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April 29 Chinese children sold "like cabbages" into slaveryChina announced a nationwide crackdown on slavery and child labour 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 neighbouring Henan. "The bustling child labour 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 labour market were only seven and nine years old," it said. According to a contract exposed by an undercover reporter, a child labourer 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. Chinese students in US using terror rather than reason to persuade When the time came for the smiling Tibetan monk at the front of the
lecture hall to answer questions, the Chinese students who packed the
audience for the talk last Tuesday had plenty to lob at their guest:
As the monk tried to rebut the students, they grew more hostile. They brandished photographs and statistics to support their claims. “Stop lying! Stop lying!” one young man said. A plastic bottle of water hit the wall behind the monk, and campus police officers hustled the person who threw it out of the room. Scenes like this, ranging from civil to aggressive, have played out at colleges across the country over the past month, as Chinese students in the United States have been forced to confront an image of their homeland that they neither recognize nor appreciate. Since the riots last month in Tibet, the disrupted torch of shame and calls to boycott the opening ceremony of the Games in Beijing, Chinese students, traditionally silent on political issues, have begun to lash out at what they perceive as a pervasive anti-Chinese bias. Last year, there were more than 42,000 students from mainland China studying in the United States, an increase from fewer than 20,000 in 2003, according to the State Department. Campuses including Cornell, Seattle and the University of California, Irvine, have seen a wave of counterdemonstrations using tactics that seem jarring in the American academic context. At the University of Washington, students fought to limit the Dalai Lama’s address to nonpolitical topics. At Duke, pro-China students surrounded and drowned out a pro-Tibet vigil; a Chinese freshman who tried to mediate received death threats, and her family was forced into hiding. And last Saturday, students from as far as Florida and Tennessee traveled to Atlanta to picket CNN after a commentator, Jack Cafferty, referred to the Chinese as “goons and thugs.” (CNN said he was referring to the government, not the people.) Rather than blend in to the prevailing campus ethos of free debate, the more strident Chinese students seem to replicate the authoritarian framework of their homeland, photographing demonstration participants and sometimes drowning out dissent. A Tibetan student who declined to be identified for fear of harassment said he decided not to attend a vigil for Tibet on his campus, which he also did not want identified because there are so few Tibetans there. “It’s not that I didn’t want to, I really did want to go — it’s our cause,” he said. “At the same time, I have to consider that my family’s back there, and I’m going back there in May.” Another factor fueling the zeal of many Chinese demonstrators could be that they, too, intend to return home; the Chinese government is widely believed to be monitoring large e-mail lists. Universities have often tried to accommodate the anger of their Chinese students. Before the Dalai Lama’s visit to the University of Washington, the campus Chinese Students and Scholars Association wrote to the university president expressing hopes that the visit would focus only on nonpolitical issues and not arouse anti-China sentiments. According to a posting on the group’s Web site, the university president, Mark A. Emmert, told them in a meeting that no political questions would be raised at the Dalai Lama’s speech. A spokesman said the university, which opened an office in Beijing last fall, had prescreened student questions before the Chinese students voiced their concerns. Some experts say that colleges feel constrained from reining in the more extreme protests through a combination of concerns about cultural sensitivity and a desire to expand their own ties with China. “I think there tends to be a great deal of self-censorship,” said Peter Gries, director of the Institute for U.S.-China Issues' “and not just among American China scholars but among the whole web of people who do business with China, including school administrators.” At the U.S.C. lecture, the Chinese students arrived early to distribute handouts on Tibet and China that contained a jumble of abbreviated history, slogans and maps with little context. A chart showing that infant mortality in Tibet had plummeted since 1951, when the Communist Chinese government asserted control, did not provide any means for comparison with mortality rates in China or other countries. One photograph showed the Dalai Lama with Heinrich Harrer, author of “Seven Years in Tibet” and a one-time member of the Nazi Party — hence the question about the Dalai Lama’s connection to Hitler, who died when the Dalai Lama was nine. The question about slavery referred to the feudal system in place in Tibet until the mid-20th century. Another photograph purported to show a Tibetan drum that, according to the caption, was covered with “a virgin girl’s skin.” The students said they were frustrated by a sense that