James Fallows wrote that, in a blog post about Al Gore's recent Rolling Stone essay, the news story it became, and why we hate the media.

Having lived in China, and especially now that I've started preparing to (yikes) write about China, conversations about "communism" and "freedom" and "democracy" are impossible for me to avoid. And, while the CCP its wasteful paranoia frustrate me, I think it's important to for Americans to take note of observations like Fallows's and remember just how imperfect (and thus understandably unappealing overseas) our democracy is.

Sam: I want to know why you were so interested.
Lee: Well, it seemed to me that the man who could conceive this great story would know exactly what he wanted to say and there would be no confusion in his statement.
Sam: You say ‘the man.’ Do you then not think this is a divine book written by the inky finger of God?
Lee: I think the mind that could think this story was a curiously divine mind. We have had a few such minds in China too.

Thank you, again, East of Eden.

Timshel (Live On Wxpn) by Mumford And Sons

(download)

Click here to download:

Timshel (Live on WXPN).mp3 (4 MB)

I'd love to show this to teachers in China.

Or, better, to Confucius.

Thank you, Bick.

But flopping in soccer is a problem. Flopping is essentially a combination of acting, lying, begging, and cheating, and these four behaviors make for an unappealing mix. The sheer theatricality of flopping is distasteful, as is the slow-motion way the chicanery unfolds. First there will be some incidental contact, and then there will be a long moment—enough to allow you to go and wash the car and return—after the contact and before the flopper decides to flop. When you've returned from washing the car and around the time you're making yourself a mini-bagel grilled cheese, the flopper will be leaping forward, his mouth Munch-wide and oval, bracing himself for contact with the earth beneath him. But this is just the beginning. Go and do the grocery shopping and perhaps open a new money-market account at the bank, and when you return, our flopper will still be on the ground, holding his shin, his head thrown back in mock-agony. It's disgusting, all of it, particularly because, just as all of this fakery takes a good deal of time and melodrama to put over, the next step is so fast that special cameras are needed to capture it. Once the referees have decided either to issue a penalty or not to our Fakey McChumpland, he will jump up, suddenly and spectacularly uninjured—excelsior!—and will kick the ball over to his teammate and move on.

That's Dave Eggers, four years ago, in an article explaining why Americans have yet to (and quite likely won't ever) fall in love with soccer.

I missed the article in 2006. I was in Beijing, eating popsicles, sprinting shirt- and shoe-less through flooding alleys to rescue a lost taxi cab, muting the painfully repetitive Chinese commentators in favor of Mos Def or Sim Redmond Band, and realizing that it's a beautiful thing to be somewhere other than the United States for the world's greatest sporting event.

This year I'm here, though. In LA. And very excited for tomorrow morning. South Africa vs Mexico kicks it off. At 630am.

Thank you, Slate, for republishing the Eggers. And thank you, China, for making me a soccer fan.

In case you haven't noticed, Google and China are mad at each other.

Thank you, internets, for being a place of creation and sharing.

Thank you, James Fallows, for keeping me connected to the country that taught me how to ride a bike.

And thank you, Little Green River, for doodling.

PS: I just asked my calendar to remind me to check google.com on June 4th. Just in case.

In December, someone tried to gain access to the Gmail accounts of a bunch of Chinese human rights activists. And that someone had some serious hacking skillz.

Serious to the point of scary.

Serious to the point that Google has decided to stop censoring its google.cn search results.

Which I think means serious to the point that Google thinks the Chinese government is involved.

Read Google's blog post. It's good.

And follow the story. It could be important.

Extraordinary talents, these two.

One, last I heard, was racing planes in Reno.

The other just launched a totally awesome iPhone app. It features a panda in a bib. And makes it possible for anyone, regardless of language skills, to navigate Chinese menus and restaurant interactions like a pro.

Here's a song one of them recorded a few months ago. Anyone want to guess which one?

Jaipur by Lil Tuna

(download)

Click here to download:

Jaipur.mp3 (2.44 MB)

Think he named the pics as he took them or added the captions later?

I once posed as a professional fisherman in a government-sponsored tournament in south central China.

Mr. Fu and I shared a raft for many hours. He was both a patient tutor and a fierce competitor.

I revealed to him that I was an impostor just moments before one of our hardhat-wearing, sugarcane-chewing river navigators took this picture.

Note: I post this in honor of Michael Dundas, who called me two nights before aforementioned (but not yet anything close to aforedescribed) adventure, told me he had an offer I couldn't refuse, and described a fishing tournament entirely unlike what we experienced. He's on the New Jersey Turnpike right now, on his way here. I haven't seen him in way too long.