Fu Lai
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Oh, and water...
Water quality a concern
China Daily, http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/90882/8142202.html
Facing up to the country's ever deteriorating environmental conditions is the first step in dealing with them.
In its plan to control environmental risks during the 12th Five-Year Plan period (2011-15), the Ministry of Environmental Protection admits that some places face drinking water risks and cancer rates are increasing in some villages.
It is to be applauded that the country's top environmental watchdog has acknowledged the harsh reality and is willing to tell the public that environmental risks are threatening our existence.
In less than 10 years, the quality of groundwater had deteriorated rapidly. A survey conducted by the Ministry of Land and Resources from 2000 to 2002 found that 40 percent of the country's groundwater was below the third standard level. By 2009, the quality of 73.8 percent of groundwater was only at fourth and fifth standard levels.
If this trend continues, Chinese people will have no clean water to drink in the near future.
With reports of some chemical plants and paper mills directly discharging polluted water underground or into limestone caves, despite claims by some environmental protection experts that the chances are slim that industrial plants will be able to drill wells of more than 1,000 meters to discharge toxic wastewater underground, it is obviously sensible for environmental watchdogs to maintain heightened vigilance against such possibilities.
But it is not just the polluters that are to blame for the rapid deterioration in the quality of groundwater. The environmental watchdogs' inaction and poor performance have also contributed to the situation.
We have a water pollution control law, but it does not protect our groundwater because it is not effectively enforced.
This is because few local governments attach enough importance to the issue.
The investment in environmental protection is only around 1.5 percent of the gross domestic product, much lower than it needs to be.
Clearly, there is no time for foot-dragging if we are to safeguard the quality of our water and air. Local government leaders must be made to realize that the pursuit of unsustainable economic growth without enough thought being given to environmental protection will only further contaminate the water we drink and pollute the air we breathe. -
By Tiffany Hoy (Xinhua)
http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/102774/8142832.htmlSYDNEY, Feb. 25 (Xinhua) -- As China searches for ways to clear the smog from its cities, it need look no further than Australia, its Asia-Pacific neighbor, as a leader in air quality management.
Australia has some of the cleanest air in the world, thanks to legislation and management strategies working to reduce emissions and improve air quality since the 1960s.
Over the last 15 years in particular, government controls on industry, motor vehicles and fuels, as well as backyard burning, have made a positive difference in cleaning up the cities' air. Today, air in Australian cities is generally better than in cities in most parts of the world.
"We certainly are leaders in the world in good air pollution management control approaches and procedures," Professor Howard Bridgman, president of the Clean Air Association of Australia and New Zealand (CASANZ), told Xinhua.
"I've been working on air pollution problems in Australia since I came here in 1977, and over those years I've seen lots of positive developments in air pollution management," he said.
However, the nation also has one of the highest per capita emissions rates from burning fossil fuels. In 2011, Australia recorded 17.3 tons of carbon dioxide emissions per person, on par with the United States.
To cut fossil fuels and other harmful emissions -- fighting both climate change and city smog in the process -- Australia is encouraging its citizens and industries to further reduce their contribution to air pollution levels.
The Gillard government recently signed up to a second period of the Kyoto commitment, legally binding Australia to its target of cutting greenhouse emissions by at least 5 percent by 2020.
Perhaps the most controversial step towards this goal in 2012 was the introduction of a price on carbon emissions -- to become a fully-fledged emissions trading scheme (ETS) in 2015.
In November's Energy White Paper 2012, Australia also made a strong financial commitment to capturing and storing carbon, expanding renewable energy, and creating a Clean Energy Finance Corporation to invest in clean, renewable and energy-efficient technology.
These federal directives are continuing Australia's strong history in air quality and pollution management.
In 1998, the federal government's National Environment Protection Measure for Ambient Air Quality (Air NEPM) set standards for six key air pollutants: carbon monoxide, ozone, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, lead and particles.
The Air NEPM, along with other legislation set by each state government, laid the groundwork for clearing Australia's air.
To meet the national standards, the New South Wales state government introduced a 25-year air quality management plan called Action For Air, which has now been running for ten years.
In Sydney, NSW's largest city, concentrations of many of the most dangerous pollutants have been reduced by 30 percent over these ten years -- despite the city's rapid population growth and the number of cars rising by nearly 60 percent over the past 20 years.