many accounts of the recent riots did not reflect the violence and destruction by the Tibetan protesters, who vandalized shops owned by Han Chinese (the ethnic majority in China). According to official Chinese news sources, 22 died in the rioting. Students argue that China has spent billions on Tibet, building schools, roads and other infrastructure. Asked if the Tibetans wanted such development, they looked blankly incredulous. “They don’t ask that question,” said Lionel Jensen, a China scholar at Notre Dame. “They’ve accepted the basic premise of aggressive modernization.” That may be, some experts suggest, because the students whose families can afford to send them abroad are the ones who have benefited the most from China’s economic liberalization. As the U.S.C. session wound to a close, the organizer, Lisa Leeman, a documentary film instructor, pleaded for a change in tone. “My hope for this event, which I don’t totally see happening here, is for people on both, quote, sides to really hear each other and maybe learn from each other,” Ms. Leeman said. “Are there any genuine questions that don’t stem from a political point of view, that are really not here to be on a soap box?” At that moment, the bottle hit the wall. From Fourth Ring to Final FrontierEssential kit and caboodle for your off-road adventures
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L-133, 9A Guanghua Lu, Chaoyang District (65871580) Recommended Retailers Trek Giant Windspeed Weeping schoolgirls wish happy birthday Saddam
Saddam Hussein, hanged in late 2006 for crimes against humanity, is hated in much of Iraq. But in parts of his native Salahuddin Province, especially among his fellow Sunni Arabs, he is still revered. "Bush, Bush you low-life! Saddam's blood is not cheap!" a crowd of pupils in white uniforms from a nearby girls' school chanted while standing around Saddam's grave in the mausoleum where he is buried among displays and photos of his reign. "There are two things we will never give up: Saddam and Iraq!" the girls chanted. Several of them wept. They entered the building carrying a banner which read: "We will not forget you, Papa Saddam," and kissed the dictator's grave. "There is no martyr like Saddam. We are here to celebrate his birthday. Happy birthday, and God willing he will go to paradise," a girl named Tiba, 11, told Reuters. Faten Abdel Qader, one of the organizers, said Saddam's legacy was the memory of a time of peace. "The children who lived during the age of this man had security. They didn't know anything about murder, violence or sectarianism," she said. "An Iraqi woman could hold her head high." Saddam, who was born in Awja on April 28, 1937, was executed for his role in the deaths of Shi'ite villagers slain after an assassination attempt on him. At the time of his execution he was also standing trial for genocide for the killing of hundreds of thousands of Kurds. Iraq's government says he was responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of others buried in mass graves during decades of oppression. His supporters say his harsh rule prevented the sectarian killing that has been rampant since he was ousted in the Anglo-American invasion of Iraq in 2003. Portland Prom Prank ProbedLetter urged parents to provide alcohol at "safe" house partiesFrom The Smoking Gun:Oregon educators want law enforcement officials to probe who was responsible for mailing parents a letter on school letterhead suggesting that they supply students with alcohol at post-prom parties. The letter, a copy of which you'll find below, was sent this week to families of students at Portland's Lincoln High School. Recipients of the missive were urged to consider opening their homes this Saturday for parties as "a safe, secure place for students to have fun," adding if adults "provide the alcohol, you can have peace of mind knowing that they did not acquire it illegally. Condoms were included with the letters--which were written on Portland Public Schools stationery--since "STD epidemics have spread through other high school communities and we want to prevent such an outbreak as best we can." The letter was purportedly written by "The Lincoln High School Faculty and Administration." Officials do not know how the letter's creator(s) got access to school mailing lists. And while rather well written, the letter did include obvious clues that it was a hoax, including a supposed recommendation from the Oregon Liquor Control Commission. The state agency, the letter claimed, "stated that a fifth of alcohol, like Hennessy Cognac, is sufficient supply for at least 8 adults. One can assume that for 17 to 18 year old individuals, one fifth can probably be spread out to 4 students. Considering our reputation (Drinkin' Lincoln), in some cases one fifth is only enough for a single person." (2 pages)
April 28 Chinese rampage in South Korea during torch of shame
