i’ve been freaking out doing everything i can to make sure we get the word out about THIS. will feel much better when the kickoff event is over. til then, i’ll continue to be in pouty, haggar insular mode. it’s been a terrifically harrowing past couple of months!

so if y’all are free on thursday and have only $5 to spare, come on by for some acupuncture, qi gong, tea, shiatsu, live chinese music, cupping (heh), and a whole lot more. it’s a total steal.

anyway, i really dig this art by wu gaozhong. his show is called spectral memory, on view at the zendai MoMA in shanghai. it heaves a visceral impact on many levels; so repugnant, yet so…beckoning. of course, anyone who’s familiar with my neuroses will immediately know exactly why these objects creep the $*#! out of me.

i also gravitate toward this art because it looks like how i feel.

photos from this flickr account

so THAT’S where they got it! this logo always struck me as, at best, smart and catchy, and at worst, mediocre. it’s always so inspirational to know how designers come up with their creations.

via poplicks

certain chinese, when provoked and offended…they will not pu$$yfoot around their feelings.

for example, this taxi driver in qingdao (hey, i was there!):

i think we’re looking at some of the fallout from the impassioned olympic torch protests in paris, london, SF, and in general, the west’s regard of china as a perilous, amoral monolith. qingdao folks are boycotting carrefour, a french hypermarket with stores all over china. french flags have been burned in the process. that’s serious business. i wonder if this endeavor is strictly regional, and if so, whether it will trickle to other provinces.

there is context to this taxi sign, so please click here. more here and here.

one chinese netizen’s artistic take on sino-U.S. relations:

via sfist/shanghaiist

given the current all-eyes-on-china affairs, is this aggressive and nationalistic, subversive and inflammatory, or good ol’ fashioned fun? or all of the above? this piece is begging to be captioned. c’mon guys, it’s captioning time! i know you all can come up with some witty, naughty nuggets.

ps – notice how liberty’s nipple is grazing the warrior’s breast plate ever so gingerly. oooh la la!

i’m irked with myself for constantly sourcing SFGate/Chronicle news (we all know of its dubious quality – for example, big headline today: “Thousands Turn Out For Anti-China Vigil” – what crap sensationalistic wording), but it’s easiest and “closest to home” so i begrudgingly defer to it. um, yeah. guess that’s my way of being apologetic.

as you can tell, i’m pretty much engrossed with this hot topic. i don’t see how you can’t be. as a chinese american, a san franciscan, and someone who was in china while it was ramping up for the olympics, this is riveting and conflicting as all hell.

yesterday, my friend/coworker mentioned the idea of wearing our olympic pins (that i bought when i was there). depending on your perspective, today is the best, or worst, day to don beijing 2008 commemorative paraphernalia. i admittedly wonder what message it sends, whether or not it’s “appropriate.” well. i’m a superficial person. i bought these pins cuz i thought they were awesome, funny, handsome, and straight from the motherland.

i wear mine:

my friend wears his:

busloads of chinese folks are coming up to sf as we speak to show their support. another friend/coworker commutes on caltrain, and she said on her way in there were hordes of mainland chinese all over the place. i really wish i could be out there in the wild to witness all this. i think we’re going to go to justin herman plaza during lunch to check it out.

here’s an article titled “China doctors the news of Olympic torch relay.” it features these interesting quotes:

A middle-age woman surnamed Feng was less optimistic about the U.S. reception and less willing to give her full name…said the tension was noticeable among guards in the embassy district where she walks her dog. She said she expects China’s international reception to continue to be rocky as the torch moves around the world. The (Chinese) government is worried; we’re all worried,” Feng said. “We’ve been preparing for these Olympics for eight years.“

“It’s just bad, bad, bad,” retired army officer Wang Guanghai said of pro-Tibetan demonstrations that marred the torch relay in London and Paris. Wang, who chatted at a fruit stand in a downtown Beijing neighborhood, said he was certain the United States would be more welcoming when the torch arrived in San Francisco. Although protesters had hung pro-Tibetan freedom banners from the Golden Gate Bridge hours earlier, the news had not been published in China.

with that said, here are photos that peg took last night at the vigil in UN plaza. yeah, of course san francisco is more welcoming!

i’m really curious to see how the olympic torch relay in SF on wednesday will play out. will it be like the one in paris, where the last part of it was canceled, succumbing to the craziness of it all? will the olympic flame get snuffed out by SF protesters? i wonder…

what do you think? as stupid as it sounds, this is a churning momentous time; history in the making. the china/human rights/tibet problem is a perennial pandora’s box of challenges to one’s morale, ethics, and understanding of how densely complex the world is. it’s like a massive impossible knot that your mind can’t navigate, a rat king, where each rat represents something (historical, social, economic, cultural issues, and so on).