To achieve its goal to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 60 percent in the Sydney, Lower Hunter and Illawarra regions before 2050, NSW still needs to work on reducing ground-level ozone and particle pollution.
One of its heaviest sources of this kind of pollution is traffic fumes, a problem which China can relate to.
Motor vehicles are one of Australia's largest contributors to city air pollution: in Sydney, one of Australia's most traffic- congested cities, petrol-run passenger cars are responsible for more emissions than all other vehicles combined.
Bridgman says this is a common problem for many cities worldwide, including Beijing and Shanghai; and the problem tends to escalate during traffic jams when people are driving to and from work.
"From the traffic you get nitrogen oxides and various types of hydrocarbons. When that occurs under the right conditions, particularly in the summer time when you have warm weather and lots of sunshine, then you'll get photochemical smog," he said.
"For cars, some of the developments include better ways of controlling emissions through catalytic converters, and cars that are more efficient in burning fuel.
"Unfortunately, that's often offset with an increasing number of cars in urban areas," he added.
Keeping cars tuned and driving less immediately reduces exhaust pollutants; well-maintained cars are likely to emit between 9 and 25 percent less pollution than poorly maintained vehicles. Greater fuel efficiency is an added money-saving benefit.
To combat the problem of traffic emissions, NSW introduced a " Cleaner Vehicles and Fuels Strategy" in 2008 to promote cleaner cars and fuels, and improve roads, housing and public transport " to reduce vehicle dependence and traffic congestion."
The state raised vehicle emissions standards and upgraded their own fleet of cars and buses to lead by example. This plan aimed to save substantial costs and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by more than 55,000 tons over three years through increased fuel efficiency, with a 20% improvement in overall environmental scores.
NSW also introduced an environmental rating for heavy vehicles, with a fuel rebate scheme to encourage retrofitting of diesel engines to reduce dangerous particle emissions.
For a better insight into the problem, remote sensors were installed on roadsides -- revealing that older vehicles were responsible for a disproportionate amount of pollution. Solving this kind of issue would require greater public awareness.
Community awareness and behavior-change programs promoted fuel efficiency, buying cleaner vehicles, properly maintaining vehicles and active transport such as walking and cycling. Annual cycle, bus or walk to work days were also introduced, to encourage people to break the habit of relying on their cars for transport.
According to Bridgman, part of Sydney's success in raising its air quality is attributable to greater public awareness of the health and environmental risks that accompany city smog.
"They've become more knowledgeable about the sources of pollution, and they're becoming more vigilant in terms of watching what's going on. And they've also become more noisy -- more willing to complain," he said.
Through the online National Pollution Inventory, concerned citizens can check the levels of monitored pollutants in real time in their local area. And in NSW, residents can sign up to receive SMS or email alerts for high pollution days.
"We have a whole range of monitoring stations in Australia, in different states and different cities ...and it's in real time -- you can actually look and see what's happened over the last hour or the last day in emissions of the major pollutants," said Bridgman.
NSW also set up an online system to allow the public to report smoky vehicles, encouraging owners to properly maintain their cars and trucks with defect notices and fines.
Both state and federal governments also introduced measures to encourage cleaner fuels.
NSW investigated and promoted alternative fuels such as liquid petroleum gas, compressed natural gas (CNG), ethanol-petrol blend and biodiesel, and researched fuels that evaporate less quickly.
In 2006, as part of an overall tightening of National Fuel Quality Standards, the Australian federal government introduced a limit on benzene (a toxic, flammable liquid) in petrol to greatly reduce community exposure.
At the pump, vapours from fuel storage tanks were captured and recycled, instead of being allowed to escape into the atmosphere.
The government regards the cost of all of these programs as an investment to avoid the exorbitant health costs of air pollution in the future -- such as China is experiencing now with several people confined to hospital for asthma and respiratory problems.
Industry and small businesses are another major source of city air pollution in Australia, and so also received tighter regulations.
In cities, "you've got small establishments -- like printers, bakers and chicken joints -- that are burning or creating something that releases hydrocarbons into the atmosphere," said Bridgman.
"These are mostly the responsibility of local governmental; ideally working in collaboration with the state government to try to reduce those emissions.