In a horrifying replay of nazism, thousands of young Chinese pushed through police lines on Sunday, some of them hurling rocks, bottled water and plastic and steel pipes at protesters demanding better treatment for North Korean refugees in China. Imagine! Fighting to ensure North Korean refugees continue to be treated like scum! South Korean police officers blocked Chinese students as they tried to confront anti-China protesters during the Olympic torch rally in Seoul. Two North Korean defectors living in South Korea poured paint thinner on themselves and tried to set themselves on fire in an attempt to protest what they condemned as Beijing’s inhumane crackdown of North Korean refugees, but the police stopped them, according to witnesses and the police. The South Korean police and Chinese students also overpowered at least two other protesters who tried to impede the run along a 15-mile route through Seoul. The route was kept secret until the last minute and guarded by more than 8,300 police officers. In other cities, the globe-trotting relay of the torch leading up to the Beijing Games in August has triggered protests against China's crackdown on violent protests for independence in Tibet. In South Korea, one of the torch's final stops before entering China, demonstrators focused on human rights for North Koreans who live in hiding in China after fleeing hunger in their homeland. The torch was scheduled to arrive in the North Korean capital of Pyongyang. North Korea said it was preparing an “amazing” welcome, indicating that the totalitarian regime would mobilize hundreds of thousands of flower-waving people. Hours before the torch run began in Seoul, several thousand Chinese, mostly students studying in South Korea, converged in this city's Olympic Park, singing, chanting and waving pickets that said “We love China” or “Go, Go China.” When lone protesters demanded that China stop repatriating North Korean refugees, they were quickly surrounded by jeering Chinese. Near the park, Chinese students surrounded and beat a small group of protesters, news reports said. In another scuffle, at the city centre where the five-hour
torch run ended, Chinese surrounded several Tibetans and South Korean
supporters who unfurled pro-Tibet banners, and kicked and punched them,
witnesses said. This in their host country. The largest scuffle erupted shortly after the first torch-bearer left the Olympic Park, surrounded by dozens of police officers on foot or on bicycles and hundreds more in buses and trailed by a water cannon, ambulances and helicopters circling overhead. Many of the Chinese gathered at the park surged toward about 150 protesters, mostly elderly South Koreans and North Korean defectors, who were shouting “No human rights, no Olympics” from across a boulevard. Armed with plastic shields, the police scuffled with the Chinese as they tried to separate the two groups who were hurling objects at each other. At least one Chinese student was hauled away by the police for throwing a rock. A South Korean newspaper photographer was carried to hospital for treatment of a cut on his head. Although the torch run stirred little interest among South Koreans in general, thousands of North Korean defectors in the South and their supporters saw it as an opportunity to press Beijing to better protect North Korean refugees in China. In recent years, thousands of North Koreans have fled across the loosely controlled Chinese border, rather than the heavily fortified border with South Korea. China sends back North Koreans it catches as illegal economic migrants, a policy condemned by rights groups. They face life-threatening punishment in labor camps once repatriated, according to rights groups. “Even as it is preparing for the Olympics, China is arresting North Korean refugees and sending them to the valley of death. Is that an Olympic spirit?” said Han Chang Kwon, a leader of North Korean defectors. Norbert Vollertsen, a German doctor and advocate for North Korean refugees, found himself surrounded by jeering Chinese students on Sunday. “This torch run reminds me of Hitler, who first invented it in 1936 to divert world attention from human rights problems in Germany under the disguise of 'world harmony,'” he said. April 27 List added It took me an hour but I managed to add on the right a list of links to historical documentaries, mostly from google video. Although the communist have blocked access to google video, lately it seems to be OK, but then if you're in China anyway you won't be able to access this site (see Article 35 of the Chinese constitution). I tried getting all these, but unfortunately MSN spaces, backward as it is, limits the number to 100: Mysteries of the Bible - Biblical Angels Mysteries of the Bible - Heaven Hell Mysteries of the Bible - Herod the Great Barbarians - Terry Jones The Brainy Barbarians Barbarians - Terry Jones The End of The World Barbarians - Terry Jones The Primitive Celts Barbarians - Terry Jones The Savage Goths Hist Chan Barbarians Series 1 Mongols Hist Chan Barbarians Series 1 Vikings Hist Chan Barbarians Series 1 - Huns Hist Chan Barbarians Series 1 Goths Hist Chan Barbarians Series 2 - Saxons Hist Chan Barbarians Series 2 - The Franks Hist Chan Barbarians Series 2 - The Lombards Hist Chan Barbarians Series 2 - Vandals Britain AD Ep 1 Britain AD Ep 2 Britain AD Ep 3 Britain BC Episode 1 - Host Francis Pryor Britain BC Episode 2 - Host Francis Pryor Cathedral - Fire At York Cathedral - Flood A Winchester Cathedral - Murder at Canterbury Cathedral - Rebellion at St. Giles Cathedral Redemption At Lincoln Battlefield Britain Ep 01 Battlefield Britain Ep 02 Battlefield Britain Ep 03 Battlefield Britain Ep 04 Battlefield Britain Ep 05 Battlefield Britain Ep 06 Battlefield Britain Ep 07 Battlefield Britain Ep 08 Crimean War Episode 1 Crimean War Episode 2 Crimean War Episode 3 Decisive Battles - Adrianople Decisive Battles - Cynoscephalae 197 BC Decoding