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I just wanted to highlight my recent confusion over Coca-Cola's sustainability efforts. Namely:
- The World Wildlife Fund – Coca-Cola Partnership: "an effort to measurably conserve seven of the worlds most critical freshwater river basins."
- The Replenish Africa Initiative (RAIN): Coca-Cola's $30-million dollar commitment to providing communities throughout Africa with safe drinking water and sanitation.
- The Global Water Challenge (GWC): founded with support from Coca-Cola, a global movement toward safe water and sanitation.
- Coca-Cola's Commitment to the CEO Water Mandate: a program designed to help companies better manage their water use.
Though I applaud Coca-Cola's apparent concern over the world's water supply, I can't help but contemplate the irony of their efforts. Surely Coke must be aware that it takes nearly two gallons of water to manufacture just one of their many plastic beverage bottles. Conservation? Good water management? Nice try, guys, but I can't help but wonder if this is "greenwashing" at it's best…
Readers, what do you think?


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Two months after SyFy announced that the Battlestar Galactica spin-off Caprica was coming to an abrupt end, another franchise staple for the network has been given a pink-slip. After much speculation, SyFy announced today that they will not be picking Stargate Universe for a third season.
Fortunately, fans of the series will not have to worry about a sudden disappearance of their favorite show from the television schedule, as SyFy still plans on airing the 10 remaining episodes of the second season. Of course, on what day and in what time-slot those episodes will air is still yet unknown.
The Stargate Universe series premiere garnered a respectable 2.4 million viewers. Unfortunately, as the series continued, it began to lose viewers week after week. When the second season took its hiatus on November 30, the show was averaging around 1 million viewers per episode - which is slightly higher than the ratings Caprica was receiving when it was canceled.
With news of Stargate Universe being canceled, one has to wonder how this will impact the subsequent episodes and inevitable end of the series. While everything has been planned for Gauntlet to be the second season finale, the producers may choose to tweak the last remaining episodes in order to get a proper send off to Nicholas Rush, Everett Young, and the rest of the Destiny crew.
Of course, with no real knowledge of Stargate Universe's production schedule, one can't really know how many of the episodes have already been completed - or if a last minute shift in the seasonal plot-line would even be possible.
Now that Stargate Universe has been canceled, it begs the question whether SyFy will attempt another series based on this popular franchise. While Stargate has been a staple on the network over 8 years, the ratings of this latest installment haven't been promising.
Even though Battlestar Galactica has been given a resurrection after Caprica with Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome, another series from Stargate is unlikely. With Caprica, many cited the complete disconnect from the original series, and lack of Cylons and Cylon fighting, as their reason for not tuning in. Fortunately, Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome picks up in the 10th year of the first Cylon war, which should interest those that originally passed on Caprica's overly dramatic storylines.
Unfortunately, in the case of Stargate, there's no real time-line of events that producers could fall back on and cite as being something they know would work as a television series this time around.
Hopefully I am wrong. Whether you're a fan of Stargate or not, the series has had a rich and diverse run. It would be extremely unfortunate if it simply came to an end.
Stargate Universe is expected to return in spring 2011, on SyFy

subset: commoncrawl


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Find us on:
22512 Gateway Center Drive
Clarksburg, MD 20871
1-800-437-2423 (Voice - Toll-free)301-258-9454 (FAX)
BrightFocus Foundation is a registered 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that funds research into cures for Alzheimer's disease, macular degeneration and glaucoma, and provides the public with information about risk factors, preventative lifestyles, available treatments and coping strategies.
A variety of booklets on Alzheimer's disease, macular degeneration and glaucoma.
Thursday, Mar 14, 2013
Language Assistance Available


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Liberty News
Students speak out at first Chancellor Q&A
Rainy weather did not keep concerned students away from the Towns-Alumni Lecture Hall last night where Chancellor Jerry Falwell, Jr. and a panel of 11 university administrators hosted their first Chancellor Q&A.
Panels represented SAO, Center4ME, Information Services, Dining Services, Commuter Affairs, LUPD, Financial Aid, Auxiliary Services, Spiritual Development and CASAS.
Students lined the center aisle of the year-old lecture hall to ask about everything from financial aid and housing to parking, food service and capital improvements.
"We've spent $38 million since July of '07 on campus renovations," said Falwell, which include major upgrades to VCAR, the DeMoss Learning Center, dormitories, hallways and academic departments.
The chancellor noted that many of the large improvements, like a year-round ski slope, come from donors. He attributed the new bookstore to Barnes & Noble and new dining facilities to Sodexho. He said upgrades to certain facilities, like the Center for Worship, are "at the top of the list," while others, like an expanded stadium, are on hold for now.
There are plans to relocate the Career Center to a more prominent location, Falwell said. "With jobs as scarce as they are, we want that [facility] front-and-center." Other likely additions include the Creation museum, Civil War museum and a premier shooting facility.
When asked about efforts to make the campus more "green," Charles Spence, Director of Planning and Construction, rattled off a number of ways the school is conserving energy — and ultimately keeping tuition low. Water savers, fluorescent lighting, insulation, reflective roofing and occupancy sensors are just a few measures in place. Plus all non-critical computers will soon be configured to shut down when not in use. More visibly, hundreds of trees have been planted on campus in the last few weeks as part of a campus beautification effort, Spence said.
The chancellor assured inquiring students that professors undergo rigorous screening before teaching at Liberty, "but after that, we rely on peer review and student evaluations" to know if they are staying on course. "If professors are not teaching from a Christian worldview, we want to know about it," he said.


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Of the problems that beset Xavier De La Torre in his brief tenure as Santa Clara County Office of Education superintendent, the yearlong unraveling of the payroll department may have been his undoing.
As detailed by current and former employees, who feared to be identified by name, and in documents, Chief Business Officer Micaela Ochoa approved cost-cutting measures that trimmed the department from seven to four and then just two people, despite a warning from the retiring payroll supervisor about problems even one cut would create. For a while, the remaining employees were forbidden from putting in overtime.
With inexperienced staff from another department filling in for overwhelmed payroll employees, the office issued so many error-filled paychecks that its internal auditor called in outside investigators, who documented numerous mistakes and warned of potential breached security, liability and penalties.
"The payroll department was overpaying employees from July," said one supervisor in another department.
The snafu also affected retirees. "They forgot to take out my state disability," said one former employee, who still fears retribution from the office.
The office is still mopping up, trying to trace incorrect paychecks and W-2 forms. But the payroll staff now has been instructed to stop sending letters alerting former employees of mistakes It is not clear whether it will seek to recoup overpayments.
When the board sent its own investigator to question De La Torre, he claimed ignorance and walked out after five minutes. This month, De La Torre said that Ochoa had ensured that the staff reductions would not affect payroll — although that clearly was not the case.
Finally, a memo from concerned employees to the education office's internal and external auditors triggered an independent study. That $23,000 report, which the office kept secret but delivered to the board in late December, found over- and under-paid employees, incorrect retirement checks, untimely payments, overpaid vacation and errors in medical benefits.
The report by accountants Frank, Rimerman and Co. of San Jose also found that shared passwords and login names compromised personnel and payroll data, and that enabling fill-in workers to both create employee accounts and pay employees raised security concerns. The study warned of possible IRS fines and liabilities, and fraud through unauthorized changes to personnel and payroll records.
The County Office now is seeking bids for a full-fledged audit. It called in retirees to sort out errors and swore them to secrecy. It boosted staffing back to 2012 levels. The cost of the repair work hasn't been determined.
Contact Sharon Noguchi at 408-271-3775. Follow her at Twitter.com/NoguchiOnK12.


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Work on replacement tournament for the Heineken Cup paused until Monday
Work on European club rugby's new elite tournament will be put on hold over the weekend and resume on Monday.
The replacement for the Heineken Cup was expected to be unveiled this week, but it is understood that administrative elements of the agreement have yet to be finalised, resulting in the delay.
Once the paperwork is complete an announcement will be made, with Monday the earliest possible opportunity to declare a ceasefire in the bitter two-year dispute over Europe.
A further delay could be caused by the rugby calendar, however, with the Heineken Cup quarter-finals scheduled to take place next weekend.
European rugby chiefs may decide to hold any announcement until the first knockout round is over out of respect to the competition as it nears its conclusion.
A new 20-team format is expected to see six Aviva Premiership teams, six clubs from France's Top 14 competition and seven of the RaboDirect PRO12 sides qualify for a competition that would succeed the Heineken Cup.
The final place would be decided after a play-off between this season's seventh-placed finishers in the Premiership and Top 14.
Press Association Sport understands an agreement is imminent. Once signed all parties can then chase a resolution between broadcasters BT Sport and Sky, both of whom have indicated a willingness to agree a compromise TV rights deal.
The Six Nations committee is expected to provide the basis of the new governing body, with some existing European Rugby Cup staff retained.
Online Editors


