I can’t help but think of that old, horribly racist rhyme we used to say as kids. You know the one that went, “Me Chinese, me play joke, me put pee-pee in your Coke.” Even while these were the pre-political correctness days, I still shudder with embarrassment thinking about that. In Hong Kong, the opposite happened though with water instead of Coke. An Indonesian house maid played the joke and put the pee-pee into the drink of her Chinese employer. A Hong Kong magistrate has sentenced the maid to six days in jail for her pee-pee joke. According to a Reuters report Wednesday:

The 29-year-old pleaded guilty to a charge of “administering poison or other destructive or noxious substance with intent to injure,” but insisted she had used the urine to treat a skin condition and its appearance in her employer’s cup was a mistake.

Her boss, Szeto Ching-han, smelled the urine after asking for a cup of water, and then asked the maid to drink it — which she did. Szeto, however, kept the liquid to have it tested in a lab, the South China Morning Post said.
The defense argued that the maid’s employer had not drunk the urine and the substance was not poisonous.

While it’s certainly wrong to piss in someone’s drink, I’m pretty sure urine isn’t poison. And while the toxicity of urine may be of interest to the court, it is certainly not the most interesting element of this story to me. How about the fact that when asked, the maid drank her own piss? At that point, maybe it’s time to bow out, admit you were caught and apologize. And second, what a bad lie about the skin condition. The man asked her for a glass of water, a very simple request. You go to the water cooler or the sink and you fill a glass with water. There’s really no room for a mistake that results in a glass of urine. The ruling magistrate acknowledged the maid was not trying to poison her boss but sentenced her anyway saying the court “must send a message to the public.”

•Reuters: Maid Jailed for Serving Up Urine

From Deadspin.com comes a video of a Chinese guy trying to throw one down. It sounds pretty boring. Except for the fact that this Chinese guy brings down the entire backboard. And at first it really looks like the thing comes down on his neck. Luckily, he walks away unscathed. Perhaps Chinese ballers, known more for their fundamentals than their above-the-rim theatrics, shouldn’t be dunking on rickety hoops anyway. Notice the Western-influenced ghetto-fab baller outfits that can be seen at any mainland street court and the very Chinese outcry of “Aye” when the rim gets pulled down.

In 2002, French scientists produced the world’s first cloned rabbit. But that rabbit was created by using the ovum cumulus cells from an adult female rabbit. How boring. In February, China created the first cloned rabbit using the somatic cells from a rabbit fetus and Tuesday, state media announced that the rabbit had passed its molecular biology test at the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences. The test both confirms the experiment’s success and legitimizes a new breakthrough method of cloning. For those unfamiliar with fibroblast cellular fetal cloning, here’s the explanation from the head scientist on the project Dr. Li Shangang:

Fibroblast cells from fetal rabbits can be cultured for longer periods than those from adult rabbits; so they are better materials for gene modification and gene targeting research… The advantage is that rabbits reproduce so quickly. Combined with the cloning technique, this would allow researchers to create genetically modified rabbits for medical research very quickly.

It seems that rabbits don’t only fuck fast, but they clone fast too. China cloned its first animal in 2000 and while Chinese scientists have replicated animals using existing cloning technology, this year’s rabbit is China’s first using original cloning methods.

