Rockin' and Rollin'

A 6.9 magnitude earthquake hit the Tibetan region of China on Wednesday. CNN reported that about 15,000 homes were brought down in the Yushu County of the Qinghai province, and more than 100,00 people have evacuated the area.



On Saturday, the Dalai Lama offered words of comfort, and even though he is too far separated to be there, he wanted the people of the area to know that he is praying for them. The Dalai Lama has been in exile since 1959, after a Tibetan rebellion against China was attempted. He appealed to governments so that he may be able to offer support and assistance, CNN reported.

I think that in times of crises, it is important for countries and regions to come together and help those who are affected. It is devastating to me to know that there are so many that have lost everything and yet little aid is being given to them.

Take the earthquake in Haiti that happened almost a month ago. You can turn on the TV and still see commercials requesting donations and other aid. Even college campuses put together care packages to send to those in need.

But soon after the earthquake faded from the news, Chili was hit by an equally strong quake that also triggered a tsunami. Yet this quake was virtually ignored by the media, and I challenge you to find commercials seeking aid for these people.

Now China has been hit by yet another quake that has displaced thousands, and has killed almost 1500. It is good that at least some powerful leaders are stepping up to help those in need, and we should all be more aware of what is happening in the world.



photos from CNN.com and hollywoodtoday.net respectively

Plastics in the Ocean

I’m stepping back from the East Asia topic this week to talk about something that affects us all, plastic pollution. Everyday we use plastic and most of us disregard it as something normal, but after that plastic leaves you house, where does it go? Perhaps you recycle it, in which case it goes to a recycling plant where it is cleaned and prepped for reuse, or you may throw it away, where it goes to landfills.

But invariably some of the plastic we throw away flies out and will drift toward the ocean.

As a San Diego native, I grew up on the beach, next to lifeguard tower 14, and I will bet you that at some point when you walk along the beach, you will come across some sort of plastic. Once that plastic hits the water, it is only a matter of time before it ends up in the ocean and gets caught in one of the currents that will take it to the middle of the Pacific, to a place dubbed The Garbage Patch.

Some describe it as a floating island of garbage, but experts on it say that it is more of an underwater conglomeration of junk. They estimate that it is twice the size of Texas. Most of the plastic that is swirling around are the little balls that are the base for every plastic product.

Animals come to the patch and eat the plastic, because they think it is food, often they die because of the plastic buildup in their stomachs.

Now, I’m not preaching to you, telling you that you should stop using plastic and switch to something more biodegradable, I use plastic everyday too. I drink out of plastic cups, throw my trash out in plastic bags, write with mechanical pencils and so forth. But this is something that everyone should be aware of. I guarantee you, the next time you throw that piece of plastic away, you’ll think about it.

Unusual Dining

Themed restaurants are starting to become more popular all over the globe. In Taiwan, the phenomenon is expressed in some unusual ways.

CNN posted a video a few days ago about the wacky ways people are dining in Taipei.

The video features a hospital theme, where diners drink beer from IV bags and crutches and x-rays line the walls. There is also an airplane dining experience, where diners can choose economy, business, or first class without having to pay more.

I think that these types of themed restaurants are something that could really catch on all over the globe. It offers people the opportunity to do something different. Personally, I would love to dine in an airplane with some extra space and without the turbulence. Maybe someday there will be one such restaurant here.

A Day at the TLT

I’m going to take a break from looking at East Asia for the week and blog about something else. Yesterday I got the opportunity to attend the 2010 Teaching and Learning with Technology Symposium at Penn State. Earlier this year a group of students, myself included, applied to present at the conference for a class project on digital storytelling and the preservation of stories. To our dismay we did not get accepted, but knowing that there would be a lot of good information about what professors are doing with technology in their classrooms, we decided to go anyway.

Breakfast and check in started at 7:30 and it was a great time to get together with faculty to talk about projects they were doing in their classes, and what we had done in ours. The keynote speaker, Dr. Michael Wesch, talked about how he was using social media in his classroom to get students more engaged in learning. He made a collaborative work environment so that his students would be able to learn all they could from each other and then put it together in a multimedia project.

Then it was off to the sessions.

At 9:45 we went to a session called “Digital Stories as Counter-Texts”. It was a project that used digital media as a platform to address issues with children’s literature and how to re-write them. The student’s project used everything from video to podcasts to make the final product.

At 10:45 we took a break to get some snacks and to talk with Justin Miller about our project and the Media Commons. It was nice to chat about some different techniques in video editing and digital storytelling.

Then it was lunchtime! At 12:15 there was a faculty panel on how social media engages students. The panel also talked about the benefits of using social media and what the students got out of it.

After lunch there were more sessions.

At 1:30 we went to one called “Bringing YouTube Into Angel,” which focused on how to incorporate YouTube onto the Angel site without allowing students to get sidetracked by other links. We went to it so that we could take the information back to some of the professors on our campus and they could use it for their classes.

For the last session at 2:30, we went to the session called “Blogs as e-Portfolio.” We are going to take what was presented here and try to apply some of the concepts to our e-portfolios for this class.

So that was our day at the TLT. We had a lot of fun and got to meet faculty from all over who want to engage students by using media and technology in new ways. I think it was a beneficial experience for us as students, because it showed us that many professors are willing to incorporate new technologies in their classrooms and also that as students we can take these technologies and do more with them.

Orange Skies

Can you imagine waking up and the sky being orange? That’s what residents in and around China’s capital of Beijing did on Saturday.

USA Today reported yesterday that the sandstorm was the worst so far this year. Affecting regions as far as “the regions of Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia and the provinces of Shanxi, Shaanxi and Hebei.”

“Chun Youngsin, a researcher at the Korea Meteorological Administration, said the yellow dust was expected to hit the Korean peninsula beginning Saturday afternoon and it would be "the worst yellow dust" this year,” according to the USA Today article.

The sandstorms come from the vast desert that covers about a third of the country and despite conservation efforts; experts think that it will take decades to reduce the number of sandstorms that hit the country. Even residents understand the need for conservation, USA Today talked to Shi Chunyan, a Beijing resident, who said, "I think this kind of natural disaster is caused by human activity, but I don't know the exact reason, and I don't know exactly what we can do to prevent this.”

Image from USA TODAY

Inked Up

In the USA tattoos are often thought of as being taboo, but in Thailand, there are tattoos that are thought to give the person “super-human powers.”

From Buddhist monks to Hollywood celebrities, people are flocking to Thailand to Wat Bang Phra, a gathering of people demonstrating the powers their tattoos have given them. Yan tattoos are the source of these powers. CNN reported that, “Yan tattoos are becoming ever more popular in this mainly Buddhist country. It's an ancient belief dating back hundreds of years. Some think their tattoos provide protection at a time when there is such political turbulence and division in the country.”

It is cool to see tattoos in a different way, that they are perceived as a good thing rather as being a sign of rebellion. Whether or not the tattoos actually give the bearer super-human powers is up to the individual themselves.


photos from CNN

Free School, Special Treatment

CNN reported the other day about China’s first government run school for autistic children. Guangzhou’s Cana School is the first of it’s kind in China. There are about 100 kids currently attending and more than a thousand on the waiting list. With a teacher ratio of 2:1, the students each have an individual education plan that is tailored to fit their needs. It is a free, full day program that is open to children between the ages of 7 and 14 years old.

I think that it is important for governments, not only in China, to develop programs for children with special needs. Besides opening jobs for teachers, it allows the children opportunities they may not have if they were taught at home or in a regular school. To have a free program that is tailored to each individual child is especially nice because it allows the child to advance at their own rate and not get left behind in a broader lesson plan.