The Past - The Antichrist Part 1 Decoding The Past - The Antichrist Part 2 Decoding The Past - Doomsday 2012 The End Of Days Decoding The Past - Heaven & Hell Decoding The Past - Mayan Doomsday Prophecy Decoding The Past - Mysteries of the Bermuda Triangle Decoding The Past - Mysteries of the Freemasons - Part 1 Decoding The Past - Mysteries of the Freemasons - Part 2 Decoding The Past - Nazi Prophecies Decoding The Past - Opus Dei Revealed Decoding The Past - Secrets Of The Dollar Bill Decoding The Past - The Holy Grail Decoding The Past - Bible Code Decoding The Past - The Other Nostradamus Decoding The Past - The Prophecies of Israel Decoding The Past - The Templar Code-Part 1 Decoding The Past - The Templar Code-Part 2 Decoding The Past - Tibetan Book of the Dead Decoding The Past - Unraveling The Shroud Decoding The Past - Vampire Secrets Crusades Episode 1 Pilgrims In Arms Crusades Episode 2 Jerusalem Crusades Episode 3 Jihad Empire Series Egypts Golden Empire Ep 1 Empire Series Egypts Golden Empire Ep 2 Empire Series Egypts Golden Empire Ep 3 Crimean War Episode 1 Crimean War Episode 2 Crimean War Episode 3 High Society - Three Kings at War High Society Churchills Girl High Society The Queen Mother - A Royal Century History's Turning Points - 0031 BC The Battle of Actium History's Turning Points - 0480 BC The Battle of Salamis History's Turning Points - 1347 AD The Black Death History's Turning Points - 1453 AD The Siege of Constantinople History's Turning Points - 1759 AD The Battle For Canada History's Turning Points - 1879 AD The Zulus at War Hitlers Children Ep 1 Seduction Hitlers Children Ep 2 Dedication Hitlers Children Ep 3 Education Hitlers Children Ep 4 War Hitlers Children Ep 5 Sacrifice Hitlers Henchmen Episode 1 of 5 - Albert Speer The Architect Hitlers Henchmen Series 1 Episode 1 - Joseph Goebbels The Firebrand Hitlers Henchmen Series 1 Episode 2 - Hermann Goering The Marshall Hitlers Henchmen Series 1 Episode 4 - Heinrich Himmler The Executioner Hitlers Henchmen Series 1 Episode 5 - Karl Doenitz The Admiral Hitler's Warriors "Keitel - The Lackey" ISOMAH - Jason And The Golden Fleece ISOMAH - King Arthur ISOMAH - Shangri-La ISOMAH - The Queen Of Sheba Hitlers Warriors Episode 2 of 6 - Rommel The Hero Hitlers Warriors Episode 4 of 6 - Manstein The Strategist Hitlers Warriors Episode 5 of 6 - Paulus The Defector Hitlers Warriors Episode 6 of 6 - Ernst Udet The Devils General Sex Love and War Episode 1 Sex Love and War Episode 2 Sex Love and War Episode 3 Sex Love and War Episode 4 Monarchy_Episode_1 UK-Monarchy_Episode_2 UK-Monarchy_Episode_3 UK-Monarchy_Episode_4 UK-Monarchy_Episode_5 UK-Monarchy_Episode_6 The Highland Clans - Campbell The Highland Clans - Episode 5 of 6 - Fraser The Highland Clans - MacDonald The Highland Clans - MacGregor The Highland Clans - MacKenzie The Highland Clans - MacLeod The Conquerors - Andrew Jackson The Conquerors - Cortez The Conquerors - General Howe The Conquerors - William the Conquerors Medieval Lives-01-The Peasant Medieval Lives-02-The Monk Medieval Lives-03-The Damsel Medieval Lives-04-The Minstrel Medieval Lives-05-The Knight Medieval Lives-06-The Philosopher Medieval Lives-07-The Outlaw Medieval Lives-08-The King Timewatch Series Inside The Mind Of Hitler Timewatch Series - The Unknown Soldiers Timewatch Series Hitlers Death The Final Report - Operation Myth Timewatch - Murder in Rome Timewatch The Gladiator Graveyard In Search of History - The Aztec Empire Crumpet - A Very British Sex Symbol Host - Tony Livesey Britains Real Monarch Ark Of The Covenenant Colosseum Gladiators Story Gladiator Games-The Roman Bloodsport Hidden History of Rome - Host Terry Jones Laughing With Hitler Lucky Luciano Mafia - Genovese Nazis - The Occult Conspiracy - Complete Persepolis Recreated Queen of Sheba - Behind the Myth Sherlock Holmes The True Story of Dr. Joseph Bell Assasination Of King Tut The Brits Who Fought for Hitler UFOs In The Bible The Queen 60 Years of Marriage The Great Plague TimeShift Series A Study in Sherlock How The Grinch Stole Christmas Documentary - Host Phil Hartman Togas On TV Final thoughts for IB students during last week preparing for final examsYou know you've been in the IB too long when...
Old Jokes HomeKerry Katona walks in to a pet shop and says 'do April 26 Profiles of CouragePhotos from http://www.sheilaomalley.com
The full set of pics can be found at http://www.flickr.com/photos/sheilaomalley/sets/72157604295759281/ The West's Appeasement of China continues China’s crackdown in Tibet after violent protests there has set off
strong criticism from human rights groups and confrontations in several
countries between police officers and demonstrators during the torch of shame relay. But here in Beijing, the world’s fastest-growing market for
security and crime-control equipment, it is business as usual between
Western multinationals and Chinese police agencies. At the recent China International Exhibition on Police Equipment here, sponsored by the Ministry of Public Security, DuPont had a large exhibit promoting Kevlar bulletproof fabric for riot police use. Motorola was selling police radio systems as well as wireless systems for transmitting vast quantities of video surveillance data. What's hypocrisy in Chinese again? China Cracking Down On TibetChina has been cracking down against protesting Tibetans, leading to
widespread unrest and nearly 100 fatalities. What do you think?