"It's easier to handle all those small sources on a local scale than try to handle it on a state-wide scale," he added.
For larger industry emitters, including power stations and mining (mostly in rural areas), the state government is responsible. These companies are required to submit annual reports about their emissions, and their levels are added to the National Pollutant Inventory -- a record of 93 toxic substances and their sources and locations, available online.
Domestic households are also a direct contributor to air pollutants, mainly from using solvents (such as paints), and burning wood and coal for heating and cooking. In metropolitan Sydney, 93 percent of airborne particle pollution -- a brown haze - - comes from wood heaters. Community education has helped reduce these emissions.
Announcing a five-year plan to reduce air pollution to protect the environment starting in 2012 is a good start, says Bridgman. " Over the last twenty or thirty years, China has taken the approach that it needs to develop very rapidly in terms of its industries and transport systems. And, as in the past in places like Europe and the USA, that development has taken priority over the environment."
"The key thing now for China is to work out a way to balance their development needs and the need to protect and control air and water environments, so that pollution is reduced but development can go ahead -- at least in some kind of modified form. "
"I think that China is moving in the right direction, in trying to at least begin to reduce its air quality. And there are good reports coming out of China in being able to reduce air quality problems. We look for more positive reports in the future," Bridgman said. -
Good luck with the new house Fu Lai. I wish the best for you guys. It's a great feeling owning outright a new home in Chinertucky. One of my happiest moments was getting home the first time to my girlfriend's new home, and walking into the door oohing and awwing at her great job of directing the workers and furnishing the place. Looks like you and the wife are gonna roll.
tsap seui
Thank you suh!
I may have a little influence over what style we go for in decorative furnishing, in place of not showing my face at the place until the main stuff is done ("if you're white like rice it'll cost twice the price and maybe not be done nice")... LOL!! She kinda takes some pride in "I want our home to be different than the others with your American influence" ... while she is busy picking out her electric mahjong table.http://i01.i.aliimg.com/photo/v0/113920575/Automatic_Mahjong_Table.jpg
She was so happy that I insisted on having a round, turntable dining room table. hahaha Little does she know that comes from me being lazy in not reaching over the table for the dishes or waiting on others to pass them around. I did grow up in a 10 member family house that was a little more than competitive over food dispersal so I am laughing at the thought of the "lazy susan" tug of war we would have had every dinner at such a table!
http://www.lafurniturestore.com/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/D/S/DSC_0683.jpg
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missed this, old China pictures of New Year's celebrations:
http://english.people.com.cn/90782/8126919.html
http://english.people.com.cn/mediafile/201302/08/F201302081558501088275211.jpg
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Funny, I got a blue print today and immediately my girls says... "there's a wall there they don't have on the blueprint." Ugh. So I will get a digital copy of the blueprint tomorrow and then physically go see the place again to match the drawing with reality. In the meantime we have been tamping through all the home furnishing megastores they have here. We came up with a pricing of stuff for our office/library:
1 Desk Y1000
2 Desk chairs Y600
1 Sofa-bed Y1800
1 Comfort chair Y1000
1 Shelving unit Y1000
1 Overhead light Y150
1 Desk light Y100
Total: Y5650 -
Thanks for the pics! Always very nice (and always jealous of that nice air, I couldn't see to the other side of the Yangtze last night).
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... Maybe Chinese is too hard of a language to teach for someone like her.???? I didn't mean to upset you tsap seui if I did and I was talking generally, not about your wife. My wife started to teach me it but it was too difficult. My name is Fu Lai and I have heard Chinese women say they won't think about China another minute once they are headed to America, for various reasons. Mostly because they want to start a new life, etc. I was just trying to add to the conversation if that's okay.
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... One hallmark of chinese history, and not necessarily a strength, is to look to the past history to know how to be today. I think it has a bit of a crutch mentality to it... but I at least observe this is occurring.
I do too. The culture and historic reference in China is amazingly tight for such a society. I'm not sure it can be compared to any other.
I see Sa Jiao as in treating and taking care of each other as kids around here. While I have seen it in other countries, in the USA particularly, it is hip deep in China. Mothers often care for their kids and husbands nearly the same way, it is funny. Husbands are reeled in by wives to reciprocate. Kids practice this early. Hilarious. If I didn't know it is an important game then I might be offended but we really just do it and laugh about it... "SA JIAO" we say to each other, giggling knowingly!