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(visited by Greg Michaels and Ru Rong Zhao)
13-Apr-2004 -- The center of the eastern half of the northern hemisphere, the center of the northeastern quadrasphere, the point halfway between the equator, the north pole, the Prime meridian and International Date Line - whatever you want to call it, this point seems quite important, as far as confluence points go. I thought I'd have to just go see what's there - a monument, as there is in Wisconsin at the center of the northwestern quadrasphere? Some dedication to Mao Tse Dong? A Buddhist temple? A mosque? Was there any evidence anyone had been there before? My curiosity and the conspicuousness of the point was enough to make me go.
So I took off to Urumqi, the capital of the Xinjiang Autonomous Republic, better known as Eastern Turkistan to the local Muslim Uigur population. The massive, Western Europe-sized Xinjiang province is controlled by China, and China has been effective in encouraging Han Chinese settlers to populate the region so that it's now more than 50% Chinese. This, they hope, would dilute the Uigur population and prevent them from starting an uprising.
Urumqi is a Chinese-style, modern, if backwards and dusty, metropolis. There are a lot of interesting Muslim outdoor markets filled with lively people and adorned with mosques - and a lot of junky, bland Chinese buildings, too.
After examining maps, my quest was clear: get to the town of Jiang Jun Miao (Jiangjunmiao) and head about 40 kilometers on the road north of there from where I could hopefully walk to the point.
In Urumqi, the first quest was finding a bus station from which to depart from. The city seems to have a different bus stations for every destination, and my destination was not a popular one. "There is no bus to Jiang Jun Miao" was what I kept hearing. So I tried Qitai, which was a closer, if bigger city. "I could probably change buses there for Jiang Jun Miao, right?" I asked them. I received unconfident nods.
I found the bus station for Qitai-bound buses hidden between shanty fruit stands and an apartment building in one of the seedier parts of town. The drive to Qitai was supposed to be about 4-6 hours and then another 4 hours to Jiang Jun Miao. I bought a bunch of snacks and got the 8AM bus, which was the earliest one (being so far west on Beijing time the sun rises just before 8AM).
Four hours later I arrived in the bigger-and-flashier-than-anticipated Qitai, anxious to get the scoop on the elusive road to Jiang Jun Miao. To my disappointment, the main bus station told me they didn't know of buses to Jiang Jun Miao, but sent me out to another 'extremity' bus station for buses heading that way.
At that 'lovely little hole in the wall' bus station the nice ladies directed me to a man whom they perhaps thought of as being well informed on the environs of the area. At least he definitely thought of himself this way.
"There's no bus to Jiang Jun Miao", he said. "There's no ROAD to JiangJun Miao, there's not even a Jiang Jun Miao", he said. He said he was very sure about this.
After many previous experiences of people in China giving out incorrect or misinformed information, I was not ready to give up there. Afterall, Jiang Jun Miao was on every map I had. Yet he said the road and the town used to exist, but had been abandoned and consumed by sand dunes.
I found out there was a bus to the Mongolian border which went almost half the distance to Jiang Jun Miao. I said I'd get off at the crossroads and hitchhike from there.
To rejuvenate myself on a day filled with few nutritious options, I decided to get a bowl full of homemade noodles with beef and vegetables. The bus station man rushed in and told me the bus to Mongolia was leaving now, there were no seats and that there was only one bus per day. I wish he hadn't waited till the last minute to give me this information. He still seemed to think I could get on it.
I rushed out, but as I stepped on the bus, I stared up at jam-packed people sitting atop bags of flour, farm equipment and who the hell knows what else. Even the Chinese and Mongols inside, who are quite used to shoving every last person into buses, said with sorrowful eyes, "there's just no room".
Hitchhiking from Qitai seemed to be even more fraught with problems. I could imagine moving in very small leaps on farm wagons, not making it to Jiang Jun Miao with no town to stay in along the way, nor any ride to return to Qitai. My only option seemed to be to wait 24 hours for the next bus to Mongolia.
I got a hotel in Qitai and took a long nap. I had lots of strange, disturbing dreams about being lost in far-off nomad lands.
I woke up and wandered in a daze around the streets of Qitai at dusk. I thought over and over about all my options. I didn't know it but fate was about to change dramatically.
Only who would have thought that two cute little ponytailed schoolgirls would be the ones to change fate? In hindsight, they created the change in events that led to the successful finding of the point. If you read on you'll find out why.
They just kept chuckling and smiling and following me down the street.
"Ni Hao!" (hello) I said to them.
"Where are you going?" they asked me, chuckling as if they knew what I was doing and thought it was funny. I said I wanted to find a bookstore. One idea I had was to find an updated road atlas of Xinjiang to find out if the road and town were still on new maps. They pointed to where I should go.
About a half an hour later they found me again at which time I told them I had no luck. "Follow us", they said. After trying two bookstores, a very nice, intelligent woman at the third inquired further about what I was doing and where I was going.
"I know someone who can help you", she said. "He will know whether there's a road or not".
We waited and waited. I talked to another rather intellectual man who, surprisingly, was interested and engaging in finding out about the quest for a latitude/longitude crossing.
At something like 9 or 10 PM the anticipated man finally walked in the door. He was kind of short and stubby with a round face and bronze, leathery skin. He went by the name Zhao Ru Rong, a mouthful of marbles to say. He was quite serious and matter-of-fact.
"There's a road there but it's not a good road. I can take you there", he said. I was overjoyed but remained guardedly optimistic. It had to be the best shot to go with him. He said he was a driver but also a tour guide, and gave me a price of 180 Yuen ($23) for a round trip drive, one leg of which he said was a 9 hour drive because of bad road conditions. He explained that I'd have to get a police permit to go out in that region, and that we'd have to deal with that the next day, and then head out the day after next.
I started to trust him. His circle of friends were kind, interesting, and intelligent and I found out his price was very good. He was a well-intentioned man who could occasionally break into a smile. This was unusual for a Chinese taxi driver.
The next day I had a good look at his car. It was a little red dilapidated taxi with pieces falling off it. The suspension seemed blown out. The seat was upright with no legroom, so I had to sit crouched. "It'll make it, no problem", he said.
He took me all around to the military headquarters, the police station and the county government office. Women seemed to hold most of the high-ranking positions not only in the official places but all over Qitai. They always seemed to deal with matters very calmly and reasonably. The final word was I didn't need a permit. We were ready to go.
We started off at 7AM while it was still pretty dark. Our communication was sparse. Ru was not the most cheerful and talkative person, but things might have been different if I could have communicated with him better. He spoke Mandarin but had a very thick accent like many of the people in the region.
We passed mud brick houses and farms before we got to a police guard tower. The guard checked Ru's papers. Soon after the guard, the road split off to Mongolia. The road we followed turned into a well-groomed dirt road. There was definitely a road!
I would almost certainly have failed in my attempt to hitchhike. There were almost no cars. I only remember seeing some donkey driven carts near the Mongolia road, and two Mongol-looking guys on Harley Davidson-like bikes going the other direction. This barren region is part of the Junggar basin, and is basically a sparsely inhabited desert with bitterly cold winters.
We crossed an area of vegetated sand dunes, and then it was basically stoney desert pavement after that. There were long, low cliffs of pink sandstone and others of black rock. Some of the landforms were quite bizarre, reminding me of the Colorado Plateau, yet the area had the same wide-open feel as the Gobi desert. The area is famous for petrified wood, another similarity with the painted desert of the Colorado Plateau. There's a petrified wood park, only 30 km from the confluence point. We saw herds of camel, horses, cattle and goats.
I was beginning to nod off when Ru shook my shoulder. "We should have gotten to Jiang Jun Miao by now, I'm not sure why we didn't see it".
"Are you sure we're on the right road?", I asked. I decided to get out my GPS. To my surprise it said we were only 5 kilometers from the confluence point! We had only traveled 4 hours - not the original 9 hours imagined. We had to turn around to get to the road's closest approach.
At 3.6 km from the point Ru decided to give a shot at some off-road driving on the desert pavement. It didn't seem to be too difficult at first, but we started heading perpendicular to the gullies. At 2.75 km we left the car and hiked. Ru had told me in advance he wanted to hike with me up to the point. The ground was fine beige sand covered with small dark slaty-looking rocks. The rocks were covered with a glaze of desert varnish. Most of the vegetation was similar to sagebrush. We saw one jack-rabbit hopping away.
As we hiked I started to let him know how significant this point was. As it sunk in, he began to grin and get excited about it.
The point was just on an undulation between gullies like the thousands of other gullies in the area. There was a small rounded black hill to the west.
There was no monument and no evidence of anyone ever having been there. There was one pair of very old tire tracks a few hundred meters away. Animal droppings nearby suggested that some animals at some time may have gnawed at the center-of-the-hemisphere bush.
Why had nobody visited such a prominent geographic location before? Could it be that no one had thought about it? Had they just never bothered to visit the location?
Leaving, we tried to figure out another mystery: that of the elusive Jiang Jun Miao. It's supposed to be right on the road - why had we never found it?
We went to walk around the petrified forest park. The whole region of the confluence seemed to inspire an awe of both space and time. The desert was wide-open as far as the eye could see and appeared as if it spanned thousands of kilometers. Time, epoch by epoch, seemed frozen in the silica of the toppled forest and the relic customs and wares of the locals. It was a little like all of human history, and pre-history, had been passed through a warp, and a trail of artifacts were left behind in an abandoned land for us to see.
In a mud-brick shack the skull-capped curators poured tea out of an old long-spout steel tea pot. On the wall was an old faded and yellowed Mao-era map of the world with latitude and longitude lines only at every 15 degrees. I showed them where we were and pointed to my GPS. They examined the map with wide eyes and smiles.
Ru had gotten the information we needed to find Jiang Jun Miao. We jumped back in the taxi.
Down the road we approached something strange we had passed on the way in. "This...", Ru pointed. There was an arrangement of a few eroding mud walls. "This is Jiang Jun Miao".
"Do you think people abandoned the city 5 or 10 years ago?" I asked.
"Maybe more than 100 years ago", said Ru.


