Have you ever wondered if what you were doing at any given moment was absolutely unique? That nobody else in your set of circumstances existed on Earth at that precise second doing exactly what you were doing. I’ve often thought that when driving and listening to some obscure Chinese dance track, but in [...]
Chinese medicine is a funny thing. There is still quite a bit of (not totally unfounded) belief in traditional medicines — vitamin stores with thousands of different herbs and roots and such abound — but at the same time modern pharmaceuticals are widely available and heavily prescribed.
For instance, I went down to the little [...]
As if I haven’t been reminiscing enough lately, I happened to dig up an old backup cd I hard burned four years ago. I was a freshman in college, and had, up until that point, kept every single file that had ever been on my computer for the past, oh, 6 years or so, [...]
Learning Chinese in an academic environment is (and this is probably painfully obvious but I’ll say it anyway) absolutely nothing like learning it in “the real world.” First, you realize that, in the real world, when you ask a stranger (in a store, perhaps) how to say something you are imposing on their time. [...]
Brainysmurf is discussing the North Korean nuclear issue and his own patriotic reaction to criticism of the United States. It’s a good read… check it out and then come back here for my take on the whole shebang.
The six-nation summit in Beijing over the North Korean nuclear issue (which has now ended) has [...]