Umbrellas are one of the things I remember from Korea, Japan and China. As a boy, I think I was surprised to see people using umbrellas when it wasn’t raining. But some do use them when it’s sunny, so encountering people using umbrellas to shield themselves on a bright day at Tiananmen wouldn’t be so strange. At least, not until they turn out to be plain-clothes security agents.

And if you’re online right now, and interested in such things, you can watch a live stream of Meltdown: The Impact of Climate Change on the Tibetan Plateau, hosted by the Asia Society and chinadiaologue, by visiting the society’s main webpage. Here is the day’s schedule, all times Eastern Standard:

8:00 am: Registration and Coffee

8:45 am: Welcome (Webcast begins)

9:00 am: Tibet on Film

* Michael Zhao, Center on US-China Relations
* David Breashears, Arcturus Pictures

10:00 am: Himalayan Meltdown

* Lonnie Thompson, School of Earth Sciences, Ohio State University
* Yao Tandon, Chinese Academy of Sciences

11:30 am: Plateau Survival

* Emily Yeh, University of Colorado, Boulder
* Daniel Miller, US Agency for International Development, New Delhi
* Yonten Nyima, University of Colorado, Boulder
* Julia Klein, Colorado State University

1:00 – 1:45 pm: Break

1:45 pm: A Region at Risk

* Saleemul Huq, Climate Change Group, International Institute for Environment and Development
* Katherine Morton, Department of International Relations, Australian National University
* Lara Hansen, WWF Global Climate Change Program

3:00 pm: Organizer Remarks

* Robert Barnett, Modern Tibetan Studies, Columbia University
* Elizabeth Economy, Council on Foreign Relations
* Isabel Hilton, chinadialogue
* Orville Schell, Asia Society Center on US-China Relations

4:00 pm: Afternoon Keynote Address

* Rajendra Pachauri, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and Nobel Laureate

5:00 pm: Closing Reception

(If you have a Mac, you may need to install the latest version of the Flip4Mac plugin to watch the webcast. Check Flip4Mac in your system preferences to see if you need an update, or just click this link to download.)

The Asia Society took its first leap into multimedia and China’s environment last year with its Clearing the Air website, which introduced viewers to the environmental challenges—especially regarding air pollution—that China faces. The most compelling feature of that site is the calendar showing Beijing’s shifting air quality, Room With A View. The calendar is continually updated, its most recent image being of a clear blue sky on Monday, January 12:

While visiting China Green, be sure to try using the interactive timelines comparing photos of Himalayan glaciers several decades ago with glaciers today. You’ll see what I mean on the opening page of China Green, as it shows the time-lapse loss of the Rongbuk Glacier. And if you know that you’ll be in New York City on January 16th, check out the Asia Society symposium Meltdown: The Impact of Climate Change on the Tibetan Plateau. [Update] If you can’t make it, the Asia Society will stream a live webcast of the event on its site that day.

Disclosure: China Green was produced by people I consider friends and colleagues. I’d like to especially point out the work of Michael Zhao, who has done a great amount of work in both multimedia and China’s relationship with the environment. A notable example of the combination of those being his look at the importation and processing of electronic waste in China, the first coverage of any depth I’ve seen on the subject.

A few days ago, the AP’s Daisy Nguyen published a report on the trend of building suburban-style developments around the world. Developers in China and India and Africa are looking to Southern California (pictured above, partially) for a growth model. While this should be alarming to anyone concerned about resources and climate change (and willing, if you’re an American, to adopt the do-as-we-say-not-as-we-do ethos), it’s a classic example of how growing middle class populations are importing elements of American life. The article describes, for example, a community outside of Shanghai:

Grassy front lawns and driveways lead to pastel-colored homes that mimic French, Italian or Spanish architectural styles. Customized kitchens, screening rooms and basement wine cellars are very different from Chairman Mao’s vision of communal living.

“It’s hard to tell you’re not in Southern California,” [Pasadena-based architect Andy] Feola said.