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Winter Games Include New Fiction From JCPL!
It's February 6; let the games begin! In Sochi, we're gearing up for competition in some slippery sports, such as figure skating, ice hockey, speed skating and ski jumping. These winter sports are designed for those who are highly skilled and trained to compete with one another and Mother Nature. I'm thinking that Mother Nature has missed the memo that the winter games should be strictly limited, however, to Sochi, and folks who are accomplished in and enjoy the thrill of the slippery slide of snow and ice.
Here in Indiana, our daily routines have reached almost Olympic proportions, as we slip and slide just trying to get from point A to point B and our cars, trucks and SUVs perform figure 8's while speed skating to work, school or wherever the day may take us, all the while wondering if our vehicles would be better off fitted with skate blades than tires. If spring is right around the corner, we can only hope that corner is not too broad or too many steps away, but in the meanwhile, take heart and stop in your local branch of the Jasper County Public Library and check out these great, new fiction titles!
William Bellman lives a charmed life. He is married to a beautiful woman and has a brood of healthy, strong children. His current life, a far cry from his troubled life as a child, couldn't be rosier. When people around him begin to die, there is a strange man in black at each funeral. When tragedy strikes and William loses all but one member of his beloved family, the man in black shows up yet again; this time, however he comes to William with a proposition in the form of a mysterious business called 'Bellman and Black' in "Bellman & Black: A Ghost Story" by Diane Setterfield.
What can we expect from America in the future if we continue on our current course? Author, Chang-rae Lee has written an imaginative tale set in a future and long-declining America, an America that no longer houses the suburban world that we know now; an America that has replaced neighborhoods with labor colonies and repurposed the members of society in classes. In this new America, Fan, a female fish-tank diver, journeys away from her settlement, once known as Baltimore, in search of the man she loves, taking her to the anarchy of the Open Counties, where crime is rampant in "On Such a Full Sea" by Chang-rae Lee.
On the first day of the Wimbledon tennis tournament, a dead body is found on court nineteen. Angela Costello has just been promoted to Detective and recognizes the victim, Petar Belic. Belic was once a double grand-slam sinner and one of the best known players of the modern era, but Petar had a complicated personal life and was not exactly well-loved by his fellow players. As Costello investigates the untimely demise of the popular Petar, her suspicions deepen. With no real proof to back her up, she must rely on vital details that prove to be elusive in "Game, Set, Murder," a D.I. Costello mystery by Elizabeth Flynn.
Detective Inspector Horton is into a death investigation full-swing. Is it murder or was it a suicide? Just as he begins to uncover the truth, his investigation is thwarted by his higher-ups, making him wonder if there is reason to suspect a cover-up at the highest level. When another body is found under similar circumstances, Horton is convinced it's definitely murder, but finding out who is behind it and why is prickly when there is no cooperation from the ranks above. Just as he gets close to uncovering the truth, it becomes more personal for Horton in "Undercurrent" by Pauline Rowson.
This winter, you'll probably slip and slide some more as you go from point A to point B, but as you skate through the rest of the winter, make a pit-stop at your local branch of JCPL and check out the great, new fiction on the shelves. Game on!
Photo collage by JCPL, original image by flickr user katerha


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Here at Don José We Strive to Maintain the Highest Quality Native Mexican Foods so the Palates of Our Guests Will be Satisfied Again and Again by the Always Taste Thrilling Mexican Cusine.
Don José Mexican Restaurant was established 1966 in Huntington Beach CA. As we celebrate our 50th anniversary three generations have consistently enjoyed an authentic Mexican dining experience.
In 1991 we opened Don José Mexican Restaurant, Lake Elsinore, CA., to continue the company's commitment to provide our customers with the highest quality Mexican food at reasonable prices.
We offer daily lunch specials and Cantina food and drink specials. We also invite you to our Sunday Champagne Brunch.


