China Shorts . . . A newsletter by Ray Mahoney

Ray is a friend from my Guiyang history that has been mentioned here many times.  You can find out about Ray, a little bit, by searching “Ray Mahoney” in my search box on this site.  He is now publishing a newsletter called “China Shorts” which is getting increasingly interesting. Hopefully he won’t get this website banned if I put some of his info on here. Here is a sample:

“Ch shorts: “China seals city as its worst virus outbreak in a year grows”; “Asian American Characters On Screen Are More Likely To Be Laughed At Than Laughed With”; video: “Asian Americans Reflect On TV Characters That Shaped Their Self-image”; “Tokyo Olympics: Taiwan stars trolled by Chinese nationalists”; “Harris will reject China’s claim in the South China Sea during trip to Asia”; “Sorry, America: China’s leading the real Olympic medal count”; “Macau to test population after four new COVID-19 cases”; “UAE rolls out Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine to children aged 3-17”; “Germany to offer booster against COVID-19, vaccines for children”; FP Africa Brief: “Ghana doubles down on homophobic laws”; “‘Gold Diggers’ Captures The Weight Of The Model Minority Myth Sanjena Sathian’s riveting debut novel is already being developed into a TV series by Mindy Kaling’s production company”; “The Entire Population of Wuhan is Getting Tested for COVID-19 – More than a year and a half after the . . .”

If you have an interest in his newsletter or if you want more published on this site, please let me know with an email to: My Email Address and I will forward your message appropriately.

Zhurong Mars Lander

This comes from the BBC and is facinating:

China lands its Zhurong rover on Mars

By Jonathan Amos
BBC Science Correspondent

Published
(Animation  Not Available this format)
media captionAn animation shows how the Zhurong rover touched down

China has successfully landed a spacecraft on Mars, state media announced early on Saturday.

The six-wheeled Zhurong robot was targeting Utopia Planitia, a vast terrain in the planet’s northern hemisphere.

The vehicle used a combination of a protective capsule, a parachute and a rocket platform to make the descent.

The successful touchdown is a remarkable achievement, given the difficult nature of the task.

Only the Americans have really mastered landing on Mars until now. All other countries that have tried have either crashed or lost contact soon after reaching the surface.

Chinese President Xi Jinping congratulated the mission team on its “outstanding achievement” in a special message.

“You were brave enough for the challenge, pursued excellence and placed our country in the advanced ranks of planetary exploration,” he said.

Thomas Zurbuchen, the head of science at the US space agency (Nasa), was quick also to add his own congratulations.

“Together with the global science community, I look forward to the important contributions this mission will make to humanity’s understanding of the Red Planet,” he said.

The Russian space agency, Roscosmos, said the success augured well for its future cooperation with China.

Chinese engineersIMAGE COPYRIGHTSHUTTERSTOCK
image captionThe mission team received a congratulatory message from the president

The robot officially landed shortly after 07:00 on Saturday, Beijing time (Friday 23:00 GMT), according to state media.

It took 17 minutes to unfold its solar panels and send a signal back to Earth.

Zhurong, which means God of Fire, was carried to Mars on the Tianwen-1 orbiter, which arrived above the planet in February.

The probe then spent time surveying Utopia, taking high-resolution images to pinpoint the safest place to put the rover down.

The aim with all such ventures is to pick a spot that is devoid of imposing craters and where the landscape isn’t covered in large boulders.

Chinese engineers would have had to follow the landing effort with a time lag.

The current distance to Mars is 320 million km, which means radio messages take almost 18 minutes to reach Earth.

Every stage of the Zhurong robot’s approach to the surface therefore would have been conducted autonomously.

Chinese engineersIMAGE COPYRIGHTSHUTTERSTOCK
image captionEngineers follow events at Mars with a time lag of many minutes

The landing architecture was a familiar one.

The rover was encased in an aeroshell for the initial phase of the nine-minute descent. This capsule’s dive to the surface was slowed by pushing up against the Martian air.

