The omniscient Danwei noticed this afternooon that access to YouTube had been restored in mainland China. To be honest, I had stopped looking. Two weeks ago today, the site was blocked suddenly while the National Communist Congress convened in Beijing. The block also coincided with Google’s launch of two Chinese language YouTube sites, one in Taiwan and one in Hong Kong. This may have been what irritated China’s web censors. I’d like to think that YouTube came back for the sole purpose of allowing me to post this video, which I have been saving for the liberation of YouTube. It is every reason I love YouTube rolled into one 1-minute-and-11-second video. So welcome back YouTube. I hope you’re back for good.

OK, a quick game. Which guy from the photo holds the Major League Baseball consecutive games played record and which is that bald guy from The Shield? If you said the guy on the left holds the MLB record, you are right. That’s Cal Ripken Jr. And the guy to the right is that bald dude from The Shield (and formerly from The Commish). But as time goes on and Ripken gets older, fatter and balder it is becoming increasingly difficult to tell these two men apart. And next week, Ripken will bring his big bald head to Shanghai to address the American Chamber of Commerce on “Baseball Diplomacy” and how it factors into the U.S.-China relationship. Cal is coming off a stint as a studio broadcaster for TBS during the MLB playoffs, perhaps the most brutal baseball coverage in the history of television. In August, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice named Ripken as the Special Sports Envoy for the State Department. “Iron Man” arrived in Beijing on Tuesday and met with Chinese baseball officials there. After touring Beijing Wednesday and Thursday, Ripken will undertake his toughest mission — a breakfast with wealthy American expats at AmCham. As for the rest of the China trip, the AmCham website posted this:

Selected as a baseball all-star 19 years in a row, Ambassador Ripken plans to spend the rest of his trip in China engaging with young people in a cross-cultural dialogue that will include, among other things, introducing them to the game of baseball. He will visit schools and clubs, run baseball clinics and share life experiences.

While I love Cal Ripken (he signed a baseball of mine in 1995, the season he broke the record) and he has always been one of baseball’s best guys, who on earth would shell out 280 RMB (35USD) to listen to him speak at 7:30 in the morning on a Friday? I mean come on. I wouldn’t even pay that much to go on a “Strike Team” mission with that bald guy from The Shield.

•Baltimore Sun: Iron Envoy Takes the Field in China
•AmCham: Cal Ripken Breakfast Information

Another Chinese Halloween has arrived and unlike last year when the big story was how the Western holiday has ruined China, this year it’s about how China has ruined the Western holiday. How? Well because every costume and prop and now some of the candy is produced in mainland China, and to be honest, nobody in America trusts any of this junk. In fact, on Tuesday, Democratic lawmakers have called for the resignation of the U.S. consumer product chief for failing to inspect toys that made it to Halloween stores. Including some of those plastic jackolantern baskets that kids use to carry their candy that were found to contain harmful chemicals. Here are some of the other interesting China-related Halloween headlines:

Scary thought? ‘Halloween Peeps’ Made in China

You know Peeps, those nasty marshmallow things from the bottom of your trick-or-treat bag when you were a kid? Well for the first time in the candy’s 84-year history, the fluffy treats shaped like pumpkins and animals are now made and packaged in China. Just Born, the Pennsylvania-based candy company that makes Peeps said the demand for the candy outgrew its factory’s ability to individually wrap the Spooky Friends candies. The company found a Chinese factory that can do the job and that meets their quality standards (wink, wink). I never liked those things anyway.

‘Ugly Teeth’ Pulled from US Shops Due to Lead Fears

You know those rubber teeth that lame boring middle-aged trick-or-treat greeters put in their mouth in lieu of a costume? Well those are contaminated. Poisoned with lead. According to AFP, “A U.S. retail outlet on Tuesday pulled hundreds of sets of Halloween costume teeth from sale amid fears they could contain excessive levels of lead.” No joke, these Chinese-made “Ugly Teeth” had 100 times the U.S. limit for lead content. Maybe some of those old people who wear them will drop dead this year. Just hopefully not the kids.