On the highways outside of cities like Beijing and Delhi, I zipped past billboards that advertised gated communities, some with McMansions and garages large enough for SUVs. They seemed out of place, but such are our preconceptions of places like China and India. (And, to an extent, disappointments–who travels around the globe to hang out in suburbs?) But they wouldn’t build them if there were no demand. As affluence increases, so does the market.

From the environmental perspective, one would hope sustainable design could mitigate the negative effects of such development. Whether that is being applied in a robust way remains to be seen. But for some, it seems, the prospect of mass suburbanization should go full steam ahead. In my favorite quote from the story, one American architecture professor said: “It’s too bad that we as Americans are turning away from suburban sprawl as Asia adopts it.”

Regarding green development–in China, anyway–an article last week in the Christian Science Monitor noted that one grand project has stumbled. The correspondent, Simon Montlake, describes the situation of Dongtan, a planned eco-city outside of Shanghai that was being designed by the engineering firm Arup. (A related article published in The Telegraph last October is well worth a read, too.)

Dongtan’s plan hits all the right sustainability buttons: energy from waste, recycling, limited carbon emissions, density, energy-efficient buildings, etc. You may have seen the feature on this project, “Pop-Up Cities: China Builds a Bright Green Metropolis”, in Wired last year. I’ve been in touch with Arup employees in the past and they seemed devoted to making this work, not just in terms of design, but socially and economically. It’s tough when, after a streak of good press, something comes along to trip up a project. (Last year, Conde Nast was particularly good to Arup, with the Wired feature and a New Yorker feature.)

One of the main sources for the Monitor article was Kira Gould, the communications director at William McDonough + Partners. Montlake briefly mentioned the Huangbaiyu Cradle to Cradle Village project:

On a more modest scale, William McDonough + Partners designed an ecovillage of 400 households in northeast China, of which 42 houses have been built. The plan called for affordable solar-powered bungalows using local materials in a bid to free more land for farming. Instead, the developer built suburban-style tract homes that most local families have shunned, according to a PBS documentary earlier this year.

Ms. Gould concedes that mistakes were made in the design and construction of Huangbaiyu, the village. One complaint was that it didn’t create enough jobs. But that was never part of the project, says Gould. “We came to learn that economic development and sustainable development were often being used interchangeably,” she says.

To give you an idea of what that looks like, we have this:

I should remark on a couple of points here, especially the take-away from my PBS report, as described in the article. I wrote a comment on the Monitor’s site a couple of days ago. (Shannon May, who studied the village, also wrote an interesting comment on the selfish reasons that have motivated Western firms to attempt green development in China.) My comment hasn’t yet been published; I’d guess the comment moderators have been short-staffed due to the holidays. In the meantime, here it is:

I’d like to thank Simon Montlake and the Monitor for mentioning the investigative piece I completed for FRONTLINE/World (PBS) earlier this year. But I must clarify one point raised in this article about my story.

The residents of this farming village currently live spread out in a long valley, near their crops, with livestock on their property. The plan created by William McDonough and his partners on this project outlined a single, dense community for the entire village.

While it is the case that the local developer built suburban-style tract homes, it is fair to say he did so based on the plan he received. (His modifications of details of the design are a point to debate.)

The planners recognized, before construction began, that the yards of the new houses would be smaller than those that currently exist. As noted in the narrative that accompanied the master plan: “The yards may be too small to support the number of livestock that currently occupy many yards in the village.” In practice, this meant the farmers could not keep their livestock–a major source of income–if they moved in.

And that, simply, is why no one wanted to. There was a fundamental flaw in the design: it neglected to account for this basic element of village life. The cause of this oversight is, to some extent, a mystery because no one from William McDonough + Partners would comment for my story. But the more important point to remember here is that villagers saw that this eco-village would require them to trade in their lives as farmers for lives in factories or offices or whatever would fit this suburban-style tract home design.

Who could blame the villagers, then, for hoping that some new jobs would come along with this high-profile international eco-village project, since participating in it would force them to give up their old ones?

