Happy Hua Guofeng Day 2008: The first in the P.H. (post-Hua) Era

As many, if not both my readers know, each October we commemorate Hua Guofeng Day, the anniversary of Hua Guofeng’s elevation as Mao’s chosen successor, the Wise Leader of the Chinese people.  HGFD 2008, of course, is tinged with autumnal sadness, poetically apropos for the time of year, as it is the first Hua Guofeng day since the former Chairman left us to meet Marx this past August.

Thus, we mourn a passing and celebrate a life: Hua Guofeng, 1921-2008.

Next week: Why Boston’s Dom Dimaggio was every bit the player as brother Joe.

Virtual Forbidden City

Just what I need, another way to kill a whole morning of productivity.  As if the Red Sox being in the playoffs hasn’t been sufficiently destructive to my schedule, IBM, in partnership with the Palace Museum in Beijing, has unveiled an interactive virtual Forbidden City.  I have only begun venturing through this online educational tool/video game and I’ll give it a fuller review later.  In the meantime, if you wish to engage in some ‘time theft’ from your company whilst you should be working, I highly recommend checking it out.

More from the world of virtual tours, the British Library has a website in conjunction with its exhibition ”Trading Places – the East India Company and Asia 1600-1834.” You can check out their China section, or get a taste for the whole site from tea to opium, Calcutta to Canton.  I particularly enjoyed this little nugget from the section on opium, summed up in classic British understatement: “Ethical trading it was not.”

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