Harry Potter Again? Maybe Jack Sparrow

This piece reminds us of two things: First, that the Chinese have not yet fully embraced Halloween. And second, that the Shanghai Daily office should be condemned for allowing idiots to write page after page of the most obvious drivel and then publishing it. This article informs us of what some Chinese people think of Halloween and how they plan on spending it, more of a 2nd grade homework assignment than a feature story. Here’s an actual quote: “It is especially popular among kids and white collars who work in a foreign-invested or joint-venture company. Some use Halloween costume parties to showcase their secret self, while others view it as a social occasion, a chance for exposure to Western culture.” What? He lost me at “joint-venture.”

The second wave of domestic tickets for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games went on sale in China Tuesday and boy was it sloppy. The Olympic committee alloted 1.5 million tickets for sale this week on its booking website, a hotline and certain branches of the Bank of China. Perhaps the Olympic Committee underestimated how many people in China have the cash and the desire to take part in the Beijing games. Because the ticket system, in a country that thinks of itself as a paragon of efficiency, totally crashed when demand was significantly higher than organizers anticipated. The China Daily reported Wednesday that according to the Beijing Olympic Ticketing Center, “the official ticketing website (www.tickets.beijing2008.cn) saw 8 million hits in the first hour starting 9 am, while the ticketing hotline received 3.8 million calls.” Basically in the first hour, 10 million more people than tickets available attempted to buy tickets. Reportedly, only 9,000 of the 1.85 million tickets were sold before people’s computer began sparking and the phone lines began smoking. The Olympic Ticketing Center is forgetting something. Thanks to the stock market, people in China have cash. Tickets for certain sports sessions cost between 30 and 1000 yuan ($4-$125 USD). Considering some tickets to a preseason NBA game in Shanghai a couple weeks ago cost 4000-yuan, these Olympic prices certainly will not scare anyone off. Even tickets to the opening ceremony are somewhat reasonable at 5000 yuan a pop. For some, that’s a bad night at a Bund bar. China ensured prices for the Olympics would be reasonable and as organizers found out when their website crashed Tuesday, maybe prices are a bit too reasonable.

•China Daily: Olympic Ticket Sales Suspended
•Photo: mikewhit’s Flickr Page

The only, and I mean only, slightly pleasurable part of the wildfire disaster that has now destroyed almost 500,000 acres in Southern California is watching Arnold Schwarzenegger flip on the Terminator switch and take matters into his own hands. People like me, who do not reside in California and thus do not rely on a film actor for things like healthcare, take some sort of pleasure in watching Arnold act less like an elected official and more like Harry Tasker from True Lies. Some of the grimaces he’s been giving to the camera make me afraid that I had something to do with starting a wildfire. And I’m in China. Last week, it was reported that two of the near 20 fires burning in California were started as a result of arson. Saturday, Arnold issued a warning to those firebugs responsible saying, “We will hunt down the people responsible for that… If I were one of the people who started the fires, I would not sleep soundly right now, because we’re right behind you.” The Governator also offered a $250,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of any of the arsonists. What’s clear is that Arnold has resorted to the persona that launched his career as a relentless, courageous action hero, the guy that chased an Islamic terrorist off a roof on a horse in True Lies. The guy in Terminator 2 who went into a bar and threw numerous bikers through panes of glass simply to procure clothes, boots and a motorcycle. It seems in California, the line between Hollywood and the rest of the state have become as blurred as the line differentiating kindergarten teacher and cop in Arnold’s 1990 action comedy. As an AP story Monday pointed out, Arnold’s experience as a movie actor means that he understands symbolism. He knows how to march through the relief centers making sure each of those displaced Californians has blankets, food and water. He knows that a disaster like this month’s California fires can make, like Rudy Giuliani, or break, like Kathleen Blanco, a politician. Arnold knows that when his term as governor expires in 2010, his response to this disaster could mean the difference between his telling California “I’ll be back” as a U.S. senator or perhaps saying “hasta la vista” to his political career.