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Ai Weiwei
A candid conversation with the Chinese dissident about being Beijing's top target, using Twitter against oppression and how art can change society.
The artist Ai Weiwei is the Chinese government's worst nightmare: an internationally revered art star who uses his work and celebrity to advocate for democracy and free speech in a nation with neither. The government has employed a draconian campaign to silence him. Ai is under constant surveillance. He has been threatened, placed under house arrest and physically attacked by a police officer. Ai's incendiary blog, read by thousands of Chinese citizens, disappeared one day. And so did he: In 2011, state police grabbed him at the airport, threw a black bag over his head and drove him to an undisclosed location, where he languished for 81 days in a tiny prison cell. Despite these attacks, Ai has continued his virulent criticism of the Chinese Communist leadership, which he deems repressive, immoral and illegitimate.
Ai's dissidence is particularly discomfiting to the Chinese government as it attempts to retain its stranglehold on its citizens while also cementing its position as a global economic powerhouse. Ai's domestic and international influence is growing. Using art, technology and civil disobedience in his antigovernment campaign, he continues to embarrass the regime—and threaten it. Most observers agree that if it weren't for his international celebrity, Ai would still be imprisoned, like Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo, who is serving an 11-year sentence, or he'd be exiled, like blind dissident Chen Guangcheng. The last time Ai was imprisoned there were worldwide protests; world leaders including Hillary Clinton called for his release.
Ai's political activism and art are informed by his tumultuous childhood. His father, Ai Qing, one of China's most revered poets, studied in Paris before returning to China in 1932, when he was arrested by Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalist Party. With the Communist takeover, the elder Ai was for a time in favor of Chairman Mao Tse-tung's regime. Then he wrote a poem that extolled the virtues of a culture that celebrated rather than repressed multiple voices. For this he was exiled to a "reeducation" camp, where he was humiliated, beaten and forced to clean toilets for nearly two decades. Ai Weiwei spent his early years in the camp.
After the Cultural Revolution, Ai attended the Beijing Film Academy. In 1981 he left for the United States, where he studied English, worked odd jobs and made art. He returned to China after 12 years and worked as an architect, artist and antiques dealer. He gained international attention for his collaboration with the architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron on the design of Beijing's National Stadium, nicknamed the Bird's Nest, built for the 2008 Olympics. His reputation in the fine-art world grew too. His controversial pieces include a series of photographs in which he uses the international hand gesture for "fuck you" to send a not very subtle message to the Chinese government. He smashed Neolithic pottery, created a giant sculpture out of Qing dynasty stools, built a breathtaking art installation in Munich out of 9,000 children's backpacks to commemorate the thousands of students killed when their schools collapsed in the 2008 Sichuan earthquake (he blames the high death toll on the Chinese government for allowing the schools' shoddy construction) and spread a sea of 100 million porcelain sunflower seeds across a gallery in the Tate Modern in London.
After being released from prison in June 2011 Ai was placed under house arrest. By 2012 he was no longer confined to his Beijing compound, but the government held his passport, preventing him from leaving the country. He was unable to attend the opening of a major survey of his work at the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, D.C.
Since Ai couldn't leave China, we sent Contributing Editor David Sheff to meet him there. Sheff, who has interviewed Representative Barney Frank, journalist Fareed Zakaria and Apple's Steve Jobs for us, reports, "Over the course of the days we spent together, I accompanied Ai on his daily walks through a Beijing park. He said he walks so he'll be in better physical shape if he's arrested again. Following these walks, each afternoon he visits his young son, who was born in 2009 to a girlfriend; Ai has been married to artist Lu Qing for 17 years. Though he lives with the constant threat of arrest, each evening after his time with his son Ai takes his place in front of a computer and spends six or more hours writing illegal Twitter messages to 200,000 followers. Helped by a coterie of hackers, he manages to circumvent the government's 'Great Firewall' to send out missives about what he considers his government's latest sins."
DS: Other renowned Chinese dissidents have been either imprisoned or exiled. Why are you allowed to remain free?
AI: I don't know if I am free. There's a threat always that any minute I could be arrested. Why they don't arrest me now I don't know. I don't know why they arrested me the last time. I don't know why they let me go after three months. They said I would be in for 10 years.
DS: Do you know why they're holding your passport?
AI: There has been no explanation. I don't know why, because if they don't want me to leave the country, they could stop me at the airport. The government doesn't explain. They don't have to explain. The Communists who run China picture themselves as above the rest of society—as the best men, a superman society. They believe they are made of special materials. That is their own words. They're elite. They tell you only what they want to tell you. So of course you will never get any clear answer about any event that happened in the past 60 years. My father, when he was sent away, never knew who made the decision, how the decision was made or why. Three hundred thousand intellectuals were crushed by a single political moment with the Cultural Revolution. None of them got a clear answer about why. Now it's decades later, and what surprises me most is that after being in power all this time, this government should have built a better society, one that's more open. They should trust the people. They should explain and discuss and negotiate. All those things are completely lacking in this society.
DS: Do you assume you were freed and for the moment remain free because of pressure from the international community?
AI: Maybe if the government could get away with it, without anyone knowing, you would not see me again.
DS: Is it gratifying to know that Hillary Clinton and other world leaders called for your release from prison?
AI: It's very surprising. Yes, it was very good. But there are so many people arrested. And worse than arrested. Why does no one speak about them? Just yesterday the number reached 92 Tibetans who have burned themselves to death because of the Chinese oppression of Tibet. Most were Buddhist monks. I don't see much international outcry for them. It's a hopeless cry for them, and no one listens.
DS: Then perhaps your celebrity saves you, the support from political leaders and other prominent people from the West. Last November Elton John shocked a Beijing audience by dedicating a concert to you. Did that surprise you?
AI: I was so happy but also shocked. Such a pure man. That's not done; people don't say my name out loud in public like that. The audience would never think somebody would have that kind of free, clear expression in a situation like that. It will always remain in my mind.
DS: Do any prominent Chinese in China stand up for you and other dissidents?
AI: No. It's too dangerous. But there are some in the young generation of artists who do. Of course they have all been taken to the police station.
DS: While you were in prison, were you aware of the protests and calls for your release?
AI: I had no idea. I was just a little piece dropped into a dark corner, into a hole.
"Without the internet, no person could say anything and be heard. It's not that everyone can know, because the government controls the internet. But some people can know."
DS: You didn't know if anyone was worrying about you?
AI: No, but of course you know your family is.
DS: Why is one man—an artist— such a threat to the government of a nation with 1.3 billion people and the second-largest economy in the world?
AI: Even to question the government can have a strong impact on its control. All my father asked for was to have a variety of expressions in literature and art. Rather than just one type of flower, he said there should be a whole garden. It's so pitiful, because every flower deserves its own identity and has its own beauty. That simple idea is seen as a threat to the Communist leadership, which is a military-police type of leadership. They want to take away any variety of expression.
DS: How does free speech threaten them? They're firmly in control.
AI: If people question—if people don't accept what they tell us—maybe the leaders will have to go. It's like during the research we did after the earthquake to find out who was missing. We simply wanted to know the names of the victims. We asked the government for their names, ages and which school they went to. We made 200 phone calls to government officials. They wouldn't release any information. I built up my anger and frustration. One by one we found the students' names, all the information related to them. We interviewed hundreds of parents. It was a very painful research study.
DS: Why would that threaten the government? Why would officials not want the names released?
AI: Maybe they worried that if people knew, they'd question the bad construction of the structures, the schools and buildings that collapsed. That can have some political impact. Next the people ask, "Who's responsible?"
DS: Your efforts to learn who died in the earthquake resulted in a list of the names of 5,000 students.
AI: Fifty-two hundred.
DS: You then made an international statement about the earthquake by creating a facade on a Munich museum comprising 9,000 children's backpacks. What were you trying to communicate?
AI: The backpacks spelled out the words of a mother whose daughter was one of the students killed. The mother said, "She lived happily for seven years in this world." People should not forget this, and the government does not want it to be remembered.
DS: Where were you when you heard about the earthquake?
AI: In Beijing, and even in Beijing we could feel it a little bit.
DS: What was your reaction when you heard of the magnitude?
AI: I was stunned. Speechless. Back in 2005 some people had created a blog for me. I realized it was a great opportunity to try to write something. I have always admired people who write. My father was a writer. He wrote very clearly what was in his mind. I think writing is a beautiful skill. I needed to learn, because I never had a chance when I grew up in the Cultural Revolution, when the whole education system failed. So I felt frustrated, and here was this beautiful tool to write and communicate.
At the beginning I was just putting photos of my artwork on the blog and writing a little. Then I realized I could talk about the social conditions. Each morning I read the newspaper, and there would always be quite a few points to talk about. I'm a person who has many opinions on everything. People always tell me, "Oh, you just want to argue." Yes, I want to argue, because everything should be argued. Because nobody else in China argues, my arguments become relevant. Suddenly my blog became very popular, because nobody was so openly talking about those things. I wrote every day, day and night, but when the earthquake came I was speechless and couldn't write a word for seven days. It was such a big tragedy. I could not write anything.
DS: Why did you begin collecting the names of earthquake victims?
AI: Since they didn't release the names, I must. Every day I put our new findings of names that we collected on the blog. It could be one, it could be 20. So many people were reading it. They all had the same questions: Why is this artist doing this by himself? Why isn't the government doing this? What kind of government do we have? That really shook the foundation of this government, because they knew nobody would trust them.
DS: Did the government ask you to stop posting the names?
AI: Day after day I did this until one day almost a year later, 2009, a very high-up official called and said, "Weiwei, can you stop?" I said, "Well, it's a little too late. I have to find the last person's name, and that is the only way I can stop." I said, "But there is one way for me to stop, and that is if you start to announce those names. Why can't you do it? I mean, once you do it, then I don't have to do it. It's not my job. It's not a particularly happy moment when I do that." But of course they would not do it.
DS: The earthquake occurred the same year as the Beijing Olympics. Why did you object to the Olympics, one of China's proudest moments, especially after your prominent role as co-designer of the Bird's Nest stadium, the focal point of the Games?
AI: In 2007, one year before the opening, they began a so-called countdown to the Olympics. I saw this celebration on a friend's television. The whole show brought up memories of growing up under the Communists. They were trying to glamorize the Communist Party. Also, they were already tightening security in Beijing for the Olympics. It was becoming like a police state. They sent all the vagrants out of the city. They took away the visas from all the students who worked in the city. You could see so clearly that all they wanted was to throw a glamorous party for the benefit of the foreign media and for the world to see the power of the Communist Party. They were trying to tell the world, "We are the same as you." But actually they were saying, "We have more. We can do something you can never do. You could never do this grand Olympics." It made me disgusted. A journalist called and asked if I watched it. I said yes, and he asked, "How do you feel about it?" I said, "I'm disgusted," and he asked, "Will you be part of a celebration?" I said no. They published the next day that the Olympic stadium designer was boycotting the games.
DS: Weren't you proud of the Bird's Nest, which received worldwide acclaim?
AI: I'm proud of the architecture. I love it, but I hated the way it was going to be used. I hate the way it was used.
DS: When you openly criticized the Olympics, were you chastised or asked to get with the program?
AI: No. The government people will never tell you directly, never show their feelings. It's like a whole table of poker players. They hate you to death, but it's like, "We'll get you later," because they know they will get you later.
DS: You once said that your generation has to do better than your father's generation in its efforts to change China, because his "didn't do a good job." What did you mean?
AI: They sacrificed so much but did not achieve anything.
DS: What has changed between then and now that makes you think you can do better?
AI: It's a different time. China was very isolated. Now China is trying to be global, so there's an opening and a chance to use a higher standard. And there's the internet.
DS: How significant is the internet?
AI: Without the internet, no person could say anything and be heard. Now everyone can know about the earthquake. Everyone can know about a person they put in prison. No, it's not that everyone can know, actually, because the government controls the internet very well. But some people can know. It's a small group, because they must know how to get around the firewall.
"It's a different time. China was very isolated. Now China is trying to be global, so there's an opening and a chance to use a higher standard."
DS: How dangerous is it to defy the government's regulations and use the internet for political discourse or to organize political campaigns?
AI: Very dangerous. Most people on the internet use fake names. They don't reveal their identities. But of course if they want, the government can find out very easily who they are.
DS: Your blog was shut down, but now you're on Twitter. How do you manage to use Twitter, which is blocked in China behind the Great Firewall?
AI: After they shut off my blog, a guy said, "I can set you up on Twitter." He said, "You have to use special equipment."
DS: A proxy server?
AI: Yeah.
DS: How does Twitter serve your purposes?
AI: Twitter is better than a blog. It's
faster. It's interesting because of the fast communication—the immediate personto-person response. Also, everybody is watching. It becomes like a school, like Buddhist teaching or Zen teaching. There is a sharing of ideas. You know people. The people know me as well as anybody in my family.
DS: :Do you ever feel frustrated by the Twitter limit of 140 characters?
AI: In Chinese, 140 characters is not like 140 characters in English. In Chinese, you can write the whole history of one dynasty in 140 characters. It's so meaningful for us. It's very poetic, because one line can jump from one subject to another and sometimes it's five subjects mixed together. It is so effective. I have 200,000 followers. If everyone in China could get on Twitter, I would have a minimum of 2 million. Today those who follow me are all technical people or people who are dedicated to the political.
DS: They took down your blog. Why haven't they stopped you from using Twitter? Even though you have techies helping you and you use a proxy server, it would seem the government, with a reported 50,000 internet police, could intercept your tweets.
AI: They always try to stop it. They cannot do it. It is very difficult. They can shut off one kind of connector, but we build another one.
DS: Was there any warning before your blog disappeared?
AI: In 2009, before June 4, an official asked me, "Can you promise not to write anything?" The government always gets nervous on this date.
DS: That's the anniversary of the 1989 crackdown in Tiananmen Square. Sources say 200 to 2,600 people were killed, while the Chinese government claims there were no student fatalities.
AI: Yes. This man was such a high official. I answered, "I never planned to write anything. It doesn't affect me so much. I have so many everyday happenings to deal with that normally I don't write about history." But then I said, "But if you ask me not to write about it, I cannot say yes. I may write something because you ask me not to." The next day my blog was shut off. Police also came to my mom's home. My mom called me. I was in the American Embassy because [Representative] Nancy Pelosi was in China. She had changed her tone, because she used to be a human-rights defender. Now she talks about how beautiful China is. I was quite disappointed with her, and I just left. I answered the phone and my mom said, "Weiwei, there are a few police here asking for your address." I said, "Just wait. I'm coming over."
I was full of energy and ready to have some kind of fight, because Pelosi had just said how beautiful this nation has become, and I was so mad. At my mom's house, this guy is very arrogant. He's undercover. He said, "I just want to know where you live." I said, "First, show me your badge. Who are you?" That got him, because he didn't have a badge; he forgot to bring it. I said, "Then just leave. Get out of here. Bring your identification." He said, "You have no right to ask me for my identification." Nobody ever does that to them. Once they say, "Police," everybody is so scared they do whatever the police say. He wouldn't leave. I said, "Okay, wait." I dialed 911. I said, "There's somebody intruding into my home, and I think it's a robbery or something." Two police came. They walked in and saw this guy was their boss. It's embarrassing for them. This new guy said, "Okay, we have to go to the station." I said, "Show me your badge." He said, "I don't have it." I asked, "How do I know you are police?" They said, "We have uniforms." I said, "Anybody can have a uniform." They said, "We have police cars parked outside." I said, "Who knows if you stole this car?" They went away and came back with badges, and I went to the station. Later they told me in detention, "You're watching too many Hollywood movies." I did something ridiculous and stupid, but I had a good time.
DS: Did they officially arrest you?
