Trusty Brothers and Sea Cucumbers melting away

The following is an excerpt from an article published by Daily Economic News (每日经济新闻) online (每经网), from Shanghai. Before and after the translated paragraphs, it addresses more global aspects of the current heatwave.

Links within blockquotes added during translation.

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It is said that the trusty brothers from the Northeast are packing to leave for the South, to avoid the heat …

据说东北的老铁们已经开始收拾去南方避暑的衣服了…..

In Shenyang, the maximum temperature has recently reached 37.6 degrees C., which is the second-highest temperature ever recorded in Shenyang ever since weather recording began. A Liaoning Satellite TV reporter took a thermometer onto a bus without air condition and actually measured 46 degrees C.!

在沈阳，近日气温最高已达到37.6℃，这是有气象记录以来沈阳第二高的温度。辽宁卫视的一位记者拿着温度计到一台没有安装空调的公交车上测了一下，结果发现竟有46℃！

As a result, there aren’t enough air condition installers in the Northeast! Gomei‘s official Weibo channel says that only during the last week of July, sales of air conditioners in the Northeast’s three provinces rose by 1,726 percent, and even by 3,545.4 percent in the Shenyang area, compared with the same period last year, with several tens of thousands of air conditioners waiting to be installed.

结果，东北的空调安装师傅不够用了！国美官方微博显示，仅7月最后一周，东北三省空调销量就同比增长1726%，沈阳地区更是同比增长3545.4%，数万套空调处于待安装状态。

And it’s not only the people who can’t stand it, it’s the sea cucumbers, too!

不光是人受不了，海参也受不了了！

According to Securities Times, Mr. Wang, with a cultivation experience of over ten years of working 240 mu of sea cucumbers on the Jinzhou coast, found in a first assessment that the losses this year are at least 2 million. Mr. Wang told a reporter that the maximum water temperature for sea cucumbers is 32 degrees C., and that once this limit is reached, they won’t last for more than 48 hours. After 48 hours, they will melt, and the high temperatures of this year have already lasted for nearly a week.

根据证券时报的报道，有十多年养殖经验的王先生今年在锦州沿海养了240亩左右的海参，据其初步评估，此次的损失至少得两百多万。王先生告诉记者，海参的水温极限就是32℃，达到32℃不能超过48小时，超过48小时就会自己融化了，而今年的高温已经持续了近一个星期。

Reading this, condescending smiles may appear on the faces of the little Southern companions: Coming to the South to escape the heat? Isn’t it obvious that calorization is normal here?

看到这，南方的小伙伴可能要轻蔑一笑：来南方避暑？难道你们不知道南方的人可都是要热化了吗？

According to Central Meteorological Station statistics, Chongqing, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangxi, Anhui, Zhejiang and the central western areas have seen ten to eighteen days of temperatures of more than 35 degrees C. since July 10.

根据中央气象台统计，从7月10日以来，重庆、湖北、湖南、江西、安徽、浙江中西部等地35℃以上高温日数已达10～18天。

Since the beginning of this year, the number of high-temperature days has exceeded twenty days in parts of Jiangnan and Huanan, with western Huanghai, central Chongqing, eastern Hunan, southern Jiangxi, southern Fujian, eastern Guangdong among the areas where there were the number of high-temperature days exceeded those in other years by ten days.

今年以来，江南、华南部分地区高温日数超过20天，其中黄淮西部、重庆中部、湖南东部、江西南部、福建南部、广东东部等地高温日较常年同期偏多10天以上。

Even an African friend says unreservedly that “China is too hot, I’m going back to Africa to get away from the heat.”

连非洲友人都直言：“中国太热了，我要回非洲避暑。”

According to China Youth Daily, young Sami from Ethiopia who is working in Chongqing took a twenty-day holiday from his company in early July because of the heat and returned to Africa. But on his return to Chongqing, it was still “brutally hot”, making him thinking about a second return home, as in his home town, temperatures were only twenty degrees after all, while it was over 40 degrees in Chongqing …

据中国青年报报道，在重庆工作的埃塞俄比亚的小伙Sami，在今年7月初，因为天气太热，曾向公司请了20多天的高温假，回非洲避暑。但当他再次回到重庆，还是直呼“热哭了”，想再次请假回家，毕竟家乡只有20多度，而重庆已经40多度了……

Xiao Bian, as a Northerner who once worked in Africa, tells everyone here that the East African high plains are really cool, and he would therefore persuade the trusty Northeastern brothers that as the South isn’t welcoming, the East African high plains are a bit more understanding …

小编作为曾经在非洲工作过的北方人，在这里告诉大家，东非高原真的很凉快，所以劝一句东北的老铁们，南方是别来了，东非高原了解一下…..

