China overtakes Japan as number 2 economy and favors euro over the dollar

TOKYO (AP) - Japan lost its place as the world's No. 2 economy to China in the second quarter as receding global growth sapped momentum and stunted a shaky recovery.

Gross domestic product grew at an annualized rate of just 0.4 percent, the government said Monday, far below the annualized 4.4 percent expansion in the first quarter and adding to evidence the global recovery is facing strong headwinds.

The figures underscore China's emergence as an economic power that is changing everything from the global balance of military and financial power to how cars are designed. It is already the biggest exporter, auto buyer and steel producer, and its global influence is expanding.

China has been a major force behind the world's emergence from deep recession, delivering much-needed juice to the U.S., Japan and Europe. Tokyo's latest numbers, however, suggest that Chinese demand alone may not be enough for Japan or other economic giants.

"Japan is the canary in the goldmine because it depends very much on demand in Asia and China, and this demand is cooling quite a bit," said Martin Schulz, senior economist at Fujitsu Research Institute in Tokyo. "This is a warning sign for all major economies that just focusing on overseas demand won't be sufficient."

China has surpassed Japan in quarterly GDP figures before, but this time it's unlikely to relinquish the lead.

China's economy will almost certainly be bigger than Japan's at the end of 2010 because of the huge difference in each country's growth rates. China is growing at about 10 percent a year, while Japan's economy is forecast to grow between 2 to 3 percent this year. The gap between the size of the two economies at the end of last year was already narrow.

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20100816/D9HKI1E00.html

Read More

QiXi Story – The Chinese Valentine’s Day

                         Lovers meeting on the bridge of magpies
 
Today is the Chinese Valentine’s Day: QiXi festival.It is a legend of love story, but there are several versions. Here is one version:

Long time ago, there was an orphan living with his brother and his wife. He is smart and diligent, but his sister-in-law still dislike him. Every morning before sun rise, she pushed him to go to mountains with oxes for food. So, everybody called him “Niulang” (牛郎, literally “cowherd”). After a few years, He and his brother split the property. His sister-in-law gave him a poor-conditioned shelter and an old ox. From that day on, Niulang fed the ox in mountains and collect firewood during the day and slept with his ox in the cowshed at night.

One day, Niulang drove his ox to a wood they had never been to. Here he saw beautiful mountains and springs as well as singing birds and blossom flowers. Niulang witnessed that nine (some say seven) fairy sisters appeared from the clouds and landed along the riverside. They took off their colorful cloths and bathed in the transparent river. Niulang stared at the most beautiful girl ecstatically. At this moment, his ox spoke in human language suddenly: “She is Zhinü (织女, literally “[the] weaver girl”, the star Vega). If you get her color cloth, she will marry you.” Niulang quietly walked to riverside behind the woods and took Zhinü’s colorful cloth. At about noon, other fairy sisters put on their colorful cloths and sailed to the sky with clouds. But Zhinü; had to stay because she couldn’t find her cloth. At this time, Niulang stepped out and requested her to be his wife. Eye witnessed such an honest, hard-working and healthy boy Niulang, Zhinü; agreed to his request for marriage.

She proved to be a wonderful wife as a weaving lady, and Niulang to be a good husband as a farmer. They loved each other very much. Two years later, Zhinü gave births to one boy and one girl. But the God of Heaven was very furious when he learned that Zhinü; had married a mere mortal. On the seventh day of the seventh lunar month, he ordered the Goddess of Heaven to lead a team of soldiers to took Zhinü back to heaven. With the helps from his ox, the deeply sorrow Niulang put their children to a basket and went to the sky and tried to catch up with them. Just before hereach them, the Goddess used her hair ornament golden kanzashi to wave in the sky. All in a sudden, there was a choppy sky river appeared in front of Niulang.

The tearing Zhinü and Niulang with children were now standing on the east and west banks of the river. They looked at each other over and cried. The outcry moved many magpies and they flew to the sky river and formed a bridge. Now, Niulang and Zhinü could meet on the bridge. The Goddess was powerless and had to agree to allow the couple to meet on the bridge on the seventh day of the seventh mouth every year. Thereafter, every seventh day of the seventh lunar month is celebrated as “Qi Qiao Day”, namely the Chinese Valentine’s Day.

Read More

DRINKING ALONE WITH THE MOON

 DRINKING ALONE WITH THE MOON  
             Li Bai  

 From a pot of wine among the flowers
 I drank alone. There was no one with me
 Till, raising my cup, I asked the bright moon 
 To bring me my shadow and make us three.  
 Alas, the moon was unable to drink 
 And my shadow tagged me vacantly
 But still for a while I had these friends   
 To cheer me through the end of spring...
 I sang. The moon encouraged me.   
 I danced. My shadow tumbled after.   
 As long as I knew, we were boon companions.   
 And then I was drunk, and we lost one another.
 Shall goodwill ever be secure?   
 I watch the long road of the River of Stars. 

月下独酌

李白

花间一壶酒， 独酌无相亲。

举杯邀明月， 对影成三人。

月既不解饮， 影徒随我身。

暂伴月将影， 行乐须及春。

我歌月徘徊， 我舞影零乱。

醒时同交欢， 醉后各分散。

永结无情游， 相期邈云汉。

Read More

Pan Gu Makes the World

In the beginning , the heavens and earth were still one and all was chaos. The universe was like a big black egg, carrying Pan Gu inside itself. After 18 thousand years Pan Gu woke from a long sleep. He felt suffocated, so he
took up a broadax and wielded it with all his might to crack open the egg. The light, clear part of it floated up and formed the heavens, the cold, turbid matter stayed below to form earth. Pan Gu stood in the middle, his head touching the sky, his feet planted on the earth. The heavens and the earth began to grow at a rate of ten feet per day, and Pan Gu grew along with them. After another 18 thousand years, the sky was higher, the earth thicker, and Pan Gu stood between them like a pillar 9 million li in height so that they would never join again.

When Pan Gu died, his breath became the wind and clouds, his voice the rolling thunder. One eye became the sun and on the moon. His body and limbs turned to five big mountains and his blood formed the roaring water. His veins became far-stretching roads and his muscles fertile land. The innumerable stars in the sky came from his hair and beard, and flowers and trees from his skin and the fine hairs on his body. His marrow turned to jade and pearls. His sweat flowed like the good rain and sweet dew that nurtured all things on earth. According to some versions of the Pan Gu legend, his tears flowed to make rivers and radiance of his eyes turned into thunder and lighting. When he was happy the sun shone, but when he was angry black clouds gathered in the sky. One version of the legend has it that the fleas and lice on his body became the ancestors of mankind.

The Pan Gu story has become firmly fixed in Chinese tradition. There is even an idiom relating to it: "Since Pan Gu created earth and the heavens", "meaning for a very long time." Nevertheless, it is rather a latecomer to the catalog of Chinese legends. First mention of it in a book on Chinese myths written by Xu Zheng in the Three Kingdoms period (A. D. 220-265). Some opinions hold that it originated in south China or southeast Asia.

Read More

Welcome

Dear all, welcome to my home! I hope you will enjoy here.

Read More