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People's Republic of...

a new China blog, on geopolitics, media, tech & culture

May 2007

( Monthly archive )

Cartoon: performing animals

Friday, 4. May 2007, 14:23:03

The Shanghai Wild Animal park, that bastion of politically-incorrect insensitivity and casual animal cruelty and humiliation, has been busy this May holiday, with several new shows and attractions.

One of these is a bicycling bear (a tight-rope motor-cycling bear caused outrage last year at this same 'zoo'), and the other is the option to buy a lil' duckling for 10rmb and feed it alive to a crocodile.

I know that this stuff happens in other countries too, and I also realise that nature is cruel and that far worse things happen in the natural world every minute; but the wild animal park has got to realise that with an influx of visitors for the Olympics next year such performing animals and displays of casual animal cruelty will harm the whole country's reputation.

Still... good for a laugh though. Hence this week's new cartoon. Credit to Flickr user 'mjnewhook' for the image of the duckling with the croc. (2 images, which will load below):

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May holiday sunshine (and crowds)

Thursday, 3. May 2007, 14:22:55

,

May holiday sunshine (so far) has brought the full extent of crowds onto the streets and all forms of public transport.

Having spent May 1st waiting 30 minutes for a bus that never arrived, then wondering the streets for about 20 minutes in search of an available taxi, I can tell you that public holidays are still living up to their fearsome reputation for tainting people's free time.

Nonetheless, myself, and tens of thousands of other people, happened to be at JinJi hu (yes, that's Golden Chicken lake) here in Suzhou. And despite a somewhat hellish journey for most people to even get there (most number 68 buses resembled cattle trucks, with some people's faces scrunched up against the panes of glass as the pressure of about 100 people crammed into the double-decker bus forced new extremes of inter-personal proximity), the sun shone, people bought and flew kites, paddled in pools, canoodled in the shade, rode rented tandems, and generally lazed around in a contented fashion. Here are a few pics:


1 comment

Photos

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  • Cartoon: performing animals

    The Shanghai Wild Animal park, that bastion of politically-incorrect insensitivity and casual animal cruelty and humiliation , has been busy this May holiday, with several new shows and attractions. One of these is a bicycling bear (a tight-rope motor-cycling bear caused outrage last year at this s ...

  • May holiday sunshine (and crowds)

    May holiday sunshine (so far) has brought the full extent of crowds onto the streets and all forms of public transport. Having spent May 1st waiting 30 minutes for a bus that never arrived, then wondering the streets for about 20 minutes in search of an available taxi, I can tell you that public ho ...

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