In fact, it isn’t only China which is being roasted, but the entire northern hemisphere.

其实不光是国内，整个北半球都在经受高温“烤”验。

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The article turns to more serious aspects of the heat from there – global warming – but not without noting that some time in future, the legend of the Mongolian Navy could become true.

In the News & Blogs (Aug 1 – 21): Beijing’s Little Helpers abroad

“China Quarterly” cooperates with China censors / Taiwan hosts 2017 Summer Universiade / Kim spoils Fun for Chinese Guam Visitors / Red-noticed police / The First “Five Marvellous Years” / Want to be Chinese?
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Doing Beijing’s Dirty Work (1): Academic Institutions

Update: Cambridge University Press restores articles, Washington Post, Aug 21, 2017

China Quarterly apparently cooperates with Beijing by blocking access to articles and e-books on their website.

Can we expect them to do better? I have my doubts. Their topic is China – and if they don’t cooperate, others will, and might replace the renowned magazine. That’s no excuse, of course, and they could still display character rather than opportunism, but one has to admit that they are facing a tough choice. If they decided otherwise, there would be no academic solidarity – alternative opportunists would chum up to Beijing.

What is therefore needed is a political answer. British legislators will need to make censorship cooperation of this kind illegal, and legislators in other free societies will need to do likewise.

You can’t do Beijing’s dirty work yourself, and remain democratic, liberal, or free.

The public needs to push a political decision. People who care about human rights (those of others, and of their own), should consider to join or support relevant pressure groups, rather than political parties.

If Chinese readers can be blocked from servers in free countries, there is no good reason why we, people who live in (still) relatively free societies, should keep access to them, when Beijing demands otherwise.

This scenario may appear far-fetched now – but what happens at Cambridge now would have been unfathomable two or three decades ago, too.

Besides, no man or woman in a free country should vote for political parties who are prepared to tolerate this kind of practice. Totalitarian challenges must be met with political answers.

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Taiwan’s Twelve Days of International Fame

The 2017 Summer Universiade started in Taipei, on Saturday.

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Chinese Holidaymakers: Kim spoils the Fun

Huanqiu Shibao (the Global Times‘ Chinese-language sister paper) worried about unwelcome side effects of the US-North Korean war of words during the first half of the month: More than 26,000 Chinese tourists had travelled to Guam in 2016, the paper noted in an article published online on August 11 – an increase by 11 percent compared to 2015. Huanqiu numbers reportedly provided by the Guam Visitors Bureau‘s China Representative Room, an organization that runs offices in mainland China and in Hong Kong.

Guam is an island in the western Pacific. It is U.S. territory, reportedly within reach of North Korean missiles (provided that the missiles are lucky), it hosts a naval base, an air base, a religious shortwave broadcasting station, and thousands of tourists annually.

The Huanqiu Shibao article also quotes from “Sina Weibo” exchanges between Chinese netizens and the Guam Visitors Bureau, where Bureau staff reportedly posted reassuring replies to questions like “will you soon be hit by missiles?”

Probably given the incomplete state of North Korea’s striking force (God knows where the missiles would actually go if the army tried to fire them into Guam’s adjacent waters), or Donald Trump‘s notoriety as a bigmouth with little consistency, no travel warning appears to have been issued by Chinese authorities. According to the BY article, the China Youth Travel Agency told reporters that

the company hadn’t received a political-risks warning notice to suspend departures to Guam until then, and reminded journalists to monitor the China National Tourism Administration’s travel risk reminders.

….. 公司还没有接到因政治风险暂停前往关岛的旅游团的通知，他提醒记者应及时关注国家旅游局的旅游风险提示。

According to statistics quoted by the article, most tourists visiting Guam are from Japan and South Korea, with rapidly rising numbers from mainland China.

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Doing Beijing’s Dirty Work (2): Red-noticed Police

The arrest of a German citizen of Turkish origin, Dogan Akhanli, made it into German news during the weekend. According to GfbV, a German organization that keeps track of cases where authoritarian regimes use Interpol to harrass critics abroad, Akhanli was arrested by Spanish police in the city of Granada. Reportedly, Turkey had requested Interpol  to issue a read notice to Spain. The dust appears to settle now, and Akhanli is free again, but the organization calls for reforming Interpol and to make sure that it doesn’t become (or remain) a tool for silencing regime critics abroad.