Update: Nothing to update, which is my point. It is the 12th of January, and they’ve not included my comment. I have re-submitted.

Update: Comment now online at Monitor’s web site. 13 Jan 09.

Dale has worked with the architect William McDonough for several years. Since 2000, she has been the director of community design at William McDonough + Partners. Dale is of medium height, with blonde hair and rectangular glasses. She looks just like her picture. A couple of days earlier, she stood up during the question-and-answer section of the panel I participated in at Greenbuild’s International Forum. She didn’t have questions so much as comments, which I described in a previous post. In a nutshell, neither Dale nor anyone from McDonough + Partners, was especially happy with my FRONTLINE/World story on the Huangbaiyu Cradle to Cradle Village Project in China.

She started by saying she knew I had mentioned her on my blog. When I asked what she thought of what I’d written, she said she hadn’t read it (she later clarified that it was printed out for her). But she did want to follow up on some of the points I made in my blog post, and gave some additional information about the role of William McDonough + Partners in the Huangbaiyu project. She did most of the talking. Our conversation was probably about 20 minutes, maybe a little longer. I spoke briefly with Kira Gould, the director of communications for the firm, soon after, and then once more, briefly with Dale. For those interested in the details, I’ve outlined the points they made, as well as some questions and responses, after the jump.

On translation: During the Q&A and in my earlier post, the problem of translation came up. On stage and on my blog, I said that there were fluent Chinese speakers deeply involved in the project. But Diane Dale, in our later conversation, told me it was more complicated than that: it wasn’t a language problem, it was a problem of cultural translation.

According to Dale, Wang Miansheng—who is currently the managing director of the China-US Center for Sustainable Development, an organization involved in the coordination and execution of the Huangbaiyu Cradle to Cradle model village—took great pride in his translation. In particular, she said that his translation was an almost exact, one-to-one linguistic conversion from Mandarin to English, and vice versa.

To illustrate, Dale told me the story of receiving a compliment from a Chinese woman. Wang translated it into English, and Dale’s response, which was translated back, was a simple thank you. The Chinese woman was offended. Dale later learned, she told me, that she should have replied with a modest, “Oh, no, no, no.” By acknowledging and accepting the compliment, Dale came across as arrogant. She said Wang interceded in no way.

I asked Dale why Wang did not caution her when she might come across as offensive. It seems, I added, that a translator would mention nuances of culture to avoid fundamental misunderstandings like this.

As Dale put it, Wang didn’t “editorialize” by including cultural connotations in his translation. He took great pride in that, she said.

She added that the translations were given with a “spirit of optimism.” There was “lots of optimistic color” to the translation, as well as a “desire to do well.”

On the firm’s role: Dale said that foreign firms have limited control over their projects in China. As she put it, “Do you know foreigners are not allowed to do conceptual design?” She also said that some firms do have control, depending on the relationship.

On studying other models: During the Q&A, one of the first questions came from an American architect who asked if the Huangbaiyu designers had done any research on rural models of development in China. I replied that none of my reporting indicates they did this kind of research.

Dale addressed this point. “It is a recent phenomenon, rural planning,” she said. She described their plans for Huangbiayu as “a pioneering event.”

On previously addressing the shortcomings in Huangbaiyu: Dale said she gave a talk entitled “A Tale of Two Cities” that discussed what went wrong in Huangbaiyu. She said I should have found this talk on my own.

On why the firm chose not to comment for my story: According to Kira Gould, neither she nor Dale had worked on the project, so they needed to study up on the project. They were unable to learn enough in time to respond to my queries. And, she added, “Bill just didn’t want to.”

On Timothy Lesle:
Dale’s “criticism of [my] criticism was that [I] was looking for something to criticize.”

After reviewing my notes and contacting Shannon May (the anthropology doctoral candidate who has now spent years studying the issues, interviewing and shadowing participants on both continents, and living in the village), I am left with more questions than answers as a result of this encounter.