Jerome Bitner, 
Janelle Varney, 
Barry Finch, Evil plan of EU revealedNo words are sufficient for this crime. Hideous, profane, sinful and wicked. What Hitler and Napoleon could not do. On St George's Day, EU wipes England off map A nation of 1.3 billion babiesMeanwhile maddened hordes can beat up laowei and parade the streets insulting other countries: Swastikas on the French flag, and threats against the Japanese
Chinese protesters are literally attacking France over the torch protests which happened in Paris. As the
picture to the right shows, protesters painted a swastika on the French
flag, and wrote that Joan of Arc was a prostitute.
The bezdomy ex patria blog writes: Perhaps not the best way of communicating your ideas to the French people. It's not hard to imagine how Chinese people would react to having symbols of their World War 2 occupier added to China's national flag or the moral integrity of China's national heros slandered. Somebody needs to relearn that "do unto others" principle- and no, it does not end with "....before they do unto you". A commenter pointed to the photo (from Japan Probe) and this article in the Daily Yomiuri, which claims torch protests in Japan could draw even a more vile response from China: "Reaction [in China to protests in Japan] would be huge in comparison to the reaction against protests in France," in which Web sites called for a boycott of French products sold at Carrefour stores, an international issue expert said, pointing out that negative feelings toward Japan remain strong in China due to historical issues. A man in his 30s who runs a Web site that is popular with many Chinese "patriots," told The Yomiuri Shimbun, "Chinese people won't forgive [Japan] if the Japanese do the same things as the Americans and Europeans, such as making distorted reports about the Tibet issue." April 25 AMERICAN VOLUNTEER IN CHINA PHYSICALLY ATTACKED BY MOB! From nanheyangrouchuan:
Here's an email we received from a volunteer teacher from an Ivy League university volunteer programme in Hunan Province (who shall remain unnamed to protect the identities of everyone involved) — a chilling account of an attack on his colleague by an anti-Carrefour mob in Zhuzhou. The matter has been brought to the attention of the US Embassy in Beijing and should serve as a warning to all Caucasian readers, particularly those living in second-tier cities, to avoid large crowd gatherings at all costs during these crazy, crazy times. Our foreign correspondent friends in Shanghai and Beijing have been receiving death threats on their mobile phones and through their faxes, but clearly, this is something else: Last night [Editor's note: Sunday, Apr 20] around 7pm my friend was attacked by a mob of about 150 people outside the Carrefour in Zhuzhou, Hunan (near his placement site). When leaving Carrefour some of the crowd started shouting at him and he tried to say he didn't have anything to do with the Olympics, but 3 men started to push him and then he was hit in the back of the head at least 3 times. He started to run, and the mob chased him. He jumped into a cab, but the mob surrounded the car and started shaking and rocking it. The cab driver was shouting at him to get out. Then they started hitting the car. The crowd was shouting "kill him! kill the Frenchman." He called the Field Director while in the back of the car. The cab driver abandon the car when he saw police coming. Two police made there way though the mob and managed to drive the cab away. The Field Director alerted [a certain public official]. The police got him another cab and he took it from Zhuzhou to the field director's home in Changsha. He spending the night here in Changsha and is likely leaving China as soon as possible. The following letter was sent by the Field Director of the programme, to all their volunteers in China: Dear Volunteers, Editor's Note: Above picture is of Carrefour in Hefei (from ESWN) and not from Carrefour Zhuzhou. All names and references to the organisation in question have been removed to protect all involved. UPDATE: The volunteer teacher who informed us of the above incident has just sent us another email, clarifying that the email he originally sent us was written at 3am, only a few hours after the incident happened, and thus "factually inaccurate in many ways". Here's more: One i know of is the line "The situation in central china is becoming much worse very quickly. He has been cut up pretty badly by the glass and the people trying to grab him." We think the whole incident is no less shocking, and our original word of caution to readers still stands: Stay away from large crowd gatherings. Threats against foreigners/French in Beijing: http://www.zhongnanhaiblog.com/2008/04/fear-and-loathing-in-china.htm Even China' s own para-olympic torch bearer is being branded a "race enemy" for calling for restraint by the Chinese people: http://shanghaiist.com/2008/04/22/anti-french-anti-carrefour-fury-bubble-over.php?gallery1919Pic=19#gallery "Another more recent story relates to Jin Jing, our Paralympian heroine who had bravely defended the Olympic torch from some pro-Tibetan protestor in Paris during the torch relay. ESWN tells of how she has become the greatest traitor of the Chinese nation literally overnight for merely suggesting that people should be careful about the Carrefour boycott, because the many Chinese employees of that company would be the first to suffer." http://www.zonaeuropa.com/200804b.brief.htm#030 http://www.bullog.cn/blogs/qianliexian/archives/127165.aspx The Western powers, India, Japan and South Korea must rise to the occasion to contain then dissect bad, bad China once and for all! April 24 "If you care about your family, give us £12,000"Selling
