I have just looked at KunmingSwap, mentioned on another thread, and was going to sign up. However, in the registration page they ask for a lot of personal data that is not needed, including phone numbers, unless they are data mining and then selling to direct marketing companies. It could be that the site owner has not considered this as a barrier to people signing up, or that data mining is the main purpose.
If anyone is using KunmingSwap, what has been your experience? Are you getting spammed? Are you getting direct marketing calls?
Are you studying for a degree or are you studying for some other college certificate?
Chinese universities generally have a reputation for being easy, with some students only turning up half the time, if that. However, I also know that engineering degrees are sought after and getting a place on a degree course can be highly competitive. That implies that courses attract some of the top students, who are highly motivated and demands may be high.
If you are doing a non degree course, some of the students will not be motivated, and probably failed the Gao Kao exams (needed for uni entrance) in high school.
On a different note, free speech comes with some responsibilities. There is no absolute free speech, not even on the internet, despite what some people believe. Many people in the UK don't realize that we have no freedom of speech laws, nor is it in the constitution (UK does not have a constitution). People in the UK have probably absorbed freedom of speech ideals from US TV shows. In the UK we have laws governing what we cannot say. There are slander and libel laws, hate speech laws, D notices, the Official Secrets Act, and the list goes on.
There was a US Supreme Court ruling, years ago, that basically says that people have freedom of speech, until that speech impinges on other peoples freedom. What if our postings are impinging on Gokunming's owners making a living from advertising. Is taking down offensive content censorship? I think not.
Look at the number of accounts that have been purged from social media, in the land of free speech (the USA) recently. Never mind the reasons why, they have gone.
At the moment, most of us are not even in the land of free speech. We are somewhere else.
On GoKunming, most posters self censor when it comes to certain topics, and this both out of respect for GoK and because of big brother.
In short. Arguments about freedom of speech are a bit naive.
@herenow said, "Not sure what the solution is, but one idea would be for the consequences of heavily-downvoted posts to extend beyond just hiding them. That obviously presupposes preventing abuse of the voting system by sockpuppets and such."
If heavily downvoted posts and their authors were reviewed by moderators, who then objectively decided if further sanctions were needed, then the sock-puppets would not be a problem.
I have noticed a lot more 'black' cabs where I live. One advantage of the little guy now owning a car. They will negotiate, some are greedy just find the next one. They actually line up like a taxi rank where I live.
I agree that the problem is related to the moving away from the Paleao diet. The big shift seems to be more meat (they love high fat cuts), more oil, more noodles, and perhaps more than anything more rice.
Western fast foods, do not exist in my wife's hometown, diabetes, is a major problem there too. The people are also more active than I see in Kuming. The key change in their life has been more affluence.
The population is eating a lot more food generally than they did before. Blaming obesity on western fast food is easy, but I am not sure there is solid causality. Western fast-foods arrived arrived at the same time as more affluence.
The affluence coincided with more processed foods (a western style diet, but not fast foods, or western corporations). Perhaps it would be fairer to call this a developed countries bad diet.
In the supermarket we can see how much store space is dedicated to high fat,high sugar, snacks. These are mostly home market products. Some of the local drinks are much more prevalent than Coke, and have more sugar in them. For the supermarket it is a no brainer what to give shelf space to, as these foods all have high profit margins.
Buying oil and meat used to be a luxury. Now everyone can afford much larger portions, and more frequent consumption of both. My mother in law will admit to consuming more meat in some meals now than she used to get in a month. In the past her main source of oil was rendered animal fats, vegetable oil was store bought and rare.
I see my kids in school. Half of them have parents who understand nutrition, and the kids are consuming a Paleo diet. The other half consume a lot of high carb snacks between meals and eat huge portions of rice and oily foods at the canteen. WangLaoJi is seen as a semi-medicinal stimulant.
Or could draw a correlation between student diet and performance, but that would be unreliable as the kids on a healthy diet have parents who seem to make better choices generally. The educational attitude may also reflect the family values.
Yes, when I first came to China 10 years ago I would maybe see one morbidly obese person, usually a pre-teen, about once per month. Now I see many more daily, and I also see more morbidly obese adults. You can't blame this all on western fast food.
