Chinese Guy Bitten by Panda, Again

Yet again, someone decided to jump a fence and enter a panda's enclosure here in the PRC, and yet again, said fool has been mauled. This time it wasn't a drunk, and it wasn't a dopey teenager. This time it wan't GuGu, twice-headlining panda in Beijing news stories.


This time, panda YangYang took a bite out of the crime of stupidity, and an uncounted number of bites out of a college student surnamed Liu. (Though a few articles have tried to categorize the twenty-year-old Liu as a "teen," such whitewashing isn't saving anyone any face.) Whatever Liu's major might be, it surely isn't logic, or press relations: asked for explanation (as to just what sort of person thinks jumping into a pen with a bear is a good idea), Liu said, "YangYang was so cute, and I just wanted to cuddle him."


Asked for comment, YangYang informed reporters that the attack should be considered as "a sort of commentary on the failings of a college system whose requirements are simply too lenient." He went on to lament the "apparent inability of some of the nation's top graduates to generalize experiences."


Liu's blunder comes at a particularly embarrassing time for wildlife officials, whose recent ad campaigns--aimed at giving pandas a harder edge--have apparently failed.

Sugar, Spice and Everything Nice (Like Salt and Margarine)

I've been getting exposure to quite a few strange tastes in the past few weeks, some of them pleasant surprises, some of them familiar shocks that I'd almost been able to forget from last year.

Returning from his summer trip to Malaysia and other parts, Nersey brought me back a tin of Malaysian-style coffee, with the warning that the first cup might take some getting used to. The tin lists the ingredients as "Coffee (70%) Salt, sugar, and margarine (30%)," and I'll leave it up to coffee experts to explain just what they do with the last three ingredients. (Wiki has this to say about it.) Strange as margarine and salt coffee sounds, the result of brewing (I used my regular perculator instead of a sock) is ... well, the first few cups take some getting used to. The coffee turns out thick and black, and there is a strange aftertaste, which (maybe suggested by the ingredient list on the tin) I'd describe as buttery. By my third pot, I'd cut back on the amount of grounds I used for each pot, and really, the coffee is pretty good. I don't think I'll ever convert from, say, Sumatra Mandheling to this Malaysian variation, but I won't turn down the offer of another cup. (In fact, I'm considering a trip to Malacca during my upcoming vacation time.)

中秋天节 (Zhong qiutian jie, Mid-Autumn festival) was Sunday. This is a traditional Chinese holiday, among the country's most important, during which people take a day of work to spend time with family, eat and gaze at the moon. (Nowadays, moon-gazing has been largely replaced by staring at the television set, as with 春节--Chun jie, Spring Festival.) The moon plays a big part in the 中秋天节 festivities in the form of 月饼 (yue bing, moon cakes). These saccharine, moist and sticky little cakes come with a number of surprise fillings (traditionally, lotus paste, bean paste, jujube paste, yam--of the purple potato-tasting variety--and hard-boiled egg yolk). Most of the fillings have chalky textures, apparently chosen to offset the jelly-like texture of the surrounding, and tastes chosen to offset the sickeningly sweet exteriors. So what you wind up getting inside the mooncake wrapper is the long-lasting and low-tech equivalent of an ipecac-filled chocolate.

What you also get for 中秋天节, if you're unfortunate enough to be a teacher, is a whole lot of moon cakes, usually from children with very fragile egos. This year I got two big, big boxes of moon cakes, one from the grandfather of a serious trouble student (It is my assumption that this gift box was a poorly thought-out apology) and another from the parents of a teenaged student who has been a VIP on and off for the past year. The boxes are flashy, gold and red affairs, ornately decorated and weighing in at about ten to fifteen pounds apiece, while only holding a few moon cakes each. (They're also expensive as all get out, adding a large helping of guilt to the honor of the gift.) I also got single moon cakes from quite a few students who, not content with my most heart-felt thanks, insisted I have a try, so I downed four of the gross little things on Saturday, trying my best to smile. In another week, the experts tell me, I may have finished digesting them. Anyone who thinks my assessment of this traditional food may be a bit harsh should check out an oldie from the blog scene: Noboby Likes Moon Cakes.