pirate DVDs on the streets of Manchester seemed the only way that
Ah-Hua would ever earn enough to pay off the snakeheads who had
smuggled him into Britain. But when he tried to quit, the gang he was
working for began to make threats, as Hsiao-Hung Pai reveals in the
second extract from her book about the lives of illegal Chinese
migrants in Britain. From The Guardian, Wednesday April 23 2008
Ah-Hua felt the sweat of fear on his forehead. It was a year and a half since he'd come to Britain, and he still hadn't finished paying off the Chinese snakehead gang that had smuggled him in. He'd turned over almost every penny he'd earned in restaurants and cockle-picking gangs, and now even those underpaid jobs had vanished. In two weeks Boss Yu's men would come to visit, and he owed thousands of pounds. What if he couldn't pay the next instalment? That wasn't an option. He'd have to the money. As he walked through Manchester, he remembered the day he had met three Chinese people selling pirate DVDs. "You can make £60 on a good day," one had told him. "And good days aren't rare!" He called his friend Chen and asked him if he could put him in touch with some DVD sellers. "Chen warned me," Ah-Hua told me later. "He said, 'You don't want to be doing that kind of work. You'll be working for the wrong people.' But my debt gave me no choice, you see? I told him I'd take responsibility for my decision. Reluctantly he gave me some numbers, and I dialled one. I got through to a Fujianese man called Lin Yun." Lin Yun turned out to be an approachable man in his mid-30s from Fuqing in Fujian province, just like Ah-Hua. He, too, warned Ah-Hua that DVD-selling was a dodgy world to go into. But with a wife and child to worry about in China, and the snakeheads on his back in Britain, Ah-Hua was desperate for a job. Lin Yun agreed to introduce him to the piantou, the name used for the man in charge of making the DVD copies. He took Ah-Hua to a in Longsight, a few miles south of the city centre. "These people move around a lot, but they're here for the moment," Lin Yun explained. A tall Chinese man with dyed light-brown hair opened the door. Three Chinese men were sitting in the room, smoking. They looked Ah-Hua up and down, searching him with their eyes. "So why d'you want to do this?" one of them - the piantou - asked. Ah-Hua could tell from the man's accent that he was Fujianese, but he couldn't place which town he was from. "I need the money. I'll work hard." The piantou stood up now. "It's got to last, you understand? It's not something you pick up and drop the moment you want to." He spoke in a bored, mechanical way, as if he'd said these words hundreds of times before. "This isn't a game. It's a business." Ah-Hua nodded. But he was puzzled. He'd always thought "pirate sales" were something you could choose to enter and leave as it suited you. He'd soon find out how mistaken he was. The piantou opened a door and went into the next room. Ah-Hua saw towers of DVDs in there, reaching to the ceiling, as well as dozens of DVD burners and printers. The man came out of the room and handed him a pile of DVD copies. "Take as many as you need," he said. "You buy them for £1.75 a disc, and sell them for £3." On Lin Yun's advice, Ah-Hua bought 50 discs. Before leaving the flat, he asked the piantou where in Fujian he came from. "Dong Bi village," the man replied. Once they were out of earshot, Lin Yun told Ah-Hua that Dong Bi wasn't just a village. "Dong Bi is known as the biggest gang in Manchester. They've been dominant in this city for seven or eight years now. They also operate in London." Ah-Hua didn't like the sound of this. "Running the DVD trade is only one part of their business," Lin Yun went on. "They also charge protection fees, they profit from high-interest loans and they bodyguard whoever pays them. You name it, they'll do it - anything to make a profit. They're ruthless. Some of them are operating in Fujian too. The local authorities in Dong Bi know about the gang and have done nothing, apparently. People say you can get away with murder in Dong Bi if you have cash." Neither Lin Yun nor Ah-Hua realised the scale of the business they were involved in. The pirate DVD trade in Britain is worth about £500m a year. At the bottom of this massive trade, Lin Yun, Ah-Hua and 10,000 sellers just like them make just enough money to survive. DVD-selling is in fact seen as one of the most "typical" Chinese jobs around. Any Chinese-looking person with a rucksack on his back could be mistaken for a DVD seller. Coming from Taiwan, I have experienced this on the street myself numerous times. "DVDs?" many passers-by have asked me. Ah-Hua described his first day of DVD-selling: "I was very self-conscious. I spoke hardly any English apart from 'thank you', 'sorry', and 'three pounds'. At first I followed a few footsteps behind Lin Yun. 'DVD! DVD!' he called. I noticed that about one in five people stopped. I started to call out too. 'DVD!' A young man stopped to look through my copies, and he asked for two! He gave me £6! That cheered me up. It didn't seem hard at all. Our morale was high." They walked on, through the Arndale shopping centre, looking for customers. "Some chubby teenage girls came up to us, and asked us what films we had and how much they were each. 