AI: They interrogated me. It took hours because they're not very educated. They wrote everything down very slowly, but finally they let me go. They didn't bring charges. I said, "The next time you come, you should bring handcuffs." Those were my last words to them. Then they shut down my blog.
DS: What was the public reaction when your blog disappeared?
AI: There was no way to talk about it. There's no independent press, so you cannot make a story. No one knows.
DS: Might that kind of suppression and repression soften under the leadership of the new president, Xi Jinping, who took over this year?
AI: He gave a speech at the beginning. The main idea was: If you are weak, you will be beaten. I think it's a very uncivilized rule. It's like jungle rule. Nothing will change.
DS: As China has opened to the West, what's the impact of a nondemocratic system in which the Communist Party selects its leaders from within?
AI: The way to survive in this party is to hide yourself or to become a person who obeys orders from above. These are not people with new ideas who are bold. One generation chooses the next, and one is worse than the former. It's like inbreeding. After so many generations, it becomes weaker and weaker. You can see in the first generation— Chairman Mao's generation, Castro's generation—the first revolutionaries are strong characters, maybe crazy but a bit romantic. Idealistic. Now you see nothing. They cannot even remember what
64 their ancestors said.
DS: Along with your Twitter messages, is your art largely a result of frustration with the current political system?
AI: I'm a person who likes to make an argument rather than just give emotion or expression a form and shape in art. I became an artist only because I was oppressed by society. I was born into a very political society. When I was a child, my father told me, as a joke, "You can be a politician." I was 10 years old. I didn't understand it, because I already knew that politicians were the enemy, the ones who crushed him. I didn't understand what he was talking about. But now I understand. I can be political. I can say something even though we grew up without true education, memorizing Chairman Mao's slogans. I memorized hundreds of them. I can still sing his songs, recite his poetry. Every morning at school we stood in front of his image, memorizing one of his sentences telling what we should do today to make ourselves a better person.
DS: What's an example of a sentence you learned?
"The moment I saw New York City, I was so happy. Never in my life did I imagine it could be like that. When I grew up, there was no energy, no electricity."
AI: "Today I want to be a servant of the
people, so I want to clean up my neighbor's street front," or "Really study hard to become a useful person to society to prepare myself to fight against capitalism," or "Build yourself as a strong person for the bright Communist future." Every day we repeated those sentences. In the evening we stood in front of Mao to confess what we did wrong. "Today at school I had slightly selfish thinking." It's called self-criticism. For meals, I went to the commune dorm, to the cafeteria. When you give the empty bowl to the cook, before they give you the food— normally just one spoonful of one food, boiled corn or something—you say one sentence of Chairman Mao. The cook will say another sentence, then give you food.
While you're a child, you have to automatically follow this. You don't know enough to question anything, because your knowledge is so limited. You don't even know there's another way. You have never read a single novel, poetry or other writing or heard a song that is different. It's like North Korea today. So there's no way you can question it. My father could question it because he had some experience in Paris. But of course he could not say anything about it. So when my father said I should be a politician, he was saying I should be something different. Because of my father's experience, I experienced the complete story of what a nation or human society without justice or fairness can be. If I talk about my youth, that deeply affected me—the society lacking essential right or wrong or justice.
DS: Did your father encourage you to question Chairman Mao's teachings?
AI: No, if he said something to me, he'd be putting me in danger, because I may react differently and then be crushed. He would never say anything to us. But we talked about that life later. I hated society when I was 17, 18, 19. I wanted to escape. Only art created some way to express something different. I had a kind of corner. First I got into art because I wanted to escape the politics. It's through certain kinds of acts that you can fully express your feelings.
DS: When your father was incarcerated in the labor camp, what happened to your mother?
AI: Our whole family was sent there. It was a difficult time.
DS: What do you remember?
AI: I remember a lot. My father tried to commit suicide every time they put him in more difficult situations. I remember in the hard-labor camp he called me after his work one day. Our home had no light. It got dark very early. After work, he just laid down on the bed. He had never really done physical work before he was 58. After a day of heavy work, he was exhausted, in pain. He thinks he's going to die. He called me to the bed and said, "I'm going to die very soon." He wrote down two names. He said, "After I die, you should go to see these two persons and they will raise you." I was speechless. I didn't know what to say. I was 10. But I showed no emotions because at that moment I had no emotion; I just accepted it.
DS: Were you traumatized by experiences like this?
AI: It's hard to measure that kind of thing.
DS: Why wouldn't your mother have raised you?
AI: My mother was with my younger brother and they went away. She could not take care of two children, I guess.
DS: Is that why you were sent to New York in 1981? Were they worried and wanted to get you out of China?
AI: I went to New York because I had a girlfriend who went. Her relatives sent her outside to study, and she asked them if they would also help me. By then I was eager to go out.
DS: What was your first impression of the U.S.?
AI: The first time, the plane landed at nine in the evening. Our airplane circled the city. The moment I saw New York City, I was so happy. All the propaganda from the Communists was about how bad and corrupt capitalism is. I saw New York and saw a
river of light, and it was like moving in a dream. Never in my life did I imagine it could be like that. When I grew up, there was no energy, no electricity. I always remember the image of New York.
DS: What did you do in the U.S.? You were 23. How did you earn a living?
AI: I found jobs to make some money. I did housecleaning and repairs. I worked as a gardener and babysitter and whatever kind of job I could find. I was also in an English program for half a year. Then after that I went to my girlfriend's. She was at the University of California, Berkeley. I went to the Berkeley Adult School to study English.
DS: Were you also making art?
AI: I occasionally did some drawings. Then I went to Parsons the New School for Design one year later in New York to do art.
DS: Some of your art involves performance. Early pieces involved breaking or transforming ancient Chinese antiques. Were you expressing your anger at Chinese culture?
AI: For people from the West, that was quite a shocking act, but for me, it's quite natural. It goes back to when I was a child and had to burn all my father's books during the Cultural Revolution. Those books were so beautiful. I burned them all in front of him; we had to. Otherwise it would cost us our lives. I tore every page. Beautifully printed books, art books he brought back from Paris. Page by page. So I know how to destroy. Chairman Mao taught us, so I know.
DS: You've created pieces in which you literally say "fuck you" to China—or at least to the Communist Party. In one you flip off Tiananmen Square with the Forbidden City looming in the background.
AI: Yes. That's so terrible to them that I would do that.
DS: Were you also saying fuck you to the government when you photographed your wife holding her dress up in Tiananmen Square?
AI: For the first few years after I came back to China from New York, I went with her to Tiananmen Square just to walk on the June 4 anniversary. There were so many undercover police, and I told her, "Let me take a photo of you." We did the Marilyn Monroe pose, just lifting her skirt like that.
DS: More recently you went on a new antigovernment attack, this time in another medium: rock and roll. Have you always been an aspiring rock star?
AI: I've never sung a song in my life except the songs forced on us during the Cultural Revolution. I went to the Elton John concert and was very much inspired by his voice as a kind of star penetrating the darkness of the sky. I decided it doesn't matter that I cannot sing. I am 55 years old, and maybe I'll be the oldest person to start in rock and roll. I made nine songs. They are about the current condition in China. One is about my confrontation with the police during the earthquake research on the dead students. Another is about Chen Guangcheng and the Great Firewall.
DS: Why did you choose heavy metal?
AI: I love metal music. It's as powerful as nature. It's poetry within a storm.
DS: Do you use your art to publicize events like the earthquake or persecution of dissidents, or is it an expression of your frustration and anger?
AI: When there's an extremely difficult situation, I think it's a unique opportunity for me to make some art. Something extreme gives me a strong reason to react to it, to respond to the situation. So if they do something extreme, then I'm sure I'm going to come up with something.
DS: Students were murdered and dissenters brutally crushed when tanks rolled into Tiananmen Square in 1989. That must have reinforced the message that you don't speak out.
AI: Yes. A few hundred thousand people were there. My father was there.
DS: In a wheelchair, we read.
AI: Yes, and also my mom with steamed dumplings she brought to the students.
DS: What was your reaction to the protests as you watched them from New York?
AI: There was a moment of great excitement. Dan Rather and all those people saw this moment, and we watched and were all very excited. It's so unbelievable, the whole thing.
DS: Were you in touch with your family during that time?
AI: Yeah, I talked with them. I could hear the helicopters flying above them. At the beginning they were excited. Then they felt shocked. Of course everybody was shattered by such a brutal reaction.
DS: What's the legacy of the demonstrations? Did they change China?
AI: Maybe most young students don't even know it happened.
DS: :In Beijing we tried searching the internet for the words June 4, and information about the protest and crackdown appears to be blocked. Do you think the government doesn't want people to know about the protests because of the massacre it perpetrated or because it doesn't want people to know it's possible to organize?
AI: Both. First, government officials don't want people to know they can unite and have such powerful expression. Also, they don't want people to know they crushed the masses with tanks. It's why some people in this country still don't know they arrested me. Many people don't know.
DS: How did your April 2011 arrest unfold?
AI: They took me from the airport. A black hood was put over me and they took me to a security detention center. I do not know where. We have tried to find out, but I still don't know. The first question I asked when they started to talk to me was "Can I have a lawyer?" They said no. I said, "Can I make a phone call to my family?" They said no.
DS: :Were you worried about your family? Your son was two at the time.
AI: I blamed myself. I thought, Why did I put myself in this position, to deal with a government that has no respect at all for human rights, human dignity or even common sense? So many people warned me, and I knew my condition was quite fragile.
They told me I would be sentenced for a very long time. They told me quite clearly, "When you leave jail your son will probably be 14, 15 and will never recognize you. And your mom may be passed away already." I was very sad to think about that.
DS: When you became a father, did you think differently about your political activism? If you remained imprisoned, your son would grow up without a father.
AI: I didn't think about that until I was arrested. When I was arrested, when they told me I could not make any phone calls for at least half a year, I felt very sorry.
DS: How else has being a father changed you?
AI: You have someone who very much depends on you. And for another 30 years, you could be some kind of influence on this child. You discover how the human species doesn't have to learn, that something is already there, and how it struggles to grow. It's kind of a miracle to see. Quite gradually it has to build up a kind of logical way of behaving, how to deal with life, which is sad in some ways. But yes, I felt very sorry about him when I was arrested and could not even call.
DS: What were the conditions of your imprisonment?
AI: Two guards stood over me every minute. It's a tough situation. I think it was a kind of psychological warfare. You are watched every moment, even while you sleep, and when you sleep your hands have to be outside the blanket. You cannot turn.
DS: Why would they care how you slept?
AI: I think it's a punishment.
DS: How do they prevent you from turning?
AI: If you turn, they order you. You have to sleep like this, like a cross. [holds his arms out] The camera has to see your arms. You don't know how to respond to this kind of degradation.
DS: Could you exercise?
AI: No, no. You can't move near the door.
DS: Did you become depressed?
AI: I think I was more than depressed. You're alert because the situation is so unknown. You don't know their intentions. And you don't know what the future is.
DS: Could you write or draw?
AI: I could not do anything. When I was sitting, I had to sit in one position, like this. [sits erect with hands on thighs] Before you make any move, you must report it to a soldier. If you need to scratch your head, you must ask. You must ask if want to go to the table to have a sip of water.
DS: Did they bring meals to your cell, or did you eat in a communal area?
AI: They brought the meals to me. The meal would never come with chopsticks. I had one plastic spoon.
DS: Did they prohibit chopsticks because they could be a weapon? Were they worried you might try to harm yourself?
AI: Yes. In my morning food there was always an egg. The egg had no shell. After a while I realized there was a little bit missing from the egg. Why was there always like a little mouse bite missing from the egg? When we became familiar, I asked a guard about this. He said, "We leave a sample of every dish you get in a box." Later, if something happened to me, they could examine it in the laboratory. A doctor came three times a day. Sometimes seven times a day.
DS: Did you become hopeless?
AI: I felt I would never be released.
DS: Were you ever officially charged?
AI: They announced different crimes— taxes, violation of exchange of foreign currency to Chinese money. Just excuses. I think they wanted to get the people thinking badly of me. They charged me with having a double marriage, which I never had. I have a son with a girlfriend, but we were never married. They charged me with obscenity for putting nude photos on the internet.
DS: Were the obscenity charges based on the art pieces you made in which you are nude?
AI: They weren't even art. People always come and want to take photos, so as a kind of joke I said one time, "Okay, let's take a photo." I took off my clothes. I jumped. I used this thing, a doll called a grass mud horse, to cover my dick. It's a joke, really.
DS: A grass mud horse?
AI: It's a fake thing created for the internet to fight government censorship. You can say caˇonímaˇ, or "grass mud horse," which isn't a real animal; it's internet-made. It's a fake animal's name, so you can say it, but it also means "fuck your mother." You cannot say "fuck your mother" on the internet in China, but you can say this animal's name. So I made this photograph and someone put it on the internet and people got excited about it. It was for fun, just for some excitement at the moment. You have a combination of meaning there, "grass mud horse" and "fuck your mother." Saying this to the central government will be the most brutal thing you can say in China; you can be killed for doing that.
There was another photo of me and these four women who came to see me one day. I try to avoid seeing so many people, so I joked, "Okay, we'll have to take nude photos." I thought that would scare them away, but everybody agreed and we did it. One of the women is an activist for sex workers who speaks out about AIDS, and others are students. It was a kind of statement.
DS: Does the reaction to the nudes say something about Chinese culture in general compared with Western culture when it comes to sex? Is China more puritanical?
AI: I don't think so. I think China is an old culture and sex is very developed. It's just as rich as any old culture. These photos are not about sex. It's about privacy. Someone put this photo online and called it One Tiger, Eight Breasts. Sounds like a porn title, right?
DS: While you were imprisoned, were you ever harmed physically?
AI: No, just intimidated.
DS: Earlier you'd been hit by a police officer when you went to testify in the trial of Tan Zuoren, the Sichuan writer and activist who had also been investigating the earthquake. He had been accused of inciting the subversion of state power. You were accosted in a hotel and struck on the head by an officer. What exactly happened?
AI: There was a bang on the door, "Open
up. It's the police!" They locked us up for 11 hours so we couldn't go to the trial. Tan Zuoren is in jail now, serving a five-year sentence. I was going to court to support him. I brought my materials to show he was innocent.
DS: How severe was the blow?
AI: I felt pain and went to the hospital with a friend and two police. I had a regular checkup and nothing was wrong, but later it developed into a hemorrhage. The doctor said if I came to see him any later I'd be dead.
DS: Are there any aftereffects of the hemorrhage?
AI: You hear my way of talking—it's slow. I can sense it's slower; the words jump out slower than they should. My memory is very bad now.
DS: After that assault and your arrest at the hands of the state, do you still consider yourself a patriot?
AI: Even though maybe I am, I will never announce myself as a patriot. You're not entitled to say you're a patriot if you don't have a nation.
DS: Don't you consider China your nation?
AI: No. You have a nation when you share the nation itself, when it holds up your beliefs or you're identified with it. If a country ignores your right to vote, you're not a citizen. You cannot make any kind of decision. You cannot relate to other people because you cannot support each other. You cannot share joy because there's no way to communicate freely. How can you call yourself a citizen? You don't bear responsibility. Any-
thing that happens is not because of you; it's because of the government. The nation is not the people; it's the party. It represents only the party's ideas. The party controls the army. It controls the judicial system. It controls the natural resources. It's a group of elites, maybe 500 families, maybe fewer.
DS: Finally, when you were released from prison, were you again hooded so you wouldn't know where you were?
AI: Yes, everything was the same. Two police sat on two sides and one military soldier in the front. They brought me to a local police station and there I met my mom and my wife. My mom had to sign a paper to guarantee my release for one year of probation.
DS: What are considered violations of your parole?
AI: Before I was released I had to sign an agreement with about nine different principles, including that I cannot go on the internet, cannot talk about what happened inside the detention center, cannot talk to journalists, cannot meet with people who are activists, cannot write articles.
DS: It seems you've ignored every one.
AI: Basically yes. First I tried to do less. They have said, "We can always arrest you again and we don't ever have to release you."
DS: Doesn't that warning scare you? Are you tempted to cease speaking out?
AI: Of course it scares me. It's not a joke. But I cannot gradually let my life deteriorate without talking about what's on my mind. That's not possible. I will not stop.