The heat this generated was managed by a forward-facing shield.

At a predetermined time, a parachute opened to reduce the velocity still further.

Finally, the Zhurong robot broke away on a rocket-powered bench for the manoeuvres that took it safely to the ground.

Landing on Mars is always a daunting challenge but China would have had confidence going into the procedure, given the great competence it has shown in its space endeavours of late.

This is a nation that has been putting rovers on the Moon, and bringing lunar samples back to Earth. This month it launched the first segment of a space station above our planet.

Successful landings

Now that Zhurong has got down successfully, scientists will try to get at least 90 Martian days of service out of it, studying the local geology. A day, or Sol, on Mars lasts 24 hours and 39 minutes.

The robot looks a lot like Nasa’s Spirit and Opportunity vehicles from the 2000s. It weighs some 240kg and is powered by fold-out solar panels.

A tall mast carries cameras to take pictures and aid navigation; five additional instruments will investigate the mineralogy of local rocks and the general nature of the environment, including the weather.

Like the American rovers, Zhurong has a laser tool to zap rocks to assess their chemistry and a radar to look for sub-surface water-ice.

Utopia Planitia is where Nasa landed its Viking-2 mission in 1976.

It’s a colossal basin – more than 3,000km across – that was formed by an impact early in Mars’ history.

There is some evidence pointing to it having held an ocean long ago.

Remote sensing by satellites indicates there are significant stores of ice at depth.

Artwork roverIMAGE COPYRIGHTCNSA
image captionArtwork: Zhurong looks similar to Nasa’s Spirit and Opportunity vehicles

Dean Cheng, a research fellow in Chinese political and military affairs at the Washington-based think-tank, The Heritage Foundation, said Saturday’s success would be an enormous fillip to the country.

“From the Chinese perspective, space benefits Chinese diplomacy, Chinese technology; it’s a great advertisement; it reinforces the legitimacy of the Chinese Communist Party to its own people.

“Space always has military implications, and conversely, by going to Mars, it demonstrates that China can contribute to what they term the global pool of human knowledge,” he told BBC News.

America put down its latest rover, Perseverance, in February. Europe, which has twice failed with landing attempts, will send a rover to Mars next year (in a joint project with the Russians).

Six Hole Bridge Part II “From Guiyang With Love”

Guiyang History II: The Six-holed Bridge

Upon me first arriving in Guiyang I often exercised my innate curiosity, trying to ask the locals about names of places and their connection to history. What I usually got as an answer was “it’s just a name, it means nothing” or, “it’s based on the phonetic sound of the characters, they are random”. I assume many people would just give up, but having my academic background and having dealt with similar responses in the past, I knew these were not the right answers. . . .

More History of Guiyang

The Four Horsewomen of the Apocalypse

The Four Horsewomen of PBS News !

Contributed by John S. Porter
Editor/Publisher of TourGuizhou.Com
The Four Horsewomen of the Apocalypse are characterized here as the staff of the PBS News, who, on January 6th were dispatched to the Capital to report on the transition of power, from the Trump Administration to the Biden Administration, the last step. This is a Constitutionally mandated ritual that has been performed about 45 times in the last 240 years. It was considered a dull assignment, where the leaders meet and count the votes from all fifty states, make speeches, and then designate the next President.

It was anything but dull this time. The last time we had this much trouble in Washington DC, was in 1812 when the British burned our capital down. Five people died and dozens of police were injured. There is no accurate number on the total number of people hurt.

CLICK ON THE LINK BELOW FOR SOME REALLY HISTORIC JOURNALISM

WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH TOUR GUIZHOU?? This web log is about foreigners in China, particularly Guizhou Province. Culture Shock indeed “reverse culture shock” is real for those of us who have stayed in China for years at a time.