On translation: From Dale’s explanation, my resulting question is not so much about Wang’s choices as a translator, but how it was received. If there was no editorializing of the translation, what does it mean when the translation is delivered with “lots of optimistic color”? Did the optimistic translation cause her or her colleagues any alarm?

As Shannon May wrote to me:

She’s contradicting herself. Was it always straight translation or with “optimistic color”? Having been in the room during many sessions with Miansheng, Bill, Dai Xiaolong [the local developer] and other Chinese officials, I’d say that the translation was always pretty accurate. But that the people were often just talking past each other. Xie [Xie Baoxing, a local official] would say, “the entire village believes in and supports sustainable development”, but no one would ask him how he knows that, or what that means. Dai would say that he “knows everything about sustainable development” but no one asked him how, or what he knew. The list is endless. No one ever asked for evidence, or for numbers. It was always all vision, always all salesmanship and no *work*. 

On the firm’s role: Who better to tell me what kinds of constraints William McDonough + Partners had to work under than William McDonough + Partners? But they did not comment. No one from the China-US Center, which Gould offered up as an alternative source in their stead, ever mentioned this constraint. And, as Dale pointed out, some firms do have control over projects they work on in China.

No American ever mentioned this. No Chinese ever mentioned this. So how would one know? Dai Xiaolong, the developer, described the American involvement thusly: “All the American side did was to point here and to point there without actual investment. It is not my own project.”

Shannon May:

I’m confused by what she means by conceptual design here. It is accurate that there must be a locally certified architect who is the signatory on the final construction drawings. But that is not conceptual design, but construction. There are dozens and dozens of foreign architecture firms in China, building in China, and they have control over the buildings they were hired to build. Yes, there must be a Chinese certified architect signing the construction plans, but that has nothing to do with what the design is. Firms often draw up the construction drawings themselves, give them to their Chinese partner, have them reprint and sign. There’s no lack of control just because of the signatory.

When May points out that these restrictions don’t apply to the act of designing, this is significant because it has been established that the design is fundamentally unacceptable to the farmers in Huangbaiyu.

I asked Dale why, if they knew they had no power over the project, they stayed with it; why they kept both McDonough and his firm’s name closely associated with it; and why McDonough himself had taken credit for the project in high-profile venues (e.g., Newsweek, the TED Conference) before it fell apart. She paused then answered: “I am very comfortable and very proud of the work that Bill McDonough has done”

On studying other models: In response to Dale’s point that there were few existing rural models available to them during the design, May notes that any project needs in-depth research into how the affected community lives, its history, future projections, and other issues. “This is the same if a new neighborhood is being developed in Beijing or Huangbaiyu.” She adds that it’s the data that differs, not the process.

May admires the premise of bringing principles of urban planning to rural development in China. But in regard to this particular project, May wrote, William McDonough + Partners simply tried to apply existing urban planning principles to this new rural context without collecting any data or asking questions. 

May continued:

When [Dale] says that it was a pioneering event, she is right, but that it was a pioneering event for her firm, and so they made mistakes. I don’t think that everyone would have. Or made the same ones. This situation was not fated, which is what she seems to keep implying. As if they can’t be held responsible because there is no way it could have been different. The gods have spoken. It’s a classic way of deflecting responsibility. 

A couple of hours before I left Boston, I ran into the architect who originally asked the question about whether William McDonough + Partners had looked at other models of rural planning in China. I relayed Dale’s response that there were few or no models when they started.

He looked at me and asked, “What about those five thousand years of Chinese history?”

On previously addressing the shortcomings in Huangbaiyu: May told me she was unaware of a speech by Dale with the title “A Tale of Two Cities.” Neither of us have found it, which is not to say that it does not exist. We have simply been unable to find it.

On why the firm chose not to comment to me: That, as Gould said, she and Dale had to get caught up on what happened in Huangbaiyu is puzzling. After all, Dale earlier told me she had delivered a talk on what went wrong. That suggests that she did, perhaps, have some sense of what happened in Huangbaiyu. Why would she need to study more? Or, why didn’t she simply send me the text of the speech?

