I'm not really sure how to even start talking about this. Here: Did you catch this Reuters story today?

That's a link to what a journalist might call a "second-day angle" on a story out of Guangxi province. People there are rioting over too-harsh applications of the One-Child Policy, including, witnesses... more

Quick note to prospective parents (and some folks "enjoying" the long wait times): the fees for filling out I600 & I600A forms are going up. You can read the new fee schedule on this pdf from our beloved Homeland Security office.

I read about this in a ... more

A final note, perhaps, on the toxic China stories that've been all the rage lately.

China has just had their equivalent of our Food and Drug Administration chief sentenced to death. Zheng Xiaoyu was found guilty of accepting over $850,000 (and maybe ... more

I was sure I'd mentioned this before, but I appear not to have. Rob Gifford, a couple of years ago, produced an NPR series following one highway - Route 312, China's answer to Route 66 - across China from the eastern metropolis of Shanghai to the Gobi Desert town of Korgaz on the western border. The trip is all archived here, with pictures and maps, so you can listen to the whole thing,... more

So, yesterday we just had our post-placement. This is the last of our home studies, when a social worker (other than the one to whom I am married) comes and evaluates your family to make sure you're all, like, not going to toss a baby in the crock pot for dinner or something.

(We have been tempted.)

The post-placement gets done at the end of everything, a year after the bundle of joy is plopped in your arms at the Social Welfare Institute or Civil Affairs Office or hotel conference room or wherever and you're wondering, "Is this it? When... more

China and Europe have connections that go back further than you'd think. So what *does* a "Chinese" person look like anyway?

National Geographic brings news of a fellow named Yu Hong found in a 1,400-year-old Chinese tomb.

He was buried there with "a woman of East Asian descent" (my guess, and theirs, would be his wife), but his DNA is different.... more

Item 1: Is Chinese business success based on lucky numbers?

That's what the Wall Street Journal seems to be asking up there. Actually that particular story is mostly about how individual investors make up the bulk of Chinese stock trading, rather than in America, where conglomerates and brokerages take up the biggest slice of the pie.

But it's got a nice chart of Chinese numbers in it, and a nice overview of why it's a good practice to give somebody you like eight of something, and why you won't find a fourth or 14th floor in a lot of tall buildings,... more

Chinese - or, I should say, Mandarin, the official spoken language of China*, has a bad rap as being a Very Difficult Language. I'm not sure this is entirely deserved - after all, more human beings speak it than any other language, and people are more or less the same wherever you go.

It's actually quite simple for most English-speakers to get a few sentences of Mandarin together - enough to a/impress people that you're trying,... more

So, since my last two entries on the subject, the Washington Post follows up with more reporting on toxic China. Or, more properly, reporting on Chinese imports with things in them that shouldn't be.

Last month, 107 shipments of food containing things like pesticides and banned antibiotics got snagged by the FDA, along with over 1,000 shipments of dietary... more

Here is a traveling dream come true: A man named Joff Summerfield is bicycling around the world. Over the past year, he's traveled from London across Europe, into the Middle East, through Australia and New Zealand and has just entered China. On a penny farthing bicycle.

He's also wearing a pith helmet, because... more