BACKGROUND: In Western Mythology the “Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse” are famous. These four riders are said to represent  Famine, War, Pestilence, and Death (maybe). We say “Maybe” because the story isn’t entirely clear.  These four were supposedly dropped from a star. We are not sure if they are coming to kill us, warn us, or have come to save us. So we don’t know if they are good or bad. Like with some of our media and some of our Presidents, opinions vary.

These are the women who reported on the insurrection while it was happening.

Upper Left, Clockwise: Omna, Yamish, Lisa, and Judy

Judy was the only one that could see all the camera feeds and she managed the coverage. The others could listen to each other’s audio feeds.

Many of us have watched these four for years and they learned their trade from some very strong female reporters who came before them.  The video of the meeting is about 29 minutes and is really historic journalism. It gives you a flavor of what went on that day.

The 29 minute clip is located online at the following link:

Four journalists and what they saw.

China Covid Update January 29, 2021 (Reported via Waijiao)

Chinese mainland reports 52 new COVID-19 cases (Jan 29, 2021)

TheWaijiao Today

The Chinese mainland on Thursday reported 52 newly confirmed COVID-19 cases, including 36 locally transmitted and 16 arriving from outside the mainland, the National Health Commission said Friday.

Of the locally transmitted cases, 21 were reported in Heilongjiang, 13 in Jilin, and one each in Beijing and Hebei, the commission said in its daily report.

Two suspected cases were reported, with one each in Shanghai and Beijing.

No deaths related to the disease were reported on Thursday, said the commission.

By the end of Thursday, the mainland had reported 4,673 imported COVID-19 cases in total. Among them, 4,373 had been discharged from hospitals following recovery, and 300 remained hospitalized. No deaths had been reported among the imported cases.

The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases on the mainland reached 89,378 by Thursday, including 1,802 patients still receiving treatment, of whom 99 were in severe conditions.

A total of 82,940 patients had been discharged from hospitals following recovery on the mainland, and 4,636 had died of the disease, according to the commission.

There were two suspected COVID-19 cases on the mainland on Thursday, and 38,876 close contacts remained under medical observation.

Thursday saw 42 asymptomatic cases newly reported on the mainland, of which 19 arrived from outside the mainland. On the same day, 12 asymptomatic cases were re-categorized as confirmed cases.

There were 996 asymptomatic cases still under medical observation, of which 293 arrived from outside the mainland.

By the end of Thursday, 10,321 confirmed COVID-19 cases, including 177 deaths, had been reported in Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR), 47 cases in Macao SAR, and 895 cases, including seven deaths, in Taiwan.

A total of 9,239 COVID-19 patients in Hong Kong SAR had been discharged from hospitals following recovery, 46 in Macao SAR, and 809 in Taiwan.

###############

For comparison purposes, here is a chart on daily infections at about the same time in the USA.  Note that China has a population about four times as great as the USA.

China engages in extraordinary lockdown/quarantines for the neighborhoods when there is an outbreak.  Contact tracing is assisted by cell phone self-reporting whenever pubic transportation is used. In order to board any kind of public transit, a scan of the cell phone is required.  People from risky geographical areas are often refused permission to board public transit.  Wearing of masks was extrensive in February, March, and April, but in many parts of the country mask wearing is now only enforced in public transit..

https://covidtracking.com/data/charts/us-daily-positive

Link for interactive chart.

COVID Status China 20201226 as reported by “The Waijiao”

The following is a status update published on “The Waijiao” a foreigner related blog serving foreign teachers in China at www.thewaijiao.com:
#####

The Chinese mainland on Friday reported 20 newly confirmed COVID-19 cases, including eight locally transmitted cases and 12 arriving from outside the mainland, the National Health Commission said Saturday.

Six of the locally transmitted cases were reported in northeast China’s Liaoning Province, while two were reported in Beijing, the commission said in its daily report.

No new suspected cases or deaths related to the disease were reported Friday.

Twelve COVID-19 patients on the Chinese mainland were discharged from hospitals following recovery on Friday.

By the end of Friday, a total of 4,193 imported cases had been reported on the mainland. Among them, 3,919 had been discharged from hospitals following recovery, and 274 remained hospitalized. No deaths had been reported among the imported cases.

