Kurt Groetsch @ OldTasty.com

My friend Dan passed this link along over the weekend. I’m usually wary of explicitly political material, but this song’s damn good:
George was the first one, Abe was the best,
Libraries and airports named after the rest,
But this year I’m queasy about Presidents’ Day
For there’s been more than one George I’m sorry to say…
Loudon Wainwright III […]

The number of temples, pagodas and other historic sites tucked away in Beijing’s back alleys never ceases to amaze. This one is 10 minutes away from my office, and I would have never known about it if a cabbie hadn’t told a friend in the office about it.

I took these photos a few weeks ago when Lu, Stacy and I went out to dinner at Gui Jie. Lu worked her way through an entire bowl of very spicy boiled crayfish when Stacy and I could only manage one each. Of course Lu’s from Changsha in Hunan Province, and the Hunanese like their […]

China Moments: Instances of shock and/or frustration that occur when a foreigner is confronted with behavior or actions that, while not uncommon in China, would be considered rude or inappropriate elsewhere.
I’ve had more than my share of China moments in the last few days, the cumulative effect of which has been to keep me in […]

Cui Jian’s not the only one paying the price for his art:
China arrests popular Tibetan musicians
BEIJING (AFP) - Chinese state security officials have arrested a popular Tibetan singer and a composer, apparently because of the implicit political content of their music, an official said.
I’m by no means happy with the political climate in the […]

Well, the Cui Jian/Deep Purple show was last night and as expected, Cui Jian’s opening set was cut short per government order. Adding insult to injury, he was only allowed to play four songs, two fewer than the six we’d heard rumors about. Given the fact that he’s playing full 15-song sets in Shanghai and […]