The Olympic Legacy in China

AssassinsMace

AssassinsMace

Lieutenant General
I guess now all official government figures on what China spends every year on the miltary cannot be questioned.

It's from the government. So it must be true!

:roll::nana::roll::nana::roll:
 
K

kliu0

Junior Member
IOC wants top Chinese gymnast’s age double-checked

AGENCIES, BEIJING
Saturday, Aug 23, 2008, Page 1

Chinese gymnast He Kexin, center, stands with teammates at a news conference at the Samsung Pavilion at the 2008 Beijing Olympics in Beijing yesterday.
PHOTO: AP
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has asked the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG) to investigate claims that Chinese double gold medallist He Kexin (何柯欣) is younger than the eligible age to compete in the Games.

Allegations have been rife that China broke the rules by fielding three gymnasts who will not turn 16 this year, with the focus on He.

He, registered at the Beijing Olympics as 16, won team gold and a gold on the asymmetric bars. She was registered as having been born on Jan. 1, 1992. Gymnasts must turn 16 in the year of the Games to be allowed to compete.

A US computer expert had said in e-mails to the media on Thursday he had uncovered Chinese state documents that proved He was born in 1994 and not 1992.

“Given that there have been some discrepancies regarding her age that have come to light, we have asked the FIG to look into this matter,” an IOC official said. “It is because of these discrepancies that we have asked for this investigation to start.”
 
SteelBird

SteelBird

Colonel
Autumn Child said:
Regarding toilets...I can give first hand account on it on daily basis.

The last time I was in beijing a week ago, I did find that they upgraded their public toilet. Tourist destination toilet are rated with start. The five star toilet includes sofa, aircon, marble walls, TV and toilet attedants. However, when I visit one of those toilet, I was dissapointed to see that it still features the squater. Upon closer inspection I was even more surprised that the squater is a "eco squater" that waste no water and naturally decompose waste. Sounds disgusting right? actually its a new innovation. You step on the squatter and a whole will open up. thank god U don't get to see the bottom of it though. I was horrifyed when i see the whole open, but surprisingly there was no smell coming out of it. That was one of the most clean, interesting and at the same time disgusting toilet i have ever been to. Apparently more and more of this toilet will be installed around tourist attraction site. I hate squatters like most people, but i learned that the sitter are actually dirtier to use in China. Most people here will squat on a sitter anyways, dirtying the seats and at the same time create more "splash" from "you know what" falling on the bowl of water. So its perception hygene vs actual hygene.

Having said that i still hope to see more sitter in shanghai public toilet during the upcoming expo. I just can't get over my western lifestyle perception. What I am more concerned with is the "software", the people that are using the toilet. Despite having modern toilets I still see people not closing the cubicle door when they are using it. It got better now but still occasionally see people not closing doors and not flushing after use. Most of these offenders are from poorer region of china where the toilets are still in horrible state. Hopefully they will change and adapt to modern toilet use habit sooner.
Click to expand...

Some mods merge the two threads together that it looks a little bit confused.

Toilets in some airliners also don't use water. I think this is a clever design to solve some problems as below:
- Logistics and maintenance: Sitter toilets with water flushing are complicated and prone to error.
- Perception hygiene vs actual hygiene: This is a man-made problem, the rule is that after leaving toilets you must flush. People just simply flush, but they never care if they have cleanly flushed the toilets or anything error after flushing.
- To save fresh water: This is a general problem in China that they don't have enough fresh water resource.

Some time back to the early 80's when I was in a refugee camp in Vietnam, there was also a kind of public toilet that used no water. The refugee camp is called Song Be. It located in a jungle of Song Be province and it is still there up to now though it has developed itself into a crowded town. The toilets were built of wood and off ground about 3 ~ 4 meters. There was no door and actually no any meaning toilet. There was just a whole and everything fell down on the ground. Just imagine how it looks like.
 
R

RedMercury

Junior Member
While I am not used to squat toilets, I don't object to them in public places. Sit toilets are more comfortable for home use or by the infirm. However, I would not want to touch a toilet that thousands of others have touched with their icky buttocks (and in China, those thousands would be in the same day, not the week or month). I use the disposable paper seat covers if I have to use a sit toilet in public. This is clearly not environmentally friendly. As a compromise, tourist sites expecting tourists not familiar with squat toilets should have number of sit toilets available, as an option. Squat toilets are great exercise :) Just needs a grunt bar to keep you from falling in.

As for maintenance, I think it is also partly about operating costs-- in electricity and water.
 
Mr T

Mr T

Senior Member
AssassinsMace said:
I guess now all official government figures on what China spends every year on the miltary cannot be questioned.

It's from the government. So it must be true!
Click to expand...

You think that lying over a gymnast's age is the same as lying about military spending - China sees both as matters of national security? :coffee:

I think the issue in hand is more to do with websites contradicting what the Chinese authorities say (i.e. it says one thing in public, but online records suggest something else). No one had found these websites with the gymnast's data on controversial up until now (maybe people didn't know about them), so that might be a reason why they weren't changed if their ages were correct - sometimes one arm of a bureaucracy doesn't know what the other is doing.

If for years PLA websites had listed spending as being a lot higher than it is officially and the matter only became more controversial recently, if the Chinese authorities started sweeping up all those websites and cracking down on discussion, people would wonder what was going on.
 
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AssassinsMace

AssassinsMace

Lieutenant General
Everything on the internet must be true.

And I read the Pentagon was being informed that their listings of KIAs were wrong by the very soldiers that were listed as KIA. Yeah, governments keep accurate records. Just like how some people successfully register their dogs to vote.

And I love how now Chna is suppose to be this well-ordered developed nation comparable to advanced 1st world countries.
 
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R

RedMercury

Junior Member
There has been suggestions on cmf that the families of the gymnasts sue the people behind the false allegations for defamation of character. They better do it quick, before they leave jurisdiction :D
 
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