The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases on the mainland reached 86,933 by Friday, including 328 patients still receiving treatment.

A total of 81,971 patients had been discharged following recovery on the mainland, and 4,634 had died as a result of the virus, according to the commission.

There were no suspected COVID-19 cases on the mainland on Friday, and 12,055 close contacts remained under medical observation.

Friday saw 19 asymptomatic cases newly reported, 17 of whom arrived from outside the mainland. No asymptomatic case was re-categorized as a confirmed case.

A total of 245 asymptomatic cases were under medical observation, of whom 202 arrived from outside the mainland.

By the end of Friday, 8,481 confirmed COVID-19 cases, including 136 deaths, had been reported in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR), 46 cases in the Macao SAR, and 780 cases, including seven deaths, in Taiwan.

A total of 7,317 COVID-19 patients in the Hong Kong SAR had been discharged from hospitals following recovery, 46 in the Macao SAR, and 640 in Taiwan.

Wudang Garage Sale Update – The Result

Self Portrait

Self portrait in my Salvation Army garb on break from my bell ringing duties.

[This post has been edited about 32 times in the past two months. ]

“Thank you for being here.” I kept being told.  It touched me. It was quite a trek to arrive in front of Oleson’s East grocery store in East Bay Township of Traverse City. That grocery store is across the street from the Township Hall where I was Supervisor for twelve years (80-92). We built that new hall and put a district library branch in the old one in the late 80s.  So it was like a big 30 year circle, participating as an elected official, then getting into private business, going to China ten years later, politics to real estate, then technology, then teaching in China, back and forth to the USA. I made up my mind to live in China, a semi-retired condition, blogging and tutoring the kids . It was a little later the pandemic hit, and I got kicked out of China. I also lost the room I had been renting for ten years due to pandemic fears. I came close to homeless 3 days before arrival “home”. I ended up staying in a vacant office, landing on the 24th of October. I am safe for now. Honestly, is anybody totally safe in the pandemic? I have been ringing the Salvation Army bell, raising money for them and myself ($10/hr.) at the same time.

More details of my experience with the COVID and China can be found at:
China COVID Memories

It was Tuesday, October 27 and I was newly back in the USA. China had ejected me abruptly and the hasty garage sale was over (see Garage Sale) It was almost a complete loss to me. Literally thousands of RMB (Chinese Dollars) were left in Guiyang in the apartment that I abandoned.  The “garage sale” wasn’t successful.  In fact, Guiyang People are still very cautious about moving around the city. Mainly, they don’t like to travel, but also they are afraid of getting out in public during a virus period. Even though Guizhou Province hasn’t recorded a locally transmitted virus since late March, everybody is still on their guard. People just don’t want to mix with strangers. Statistics, flawed as they may be, still indicate that COVID 19 is a threat to China, despite it’s success in containment.

I found the culture in my home town (Traverse City, MI)  to be very weird. It is almost as if people have given up. Just in the last six weeks, more masks have appeared. People seem to appreciate the danger more now, but still too many people take too many risks. Perhaps they are just resigned to the danger and just hope they survive. There was too much bad information early in the pandemic. An established culture is hard to change. Perhaps the Trump plan could still work out in the next four weeks, but I think we need a change in culture.

It seems such a shame because the mask is so easy to wear. I understand that rather than being scared all the time, some Americans have the attitude almost like “I can handle this and I’ll take my chances.”  Our Governor closed restaurants and bars, but kept the gyms open. Yesterday morning I went to a health club. Since most customers are young, they do not seem to worry (except maybe me).  I may be a bit foolish, but I kept the mask on, went early, and tried to maintain social distancing. . The pandemic was accelerating as of 11/17/2020. The restaurants and bars were closed. You could eat outdoors, but it was freezing most of the day. J&S Hamburger opened a tent and I was able to get my first real hamburger since being back in the States. In the tent it was breezy. I felt that between the wind and my Chinese N95 type mask, I felt relatively safe.