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I just tested it and no reason was needed to edit. You can't delete though.
Sorry for going off-topic. It was just a thought. Notice this post. I will submit it, then edit it in the next 10 seconds to fix a typo, then re-submit it. All in under a minute. Some sites allow this to be done without it displaying a [edit] notice, a setting in the admin for how much time they will allow a post to be edited without showing the [edit] notice. This site displays an [edit] notice immediately.
Frankly, people edit posts dramatically after a couple of hours with no explanation and those SHOULD show the [edit]. Anyway, it was just a thought. Carry on and thank you.
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I would suggest that Chinese women that are going to the USA might be more interested in learning English then teaching you Chinese or about China. Maybe they don't want to think another minute about China and have reasons to put it in their rear view mirror? Or maybe they just CAN'T teach you and want to prevent losing face? It is peculiar that someone coming from such a deep culture as China would avoid it so much.
My girl has no interest in EVER going to the USA except to meet my family, we deal with only Chinese people every day [besides me and my work]. So she always teaches me things about China and encourages me to learn more Chinese language. It is ESSENTIAL that we meet each others needs in changing our way of interacting so that we can function optimally. The changing we do for each other benefits every aspect of our relationship. There is no forced change in anything but us wanting to fit better together.
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I believe that is reserved for moderators and admins only.
May I request a 2 minute window to edit our posts without having the [EDIT] notification put on the post? 2 minutes lets we who deplore typos, misspells, etc. to fix our posts. Thanks for your consideration.There is a short window of opportunity to edit your post for just this very reason.
Anyway you are given the opportunity to give reason for edit, simply indicate typo correction or such as a reason.
I know that many forums allow people to fix typos etc. with a short window before the [EDIT] is displayed, maybe consider it. All forums I know allow people to edit posts with the caveat that a big notice of [EDIT] is displayed and usually with a line of why. Thanks.
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I suspect it is used, at least in my girl's respect, to gently point out what they consider failure by the man to assist his girl. Maybe a way to save face for everyone, the girl who needs help and the guy who is not helping?
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General Visa discussion used to be where most of the posts were made and as Dan said the other forums weren't invented yet. We used to have the board set so members could delete their own posts until a couple of them decided to delete all their posts and quit. We changed it after that. That could explain the missing old posts. Also PJ still has admin access. He could have deleted them himself anytime.
Carl, I remember those days.
Just a thought, Maybe we could get that back again.
BUT!! only delete the current post being made at the time.
NOT all the posts we made during the thread.
Ya know sometimes we post things and push the button and latter wish we didn't.
One post delete only.
There is a short window of opportunity to edit your post for just this very reason.
May I request a 2 minute window to edit our posts without having the [EDIT] notification put on the post? 2 minutes lets we who deplore typos, misspells, etc. to fix our posts. Thanks for your consideration.
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... It's okay to ask them to get a clue and learn how to communicate with Western people and for us as Westerners to take a pause, breath, and step back while they learn a new way.
I agree as long as we acknowledge that we reciprocate in the same way... get a clue and learn how to communicate with Chinese people and for them as Chinese to take a pause, breath, and step back while we learn a new way.
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Harkened by lanterns, wayward souls return. This pic is from a Lantern Festival I attended yesterday in the small village of Huangpi, about 40km north of Wuhan.
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Pretty straightforward. By far people here talk Visa, then sidechat with members and life together after visa
But most of all, what the 'stats' tell you is that VISA topics are far less likely to be deleted during a database purge
That is disappointing. A database purge is like amputation or erasing history to a messageboard / database guy.
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Pretty straightforward. By far people here talk Visa, then sidechat with members and life together after visa
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Probably superfluous but this is a good link for a visitor's visa:
http://www.chinaconsulatechicago.org/eng/ywzn/qzhz/qz/grqz/P020120801225217510261.pdf
My mother plans to visit us in June this year. She has been in the states before. In addition to DS160, what other supporting documents does she have to prepare? Also, can the mailing address on the DS-160 be written in Chinese?
Thanks.
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Knowing how much of a seafood lover my girl and generally Chinese are this report came out Thursday of widespread fish mislabeling. The USA imports 90% of its seafood and only 2% in checked so they figure this is a way to label a cheap fish as a more expensive one to make money, fraud. But there are other problems with it.