In other news, I have discovered Hunan and 客家 Kejia food, both of which now join Sichuan, Xian and Xinjiang food, on my list of 好吃. From Hunan, 红烧肉 (hong shao rou), thick hunks of pork and some small vegetables in a rich red sauce and 农家炒肉 (nongjia chao rou, Farmer's home fried meat), little strips of pork cooked in a heaping helping of edible spicy peppers have become part of my regular routine. I've had a certain kind of tofu a number of times while in China--a yellow, eggy tofu rectangle with a small piece of sausage in the center; it turns out this is 客家豆腐, Kejia or Hakka tofu. The dish tastes a bit like the egg and sausage casserole my family makes for 圣诞节 (Shendanjie, Christmas), and has made for a nice brunch-time treat on my days off. If the self-styled Guangdong/Hakka women I met on Sunday is right, and Hakka should be counted as Guangdong people, then I guess there is such a thing as good Guangdong food.

Trust Us. We Know What We're Doing.

Checking out of my old apartment turned out to be more of a pain in the neck than finding a new one. Because my former landlord was apparently a busy man, he'd long ago turned all the actual rent issues over to a real estate company, with whom I'd had at least one prior problem.

This meant that my deposit--a whopping two months' rent--was in the hands of the real estate company, rather than those of my landlord. Before you get your deposit money back, any outstanding bills have to be resolved, and an inventory of the apartment has to be done (in my case, to be sure that a cagey 外国人 doesn't make off with some poor sap's TV). After two hours of looking over the place, the real estate agents conceded that I hadn't stolen or damaged anything, and the landlord had not only agreed but also pointed out that I'd actually fixed a few things up, putting the place into better order than it had been when I moved in.

I asked whether we should go to the real estate office then to take care of my deposit. "在这里我们没有钱。 我们的福田办公室有钱。 你请给我们你的合同和你的发票，还有我们的福田(什么）五天后(什么) 你钱." (Zai zheli women meiyou qian. Womende Futian bangongshi you qian. Ni qing gei women nide hetong he nide fa piao, haiyou womende Futian (shenme) wu tian hou (shenme) ni qian.--We don't have money here. Our office in Futian has money. Please give us your contract and your receipts, and in five days our Futian (something) will (something) you money.

I responded, “你们先给我钱，就我给你我的发票." (Nimen xian gei wo qian, jiu wo gei ni wode fapiao.--Give me then money first, then I'll give you my receipt.) Then the agent did the one thing that always tells me I'm about to be screwed over by someone; he said, in English, "Trust us. We know what we're doing. This is process, always process." I told him I didn't much care about the process, pointing out that once I handed over all my receipts and my contract I had nothing left to indicate his company owed me money. Even my landlord said I shouldn't hand over my contract or receipts until after I'd been paid. "This is not a confident matter. We just want to help." I told him he could help me by writing down the address of their Futian office and letting them know that I'd be coming to collect my money at my earliest convenience, so they'd better get ready.

The next day, I got a message from the company, asking for my fax number. I sent them the school's number, and they faxed me an invoice detailing what they thought I was owed as a return of my deposit. Unfortunately, they'd listed one month's rent as unpaid (which was bunk), bringing my refund down significantly to about nothing. One of my coworkers called and cussed them out over the phone, and then they sent another fax, this one indicating that I was owed more money. They then began calling the school, asking me to sign and date the invoice and fax it back to them so that they could prepare my money.

I asked a coworker whether the invoice clearly stated I was owed money or whether my signing might indicate I'd been paid money. The invoice stated neither. Again, my coworker called and cussed the company out.

The next week, at my earliest convenience, I made a trip to Futian and visited the company's main office. When they asked what I wanted I showed them the invoice, and they immediately said, "你需要去那个南山办公室." (Ni xuyao qu nage Nanshan bangongshi.--You have to go to that Nanshan office.) I told them that, since the Nanshan office had told me to come to the Futian office, I was there, and I planned on getting my money.

“如果我需要再去南山，就我先要去给公安说话." (Ruguo wo xuyao zai qu Nanshan, jiu wo xian yao qu gei gongan shuo hua.--If I have to go to Nanshan again, then I'll go to the police to talk first.)

Then the woman quickly went back to get my money.

Back Online in a New Place

It's been a good while since I put up a post, mostly because I've been busy. (It's a funny thing how when interesting things are happening, it's harder to find time to write them down, while when nothing's happening, I've all the spare time I could use.)