McDonough’s not wanting to talk to me will have to speak for itself.

On Timothy Lesle: William McDonough + Partners had ample opportunity to comment. I volunteered to go to the San Francisco office. I offered to fly to their headquarters in Virginia. I tracked Kira Gould down at a conference last year to ask, in person, for their participation. When I first had the notion of doing the story, almost two years ago, a colleague approached William McDonough at the World Economic Forum on my behalf (the funding and reporting wouldn’t actually start until about six months later). If they had given me any information appropriate to telling the story, I would have included it. As it stands, every point that Dale has mentioned to me after the story was published has been exculpatory, shifting responsibility away from William McDonough + Partners. Fair enough.

But to come up to me nine months after publication and say I should have included point X or point Y is a little disingenuous. As I said to Dale, I respect your perspectives as participants and experts, and I was seeking that expert perspective for my story. It was not my decision for them to decline to comment.

Still, they can make their voices heard, especially in regard to Green Dreams. If Diane Dale or her colleagues have anything to add to the story, I invite them to submit a comment to the FRONTLINE/World page where the story lives.

In fact, I extended that invitation to Dale toward the end of our encounter at Greenbuild.

Her response?

“I would rather not.”

During the question-and-answer portion of the session, Diane Dale, who directs community planning at William McDonough + Partners, stood up. She was well-spoken and gracious in many ways, but there was a sense that she was trying to call me out.

Although I think there may be an audio tape of the event, I caution that these are my recollections. I’m sure, once the tape comes out, we will all hear how inarticulate I actually was. Something to look forward to. In the meantime, I figure I might as well give a rough accounting for those who are interested. As several attendees noted after the exchange, there is always more than one side to every story.

Ms Dale introduced herself and said that she thought my presentation was not as critical as it could have been. She noted that her firm had been quite critical of the outcome and had learned many important lessons. She didn’t have questions so much as comments. The first of which, a big lesson learned, was the importance of translation–simply, good translation–which apparently hindered the effective communication of ideas and concepts.

In regard to the point of the yards being too small for animals, she noted that during the time of the design, SARS was floating around Asia. SARS, she reminded us, was a devastating, deadly illness. “They told us” that the animals would have to be kept separate from the houses.

And she seemed to question the fairness or purpose of this session because neither she nor anyone else from William McDonough + Partners was on the stage.

From what I recall, those were her main points.

I have a few initial thoughts that will no doubt be refined over time. Some of these points I managed to mention on stage; others have bubbled up since then, classic examples of l’esprit d’escalier. I neglected to address the SARS point while on stage, simply because I forgot. But that’s what blogs are for, I guess.

1. In regard to translation, two names immediately came to mind: Zhong Ping and Wang Miansheng. As far as I know, both are Chinese, native speakers. Both were employees of the China-US Center for Sustainable Development, which was the key coordinating organization for this project. These are people who have some influence within the organization and are familiar with the project, with China, with all the key elements of this effort. In fact, this is why I hoped to find Zhong Ping while I was in China (he was traveling); and asked to interview Wang Miansheng after returning to the U.S. (also traveling). To say that translation is a problem doesn’t jibe with having men like these on board.

Still, on the merits of Ms Dale’s translation point, I have to ask: if McDonough + Partners is a sophisticated design firm of international scope, why couldn’t they manage to hire one good translator in China? Hundreds if not thousands of other companies do it every day. I did it on a shoestring budget.

2. This SARS point. In the context of the Huangbaiyu story, this is news to me. When Ms. Dale says “they” told her colleagues about this design restriction, I’d like to know who “they” are. This issue is certainly not mentioned in the vision plan to justify the planners’ admission that “the yards may be too small to support the number of livestock that currently occupy many yards in the village.” My understanding is that this was written in 2004, or thereabouts, which places it after the main SARS outbreak. If SARS were a concern, why didn’t it say, “The yards have now been designed too small to support livestock in order to keep them away from humans due to disease concerns,” or something like that?