In Guiyang I moved around the city during a peak infection, but kept my sense and awareness. I didn’t catch anything. Here in the USA I study this culture and feel that promoting the discussion virus seems important. I try to see how this has gotten so out of hand. From what I have seen, it looks like the tourists and young people are driving this pandemic at this point. The tourists have pandemic fatigue, and this Trump led anti-mask culture has been major. Hopefully Biden messaging can help reverse this cultural direction.  Trump seems so foolish to me, but people still seem to follow him . . . especially the Republicans.

My Russian friend describes something similar us in Russia.  Mask rules are all around, but many are exposing the nose, maybe obeying the rules, but really missing the point of filtering the air.  It is an obstinance of not obeying the government because you don’t trust them. Perhaps you don’t like them. I suspect that a very significant part of this outbreak is driven by mistrust of the government and people disobeying even the simplest rules . . . just because they disagree. Maybe this applies to Russia and the USA.

Culture is so important. In China there was a very pro-government tone to everything. It was China against the evil virus.  Culture is very different in the USA. I was wearing my USA Flag T-shirt and an open jacket in the grocery store and the check-out lady went off on me. She talked about about how great Trump was and how patriotic we should all be.  So I didn’t pick up on it, but Trump doesn’t wear a mask most of the time. I think  that much of the potential of universal mask wearing is lost because it isn’t considered patriotic. So there are billions of virus particles circulating from those that refuse to wear masks. As the Chinese say, one small mouse turd can ruin the soup. (kind of like one rotten apple). If one person doesn’t wear a mask and he happens to be a super spreader, that is the result.

A simple example of how culture influences other people hit me in late February in Guiyang. I was shopping for veggies in the local market and I picked up a tomato to put it in the plastic bag. Now I had been wearing a mask religiously for almost a month. I couldn’t get the plastic bag open because my fingers were too dry. I looked both ways and then pulled my mask down. I then  touched my finger to my tongue. Then I could open the bag easily, but I immediately thought, “Oh my God! Am I gonna die now?”  I had contaminated my tongue. Everybody was saying “Wear the mask. Wear the mask. Wear the mask.” It is the peer group pressure and the culture of the place that was the bigger factor, not the logic of trying to avoid the virus. I looked around and when nobody was looking, When I thought the peer group wasn’t looking, I did the unthinkable. The power of the peer group (when it wasn’t watching) was more powerful than the simple logic of wanting to stay alive. The Republican peer group pressure has indeed been powerful in the USA,  overwhelming the logic of protecting each other with by wearing masks.

In my opinion, we need to change the culture in the USA. It isn’t about government leaders or policies so much as generating a positive culture. We all have the ability to change our culture every day. Don’t put that on the “politicians”. So perhaps the key to survival is a positive relationship, teamwork if you will, between each other and with our respective governments. Just be nice and supportive and it will change a culture. We all have that power, whether Chinese or American, or the world for that matter.

###### 12//20/2020
[ THE PRIOR PARAGRAPHS WERE LARGELY WRITTEN IN THE SIX WEEKS AFTER OCTOBER 29, 2020 ]

So that was the post from a month ago. As of today, the Sunday before Christmas, not so much has changed.  The “third wave” is real and more people believe it now. I am bell ringing for the Salvation Army now.  I just learned that my good college friend (70 year old Ken) has COVID. After two weeks of almost constant pain and bed time, he seems to have turned the corner. Hopefully his “after virus” ailments will be minimal.

It seems impossible to get into a discussion with an American about the election and the two political parties.  Somebody almost always interrupts you or disagrees with you, often in a hostile way and sometimes aggressively. Most people simply tune out after 30 seconds and say “I don’t want to talk about this”.  It just proves to me how successfully foreign governments and malice domestic have taken their toll on the American Spirit. It seems certain to me that when you have the country divided into roughly thirds: Dem, Rep, and Indy, that nothing good can happen. Democracy depends on consensus of representatives to secure legislation and respect for the executive authority in administration of the law. This process of government has been in force for well over 200 years in the USA, and it is enforced by  the authority of our court system. I see a much different culture (in both parties) today. In several respects the people in the two major political parties are almost identical. . .