In recent weeks, I've changed apartments, which has eaten up most of my free time. Just looking for an apartment in Shenzhen is one of the worst experiences anyone can live through, and it's getting more expensive. (Oddly, while the real estate market is consistently going down in Guangdong, the asking prices for rent are rising. The explanation I've been given is that if fewer people are buying homes, then it must be because they're waiting for prices to go down even lower, and if they're not buying, they must be renting; therefore, raise the rent.)

On the bright side, the real estate agents in town seem to be getting a little better about showing people to apartments. The first agent I contacted actually showed me more than ten places on our first day of hunting, and she called back the next day, eager to show me more places. Perhaps the closing of many real estate offices has led to an increase in customer service and competitiveness: See last year's apartment shopping stories below. At the end of the first day, though, she did tell me, "我们今天看了那么多房子。 如果你不买一家，就我会哭!" (Women jintian kanle name duo fangzi. Ruguo ni bu mai yi jia, jiu wo hui ku! "We've seen so many apartments today. If you don't buy one, I'll cry!")

Overall, the apartment shopping was almost fun at first. I got to practice my Chinese a lot, and I got some good exercise. After a few hours, though, the whole process started to wear thin. Bathrooms in most places were too small, or had squatters. We saw at least a dozen huge apartments with no furniture. Many of the apartment owners didn't even bother to clean the places before trying to find new tenants (in two cases, families totalling more than ten people were still in residence), so bonuses like air conditioners or refrigerators were unseen behind piles of of clothes, knick-knacks or packing boxes.

In the end, I finally found a decent place where the landlord seems to understand investing a little bit of money into an apartment raises the value. The place I have now has a smaller living room, bathroom and kitchen than my previous apartment did, but these are all large enough to be comfortable. (And, really, I never got much use out of the massive sofa I had in my former apartment.) The bedroom is larger, so I'll probably end up putting in a desk for my computer--I may even get an Internet connection...maybe. My rent is about 200 元 per month cheaper, and I can walk to school, which doesn't save that much money but does cut down on the number of smelly, dirty, loud, or otherwise offensive people I have to sit next to in a day.

Probably the biggest improvement is my balcony: large enough for a patio table (metal and glass, with an umbrella) and four chairs. Since my living room is smaller now, I may not be able to host as many people at one time, but with the patio set-up, I'll probably be able to do a lot more barbequing a lot more comfortably than I used to. The balcony's cooler at my new place, too, and more private (meaning I'm looking out over rooftops instead of at a wall of other apartments), so I've been spending a lot more time there.

It took me about three days to move all my things, and about four trips in cabs. Then I got to go through the process of closing out my contract for the old apartment, a pain I'd been warned about before, which ended up being worse than I expected. (No matter how much the service may improve when it comes to getting you into an apartment, there's been no decrease in the size of the hassles you face when you leave.) Next post I'll be sure to write something about the little scam artists in my old real estate agency.

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Six Days in Nanshan: Day Two
Originally posted: 07:33, 2007-08-27

After a slow breakfast and some reading, I left the Hai Tao and got a cab to the Hai Wan hotel, where it turned out no rooms were available. I wound up at another hotel whose name I couldn't discern, unless it was actually "The Vienna Group," which is under the same management as the Hai Wan.

Where the Hai Tao had been well above my price range for the long term, this second hotel closer to the cost for renting. Besides, this hotel room provided me with much better motivation to get out and find an apartment. A bit darker and older, this room was a nice enough place to sleep and shower, but not the kind of place you'd want to kill time in.

I met with Nersey and his mother-in-law to go apartment hunting and ran smack dab into the Shenzhen business model for real estate. Set up an appointment to see places with a company, and you find out they only begin looking through listings (mostly above your price range) after you've arrived. Ask to see one of the places in your price range taped to the agency's window, and you're told it's too far away or that a much pricier one is more "beautiful." Beauty >Space+Cost is apparently the basic formula in determining desirability in housing here. After hours with the first agency, we got to see two apartments: in one the bathroom was simply too small; in the other the bathroom would have been large enough had it not also been the laundry (with a washing machine plunked right in its center). I learned the phrase "Ce suo tai xiao le" quite quickly and had a good deal of fun sitting on the washing machine, pantomiming scrubbing my feet and back.