'Three pounds,' I told them. They said they hadn't got the money. They said they'd pay us back tomorrow. We were quite intimidated. The girls were taller and heavier than we were. Lin Yun just nodded hesitantly, and handed the DVD over to them. They walked off, laughing their heads off. "I asked Lin Yun, 'Why did you do that?' and he said, 'Listen, I know these kids. They pick on Chinese people. If you say no to them, you'll regret it. Let them take it. It's only one copy.' "'But if we did that all the time,' I said, 'we wouldn't be making any money at all.' So we decided to go somewhere else. And we had much better luck. In St Patrick's Square I managed to sell 15 copies in an hour. Forty-five pounds, just in one hour!" Lin Yun congratulated Ah-Hua at the end of that first day. "You did well. But you'll have to keep it up." Ah-Hua asked him what he meant. "Well, as I explained to you, Dong Bi controls the trade. They'll pressurise you into selling more and more." From the next day, Ah-Hua and Lin Yun got up early each morning, took the bus into town and worked from street to street, from pub to pub, for seven or eight hours a day. They built up regular contacts to whom they sold dozens of copies. They also paid a pub landlord to allow them to sell DVDs inside his pub. Occasionally, they would get complaints from customers who weren't happy with the quality of the copies. Sometimes they were chased by boys trying to rob their DVDs, and once they were spat at by passers-by. Undeterred, they managed to earn more than £40 a day each. And, every day, Ah-Hua counted the number of weeks till his debt to Boss Yu would be paid off. "On good days," Ah-Hua told me, "when the sun was shining and people were out, we could earn up to £70 a day. And at last - the day came! I prepared my final payment of £460 for Boss Yu's man, and handed it over. 'You're clear,' he told me. I felt like a new man." Ah-Hua called his wife to tell her the good news, but she brought him back down to earth. She reminded him that his journey to Britain had cost more than he would have earned in 30 years in Fujian, and the couple had had to borrow from local moneylenders. The snakeheads might have been paid off, but the moneylenders were charging 2.5% interest a month, and Ah-Hua's wife was struggling. As if to prove that things could get worse, DVD sales began to slacken off. It was partly that customers were getting tired of the poor quality of the pirate copies. Also, a tightening of immigration controls had left restaurant and takeaway owners afraid of employing "illegals" for fear of fines. Unable to get work elsewhere, the undocumented workers had taken to hawking DVDs. Competition was growing. On top of that, there seemed to be more police on the streets. It was obvious that Ah-Hua should find a job elsewhere, but he soon found there was no easy way out. One day he arrived at the headquarters to pick up some DVDs, and overheard two sellers telling the bosses they intended to leave the trade and go back to working in restaurants. "A Dong Bi gang member stopped them from leaving," Ah-Hua told me. "He said to them, 'It's your choice, but, if you leave, the consequences will be your own responsibility.' "The men had some knowledge of Dong Bi's reputation. They decided to stay in the trade. It was at that moment that I understood the kind of trouble I was in." A few days later, as he was picking up some DVDs, a gang member confronted him. "How come you're taking fewer and fewer copies now, when you come here? Where have your customers gone? Are you actually selling?" Ah-Hua replied nervously that he didn't know the exact reason - it was just getting harder and harder to sell. "Try a bit harder," the gang member said, with a calm voice that terrified Ah-Hua. Living under the control of the gang became a huge weight on Ah-Hua's shoulders. Selling 10 copies a day wasn't good enough for Dong Bi, but the sales wouldn't go up. Ah-Hua and Lin Yun relied mostly on regular customers in town, such as the owner of a corner shop and two middle-aged men in a pub who had a penchant for erotic films. But the number of regulars was also declining. As the days went by, Ah-Hua's trips to Longsight became pervaded with fear. He continued to hear stories of sellers being attacked by gang members, and he dreaded being attacked himself. How could he get out of this trap? One day, his wife told him on the phone that the moneylenders had called for payment. "I knew I had to do something to push up my earnings," he told me. "I'd have to leave the DVD trade." He knew no one could help him but himself. Should he run away to another city? But he'd heard about sellers who had run away - and what happened to them. The only way out was to confront the gang members and tell the truth. It was Ah-Hua's worst trip to date, that bus journey to Longsight to break the news. He arrived at the piantou's headquarters and informed the gang members that he intended to return to the restaurant trade. He waited for the threats, but they didn't come. He left the flat. That night, five gang-members knocked on his door. When he opened it, they pushed their way in. They beat him up till he lay helpless on the floor. He felt blood running down his face. Then they dragged him out of the flat, bundled him into a car, blindfolded him and drove off into the night. He had no idea where he was being taken. It was only when they locked him up in their flat half an hour later that he realised he was being kidnapped rather than killed. "I was in that flat for three weeks," Ah-Hua told me. "My hands were tied behind my back. I had no contact with the outside world. I couldn't even reach into my pocket to see if my mobile phone was still there. The gang gave me water and fed me with scraps of their leftovers. I was losing all sense of the world around me. I kept hearing the name 'Yu Jian' being mentioned. I got the sense that this guy was the leader of the Dong Bi gang. "Then one morning a gang member came up to me and said what I'd been dreading more than anything else in the world. 