on saturday i was leaving ranch 99 and a young chinese fellow, adorned with beijing olympic pendant and flag, was rallying people to show up in SF. he was handing out fliers that had info on the torch relay route. the print said something to the effect of: “chinese people, stand up bravely and show your support for the olympics.” he anticipated around 9,000 chinese folks to attend. that’s a lot.

tibetan exiles performing a street play during a protest in new delhi on march 31

THANK YOU DEREK FOR FIXING MY SITE!

and thanks to those who have shown an interest in our whirlwind NYC trip. it was intense and jam packed. i can’t wait to post here and there about it, but work is all up in my grill and i owe it to myself to get all up in work’s grill too. again, thank YOU for reading and commenting!

ps – the olympic torch route has been announced. activists are chomping at the bit to get their groove on. i even saw an ad on the side of the bus today promoting the protest this saturday. things are really heating up. i can feel the molecules in the air starting to sizzle…

our dear city is the only stop in north america for the olympic torch. this is a monumental, historical biggie…with some heavy baggage.

ever since the announcement of china hosting the olympic games, there has been mounting scrutiny of the country’s human rights policies. the recent insanity in tibet has only intensified the frenzy. last month, steven spielberg withdrew from the olympics as artistic adviser, remarking in reference to china’s complicity in sudan’s involvement in darfur: “I find that my conscience will not allow me to continue business as usual…At this point, my time and energy must be spent not on Olympic ceremonies but on doing all I can to help bring an end to the unspeakable crimes against humanity that continue to be committed in Darfur.” the CCP surely lost some face after this media chumming.

back to us: as we all know, SF activists love to rallie passionately for all sorts of things by throwing a hearty protest. with the impending visit of the torch on april 9, they have been clamoring for details about its eight-mile route through the city, and the ACLU has their back. how else can they stage demonstrations without time, coordinates, and other vitals? the mayor, of course, will not divulge for obvious reasons.

some tidbits: responding to china’s latest heavy handed handling of tibet, folks recently set fire to one of the gates at the chinese consulate. nobody was hurt. also, so far it’s been announced that the torch will not make its way through chinatown.

here is just one of many countless articles out there about it.

here, the comments section. below are interesting highlights:

The Chinese killed your dogs, sent lead laced toys to poison your children, stole your jobs, have a mortgage on your children’s future, aid and abet genocide in Darfur, kill, torture and imprison it’s citizens that try to implement democracy, and last but not least invaded the country of Tibet in a blatant colonial land grab, committing cultural genocide while killing thousands. If you don’t have something there to protest there, then you are probably already dead.

I won’t be watching the athletes of the world risk their health in the very polluted air of Beijing, so one might say I am personally boycotting the Beijing Games.

Since I work by Union Square and see the proliferation of Chinese Tourists invading and shopping like there is no tomorrow ,we have to acknowledge the damage that our Current Administration has done in creating the next Super Power

This will be an epic day, as thousands of people with consciences will arrive in SF to protest China, even as the Olympic torch moves on its secret eight mile path through the City. Wouldn’t it be inspiring if one of the people who carries the torch also makes a powerful statement by finding a way to shame China; to make its government lose face?

Every unemployed ,green haired punk, with a dripping nose ring, will be wearing sneakers and clothes made in china,and purchased by their mommy.

Wanna protest China? Then stop buying the cheap, toxic plastic crap they manufacture and that American executives happily put on our store shelves.

This year the torch symbolizes oppression and a lack of human rights.

Gavin better not get too close to the torch lest his hair catch fire.

there needs to be a major protest against the PRC (“mainland” China) on the day in questions. Supporters of Taiwan and Tibet independence need to get out in force and embarrass the hell out of the Chinese fascist government in Peking.

I have a deep respect for the Chinese people and feel bad for them in all this. But having had to watch colleagues face their friends and classmates being shot in Tienamen Square, and many of them then deal with become political exiles for daring to protest it; I can only wish the Chinese government public shame every step of the way through the end of the Olympics.

F the run and tell the Chinese govt they can’t control us like they do with their people.

It’s perfectly reasonable for freedom loving people to want to piss China off over Tibet and other human rights abuses.

I wonder how many protesters are going to be using materials from China to make their banners with.

If the route is publicized then it’s going to be one large protest free-for-all, there’s no question about it. This is not the Chinese New Year parade. It’s impossible for SFPD to cordon-off the entire route unless the torch bearer is surrounded by a police motorcade 100% of the time. This event is going to be such a farce.