THEY expect you to agree with THEM on all points or you are against THEM.
THEY are so sick of this subject THEY don’t want to discuss it.
THEY all agree it is somebody else’s responsibility for the troubles.
THEY don’t see the necessity of any change in their own behavior or attitudes.
THEY think somebody could get us back to “normal” if they just did the right thing.
THEY don’t see our future as dependent on a successful political system (POLITICS).
THEY don’t value good deeds or behavior in themselves but expect both from others.

So in answer to the friends that are worried about how I am doing, I can offer you the following: I have a little part time work as a Salvation Army Bell Ringer; have temporary housing; I wear a mask whenever I am near people; and I am probably OK. I seem to be suffering from some kind of reverse culture shock. It is either that, or I landed in some weird parallel universe and I haven’t found  the portal door (rabbit hole) that I came through to get here. . .

I often  think about my life in China and how much I enjoyed the people, scenery and the rich experiences.  Of course I don’t want to stay where I am not wanted and even though I have four years left on my ten year visa, I was required to leave China.  As an American I wasn’t allowed to cross the border anymore. This happened not long after Chinese students and many Chinese Nationals, with visas, were told they were no longer welcome in the USA. Perhaps there is a connection. I don’t blame them. I have been working with Chinese, for close to thirty years and have no ill feelings toward them or their culture. I have learned a lot. So I thought that living in China for fifteen years and working with their students and their projects might protect me a bit from the ill will that was building between China and the USA. For many years the two governments believed that working together was the key to prosperity for both countries. I helped the Oakland University China initiatives from the nineties onward. I visited China as a volunteer teacher in 2000. Oakland University’s Summer Institute has existed for 30 years and over that time they have probably trained 3000 middle school teachers in English. I crossed the Chinese border a good fifty times over the ensuing 20 years. These contacts share culture, friendship, and promote peace.  I published a blog about some of those experiences at www.tourguizhou.com. I hope the respective governments can find a way to work together in the future. What is happening now isn’t particularly helpful in my opinion.

It all starts and ends through the governments and I hope our leaders will be wise enough to restore conditions for sharing culture, working, and playing together in the future. If we learn to work and play together, sharing culture along the way, maybe we won’t have to fight each other like so many other countries with ambitious leadership.

When Nixon and Mao met to set up this cooperation, it was reported that Nixon said to Mao that “Our countries aren’t getting along right now”.  Mao was reported to have replied, “No. You and I aren’t getting along and our people are suffering.” I am starting a blog called “www.jaxteaparty.org” and I plan to work on this ambitious government problem in the USA. Maybe people and donors will come forward to help. My friends aren’t optimistic. I am a bit pumped up by the people who came up to me to put money in my SA Kettle. A lot of people said the same thing that one of my first donors said . . . “Thank you for being here.” Frankly, at nearly 70 years old, I am happy to be anywhere right now.

I had other options rather than coming back to the USA. Many people have asked me why I didn’t just go to a tropical climate to kick back, where COVID is controlled, —  the small tropical islands, or someplace in Southern Asia. No matter where you live, you consume the world’s resources. This is an important time in the USA. I had to come back. I am just not ready to stop contributing and not be productive. I like writing and teaching.

Why Teaching? Because its fun.

Practice Your English!

The 500

I’m afraid that my teaching days are over. We have a real bad problem in this world. Because I am deemed old, my work isn’t valued. Perhaps all that is left of my teaching is some writing. There are a lot of us old people that have a lot to give, and this resource is being wasted.

If you want these kinds of resources to be penned by me, you can support that effort through a donation to support this blog or the future.

 All help is appreciated during this difficult period:
Support this Blog