The free-tuition move at MIT will definitely help those smart and poor kids to fulfill their dreams, and more importantly help the society to benefit from better matching good education with smart kids.

I’m grateful to MIT for the support during my PhD study.   In addition to tuition waiver, I also got stipend to pay my rents, etc.  In return, I don’t know how to pay back this generosity.  Should I send my daughter to MIT in the future?  One thing for sure, her dad is richer than her dad’s dad.  If she needs to pay some tuition, I’d be happy to contribute.  The question is “Is MIT a good place for her?”

Back in Boston, we had some guests visiting,  one of them (G) asked Alantha (A),

G: Hey, Alantha, do you want to go to MIT or Harvard?
A: Hmm, I don’t want to go to either.
G: Oh, so where do you want to go?
A: Disneyland… (a sheepish smile)
Everyone else: (speechless)