In the same press release, GfbV notes that Dolkun Isa, secretary general of the World Uyghur Congress, had been arrested in Rome, on July 26 this year. Isa was on his way into the Italian senate when he was arrested. According to GfbV, Chinese authorities are now using Interpol’s “red notice” mechanism systematically, to restrict movement of the regime’s critics abroad, and thus creating a de-facto occupational ban against them (Chinas Behörden nutzen die „Red Notice“ inzwischen systematisch, um die Bewegungsfreiheit von im Ausland lebenden Menschenrechtlern einzuschränken und de facto ein Berufsverbot gegen sie zu verhängen).

It certainly wasn’t the first time that Isa had been arrested. In 2009, South Korea arrested him, apparently on arrival at the airport, and refused him entry into the country. Previously, he had been arrested by the UN security service when visiting the Human Rights Commission in Geneva.

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The First Five “Marvellous Years”

China’s state television (CCTV) website reminds the public of CCP secretary general Xi Jinping‘s feats during his first five marvellous years (不平凡五年) in office. On August 14, the media organization published statistics of Xi’s speeches on foreign policy.

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So: Want to be Chinese?

Given that under the secretary general’s correct leadership, China is becoming the marvel of the world (an unscientific condensed international press review by JR with no further sources), it should be no surprise that Daniel Bell wants better international access to Chinese citizenship, for meritorious citizens of the world who would like to share in that glory.

Ji Xiang posted some thoughts on that, early this month.

Guessing Games: “Don’t wait for Beidaihe”

— Note: the following is old news: it’s about articles that appeared during the past two weeks and a half. —

Big sensation? Or was the Xinhua article, published on August 5, making fun of the international press in general, or the South China Morning Post (SCMP) in particular? The headline read Liao Wang Think Tank: Don’t wait for it, Beidaihe won’t happen, and it seemed to refer to an article in Hong Kong’s English-language paper, published on July 30.  The headline, of course, doesn’t necessarily mean that the near-tradtitional gathering of China’s top leaders has been cancelled. But it does suggest that Beidaihe is no longer the place where the big decisions are made: after all, Chinese politics had gradually become more transparent and “regular”, especially after the 18th National Congress of the CCP (i. e. the election of the current leadership) and the Eight Provisions (or Eight Rules). Hadn’t the politburo met on July 20 and 30? One could well expect that issues like the 13th 5-year plan, economic policies, striking the tigers (打老虎, put into quotation marks in the article, and referring to the ostensible fight against corruption among leading cadres) had been discussed there time and again – so what would be the use to go to Beidaihe? “Is it necessary? Is it likely [to happen]?”

Obviously, Beidaihe doesn’t need to be the place where big decisions are made. But it may still be the place. While the CCP is indeed fairly transparent when it comes to the publication of its final decisions, the decision-making process remains as murky as ever.

Maybe that’s why the Xinhua/Liaowang author found speculation about the time and agenda of the Beidaihe meetings so funny. The Economist also got a mention for suggesting that [n]ormally the meetings start in the second week of August and run for seven days or so. This year they started a week early […]. However, the Xinhua article didn’t mention that the Economist referred to reports in overseas Chinese media.

And, as usual, the sources weren’t specifically mentioned, either, let alone linked to, its sources, even though both the SCMP and the Economist article were available online. Maybe they were running counter to the Liaowang author’s message to his readers that Chinese politics had become “more transparent”.

Summer Vacation

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An (unkept) promise of rain.

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Temperatures are alright by sunset …

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But at daytime …

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…  only the coolest place in the house is good enough.

Before Sunrise

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Summer: Walled Little World

Good weather conditions so far – mostly a good mix of sun, rain and overcast skies. Everything is still lagging behind schedule by a few weeks, as the warm season started late.

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Small grapes, great expectations

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Some of the crops are growing on mini-terraces as the slope would make watering wasteful otherwise.

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Lavender and potatoes

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potato blossom

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Tobacco – only a few rows so as not to exceed the legal limit.

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Related

Summer Observations, July 12, 2011
Rain at last, June 19, 2011

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“China is Alright”: a Summer Camp for Overseas Chinese students from Laos

China Radio International‘s Mandarin service renders a newslet by China News Service (中国新闻社), China’s second-largest state-owned newsagency after Xinhua, on the field of public diplomacy.

Original title: Ethnic Chinese Laotians go to Yunnan to experience Chinese culture

CRI Online news: according to China News Service, the “2013 China is alright – the perfect Yunnan summer camp” has started in Kunming, with fourty campers and group leaders from Chinese schools in Laos. It is scheduled to go on for ten days. Apart from developing [an awareness or knowledge of, apparently] Yunnan ethnic culture, knowledge of China, and exchange, the overseas Chinese students will also experience Yunnan province’s local conditions and customs.

