Data from Spreadsheets, a mobile app that tracks sex stats such as number of thrusts, average duration and volume level (gamifying performance in bed, if you will), has revealed that while Americans unsurprisingly have the most sex, Australian men last the longest, coming at 4 minutes, 3 seconds. What about China, you ask?
People's Daily deserves not our scorn but our patience and understanding. I make the comparison with autism with absolutely no intention of being insulting to autistic people or their family and friends, and please accept my apologies if this still sounds offensive. But maybe the proper response to People's Daily -- which has underdeveloped communication skills (despite being the official mouthpiece of the government), difficulty grasping abstract concepts, and fantasies that are simply untenable in the real world -- should be with tolerance, composure, and encouragement?
Here's a map unlike any you've likely seen. A Chinese artist, using water and ink, has reimagined Chinese provinces as dually simple and abstruse classical paintings. As posted on the website Portal (Chuansongmen), these are hand-drawn outlines of provinces and special administrative regions that are then filled in with splashes of watercolor. We don't quite know what to make of it -- neither does Beyond Chinatown, which has translated the province names. Maybe that's for the better: let these depictions defy easy classification.
People's Daily has had an eventful week. Last Monday it called the New York Times "circling vultures" for an article on Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370; on Friday it sought "immediate rectification" from a parody Twitter account, @relevantorgans; then, somehow, it got a guest editorial out of Bill Gates. But PD truly tops itself with this next thing, because these are words that someone actually wrote. Via Reuters:
Sometimes, when life throws you an obstacle, simply call on a dozen people to move said obstacle out of the way. In Tianjin on Sunday morning, a van parked in front of a building blocked a coach bus from leaving the enclosed lot via the only road out. That bus happened to be carrying more than two dozen Beijing Ultimate Frisbee players who were in town for a tournament. They had an idea.
Time has released its most recent edition of the Time 100, its click-baity list of "the most influential people in the world in 2014." Among those on the list is -- no surprise -- Xi Jinping, who got a three-paragraph writeup from former US ambassador to China Jon Huntsman. The opening sentence should raise some eyebrows:
