Olympic Park, Beijing

Today, I has mostly been eating…

煎饼果子 (jian1 bing3 guo3zi)

With quite a long history, “jian bing guo zi” is something quite unique to Tianjin. It is a kind of Chinese pancake that is usually sold as a fast breakfast food on the streets. “Guo zi” refers to the deep-fried dough sticks made in some places in northern China. Prepared on stalls on the street it comes with a variety of garnishes and relishes – very tasty.

They cost 4RMB.

for the longer HD youtube version click here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SSqIJuQSzsM

China wants democracy | The Sun |News

http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2005410270,00.html

https://www.thesun.co.uk

From the page:

“TONY Blair’s mission to Asia was boosted last night when China’s premier Wen Jiabao vowed his country WILL become a democracy.

Mr Blair was visibly shocked when Wen publicly promised the world’s largest country is heading for a peaceful revolution.

The Chinese PM said free votes for all in the communist superpower are on their way.

British diplomats believe his comments are a ‘significant’ step forward.”

I traced the article back to Reuters.

We live in interesting times.

“whether soar-away Sun or BBC1, disinformation is a weapon of mass destruction”

Anti-China ranting site (is no more)

http://www.boycott-china.com/

Appealing to to the lowest common denominator. What about Russian and French nuclear weapons? Are you going to stop buying their goods too?

– Luckily this “hate site” is no longer working (Oct 2006)

Update 2022: Interesting to note how perceptions of China have changed since 2005. Back then China was very much in its ‘bide your time, hide your strength’ phase. Nowadays however, with the c current core-leadership this is no longer true and the wolf warriors are more to the fore.

To be honest it is very difficult to find information that is balanced on this matter. Rana Mitter writes some good stuff that makes sense though. I’d recommend you start with him.

For nice pics of China and other stuff check out the China category.