•China Daily: Cloned Rabbit Fine Five Months After Birth

As a friend of the lesbian community, I find it irresponsible of Reuters to blame promiscuous lesbians for the devastation caused by the deadly floods in south China. The headline of a Reuters article Tuesday running in the China Daily among countless publications around the world reads, “Loose Dykes Spur China Flood Fears as Hundreds Die.” While “loose dykes” may spur a multitude of fears in today’s China– a corruption of traditional Chinese values, a shrinking pool of potential mates for single Chinese men, and a perceived Western-influenced indifference to monogamy, to name a few– I can’t comprehend how lustful lesbians would contribute to a natural disaster as severe as this summer’s flooding in China. If the news agency saw a correlation between lesbianism and rising fears of flood damage, the least the writer could have done was establish a connection in the article. Rather, Reuters just discussed how the embankments built to protect floods running along the Huai river, China’s third longest, are about to loosen and endanger millions of homes. Moreover, the flooding has taken over 500 lives, displaced millions of Chinese and caused billions of dollars in damage. The magnitude of the disaster is such that a blame game, much less one targeting a seemingly innocent sexual minority group, seems a bit boorish and borderline discriminatory. My hope is that in the future, Reuters will be more sensitive to the language it uses in its headlines and more careful about choosing headlines that reflect the nature of their stories. But most of all, I hope the “loose dykes” to which Reuters so callously refers, continue to stay strong and and keep doing what they do.

•Reuters: Loose Dykes Spur China Flood Fears as Hundreds Die

Monday night, we will witness the first U.S. presidential debate in this new open-source savvy, Web 2.0-wise flat world. Unlike previous elections, where debates would be moderated by someone old like Jim Lehrer and broadcast on a major network, this year the CNN/YouTube Debates will be moderated by hip, homosexual, silver-haired cable news anchor Anderson Cooper and broadcast on both CNN and a Web site where I once saw a monkey smell his own ass and then pass out. I guess YouTube has come a long way since those days of Afro Ninja falling on his face and the exploding whale. Many have noted that Monday’s CNN/YouTube debate signifies that the mainstream media has finally embraced Google’s online video site as a legitimate medium. Rather, the Democratic debate will make clear to the middle-aged political types what fat pimply teens have known for a while: YouTube is the mainstream media. More young American voters use YouTube than watch CNN and the video site is accessible to anyone, anywhere in the world. In terms of exposure for the candidiates, there is nothing better than YouTube. All the questions asked to the candidates Monday will be chosen by CNN editors from online video submissions to YouTube. To date, over 2,300 questions have been submitted on topics such as Darfur, Iraq and whether Bill Clinton has had extra-marital affairs since leaving office. Fortunately for the politicians, CNN’s senior vice president vowed that the network “will make responsible editorial decisions about what will air during the debate.” Because if it were left to the YouTube community, there would probably be questions about the Clinton marriage, the Edwards $400 haircut and what Obama really said about how kindergarteners should have sex education. Despite the crassness that will always pervade a video site intended for low-lifes to post funny videos, it is clear that YouTube has arrived– not just as a place to watch female weightlifters shit their pants, but as a place to watch political heavyweights talk about the shit that really matters.

•LA Times: The CNN/YouTube Debate

In Chinese, a “tai-tai” is translated directly as “lady of the house” or in the U.S., “housewife.” The author of this column, other than being a writer and photographer, is a stay-at-home dad. He refers to himself not as a tai-tai, but rather, a “guy-tai.” But he’s not just any guy-tai. Having lived in Shanghai for six years and having coined the phrase years ago to describe his new role, he is the Original Guy-Tai. I’ve decided to include him in Flumesday from time to time because he bought me lunch once.

I live in China. I have access to 60¢, pirated DVDs on every street corner. I have already bought Ocean’s 13, Spiderman 3 and the new Pirates of the Caribbean while the rest of the world will have to wait months. I am happy, while those of you who don’t live in China are most likely jealous, pissed or both.

I cannot buy any DVD legitimately in Shanghai because they are not for sale anywhere. Can I go to Carrefour (#2 retailer in the world behind WalMart) and buy Double Team starring Jean-Claude Van Damme and Dennis Rodman circa 1997? Yes. But can I buy anything close to decent or remotely from this decade like Apocalypto, Deadwood or Ghost Rider? No way Jose.

Honestly, thanks to a non-existent distribution system by the major Hollywood studios, probably due to their lack of work with the Chinese government, I couldn’t buy their real DVDs in China if I wanted to. They don’t exist. It would in fact, be easier to find a 40-year-old virgin.