Earlier investigations by Oceana and the Boston Globe revealed that seafood mislabeling is common in cities like New York and Boston, where people eat a lot of fish. But the report out Thursday shows it's happening across the country, and is as bad or worse in places like Texas and Colorado. Some 49 percent of the retail outlets sampled in Austin and Houston sold mislabeled seafood, while 36 percent in Colorado did so.
So what's the big deal with fish sold under a pseudonym? Well, for one, it's often just a form of swindling – a cheap fish like tilapia sold as red snapper. But Oceana says the practice also can put consumers at health risk when species like king mackerel, which is high in mercury, or escolar, which contains a naturally occurring toxin than can cause gastrointestinal problems, are marketed as grouper and white tuna, respectively.
Oceana's also concerned that substituting cheaper, easier-to-find fish for rarer, more valuable ones gives consumers a distorted sense of the market. Of the fish types most heavily sampled by Oceana, those sold as snapper and tuna had the highest mislabeling rates — 87 and 59 percent. Only seven of the 120 samples of red snapper purchased nationwide were actually red snapper, the report found.also...
Even though fish mislabeling has been documented before, these two recent reports — one by the Boston Globe and the other by Consumer Reports — underscore how rampant the practice is. The Boston Globe tested the DNA of 183 orders of fish at various outlets in the Boston area and found that a higher percentage were mislabeled (48%) than were correct (46%), with a small fraction having inconclusive results. Some of the substitutions were particularly egregious: “All 23 white tuna samples tested as some other type of fish, usually escolar, which is nicknamed the ex-lax fish by some in the industry because of the digestion problems it can cause.” That’s pretty gross.
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This is good.... I explain it to the Chinese as the five W's and an 'H'. Whenever we want to know something, we are thinking of:
1. Who
2. What
3. When
4. Where
5. Why
6. How
I still ask who but I have come to understand there are mainly three answers... family, colleagues and classmates. If it is a friend that I know well she will say the name. She has the what, how and when figured out as something I always need to know so she is good with that. She will tell me something she wants to do and I'll ask why. Often she replies, "no why, we will do it." I will ask where is it and she will reply, "in Wuhan." I'll ask where in Wuhan and she'll say, "in Wuchang." I'll ask what street and she'll say "it is far away." Finally I'll ask what is the street and number and she'll reply "you do not know the place so do not ask." So I deduce that she knows where it is but not the address.
She still does the "I'll ask a Chinese person" after I give an answer. Example, her 16 year old son wanted to get rid of the peachfuzz on his lip and asked me if he could shave. I said certainly. The hair does not regrow faster or any of that myth. I even showed him and his mother a few doctor sites that confirmed it. She said nothing but 10 minutes later she told her son he could shave. I asked her why she delayed her answer and she said she had to ask some Chinese people and check Chinese doctors first. So I taught the son how to shave.
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I didn't mean to portray my girl as a beating around the busher, she is far from it. She is very direct and blunt as can be, with no time to spend dealing with blah blah.
Since the Chinese seem to use any sound in the world to agree or disagree, say yes or no, I did convince my wife to use uh-huh and uh-uh as much as possible for my ease of understanding. This is a work in progress right dear? "uh"
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Does my wife have to file a W-7 and apply for an ITIN? She works for a government university and has never been or lived in the USA (no plans to either).
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http://www.jennichong.com/?p=411
China is the homeland of tea. It is believed that China has been growing tea bushes as early as five to six thousand years ago. Tea is grown in forty countries, with Asian countries producing 90% of the world’s total output. All tea bushes can be traced back to their origin directly or indirectly to China.Tea drinking spread to Japan in the 6th century, but it was not introduced to Europe and America till the 17th and 18th centuries. Now tea is the most popular drink in the world. There are the English tea, Japanese tea amongst many but today I am writing about Chinese tea.
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I wonder if it will make the visitor's visa easier to get
Some stats
in Site Issues & Announcements
Posted
The request was to give us a minute or two to make a quick post change without the "Edited by ..." line appearing. Notice you posted at 03:43 AM and edited a minute later? I have no idea if IPB software allows this but I do know other software does. I didn't mean anything about a reason given.