We parted ways with the real estate folk and had lunch at Hasio, then rested a while. Later Nersey and I went out walking, collecting mingpien, and trying to get to see apartments. We managed to get a look at a little loft-style place that was really quite nice (or would have been, were it not for the garden gnome-sized bathroom), and later met with an English-speaking agent called "Apple," who almost took us to see the same loft we'd already seen. After a visit back to her office, she was able to show us an unfurnished apartment in one of the Time buildings; the owner raised the rent by 300 kuai per month as soon as we entered, and it just wasn't worth it without the furnishings.

I had dinner with Nersey and his family, and his wife made a few phone calls to agents that night, asking them not to bother calling unless they had a few apartments to show instead of just one. I wasn't waiting with bated breath while I returned to the hotel.

****On a side note, in real time I have had my first corporate class tonight. For now, I'm teaching English training at a big computer company on Monday and Tuesday nights. The class went quite well from my point of view. The students are talkative, have good senses of humor when it comes to success or mistakes in English, and seem to be very much invested in improving their English. Even better, their English is already quite good, so it's largely a matter of lowering their inhibitions about speaking. In true Chinese fashion, I'll probably have to wait a week or so to see if the class went well for them, but tomorrow I have the chance to talk less (since I don't have to do the whole spiel about my credentials) and lean on the curriculum now that I know how far they've gotten in it. Hopefully, things will continue going well, and I won't wind up with the same fate as their last teacher, who apparently forgot to let them speak now and then.

Six Days in Nanshan: Day Three
Originally posted: 08:22, 2007-08-29

For the second day in a row, I had a breakfast pass, though this meal turned out more disappointing than the previous day's: no good meat, no fruit, just a thoroughly Chinese breakfast--various steamed bread objects and congee. The only things I recognized as baozi were stuffed with zhu (pig) something, and that something wasn't rou (meat), whatever part of the pig it was. In the end I got a tray of jidan (egg) buns that were light and moist to look at, but dry and chewy to eat. Coffee, it turned out, wasn't part of the breakfast pass, so the disappointment cost me 50 RMB; live and learn, no such thing as another free meal.

Nersey and I started apartment hunting again, this time with an agent who, while not seeming to get the point of looking at many apartments, was at least willing to try. Such people help you appreciate China's sense of service, even after others have robbed you of hope. After seeing two lackluster places in the immediate area, we took a longer walk out toward the local Walmart to the NewEra building. There I got to see the first apartment in my price range that I could imagine living in. Though small, it used space very economically, allowing a good amount of space in the kitchen and bathroom. Alongside the mainroom was a sheltered balcony-cum-laundry, and the main room itself was built on a sort of open concept design; a half-wall of silhouette shelves divided the main space mentally into a sitting room and bedroom, with a curtain hung on the bed side to create actual privacy. It was a cozy little place, well furnished and decorated in a style John Waters would have loved--nice '60s and '70s colors and a sofa whose camp value alone justified a good part of the rent.

For some reason the owner felt it very important that a Chinese lantern be hung from the curtain rod while we were there looking. Since I couldn't follow the Chinese being spoken, I'm not sure whether she was just taking advantage of having people taller than herself in the apartment or whether she thought the lantern really filled out the whole overall style of the place. I put the apartment in the category of "very strong maybe" and said I'd contact the agent if I was still interested after seeing a few more places.

Nersey and I went back to his place to have lunch and a rest. Since his knee was giving him a lot of pain, his mother-in-law gave him a Chinese medical treatment; this is a massage that looks quite painful--consisting largely of loud beating and vigorous stretching of the leg--but I'm told it's actually very relaxing.

Later we saw a few more places, all disappointing. The worst was over the Eastern Athens Hotel, a cramped little space with a bathroom so Lilliputian that, were I able to sit on the training-sized toilet, my knees would jut out into the entryway and showers would have to be taken in just such a posture. The NewEra apartment was looking better and better. I got back to the hotel figuring I had at least one good option if the next day turned out to be a bust.

Six Days in Nanshan: Day Four
Originally posted: 07:53, 2007-08-30

I skipped breakfast at the hotel, opting instead for a walk around the area and some vegetable baozi with a canned coffee; all told, this ran me just five kuai. Nersey begged out of the apartment hunting, as his knee was still acting up, so I set out with two agents and a little English to one of the Time buildings and saw two apartments.