And yet I have close friends back in the US film industry who are ready to jail me like my name was Paris because they claim a gazillion dollars are lost each minute due to piracy. But are Hollywood studios really in danger of going bankrupt? Dreamworks, Pixar, Universal… anyone?! No. And how about the actors, directors or producers? Even despite multiple, multi-million dollar divorces like Spielberg’s $50 million whopper? None.

So what’s the real reason Hollywood is crying over lost revenue when they easily pay off all production costs and much more with just the US box office proceeds? I’ll tell you. It’s because they have all caved in to alarming, spiraling out-of-control, multiple actors’ and directors’ and producers’ salaries that are way over $10 million plus a percentage of the gross and royalties.

You know like Clint Eastwood, who made $12 million plus 15% gross for the film…anyone? Letters From Iwo Jima? Million Dollar Baby (4 Oscars)? Unforgiven (2 Oscars)? No, no and no… it was for the prehistoric, 1978 not-even-close-to-Oscar-winning Every Which Way You Can. Now imagine how overpaid everyone in that industry is today.

If some marketing manager works for Pepsi, has an idea and brings a new product like Lemon Diet Pepsi to market, do they get a percentage of every soda sold. No. They are an employee and so they are paid their salary. But if some lame producer or director, brings most any ordinary film to market, he is paid an obscene salary plus % of gross plus royalties. Great for them, but the studios who negotiated this plague should NOT push this cost directly to the consumer. That’s their bed, they should sleep in it.

OK, now it’s your turn to argue… But before you get started, can I just ask you to do something for me? Please use “Intellectual Property” and “Police Academy 6″ in the same sentence. Go on, I’ll wait… Yeah, just as I thought. Now wipe that drool from your chin and close your mouth.

Each DVD, no matter how elaborate the packaging, costs the studio about 25 cents to produce; yet they expect us to buy it for $20? I’ll gladly pay $3 and they can still make 400%. OK but even then, it won’t play in my regionally encoded DVD player because I live overseas. I suppose that’s just punishment for trying to play by the rules. I may as well go play lacrosse for Duke.

And so I have at least 1,500 responses to all this and I continue to buy them by the fistful; and for peanuts too. Oh and get this, I have so many pirated DVDs, that there are many current titles that I don’t even have time to watch…they just sit there, in a huge stack.

So are you spittin’ nails yet, or just plain jealous? Don’t be either. “Come to the dark side… It is your destiny.”

China Daily’s front page headline Saturday said it all: “Chinese Bookworms Going Potty About Potter.” Saturday’s release of the final installment of the kid wizard series is making Chinese kids wish they could read in English. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows became available in China at 7am Saturday morning and is expected to be the biggest English-language book release in China’s history. But back to the China Daily headline. “Going Potty?” Doesn’t that mean go to the bathroom? Does that mean that Chinese kids are making poopy and peepy for the new Potter volume? Rather, I think it means that if a kid in China can read Potter in English, then his or her level of English might be higher than those writing headlines for the China Daily. According to the China Daily’s “potty” story Saturday, China’s largest foreign book trading company ordered 50,000 copies of Deathly Hallows, as opposed to the normal demand of about 100 copies for a New York Times bestseller. While the official Chinese-language version will not be released in China until October, both the U.S. version (218 yuan) and the UK version (208 yuan) are available at foreign language bookstores and a select group of newsstands in Beijing. Suffice it to say, I am not only excited about the Potter release, but I have gone potty about it numerous times already.