•AP: Fires Give Governor Chance to Shine
•CNN Video: Arnold Speech
•YouTube: T2 Biker Bar Scene

Be careful what you wish for Palm Bay, Florida. The residents of this blue-collar town on the Atlantic coast will soon vote on a initiative proposed by their mayor to prohibit the city from buying any Chinese-made products. Which, unfortunately, means everything. What a shame with the holiday season just weeks away. That Mac laptop you wanted for Christmas, made in China. Pretty much any article of clothing you wear in this town, made in China. And for all you Palm Bay kids, Santa won’t be bringing you any toys this year. Well, at least not any of the 90% of the American toys made in China. And that probably means all the cool ones. Apparently, residents of Palm Bay are fed up with the substandard quality of Chinese imports and all the American jobs lost to the Chinese. On the city’s website, which I have been browsing for about 20 minutes, the slogan at the top of the page reads, “Buy American.” Palm Bay would be the first American town to enact a blanket ban on items imported from a particular country. You’re probably wondering why I’ve been on the Palm Bay website for so long. Well, to be honest, I spent about a minute reading about Palm Bay and the other 19 perusing the town’s sex offender notification page. I guarantee the camera that took all of their mugshots was made in China. And if you’re bored, try to find the lone female of this handsome bunch. What the residents of Palm Bay don’t understand is that blue-collar towns such as Palm Bay, the towns that patronize places like Walmart and Target, are the places that benefit most from Chinese imports. And as an ABC News story Wednesday points out, the town’s 107,000 residents aren’t really going to stop buying Chinese goods. Like any good Americans, they just want to make a political statement without really sacrificing anything. There are more exceptions in the proposed ban than there are lead particles in little Tyler’s rattle. First, the ban only covers items priced over fifty dollars. Second, the ban doesn’t restrict individual shoppers, only goods purchased by the city. Third, the ban only applies to items in which 50% of the parts are Chinese-made. Fourth, if the item can’t be found anywhere else, the city will be allowed to purchase it from China. And last, and most absurd, if an American-made item costs 150% more than an identical Chinese-made version, the city is permitted to buy the import. How ridiculous is that last one? That’s exactly the point — Chinese stuff is cheap. As ABC cited from a Morgan Stanley report, Chinese imports have saved American consumers $600 billion in the last 10 years. There’s a reason why laptops are so cheap. And if these Floridians don’t support America’s trade relationship with China, a silly ban that will give their town some cheap publicity isn’t the answer. If Palm Bay feels so strongly, that we all should buy American, then they should actually do something, forgo something, stop going to Walmart, stop buying Apple products. While the health risks of Chinese products might be scary for people in this town, there are things in Palm that are much more frightening. Like sex offender James Jay Davis on Seahorse Circle. Third row, fourth column.

•ABC News: Florida City Tries to Ban Chinese Products
•Photo: hallock35’s Flickr Page

Following the meeting of China’s top Communist leaders last week in Beijing, China has switched gears from its national agenda to its galactic agenda. The Chang’e I, the nation’s first lunar probe blasted off from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in Sichuan province at 6:05pm Wednesday and separated from its rocket 24 minutes later. And a half an hour after that, the director of the Xichang center declared the launch a success. The probe will orbit the moon for the next year and send satellite images to China’s space program in preparation for a space vehicle landing in 2012 and a manned mission in 2020. While congrats to China on launching its first orbiter — there’s no reason the U.S. and Russia should be the only ones there — there are few funny elements to this story. And it’s not the word “probe.” It’s the fact the Chinese government came out last week and said that there would be a branch of the Communist Party in space. The laws of the party stipulate that a chapter can be established anywhere there are 3 or more card-carrying members of the party. And while this lunar orbiter is unmanned, the 2020 lunar mission and a manned mission next year will have the requisite numbers of card-carrying Communist astronauts to bring a CPC chapter into space. The second funny thing about the Chinese space program is that Beijing felt the need to calm fears within the international community that these space missions had military objectives. Even with an unmanned moon probe, the world still doesn’t trust China. Perhaps because earlier this year, China blasted one of its weather satellites to bits with a ballistic missile. The China Daily quoted a National Defense official as saying, “Chang’e I is purely a scientific mission; it has no military aim and is carrying no military facilities or equipment.” Phew. In 2003, China became just the third nation, after the U.S. and Russia, to send a man into space.