The first was a spacious room with a large kitchen, large bathroom and good-sized bedroom set off of it. It had lots of storage space, one large balcony and a second balcony for the washing machine and complete furnishings, all new or in good shape. (This is actually the apartment I wound up renting.) Next I saw a place in the same building, offered by the same owners, for the same price; this second place was smaller, on a lower floor (which Chinese apparently like less) had no washing machine or refrigerator and only one air conditioner set in the place of the least possible usefulness. "Yi yang, danshi meiyou, meiyou, meiyou . . . wo bu dong," I said to the real estate agent: "The same (price, I hoped, was understood), but doesn't have, doesn't have, doesn't have . . . I don't understand." He shrugged, nodded, smiled; I think maybe he got the joke.

I managed to get across that I really liked the first place, but that I'd need to wait for my Zhongguo pengyou (Chinese friend) before I could settle anything. While I was waiting for Nersey's wife to get home, I went out with another agent from another agency. She was able to show me a once-nice apartment whose current resident looked like he was preparing for the lead role in a cinematic version of Kafka's The Hunger Artist and who had done a good job of starting the apartment's decline into utter squalor; all that was missing was a boarded over window and maybe a graffitoed RIP for someone named Tiny or Boo. Then she showed me an absolutely beautiful room in the same building (with enough furnishings and details--such as a forty-two inch plasma TV--to make up about a year's salary for me) that just exceeded my price range by, oh, half of my monthly salary or so.

After Nersey's wife came home, we had dinner, and then a storm broke out, during which Nersey's mother-in-law taught me shandian (lightning), leisheng (thunder), and that you shouldn't touch a shu (tree) during a thunderstorm, though I think tree is actually shumu. We decided against going to look at more apartments, and I settled myself on the apartment I'd seen that morning.

We walked down to the agency, but it was closed for a business function; she phoned the agent, and he and his partner came rushing back to the office just to explain to us that the landlord was currently out of town, so the apartment couldn't be rented yet. After a bunch of talk (among the Chinese) and some confusion (on my part), we managed to set up a meeting for the next morning, but only after I'd paid a deposit--not the apartment deposit, but an agency deposit; I'm not sure why. (Perhaps arranging to sign for an apartment and then not showing up is the Chinese equivalent of knocking on someone's door and running away.)

好吃:Hao Chi

Since I've been asked recently about what foods from home I miss the most here in China, I figured I'd mention a bit about the dining and snacking situation in China.

I eat out for nearly every meal here: restaurants are so cheap that it costs about the same for me to cook at home as it does to eat out, and the Chinese food I can buy in a restaurant is much better than Chinese food I could cook myself. Though I'm actually pretty good at cooking Western dishes, it's impossible, unusual, or ridiculously expensive to get many of the ingredients I need. The things that are 找不到 (zhao bu dao, not to be found) in Shenzhen are herbs, spices, and some fruits and vegetables--there's no fresh basil or thyme here, though there's coriander aplenty, and things like cloves or allspice are only available in the foreign import shops, sometimes; artichokes and raspberries are as common as unicorns. A lot of the other common ingredients I'd use at home--things like canned tomato paste or corn, soup mixes, wheat pasta, BBQ sauce, 等等--sell at steep prices here (One can of tomato paste goes for about 8 元; that doesn't sound like much until you consider I can buy a large bowl of egg-and-tomato fried noodles for about the same price). So I end up eating out every night, unless Nersey and his family invite me to dinner or I cook to celebrate some holiday.

The good news about this is that the Chinese food I can get at restaurants is also much better than that I could get back home in the States. Sichuan, Xinjiang and Xian dishes are all spicy--really spicy; back home I'd tried dishes like Kung Pao chicken (here, gong bao ji ding) and been disappointed, but most of the Sichuan places that cook it here manage to make it both spicy and tasty, a skill that eludes most of the stateside cooks. Sichuan cuisine also has a lot of ma la dishes, made with little peppers so spicy your mouth goes numb while you're eating, that are high on my list. The Xinjiang restaurants make a lot of lamb dishes, a lot of noodle dishes, and some of the best barbeque I've ever had: at least once a week, I just eat food on a stick (lamb on a stick, chicken wing on a stick, sliced potato on a stick, mushrooms on a stick, 等等) all grilled with hot pepper and cumin. At the local Xian restaurant I've discovered a dish called 回锅冬瓜 (hui guo dong gua) that's some kind of spicy battered and fried squash; even though it's no longer on the menu, the cooks will still make it for me when the supermarket next door has 冬瓜 on sale.