•China Daily: Chinese Bookworms Going Potty About Potter

This week, those in China who buy Business Week might have a hard time finding a copy. Not because the July 23 issue will fly off the shelf, but rather these magazines might not make it past those Ministry of Information inspectors at the border. The cover story this week takes a look at the darker side of China’s economy and political climate and ponders whether the mainland is as strong as the world believes. Four authors collaborate on this piece to try and answer a question that has stumped me since I’ve been here: if the Chinese government can control information, population, property and religion, why can’t it control bottled water, cough syrup, toothpaste, seafood, toys and piracy? Is it that they can’t or that they don’t want to? Here is an excerpt from the July 23 issue of Business Week:

The same Communist Party apparatus so proficient at censoring the Internet can’t keep peddlers in the heart of Beijing from selling knockoff Callaway golf clubs and fake iPods, despite solemn promises to Washington since the early 1990s about enforcing intellectual property rights. Shanghai’s stock exchange may be one of the world’s hottest and may boast a state-of-the-art paperless trading system. But it was a casino when it opened in 1990 with eight listings, and after years of flaccid regulation it’s an even bigger casino with 1,118. Beijing proclaims all sorts of green initiatives, yet heavily polluting new factories and coal power plants keep going up. The party has talked for decades about building a social safety net, yet as the working population ages the government isn’t investing nearly enough to head off looming crises in health care, education, and pensions. China spends more than Japan on research and development, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD), but its record of innovation is underwhelming.

Toward the end of the piece, the authors explain why China has a tradition of replicating existing technology as opposed to inventing its own, another question I’ve grappled with. I also like how China is represented on the cover as china. Nice touch.

•AP: Great Wall, Colosseum, Taj Mahal Among New 7 Wonders of the World
•New7Wonders Web Site

Saturday, the new seven modern manmade wonders of the world were announced from Lisbon, Portugal and China’s Great Wall made the cut. The remaining six were India’s Taj Mahal, Rome’s Coliseum, Jordan’s Petra, Peru’s Machu Picchu, Brazil’s Statue of Christ Redeemer and Mexico’s Chichen Itza Pyramid. The selection was made by an American Idol-style voting system; around 100 million votes were cast by Internet and text messages, though according to New7Wonders, the organization overseeing the selection process, there was no way of preventing a voter from casting multiple votes. I don’t really understand the point of the new list, as the obvious wonder of the world, the Great Pyramids, was left off the list. I guess these were supposed to be the new wonders, distinct from the original seven ancient wonders, of which the pyramids is the only remaining wonder. It’s not like the Great Wall or Machu Picchu are particularly modern. And the only questionable selection on the list is Brazil’s Christ statue. The thing was built in 1931. While it sure is a big Jesus, this monument does not belong on a list with the Taj Mahal or the Coliseum. It’s like how Sydney was disappointed when the Opera House, nominated for selection, didn’t make the list. Cool structure, but come on. Apparently the Christ statue received very few votes until a recent surge in votes propelled it into the top seven. Scandal? The manmade wonder left off the new list that without a doubt belonged is Cambodia’s Angkor Wat. Way more impressive than the Christ statue. And what about the Acropolis? The campaign to name the new wonders was initiated in 1999 by Bernard Weber, a Swiss adventurer.

•AP: Great Wall, Colosseum, Taj Mahal Among New 7 Wonders of the World
•New7Wonders Web Site

The country with the most people now has the public restroom with the most shitters, CCTV reported Friday. The city of Chongqing, in southwest China has announced it will apply to the Guinness Book of World Records for the title of the “world’s largest restroom.” With an urban area population of 31 million people eating the spiciest food in all of China, maybe a free-of-charge restroom with over 1000 stalls isn’t such a bad idea. According to an AHN report Saturday:

While some of the urinals are shaped like a woman’s mouth, others resemble the crocodile’s mouth and the bust of a woman. The urinal palace, named “Sunshine Toilet,” is spread over an area of 32,290 square feet on the “Foreigners Street,” a well-known tourist area.” We are spreading toilet culture. People can listen to gentle music and watch TV,” CCTV quoted Lu Xiaoqing, an officer in-charge with the area as saying. “After they use the bathroom they will be very, very happy,” he said.

All of the urinals are innovatively designed; some resemble the Virgin Mary (photo) and others are crocodile mouths. Many of the sinks are designed as the lower half of a human body in a rear-entry sex position. I can’t help but wonder what it would smell like if all 1,000 stalls were in use simultaneously.

•AHN: Chinese Town Touts Its Open Toilet Palace