Let’s see– Uh-merica: 300 million of the most privileged people in the world. The country that has bombed civilian populations in FORTY-ONE countries since the end of WW2. The country that has slaughtered nearly two million Iraqis since 1990 in an ongoing genocide. The country whose globalist drooling greed has created the evil trade machine that enables terror, slavery and repression all over the world. WAKE UP SWINE! YOU ARE THE MURDERERS, THE SLAVE-DRIVERS, THE DESPOILERS, THE POLLUTERS. Look in the mirror, American, and see the enemy of the world. Oh and your “rights,” your “liberties” your “free-dums?” Wake up! You’ve been giving them away for 25 years now and they’re gone! You wouldn’t know what to do with them anyway. Now shut up, fill your SUV’s tank with blood and head for Walmart. Swine.

I suggest you leave for China or Pakistan or Nigeria and see how you get on there you imbecile. America isn’t perfect but it’s imperfections are a lot smaller than the vast majority of the rest of the world, which is why a large proportion of the rest of the world would love to live here.

..we’ve brought untold misery to an entire region of the world and we are barking at the chinese?

China brutalizes not just Tibetans, but their own people. Yet we’re all happy to drive on down to the Wal Mart and buy lots of Chinese made garbage to fill our empty lives with. Not only should we be boycotting the Olympics, we should be boycotting anything coming from China until China begins to behave with ethics.

I’ll be there protesting tapioca pearls. Those things are a menace.

China doesn’t deserve these games.

CHINA: FREE TIBET – FREE FULAN GONG – STOP HARVESTING ORGANS FROM HEALTHY LIVE PRISONERS – STOP USING PRISONERS TO MAKE CHEAP LEAD TOYS – STOP TORTURING ANYONE WHO DISAGREES WITH YOU – STOP USING EXECUTED PRISONERS FOR ART SHOWS OF CORPSES – STOP PICKING YOUR NOSE – STOP SPITTING – STOP PUSHING AND CUTTING IN LINE – STOP EATING ANYTHING THAT’S ALIVE AND I MEAN ANYTHING—-JOIN THE REST OF HUMANITY

I wish the chinese well, and hope their officials enjoy their olympic event…alone…and that one day the corruption that is so rampant and which feeds on the people’s efforts, falls away like a fattened tick, as it seems to be, and that the feelings of outrage takes measure to see that it never fattens on the suffering of common folk and that it does so in a compassionate way that does not perpetuate the violent revolution we’ve come to both expect and dread.

at the sf international asian american film festival opening night gala a few weeks ago.

i know, i know, it’s old news, but it’s still thrilling!
he was in the VIP area chillin with dan the automator and i couldn’t help but (gently) intrude for a photo opp. he was nice about it. i even managed to squeeze three photos out of it (thanks jason!), my crone claws clutching his arm to make sure he couldn’t escape after the second photo. i am so classless.

when i stumbled upon his GR blog about a year ago, i was curious enough to google him. my “research” led me to conclude that he is utterly fascinating, not to mention…well, uniquely gorgeous. when was the last time you’ve seen a profile like that? when i was in china i kept seeing the same l’oreal commercials featuring this megastar, which must’ve imprinted my psyche or something, because i came back fired up with a healthy obsession.

what i know is that he’s a yay area native (went to head-royce high), went to college in oregon (architect major!), has studied wushu all his life, moved to HK after graduating college to pursue modeling, is supportive of the arts, and is a huge celebrity in HK. i could care less about the celebrity part, but it’s the duality of who he is that blows my mind. if you saw him on the street here (as many did during the run of the festival), you may not suspect he’s a bigtime actor in asia. i really recommend checking out his blog. he writes about his dogs, family, friends, wild turkeys in his parent’s backyard, seeing the cure in concert, unbelievable meals, shooting movies and commercials, incredible travels, and so forth, but in a down-to-earth language both literally and figuratively familiar to us. charming too.

i’m pretty sure i’m not making any sense. but let’s be clear that i’m not just going on a maniacal fan girl rant here. the reasons why i admire daniel wu stem from deeper “issues of identity” (grasping for words from my asian american studies 101 grab bag here) and all that baggage, and not just cuz he’s a pretty face (like chang chen).

at the sold out blood brothers san jose screening on sunday, they called him and put him on speaker phone (held up to the microphone) before the movie started. he spoke of how personally important this movie was because his father grew up in the same era (shanghai 1930s) and told him romanticized stories of the time and place, and how he couldn’t be at the screening because he was celebrating his father’s birthday. he also said that san jose has the best pho (it’s true!).

you gotta love that.

meet the giant chinese salamander. the largest living amphibian, it can get upwards of five, six feet. i love these lil’ guys, or i should say, big guys. i think i saw one in china at the creepy museum of natural history. can’t remember. something about this photo disturbs me, yet it’s a rather cute creature. look at those paws.

have a great weekend. eat lots of chocolate eggs!