text:
Don't get spooked by our Halloween friends, get wrapped up in fun with them instead! Recommended for toddlers and preschoolers.
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|10:00AM to 5:00PM
|Sat, Nov 16
|10:00AM to 5:00PM
|Sun, Nov 17
|1:00PM to 6:00PM
LYNX Bus Link 125 Silver Star Rd.
LYNX Bus Link 27 Ocoee / Winter Garden
The construction of the West Oaks Branch was funded by the Library System and a Florida Library Construction Grant.


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Mission Viejo-based nonprofit organization US2Uganda4Life is hoping to raise $5,000 during its May 4 Scavenger Hunt and Road Rally fundraiser. The funds will support its Jireh Children's Center in Uganda. A $50 ticket for adults and $5 ticket for children include a four-hour adventure with base camp at Mission Hills Church in Mission Viejo and a catered dinner donated by Wahoos. There will also be a silent auction featuring artifacts brought back from Africa. Sign up at www.us2uganda4life.org. The group, founded by Cormac and Ali O'Modhrain, is also planning a mission trip to Uganda in October.
Irene Dressler of Mission Viejo and Suzanne Millhollen Goodrich of Rancho Santa Margarita are two of the dozen contestants in the Miss Senior Orange County pageant on Saturday. The pageant will be held at the Norman Murray Community and Senior Center, 24923 Veterans Way, Mission Viejo. Tickets are $10.
Trabuco Hills High School student Madeline Klein, 16, won first place at the Color It Orange student art show in Laguna Beach. She was awarded a $1,500 summer scholarship to Laguna College of Art and Design.
Navy Seaman Apprentice Anthony Clay, son of Martha Clay of Irvine and Michael Clay of Mission Viejo, was promoted to his current rank at graduation from recruit training at Recruit Training Command, Great Lakes, Ill. Training included naval customs, first aid, firefighting, water safety and survival, and shipboard and aircraft safety. Clay is a 2011 graduate of Laguna Hills High School.
Mission Viejo/Saddleback Valley Elks Lodge has installed new officers. They will serve the lodge for a one-year term. The new officers are: Elks Lodge President Jason Spence of Rancho Santa Margarita, vice presidents: Leading Knight Derek Randles of Laguna Hills, Loyal Knight Camacho Alvarez and Lecturing Knight David McLeod of Mission Viejo. Other officers include: Secretary Rich Heimann of Mission Viejo, Treasurer William Bongartz of Lake Forest, Esquire Greg Morgan of Rancho Santa Margarita; Chaplain Tommy Nestor, Assistant Chaplin Ryan Jacobs, Inner Guard Matthew Williams, Assistant Inner Guard Rhonda Peiloni, Tiler Ryan Granneman, all of Mission Viejo. Officers also include organist Andy Costello of Laguna Hills.
The Board of Trustees include Gary Bennington of Rancho Santa Margarita, Gary Smith of Laguna Niguel, Harold Allen of Lake Forest, Steven Rusie of Lake Forest and Marzena Bills of Mission Viejo.
At a year-end awards ceremony, three of Elkdom's highest awards were presented. Citizen of the Year went to Randles, Officer of the Year to Rusie and Elk of the Year to Jacobs.
Girls ages 12-18 years have celebrated their annual New Beginnings event with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints in Rancho Santa Margarita. The program includes the girls working with their parents, Young Women leaders and other women to set goals based on the eight Young Women values, such as faith, integrity and good works. At the end of the four-year Young Women's program, the girls will receive a Young Womanhood Recognition award that includes a certificate and gold medallion.
The Capistrano Valley High School baseball team, led by long-time coach Bob Zamora, has been selected as the 2013 CIF Southern Section Team Academic Champion. The team's grade point average of 3.65 was the highest among schools with an enrollment of 1,500 or more, according to the Capistrano Unified School District. The team will be awarded a championship banner at the Academic Awards ceremony on April 24, before the baseball game between the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim and the Texas Rangers at Angel Stadium in Anaheim.
Two Scouts from Troop 776 have been honored by the Laguna Hills Mayor Barbara Kogerman with a certificate of recognition for earning the rank of Eagle Scout. For his Eagle Scout project, Scott Matthew Robison built wood donation boxes for south Orange County's Domestic Abuse Shelter Laura's House in Ladera Ranch. He was able to raise the money for the materials by selling items on Craigslist. Robison organized a work day where several Scouts and leaders worked together sawing, sanding, building and staining the large boxes. The donation boxes are used to collect items Laura's House will use to help women and children who are victims of domestic abuse. Tyler Braithwaite's Eagle project also benefited Laura's House. He made a sand tray and a shelving unit which is used for play therapy for children.
Contact the columnist at firstname.lastname@example.com