I will use about 5 ltr of oil per year, mostly for baking bread, and less than 1 ltr for frying food. I see a neighbor coming home from the supermarket with that much every week.
People also think Asians are skinny because they eat rice. But rice is a simple carb. Lots of rice leads to fat. Add to that all the oil and sugar.
As for sedentary life, it is a problem, but 11% of the popn. do not live a sedentary life.
A reasonable choice of lumber that has improved over time. Fancy hardwoods like walnut, and mahogany are in abundance. There are some plywood and rubber-wood boards available. There are also some kiln dried imported softwoods and merbao available. Some of the lumber is very green, so look for the kiln dried if you need stable timbers.
Echo everything said by others.
Breakfast great and the serve from 8am. Most other places say 9am and they still are not ready.
Sandwiches are cheap 22-32, and really packed full of filling. We got some sandwiches for a day out, the only mistake I made was ordering two, as this was too much. These are seriously good sangars, and they are wrapped in alu foil.
In fairness to Metro, they are a wholesalers, and not really a supermarket. Hence the need for a card, which can be got around.
They have improved in the year I have been away. They now carry a more consistent range of imported foodstuffs and they also seem to have sorted out the mported milk supply.
They have a wider range of electrical appliances now, there is a coice of more than one toast. There is also a better range of seasonal non foods, like clothes, shoes, garden furniture and camping gear.
Cookie Preferences
Please select which types of cookies you are willing to accept:
New taxi placards target 'civility'
Posted byI have noticed a lot more 'black' cabs where I live. One advantage of the little guy now owning a car. They will negotiate, some are greedy just find the next one. They actually line up like a taxi rank where I live.
Kunming reservoir levels rising, officials remain cautious
Posted byEnough water for 9 months.
China's diabetes rate passes 11 percent
Posted byI agree that the problem is related to the moving away from the Paleao diet. The big shift seems to be more meat (they love high fat cuts), more oil, more noodles, and perhaps more than anything more rice.
Western fast foods, do not exist in my wife's hometown, diabetes, is a major problem there too. The people are also more active than I see in Kuming. The key change in their life has been more affluence.
The population is eating a lot more food generally than they did before. Blaming obesity on western fast food is easy, but I am not sure there is solid causality. Western fast-foods arrived arrived at the same time as more affluence.
The affluence coincided with more processed foods (a western style diet, but not fast foods, or western corporations). Perhaps it would be fairer to call this a developed countries bad diet.
In the supermarket we can see how much store space is dedicated to high fat,high sugar, snacks. These are mostly home market products. Some of the local drinks are much more prevalent than Coke, and have more sugar in them. For the supermarket it is a no brainer what to give shelf space to, as these foods all have high profit margins.
Buying oil and meat used to be a luxury. Now everyone can afford much larger portions, and more frequent consumption of both. My mother in law will admit to consuming more meat in some meals now than she used to get in a month. In the past her main source of oil was rendered animal fats, vegetable oil was store bought and rare.
I see my kids in school. Half of them have parents who understand nutrition, and the kids are consuming a Paleo diet. The other half consume a lot of high carb snacks between meals and eat huge portions of rice and oily foods at the canteen. WangLaoJi is seen as a semi-medicinal stimulant.
Or could draw a correlation between student diet and performance, but that would be unreliable as the kids on a healthy diet have parents who seem to make better choices generally. The educational attitude may also reflect the family values.
China's diabetes rate passes 11 percent
Posted byYes, when I first came to China 10 years ago I would maybe see one morbidly obese person, usually a pre-teen, about once per month. Now I see many more daily, and I also see more morbidly obese adults. You can't blame this all on western fast food.
I will use about 5 ltr of oil per year, mostly for baking bread, and less than 1 ltr for frying food. I see a neighbor coming home from the supermarket with that much every week.
People also think Asians are skinny because they eat rice. But rice is a simple carb. Lots of rice leads to fat. Add to that all the oil and sugar.
As for sedentary life, it is a problem, but 11% of the popn. do not live a sedentary life.
Metro Line 1 begins passenger trial period
Posted byYankee
They were waiting until you moved to open the bit up BJ Lu.
;-)