Welmer

Now that gender equality in terms of income has been achieved in the younger generation, and educationally women currently surpass men, most of us ordinary men find ourselves staring irrelevance straight in the face. A friend of mine recently observed that women are “taking over” his department at his former company. Except in specialized occupations [...]

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The vast territory of China encompasses many different lifestyles, cultures, nations and even races. Even within the prevailing Han ethnic group there are differences at least as important as those between the various Romance countries of Europe. The lowland farmers of the Yellow River basin are distinct from those of the Yangtze, who are different [...]

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I came across an essay titled "Politics and the English Language" a few days ago and read it before going to bed. It was written by Orwell in 1946, and remains relevant today. However, the examples he uses to make his point that indirect, vague and obfuscating prose has a real influence on our thought [...]

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Only an elite few are familiar with the exquisite pain that is gout, that "disease of kings" that strikes in the wee hours like a thief in the night, leaving its victim howling and cursing as he hops on one foot or hobbles to the medicine cabinet for a dose of painkillers.
Podagra, the most common [...]

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Below the pale sky on the sands of a gray beach the children played, barefoot and happy in their children’s world, plunging their little hands into the wet sand, chasing the water then running from the waves as they splashed ashore. They took little notice of the man watching them from the grassy bank at [...]

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China in the late ’90s was in the early process of opening itself up to the rest of the world. Decades of isolationist policy were just starting to give way to engagement with the world — economically, politically and culturally. In this climate, more and more outsiders – known as laowai to Chinese – were [...]

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The years have pushed on since I lived in Beijing, so for better or worse, I think it’s time to write down some of the history of the city when I lived there in the late 1990s.
I lived in NE Beijing, on top of an old cemetery near sihuanlu (fourth-ring road) — a location considered [...]

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An urban scene in contemporary China, by Yan Yong (click on photo for gallery site)
Judging from most modern and public art, skill and beauty are foreign concepts to Americans. The statues cities put up and the paintings displayed in museums seem almost as though they were designed to puzzle or disgust people rather than inspire [...]

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Until I had kids I didn’t really think much about the issue of homosexuality. It seemed a bit odd, but not all that important. Things changed when I realized what a big issue it has become in schools, and then it started to bother me. Not only the political aspects of homosexuality, but the fact [...]

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