•China Daily: One Step Closer to the Moon
•Photo: China Daily

I’ve been to a Chinese zoo once and I doubt I’ll go back. All the animals looked like they were half-dead and all of the visitors climbed the protective walls and held their kids over the rails. I remember thinking to myself that one of these days, someone was gonna get mauled. Lo and behold, Monday afternoon at the Beijing Zoo, a 15-year-old boy climbed over one of the protective barriers into the outdoor panda exercise where the bears were eating. Lulu, an 8-year-old panda who, according to the Beijing News, had bitten a drunken tourist last year who jumped into her cage, viciously attacked the boy and bit substantial chunks out of both the boy’s legs. As reported by the AP Tuesday, “The Beijing News identified the teen as Li Xitao, citing emergency medical officials who said he was so viciously attacked that his bones were showing. Chunks of flesh were left behind in the ambulance, they said.” The attack lasted 2-3 minutes, which doesn’t seem like such a long time, but think about counting slowly to 180 while a 240-pound panda ripped flesh from your legs. To add insult to injury, the director of the zoo told the press that the zoo would consider pressing charges against Li, a recyclable collector from Hebei province. What kind of punishment could possibly make Li learn his lesson more than a bear attack?

•AP: Beijing Zoo Panda Bites Teenage Boy

Baseball fans in China who don’t have full-time jobs, you’re in luck. Major League Baseball and the Shanghai Media Group have reached an agreement by which this year’s World Series, beginning Wednesday night in Boston, will be broadcast live on Chinese television. Where the full-time job becomes an issue is that Wednesday night in Boston is Thursday morning in China and most people here are not sitting at home at 8am on a weekday. Well, most people who aren’t English teachers. Here are the details of the MLB/SMG deal from a press release Monday:

The agreement was launched in July with coverage of the 2007 All-Star Game and has continued throughout the second half of the 2007 Championship Season on a weekly basis with a China-specific edition of “This Week in Baseball.” Produced and aired by SMG, the show includes a weekly recap of MLB action and features segments entitled “Baseball Basics” and “Baseball in China” that highlight the most important elements of the game and provide viewers with in-depth coverage of the local baseball scene. “This Week in Baseball” will continue to run through the end of the postseason in its normal time slot on Fridays at 6:30 P.M. The World Series, MLB All-Star Game and “This Week in Baseball,” will air on Great Sports through 2009.

The only question that remains is whether the Chinese “TWIB” will have a Chinese host or whether they’re gonna enroll Ozzie Smith in a crash Mandarin course and have him do it.

•MLB: MLBI and Shanghai Media Group Bring World Series to China

It’s fitting that more people in the United States do Sudoku than play baseball, basketball or football. It’s a game that requires no cardiovascular endurance and provides the player a quasi-intellectual alternative to reading. If you’re not familiar with the American numbers game with a Japanese name and you haven’t read a newspaper or walked down an airplane aisle in two years, Sudoku is like the mathematical counterpart of a crossword puzzle and can be justifiably considered a U.S. “craze.” And according to a Reuters article over the weekend, 167 million Americans, more than half of the U.S. population, play Sudoku. On Saturday, over 800 Sudoku players from all over North America held the game’s first ever national championship in Philadelphia. Stanford doctorate candidate Thomas Snyder became the first U.S. Sudoku champion when he completed an advanced puzzle in 7 minutes. There are many things I can complete in 7 minutes. An advanced Sudoku puzzle is not one them. I’ve dabbled in those difficult puzzles and it usually takes me 7 minutes to put the first number in. I also have a chronic Sudoku problem that involves spending a long time on a puzzle and right at the end, when I think I am going to bask in the satisfaction of having completed some silly little puzzle that belongs on an LSAT practice exam, I realize that I’ve fucked up. And unlike a crossword puzzle, where you can go back and correct a mistake, it is impossible to figure out where I went wrong. A spokesperson for the event said that the popularity of Sudoku stems from the fact that anyone can do it and unlike a crossword puzzle, it doesn’t assume “a certain vocabulary and some cultural knowledge.” Well I like crossword puzzles for this very reason — not everyone can do them. Whereas the crossword is an exercise in intellect, Sudoku seems more of a test of patience. Whatever the game measures, it is now a competitive sport whose champion wins a $10,000 prize. And all those people on airplanes and waiting rooms and the public bus scribbling numbers in boxes are no longer killing time. Now that there’s a championship, all these people are officially “training.”

•Reuters: Sudoku players Hold Championship