I do miss some food from time to time, like meatball parmigiana subs, good steaks or gravy, but I rarely get long-term cravings for specific things. Probably the thing that's easiest to miss from home isn't the kind of food as much as convenience: for some extra money and a lot of time, I can eat, say, pasta salad here, but one thing I can't do is go to the supermarket and buy a pint container of pre-made pasta salad. I can buy a decent sandwich at Andes cafe or hunt around for thinly sliced meat at restaurants, shop for bread that isn't sickeningly sweet, take out a loan for some cheese and put together a decent sandwich on my own, but I can't just order an Italian cold cut sub for take-out. In fact, I can't get cold cuts: they just don't have them here. And cheese here is so expensive that I rarely even eat it with crackers, let alone cut it up and put it on a sandwich where I'll hardly taste it.

One thing I don't miss that much anymore is pizza, especially not now. Granted, living above a Pizza Hut makes it hard to miss pizza much, but a few months ago I was getting cravings for good pizza. (The stuff at Pizza Hut just isn't that good--not since the Arabian Nights pizza left the menu--and I'd been getting tired of it.) Ah, but 意想不到, a wonderful thing has happened here in Nanshan! Just as Pizza Hut rolled out its new Olympics themed menu (including the "World Conqueror Pizza")--Jia gave me a brochure for a new pizza place: Champion Pizza, whose incredibly perplexing website apparently hypnotizes people to make them want more pizza. Since trying it, I've developed an out-and-out addiction for it--an addiction largely fueled by the VIP cardholders' deal they offer: two ten-inch pizzas for 57 元. Compared to 78元 for a nine-incher at Pizza Hut, that's almost like getting free food.

So at the moment, the food situation here is pretty good. If anything I think more about the food from here I'll miss when I go back to the States. For example, there are a lot of good eggplant and tofu dishes here (yes, good eggplant, good tofu) that I know I can't get at home.

放假: Taking a Vacation

在夏天, 老师们几乎都放假,大概放两个月. (Zai xia tian, lao shi men ji hu dou fang jia, da gai fang liang ge yue.) In the summer, almost all teachers get to take a vacation for about two months. I'm not that lucky; since I work at a training center, my school winds up being just as busy as usual (if not busier) during the summer.

Nonetheless, I've scored something like a vacation, because I have a fixed class on Saturday afternoons, one that can't be cancelled, which means that I can't work a set Monday through Friday schedule. I've enjoyed that fixed class since it started, and it's been my favorite class for a while. Now, I think I'll never like another class as much again.

Why? Because, since I have to work Saturday, it means my schedule is the least suited to the new summer camp classes that began today--the summer kids' classes. This means that I won't have to teach anyone under the age of eighteen or so until (probably) early in September. So my schedule for the foreseeable future includes just two fixed classes (one a corporate gig) and a bunch of flexible adults' classes. Sometimes a change really is as good as a break.

Independence Day may have officially been last Friday (which a few foreign teachers--three of us actually American--and I celebrated at my place with burgers, chips, pasta and potato salad), but today I feel a much greater sense of freedom than I did three days ago.

...And a Sight of Beijing, Hold the Mao

A former 同事 (tong shi, co-worker) returned to Shenzhen for a week after having spent about a month or so traipsing around China. The traveling opportunity would almost be enough to make me jealous--after all, it's a chance to really see something of China, instead of just Shenzhen--but seems to involve a lot more walking, sweating, and running into other strange back-packers than I really have the desire for. (Among the strangest on-the-road tales was the one about a 40-something guy who's apparently traveling with a stuffed koala bear--a stuffed koala bear with definite opinions about weather, tourist sites, 等等, that only he can hear.)

The most interesting bit of information, though, came from Beijing. It seems Mao's tomb is closed, and Beijing's Underground City is also unavailable for viewing. In fact, it sounded like nearly all Beijing's tourist sites were "closed for renovations" while she and her beau were there--renovations apparently expected to last until after the Olympics. If the PRC really has shut down all the tourist sites in Beijing (except for the Wall and the ugly buildings constructed for the Olympics), it must mean someone didn't get the memo about basic marketing.

Add this to the recent visa restrictions over security concerns and all the areas where travel is currently restricted due to one disaster or another, and you wonder whether 2008 won't actually become a benchmark low for China's tourist industry.