国际在线消息：据中新社电，“2013中国文化行—完美云南营”4日在昆明开营，来自老挝华文学校的40名营员和领队将开启为期10天的“中国文化之旅”。除了开展云南民族文化、中华知识学习和交流外，海外华裔学生还将体验云南的风土人情。

With Chinese-Laotian cooperation growing closer and the surging “Chinese language fever” in Laos, more and more ethnic Chinese and Laotians want to understand the Chinese way of life and traditional culture. Luo Bailan, a teacher and group leader with the camp, says that the Chinese schools in Laos are continuously adjusting their educational methods, to allow the students to learn by experience.

随着中老两国合作日益密切，老挝掀起了“汉语热”，越来越多的华裔和老挝人希望了解中国的生活方式与传统文化。老挝领队老师罗白兰表示，老挝的华文学校在不断调整教学方式，让学生们进行体验式教学。

Chinese Language and Culture Education Foundation of China deputy secretary general Li Xianguo says that “China is alright” is an important part of the foundation’s “Young Ethnic Chinese Chinese Culture Heritage Project”.

中国华文教育基金会副秘书长李献国表示，“中国文化行”是中国华文教育基金会“华裔青少年中华文化传承工程”的重要组成部分。

Chinese fever – click pictdure for China News Service coverage

The State Council Information Office (SCIO) is more elaborate, adding that most of the students haven’t been to Yunnan before. Even though it has been rainy for days, and temperatures in the spring city [i. e. Kunming] are a bit low, this hasn’t affected the campers’ high spirits in the least. They are reading the course schedules of the camp reader, excitedly discuss the coming lessons and the tourist attractions. A student tells the SCIO reporter that he is most interested in poetry recital and calligraphy, and in touring the Stone Forest, the birthplace of Ashima:

“We also want to experience the culture of national minorities in the Yunnan Nationalities Village I don’t know a lot about national minorities and hope to experience a lot of interesting things”, Lin Yingcai says in fluent Chinese.

“我最期待看石林的奇山怪石，听说那里是阿诗玛的故乡，我们还要去体验云南民族村的少数民族文化，我对少数民族了解不多，希望能体验很有意思的东西。”林英才用流利的中文说。

Many Laotians and Burmese and Cambodians and North Koreans see China as a promised land, Joshua Kurlantzick wrote in his 2007 book Charm Offensive (p. 137). And America, he warned, had earned itself a bad image in the past, and was still doing so:

For decades, the United States still did not grant Laos normal trading relations, though Laos’s human rights record was no worse than the record of China, with whom America traded vigorously. American sanctions on Laos infuriated Lao officials, who didn’t understand why such a big country like the United Stateswould punish a minnow – especially since during the Vietnam War, America had dropped more bombs on Laos than it dropped on Germany and Japan together during World War II, leaving Laos riddled with unexploded ordnance.

(Kurlantzick, p. 59)

Jiang Zemin visited Laos in November 2000, reportedly the first visit by a Chinese head of state. In November 2006, Jiang’s successor Hu Jintao followed up, and moved China Radio International (CRI) one step ahead of the BBC and the VoA, by pushing a button for a rebroadcasting FM station – the inauguration ceremony was reportedly broadcast live, as the rebroadcaster’s first program ever:

So, Vientiane listeners, for the first time, clearly and vividly heard the the warm voice of state chairman Hu Jintao, a visitor from a friendly neighbor.

万象听众第一次如此清晰真切地听到了来自友好邻邦——中国国家主席亲切的声音：

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A CRI official said that the friendly relations between China and Laos created good conditions for CRI’s operations in Laos. According to the official, the Laotian government’s approval of CRI’s Vientiane frequency was one of only few. Before, the BBC and the VoA had applied for frequencies to the Laotian government, but had received no approval.

中国国际广播电台一位负责人说，中老两国的友好关系为国际电台节目在老挝落地创造了良好的条件。据这位负责人透露，国际电台在老挝调频落地是老挝政府已批准的为数不多的落地项目之一。之前，英国广播公司、美国之音等广播电台，均向老方提出过调频落地申请，但老挝政府未予批准。

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Related

Branding China, May 18, 2008
Meeting the Volunteers, CRI, Nov 21, 2006

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Seasons: Cool May, some Rainy Days in June

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This could become a rather wet summer.

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Make rain your friend …

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… not your enemy.