If this separation rule were an order from the central government, anyone familiar with the way things work in China will understand that just because the central government says it should happen, it doesn’t always happen on the ground, for better or worse. Had they ever heard of that?

For that matter, even if the animals were to be separated, what would be the method of taking care of them? Lone outposts of pigs and goats that farmers must trudge through the winter snows to feed and water every day? Should someone be posted nearby to guard them? Or would it be a single, collective space, where the community’s animals would live and which would probably begin to resemble a factory farm?

Frankly, I would have heard about the SARS issue much earlier had McDonough + Partners actually told me; but a year ago, they weren’t talking to me; before that, McDonough was publicly blaming the developer for the project’s outcome.

And in any case, as a journalist it’s not always enough for me to rely on what “they” tell me–it’s often better to just go and have a look myself. That’s why I went to Huangbaiyu rather than simply report on what McDonough + Partners might have told me here in America. I would hope a community designer would do the same: visit the place and take a walk around. It soon becomes clear that these farmers do live near and interact with their animals.

3. I think it’s perfectly appropriate that the USGBC invited me on stage to talk about this project in the context of my story. My reporting was fair and well-researched; the story is designed to give a look at the village and what contributed to the present outcome of the development. Another person who could deliver a fair, and even more thorough, analysis, would be Shannon May, the anthropologist who lived two years in the village.

That the McDonough people weren’t on stage does not seem especially critical in light of this. For what it’s worth, the fact that they did want a place on the stage suggests that they feel some sense of ownership or responsibility regarding the project’s outcome. The bigger issue this brings up is one of accountability, a point that is essential to my story. But if they wanted to go onstage simply to defend their reputation, that would defeat the purpose of the panel, because it becomes about them and not about the project.

As I pointed out yesterday at the event, it’s difficult to tell a story if people who are part of it refuse to participate. I spent a month trying to get on-the-record comments about this project from them, especially William McDonough. In fact, I corresponded with Kira Gould, McDonough’s communications director, who was sitting next to Ms Dale in the audience. McDonough and his firm had an opportunity to tell their story in my report. They are expert designers; I wanted to hear their expert conclusions. And they took a pass.

But now that the story’s out and I’ve been invited to speak on it, they want to be on stage, too. Frankly, this makes me think of someone who complains about an election but didn’t bother to vote. Like voting, a robust press is a part of what makes the democracy. Participation is key.

***
Several attendees who had no opinion or knowledge of the project approached me after the talk. A couple of them said that McDonough staffers had talked to them after my talk, as well. One woman said she’d just been told that the local officials completely cut the Americans out of the project, and McDonough + Partners could only participate as a kind of consultant with no real influence or control. Another attendee claims he was told by a McDonough staffer that they had almost no budget for their work on the village design, and that the budget barely paid for their plane tickets, which is why they couldn’t do a thorough job. Neither of those points came up during Ms Dale’s comments, though they sound as if they would be fundamental to the outcome.

Still, I was glad to finally hear something from William McDonough + Partners.

He’s holding two cigarettes. One is for me.

This story started out as an assignment for PBS Frontline/World, and covers the same ground. I’m grateful to Frontline/World and the team of producers and editors there, and to the editors at Dwell for giving me an opportunity to reflect on the story.

The essay hasn’t been posted online, but as soon as it’s available, I will link to it. (In the meantime, check out the magazine in print.) It’s accompanied by some excellent illustrations by Grady McFerrin. And the editors deserve extra credit for coming up with the title.

One thing I don’t regret missing, though, is the promotional marketing that NBC must be constantly playing. Boring, I’d guess, but designed to appeal to everybody. Boring. So points to BBC SPORT for choosing something inventive, and specific. That’s Monkey. Fans of Damon Albarn and the Gorillaz will be pleased.

A high-res version with more info is available at the BBC.