'We know your family in Fuqing. Pay us £12,000, or your family will be in hell.' It was my nightmare come true. How could they have located my family? How could we possibly afford this money?" Of course, they'd located the family very easily from Ah-Hua's mobile phone. They pushed the phone to his ear. "Call your family. Tell them to send the money." "So I was coerced into asking my wife to borrow more money from the moneylender. When she heard I had been kidnapped she cried desperately on the phone. The burden of keeping the family above subsistence level was bad enough. The thought of borrowing more money was too much to bear. "I tried to reassure her, but I had run out of words. I felt as hopeless as she did. I felt so guilty for bringing my family into this state of despair. But my wife knew she mustn't collapse and give up. She was overcome by fear: fear of losing me, fear for the safety of her son and family, fear of losing everything we'd fought for so far. We had to fight on. Within a week, she managed to borrow £7,000 from the moneylender in town. "I told the gang members that was all we could get. I begged them to be satisfied with that. They beat me up again but I had no more to give. They decided to make do with the £7,000 and to let me go. I left the flat, half-dead. But I couldn't go to the police for fear of deportation." Shortly after this, Lin Yun, who had also tried to get out of the DVD trade, was attacked and robbed. After the gang members, armed with guns and knives, had taken every penny from him and his flatmates, one told Lin Yun he would have to come up with another £3,600. It was a "penalty". "I told him I hadn't got that amount of money," Lin Yun told me. "I said I'd stay in the trade. 'You think you can get away with it that easily?' the man said. "They pulled me to the middle of the room and beat me up, right in front of my flatmates. I was left with deep bruises on my arms and legs. I couldn't walk for two weeks. I thought I might have an internal injury. But there was no way I was going to hospital. It's an unspoken rule among us Fujianese undocumented workers that unless you're about to lose your life, you don't try to access the health service. You'll just expose your status to the authorities. "So the next day, while I started to recover from my injuries in the flat, my co-workers just went back to their street sales as if nothing had happened. They told me there was almost a feeling of relief among them: they'd been robbed so at least they'd be immune from these attacks for a while." Shortly after this, Ah-Hua and Lin Yun heard that Yu Jian, the Dong Bi gang leader, had been arrested and jailed. They knew the news was good - but had no idea how long he'd be in prison for. The conviction didn't put an end to the gang, which continues its ruthless existence. After his kidnapping, Ah-Hua managed to keep out of sight for a while, and slipped back into a job in Chinatown as a kitchen porter. He is one of the few lucky ones. He says it won't be long before he pays off all his debt to the moneylender in Fuqing. He's looking forward to the day when he can start to make a better life for his family. · All names have been changed. Extracted from Chinese Whispers: The True Story Behind Britain's Hidden Army of Labour by Hsiao-Hung Pai, published by Penguin. China down to 12 days worth of coalCHINA only has enough coal for 12 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. N.J. Officer Allegedly Performed Sex Acts On Cows |
Cycling
in Beijing isn’t just about dodging traffic on the commute to work. The
city boasts a burgeoning off-road bike scene where riders need more
than a secondhand Shanghai Forever to keep up. To find out what kit we
needed to get started on the inclines of Fragrant Hills and beyond, we
talked to Jesse Robertson, a man who’s been biking longer than he’s
been growing his beard.
The ATX 775 (RMB 2,298)
is a great bike for newcomers to get started on. Ultimately, however,
bikes depend on the rider’s weight, size and personal preference, so
it’s almost impossible to recommend one in particular.
Puncture repair kit (from RMB 20) and pump (not pictured)
Zéfal tire sealant (RMB 98), CO2 cartridges (RMB 30) and gun (RMB 80)
Inner tube (from RMB 20)
Multi-tool (from RMB 50)
Lubricant (from RMB 60)
Glasses (from RMB 10 to RMB 1,500 and upwards)
Tire tools (from RMB 20)
Camelbak Hydration Pack (from RMB 280)
Cycling gloves (from RMB 100)
Helmet 
Cateye Cyclocomputer (RMB 320)
Giyo mini-pump (RMB 75)
Cateye lights – front (RMB 350) and back (RMB 380)
Riding shirt (from RMB 100-500)
Gucci Bike
Puma Eight-speed Urban Mobility Bike 
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