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Most visited:
10: Glacier
9: Acadia
8: Grand Teton - see The Tetons in Brief.
7: Cuyahoga Valley
6: Rocky Mountain - I've been near this park, not sure if in it.
5: Olympic - only seen it from a distance and from the air.
4: Yellowstone - see Accretionary Wedge: A Time Warp!
3: Yosemite
2: Grand Canyon
1: Great Smoky Mountains [NOTE: I corrected the spelling on this one!]
Least Visited:
10: City of Rocks NR, Idaho
9: Cumberland Island NS, Georgia
8: Florissant Fossil Beds NM, Colorado
7: Chiricahua NM, Arizona
6: Tonto NM, Arizona
5: Dry Tortugas NP, Florida
4: Katmai NP & Preserve, Alaska (I would like to see this one.)
3: Kalaupapa NHP, Hawaii
2: Hagerman Fossil Beds NM, Idaho
1: Russel Cave NM, Alabama
Haven't seen very many on the most visited list, none on the least visited list. Hmm...


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Torii Hunter: 'I'd die on the field for this'
BOSTON – For the first 16 innings of the American League Championship Series, the Detroit Tigers seemed in total control.
But David Ortiz may have saved the Boston Red Sox's season with a two-out grand slam that Tigers right fielder Torii Hunter was inches away from catching before he crashed into the Boston bullpen.
GAME 2:Big Papi saves Boston
BOX SCORE:Red Sox 6, Tigers 5
And instead of the Tigers riding a string of dominant pitching to a 2-0 lead back to Detroit, the ALCS is knotted a game apiece and the Red Sox are savoring an improbable comeback that arose from one unforgettable play.
"The one guy you don't want to beat you … and he beat us," an aching Hunter said afterward. "One of the best hitters in postseason history and he hit it out of the park and it ties the game up. They end up coming back and winning the game. I'm (furious).
"I was trying my best to just stop that ball from going over the fence. I'd sacrifice my body if I have to. I've done that my whole career. This is postseason. I'd die on the field for this."
The Tigers had built a 5-1 lead and when starter Max Scherzer came out of the game after 108 pitches and seven masterful innings ("I was done," he said emphatically afterward.), manager Jim Leyland turned the game over to the bullpen.
BREAKDOWN:Turning point of Game 2
And the Red Sox found an opening in the fortress they hadn't yet been able to crack. To that point in the first two games, the Tigers had held Boston to one run and a total of three hits in 51 at-bats – an .059 average.
"The whole regular season you haven't seen a team shutting us down for 14, 15 straight innings like they have done the past couple of days," Ortiz said. "They way they've been pitching us the past couple of days, it's up to us to make an adjustment."
With his one swing, Ortiz made a major adjustment to the balance of the series – and did so in the dramatic way Boston fans have come to expect from him.
Despite his many postseason heroics, Ortiz had never hit a grand slam in the playoffs. Until now.
"You can't pitch around him with the bases loaded," Tigers catcher Alex Avila said afterward.
After the Red Sox had spent much of the first two games taking strike one, Ortiz pounced on a first-pitch change-up from closer Joaquin Benoit.
"It was just a little bit up," Avlia said. "It was up enough that he just got good wood on it."
Ortiz lifted the ball deep into the Boston night, toward the Red Sox bullpen in right field. Hunter, a nine-time Gold Glove Award winner, raced back for it.
"I lost it in the lights for a second," Hunter said. "And then I picked it up again. I tried to make the adjustment ..." He extended his glove, missing the ball by inches as he reached back for it "and the next thing I know I was flipping over the wall.
Hunter was down for several moments as a trainer was summoned to the Red Sox bullpen. He landed awkwardly and had the wind knocked out of him, but he stayed in the game.
"I was trying my best to just stop that ball from going over the fence," Hunter said. "I'd sacrifice my body if I have to. I've done that my whole career."
Teammates and opponents alike have become accustomed to seeing Hunter make those kinds of catches.
"Torii always scare me. He's one of the best outfielders I ever saw in my life," said Ortiz, whose ties to Hunter go back to when they both broke into the majors in 1997 with the Minnesota Twins.
"When he hit it, I didn't think it had enough to get out," Avila said. "It just kept going. Torii got pretty close to it. I wasn't sure there but once the crowd started cheering, I figured it was gone."
And just that quickly, the Red Sox were back in the game – and the series. A game-winning RBI single from Jarrod Saltalamacchia in the bottom of the ninth seemed almost a foregone conclusion.
Instead of celebrating another pitching masterpiece, the Tigers will need to regoup from what Scherzer admitted was one of his most painful losses. "Probably just because of the nature of it and you're dealing with the postseason," he said. "Whenever you lose one in the postseason, it hurts."
Still the Tigers can take some comfort knowing they did get a split in Boston and have Justin Verlander on the mound in Comerica Park for Game 3 on Tuesday.
"That's the positive about it," said first baseman Prince Fielder. "We definitely should have won that game. It happens. We got one. Let's see what we can do at home."
ALCS: RED SOX vs. TIGERS


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Yahoo's Carol Bartz to Give CES 2010 Keynote
Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz has been added to the keynote lineup at next year's Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. Bartz will take the CES keynote stage at 11 A.M. on Thursday, January 7, 2010 in the Hilton Theater at the Las Vegas Hilton.
Bartz, who served as Autodesk CEO from 1992 to 1996, was selected as Yahoo's CEO in January 2009, several months after Jerry Yang resigned the post. She has since had a rather colorful tenure. Several days after her appointment, she urged investors to give Yahoo some "friggin' breathing room" to let the company get back on track. A month later, she pledged to "kick ass" with the Yahoo brand, and she accidentally ended an April conference call by suggesting that certain Yahoo engineers were not "f**king doing anything."
Former Yahoo CEO Terry Semel was a featured keynote speaker at the 2006 CES, and Yang appeared during the 2008 CES, but the company did not have a major presence at last year's event.
"Yahoo is a top global brand whose vision is to be the center of people's online lives, and Carol Bartz is leading the development of Yahoo's approach to delivering personally relevant, meaningful Internet experiences," Gary Shapiro, president and CEO of the Consumer Electronics Association, said in a statement.
Other executives expected to give keynote addresses at CES 2010 include Steve Ballmer of Microsoft, Alan Mulally of Ford, Paul Otellini of Intel, and Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo of Nokia.


