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Many Chinese suffer discrimination based on their regional origin

https://www.economist.com/china/2019/04/13/many-chinese-suffer-discrimination-based-on-their-regional-origin

Life is often hard for internal migrants in China, especially those from Henan and the north-east

Apr 11th 2019

THE SCHOOLCHILDREN started to vomit. Some fell unconscious and were whisked into hospital. Angry parents demanded an explanation. The food-poisoning scandal quickly lit up Chinese social media. A kindergarten teacher in the central province of Henan was detained—accused of adding sodium nitrite, which can be toxic in large doses, to the meal boxes of at least 23 pupils late last month.

Most comments online have focused on the evil of the act and have expressed sympathy for the parents. But a surprising number have noted the alleged perpetrator’s home province. “I’m not surprised. Henan people would stoop to anything,” says one commentator on Baidu Tieba, a social-networking site. “Apart from wicked, I can’t think of another word to describe Henan people,” chimes in someone with more than 50,000 followers on Weibo, China’s version of Twitter, who identifies himself as a financial journalist.

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The case for crying at work

https://qz.com/work/1589513/how-to-handle-crying-at-work/

If you’ve ever cried at work, you may be able to relate to the recent Saturday Night Live sketch “PowerPoint.” In it, a pair of receptionists played by Aidy Bryant and Kate McKinnon burst into tears in front of their colleagues at a Microsoft training session as soon as their mock PowerPoint presentation appears on the projector screen. The presentation is, to be fair, not very good. The first page features nothing but layers of empty squares and the desperate lowercase missive, “help.”

“We’re so sorry,” Bryant sobs as the befuddled Microsoft instructors attempt to reassure them. “We made trash, sir,” McKinnon chimes in. “We’re going to be fired and slapped.”

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What your method of brewing coffee says about you

https://www.1843magazine.com/technology/test-drive/what-your-method-of-brewing-coffee-says-about-you

Coffee machines aren’t just conveniences, they’re windows into the soul. Jonathan Beckman pours over the options

When political scientists examine the great divide of our age between nativists and cosmopolitans, they can point to a number of underlying causes: unemployment, class, education. But to my mind, the thing most likely to determine on which side you fall is your favoured hot drink. Recent American populism began with the Tea Party, a movement that memorialised direct action to lower the price of a brew. What unites Brexiteers across England, from golf-club bores in Godalming to trawlermen in Grimsby, is the love of a good cuppa. British patriotism has always come sodden in tea. Yorkshire tea is one of the nation’s great oxymorons – a brand that leads tourists to scour the landscape around Pontefract in search of the famous sub-tropical microclimate.

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得体才是成年世界的唯一准则

有一句话是这么说的：“只有小孩子的世界才分对错，成年人讲究的是得体”。这是一句一下触动我内心的话。我只能遗憾为什么二十年前我没有听到这句话，没有悟出这句话。懂得了那么多的道理，却依然过不好这一生，主要的原因就是我们拿着小孩子的准则和世界观，生活在成年人的世界。连“得体”是什么都不知道，这是一种;两个世界的错误配搭，所以感觉过不好这一生。

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纪念700年历史 五先贤塑像齐集新加坡河畔

https://www.zaobao.com.sg/znews/singapore/story20190105-921256

我国著名地标莱佛士塑像（右二）昨天恢复原貌，“重现”新加坡河畔，身旁还多了四尊新塑像，分别是桑尼拉乌他玛（左一起）、阿都拉、陈笃生和比莱。（梁伟康摄）

一度“隐身”的莱佛士塑像昨天“重现”新加坡河畔，身旁还多了四尊新塑像，纪念在我国700多年历史中为社会作出重要贡献的四个人物。

他们是：相传将我国命名为“狮城”的苏门答腊巨港王子桑尼拉乌他玛（Sang Nila Utama）、富商兼慈善家陈笃生、莱佛士秘书兼马来文豪孟诗阿都拉（Munshi Abdullah）以及商人兼印度社群领袖纳莱依那比莱（Naraina Pillai）。

新塑像由新加坡开埠200年工作组委托制作，将伫立在新加坡河畔莱佛士登陆点直到下周二（8日），之后会全年在新加坡河畔不同地点展出。

四尊新塑像代表
1819年或更早登陆本地人士

不久前被漆上特别油漆、与后方建筑融为一体的莱佛士塑像，昨天也恢复了洁白的原貌，“重现”新加坡河畔。

根据工作组文告，我国今年纪念开埠200年，四尊新塑像代表的是在1819年或更早以前登陆本地的人士。

其中，国人对桑尼拉乌他玛最为熟悉，相传他在1299年登陆本地时，曾见到一头像狮子的野兽，因此建立了“新加坡拉”（梵语“狮城”之意）王国。

另三位历史人物则是在1819年抵达新加坡，并为我国社会做出不可磨灭的文学、宗教和文化贡献。

新加坡开埠200年工作组执行总监陈惠勇在文告中说，多数人可能只会将新加坡开埠200年与英国和1819年挂钩，另四尊塑像的出现因此清楚表明我国下来一年将采取的纪念方式。

“1819年虽是我国历史上的重要时间点，但在英国人前后，曾有许多人士和社群来到新加坡。这四尊塑像仅代表了700多年来为新加坡发展做出贡献的众多人士中的一小部分人。通过今年开展的活动，我们希望国人能更了解各社群如何在我国历史中发挥作用。”

南洋理工大学国立教育学院亚洲语言文化部门主任哈蒂嘉（Hadijah Bte Rahmat）副教授也说，新加坡是由多元种族、文化和宗教的人士共同打造的，而他们拥有丰富多样的背景和强项。

“无论是土著和当地人，或是来自东南亚和世界各地的移民，大家一同努力，直接或间接地为我国做出贡献，塑造了其独特的历史、发展和身份。”

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Suzhou Pan Family donations

The Suzhou museum is running an exhibition of works collected by the Pan family of Suzhou, the lineage responsible for producing the most number of scholars in South East China, maybe incomparable even on a national scale.

The documentary being featured tells a story of how the Pan family managed to hide two 3000 year old cauldrons from the invading Japanese during WWII, and later on they donated both of them to the national archive.  

Story from searching (in Chinese) : http://www.gucn.com/Info_KnowLedgeList_Show.asp?Id=22652

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