While we’re at it, here’s an old favorite:

I was surprised to hear that Li Ning was the final torch bearer at Beijing’s opening ceremonies. That’s him flying through the air, photographed by Xinhua. That Li should be the choice makes sense: after staying away from the Olympics for decades, China returned in 1984; then-19-year-old Li Ning left L.A. with six medals in gymnastics, three of them gold. So there is some national significance to Li’s selection.

Li is now an incredibly successful businessman, owner of a sports apparel and accessory company that does a brisk business in China. His company is called Li Ning.

I own a Li Ning shoulder bag, bought almost exactly one year ago at one of the company’s stores on the third floor of a mall in Benxi City, Liaoning. The store’s columns were wrapped with life-sized posters of Shaquille O’Neal, appropriately branded. It’s a durable bag. I didn’t realize that it was such a recognizable brand until, one day in San Francisco, a Chinese emigre lifted up my bag and announced, “Li Ning.”

Li Ning. If you visit the company’s English-language web site, there is no mention of the Olympics. If you visit the company’s other English-language web site, there is some mention of the Olympics. Oh, Mr. Li and his executives must have desperately wanted their company to be an official sponsor of the Beijing Olympics, but lost out to Adidas. But Li Ning is no slouch, and the company is outfitting a number of teams, starting with the Swedish, and including the American ping pong team. He’s also got CCTV-5′s sportscasters. Li Ning’s continued presence, corporal and corporate, will, presumably, be noted.

So the more cynical side of me registered some surprise at Li Ning’s moment in the spotlight. Offend the advertisers and sponsors? But the takeaway seems to be that there are still some things money can’t buy, and Beijing’s organizers put national pride before commercial imperatives. Classic. And reassuring, so long as national pride does not transform into a nationalist imperative. This is China.

This morning, NASA and the Exploratorium webcast live from Xinjiang, China. You can watch their hour-long production at the Exploratorium’s Total Solar Eclipse web site. (That’s a photo from the Exploratorium blog above.)

The broadcast starts about 30 minutes before totality, when the moon completely blocks out the sun. The first fifteen minutes include a lesson from scientists on the ground about what happens during an eclipse. That’s followed by some back-and-forth between the scientists and a local Chinese news anchor, which includes a few minutes of classic Chinese journalism/propaganda/travelogue that touts the wonders of Xinjiang. Xinjiang has quite a few ethnic minorities, notably the Uighur, some of whom agitate for independence from China. Words like peace, harmony, and unity are sprinkled in this section of the show. The astro-drama begins at about the 33-minute mark.

Ah, to be in China again. The story I want to see stemming from this is the story of Yiwu County, perched among desert and mountains, a 16 hour drive from Urumqi and its airport, with, according to Wikipedia, 20,000 inhabitants. Over the last couple days, busloads of telescope-toting nerds and media have laid siege. In anticipation, the government set up a tent city to accommodate all 10,000 of them (as well as what one scientist calls a “Gobi Stonehenge.”). All that planning leading up to a two hour show. And now that this place has had its moment in the sun, so to speak, what next?

Here’s what the moon’s shadow looks like on earth during a total solar eclipse. Taken on the Russian Space Station Mir, 11 August 1999.

The next total solar eclipse is scheduled for 22 July 2009. Totality will occur from northern India, across Bhutan, and along the Chang Jiang (Yangtze River) to Shanghai.

He lives in a village in northeastern China. He has traveled throughout the country but his favorite part is this little valley. His family has been here for centuries. These are his cattle:

Every morning he takes his cattle out to graze, then brings them back around lunchtime. He usually orders lunch from the village restaurant.

If there are guests, there is beer. Lu says he can drink 27 bottles in one sitting. 

He was one of the poorest people in his village when he was a boy. Now he is among the most prosperous. He’s got the cash to prove it.

That’s his younger daughter. She refused to hold up any of her dad’s cash.

There is a cat that hangs around their property. It showed up one day, unbidden. The next morning, it had deposited eighteen mice on their doorstep. Eighteen.

He’s a good cat, says Lu. They haven’t had any problems with mice since then.

Lu’s daughter refused to hold up any of her father’s money. But she was happy to hold the cat.