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XCBusa is an annual paragliding competition that has been run by the Busa Flying Team in the Lake Garda area of Italy since 2014.
Scores take into account three flights. These can be flown any time between February and October but must meet specific criteria. Two must be declared before the flight is flown, and a third can be declared within 24 hours afterwards. The specific criteria can be studied on XCbusa.com.
There are always good prizes on offer, and this year the first prize is a Woody Valley GTO Light harness.
The second of two British Paragliding Championships/Opens of 2019 will be held at Pedro Bernardo near Avila in Spain, from 22-28 June.
The Parabatix Sky Racers will be taking their pylon-racing show to Tianmen Mountain, Zhangjiajie, China, the location use in the film Avatar.
Sky racing, night shows, acro and wing suit stunts are all on the program.
Details at parabatix.com
This low-stress, friendly competition is now in its 14th year. It will take place during the first week of July, and makes use of several take-offs in the vicinity of Laragne-Montéglin in southern France.
This year the competition will be open to sport class wings and below – no EN-Ds allowed! Jocky Sanderson will be meet director again.
Scoring will be in Fun, Recreation and Sport classes, defined by wing aspect ratio (see flylaragne.com for more details) with a strong emphasis on team flying. Pilots are encouraged to form mixed-ability and mixed wing-class teams of four pilots.
A full programme of events – social and educational – will be planned around the flying.
Pilots flying Ozone wings get a €20 reduction of the entry fee.
Registration opens on 20 January 2019 at 6pm GMT. Pilots need to register early, and are encouraged to register in teams of four.
The third round of the 2019 Paragliding World Cup tour takes place at Manteigas, Portugal from 29 June – 6 July 2019.
The other dates on the tour are:
Coeur de Savoie, France 25 May – 1 June
Pico do Gaviao, Brazil 7-14 Sep
Loma Bola, Argentina, 9-16 Nov
Photo: Xabier González
The 42nd Spanish National Hang Gliding Championship takes place in Zujar near Granada in southern Spain, from 30 June to 6 July 2019.
Class 1, Class 5 and Sports Class categories.
More information on Airtribune.com
The second BGD Weightless competition will take place in Saint Jean Montclar, France from 7-13 July 2019.
The competition is aimed at up-and-coming pilots looking to improve their cross-country competition flying, in a fun environment alongside some of the best pilots in the world.
Organisers say the event is particularly suited to leisure pilots who have flown some XCs (20km+), but it does not exclude more advanced pilots who will also benefit from participation, although no two-liners are allowed.
For 2019, Bruce has says he will be testing a new handicap system for Weightless.
"We will remove the weight categories and have a handicap system instead. The handicap will be based on 0.25% score adjustment (score of each pilot per task) for every 1kg in weight. This is the conclusion drawn from the analysis of the first weightless comp. Fine details of how this handicap will be applied are not yet decided. Anyway it's an ongoing experiment, so we will try it next year and see how it works.
"As the BGD weightless scoring is experimental and the scoring system is 'in development' we will be using this prototype handicap scoring system only for the event itself. The results submitted to FAI will be the standard results without any weight adjustment. So effectively there will be two different scores for the event. The Weight Adjusted scores and the standard FAI scores.
"Prizes at the event will follow weight adjusted scores. FAI ranking will follow FAI scores".
More information and registration at airtribune.com
The US Paragliding Open will take place in Chelan from 7-13 July 2019. It is an FAI cat 2 and USHPA sanctioned XC competition, with Open, Sports and Women's classes.
More on Airtribune.com
The UK's music and flying festival, Parafest, returns to the stunning setting of Caerwys in North Wales in July 2019.
Parafest is the UK's only event for all foot launched and single-seat trike aviation. The festival site is ideally placed for access to both coastal and mountain flying, with several North Wales flying sites a short drive away for free-flyers, and a dedicated field for powered craft to use from Thursday to Sunday.
There will be a trade show with demo equipment available, and the British Vintage Hang Glider Rally will be on site with up to 40 fully rigged gliders charting the history of UK hang gliding from its beginnings to the present day.
The pilot-run 'Fly Inn' bar will be stocked with Welsh real ales, gins, rums, Pimms, Prosecco, cocktails and more. In addition there will be arts and crafts markets, a children's area, live music from 1pm to 1am on the Friday and Saturday nights, sideshows and much more.
Tickets are on sale now and cost £65 for pilots (Thursday to Sunday) or £55 for non-flyers. Under-16s are free and dogs are welcome. Organisers warn, "Parafest sells out to capacity every year and tickets must be bought in advance from the website".
The FAI World Hang Gliding Championship takes place every two years, and 2019 is a Championship year! The 22nd event will take place from 12-27 July 2019 in Friuli Venezia Giulia, Italy.
Organisers say tasks will explore far and wide, and may well take pilots across borders into Slovenia and Austria.


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Most summer days you'll be wishing you could lounge in the park or go for a swim at the beach, but for better or worse, you'll be at the office, getting the daily grind done and looking forward to the weekend when you can make good on a few of those daydreams. While cubicles and office desks aren't the most welcoming of spaces, they can be made much more comfortable with just a few touches.
1. In a cubicle, face your entrance. This minimal bit of Feng Shui can make all the difference. It's more relaxing not to have your back to the door - just look at most offices - so there's no reason it should be that way in your cubicle. Feel free to move things around until you're at your most at ease and productive.
2. Plants - or at least pictures of plants. If you can't bring in a few potted plants for your desk or cubicle, consider bringing in photos of lush tropical locations or breezy, cool meadows. Or, just change your computer's desktop background if you think that will help. The main benefit of actual plants, however, is that they keep the air from feeling too recycled, which can be just as exhausting in an office setting as fluorescent lighting.
3. Air conditioning is great, except when it's on too high. You shouldn't have to pack multiple sweaters in the middle of a heat wave just to stay comfortable at work. When temperatures jump into the 90s or above, most offices turn on the air conditioning as though it were the only thing keeping the building from melting. To stay warm in an office tundra, consider investing in an Under Desk Heater. Models like the ones offered by WarmlyYours are environmentally friendly and easily adjustable to your comfort - so you won't be doing the environment any extra damage or heating up the cubicles and desks around you thanks to the radiant heat technology.
4. Stay organized. Summer commutes are exhausting, so when you finally collapse into your chair, the last thing you want to do is tidy up and get your stuff in order - but you should! Don't let any office spring cleaning opportunities go to waste. Stay organized and you'll be happy for it down the road.
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Diversity Statement
Diversity supports the mission of Bates Technical College. Respecting and promoting diversity is vital to the education of our students and to the learning environment of our campus community. We foster an atmosphere where each of us is valued for our intellectual and cultural perspectives, increasing our ability to reflect critically and resolve challenges. We share a wealth of experiences that strengthens us individually and as a society. As students and educators, we commit to building a diverse and engaged community.
In 2011, the college adopted a Leadership Document on Diversity, to outline ways to incorporate diversity throughout the college.
Diversity Center Services and Resources
The Diversity Center is a hub for the campus community and is accessible to students, staff and community members. The center, located at the Downtown Campus, offers a welcoming and comfortable place to meet, and is a safe place to learn, where conversations and discussions can occur within an atmosphere of respect and trust.
The Diversity Center includes a large conference room and smaller meeting rooms and spaces for conversation and meetings. Computer workstations, a library stocked with a plenty of diversity-related resources and a small kitchen area add to the space.
Diversity Center Activities
The Diversity Center celebrates, promotes and plans various activities and events throughout the year. The four main events include Disability Awareness Day in October; Veterans Day in November; Martin Luther King Jr. Day and a March to the Tacoma Dome in January; and Global Heritage in June. Bates recognizes additional heritage months throughout the year. Be sure to check out the college calendar for these and other events. Check out photos from past events.


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Begin your Federal, State and Local withholding tax research here with links to direct sources for help with labor, unemployment and other tax laws. Search the entire site or use the payroll glossary in this section for anything relating to payroll withholding tax and laws.
Payroll Tax Research LibraryA compilation of research, collaboration and
web tools for use by payroll professionals.


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Incredibly Easy Pumpkin Dump Cake
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New technology is all very well in the showroom or tooling round city roads, with plenty of assistance nearby if it all turns pear-shaped.
But what about taking it out of town, flinging it through a few bends along the road less travelled and overnighting at some coastal town? That's exactly what we did with Holden's Volt, an electric car with a supplementary petrol engine that remains entirely disconnected from the wheels, but fires and acts as a generator to charge the battery once it's out of juice.
That means no worries about range; simply top up with petrol as normal if you're travelling further afield than the battery and 111kW electric motor alone will take you.
Most city drivers negotiating the everyday commute won't need to. We drove 56km north on the battery, selecting sport - it takes a few seconds to engage - and planting boot to overtake, heedless of the effect on electricity stores. For the fuel tank was full, the 1.4-litre 63kW petrol motor engaging so seamlessly it took the instrument panel to confirm it had happened; wish the portable generator at home was as subtle.
Cruising at any speed is silent and refined in an electric car, although the payoff for the low-revs-around-town acceleration the format revels in is asthmatic high-rev performance - hence the power button.
But what's it like on the bendy bits?
Surprisingly effective, despite having no gear steps. That means brisk cornering requires you to overbrake into bends (regenerating power as you do so) since you can't settle the car by slotting it down a cog or two, then using the electric motor's low-rev punch to pull out - the 370Nm is on tap from 250Nm to 2800rpm.
This feels odd at first but once you're used to it the Volt scampers along quite nicely, considering its relatively hefty 1721kg weight.
Meanwhile, your passengers can play with all the clever tech like the touch-activated centre console and many info screens. The driver benefits from lane departure warning, collision alert, a rear view camera, satnav and other goodies.
Once in Russell we cruised silently to our hotel, windows down to hear the waves rustle on the shore as we were undisturbed by the noise and fumes of a conventional engine, then plugged it in. A six-hour full charge from an ordinary socket costs $3, and our trip averaged 3.1l/100km of petrol on top of that - truly frugal motoring.
Given the vehicle's range on battery alone, Kiwi commuters may never use petrol until the Volt warns you the tank is getting stale.
Clever stuff, from a car that feels like any other mainstream sedan, at least until you check out the whopping $85,000 price.


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Ebola Virus Inflicts Deadly Toll on African Health Workers
Mounting Deaths Increase Strain on Front-Line Medical Staffers; Obama Says Better Infrastructure Can Help Control Virus
The number of people to have died in the worst Ebola outbreak in history has risen to at least 932, the World Health Organization said on Wednesday, as overworked hospital staff struggled to quell the epidemic and in many cases became its front-line victims. (Ebola virus: Outbreak is a public health emergency).
Between Saturday and Monday, 45 people died of the disease in West Africa, with 108 new cases reported during that period, the WHO said as it began a two-day emergency meeting in Geneva to determine whether the outbreak...