September 2009 - Posts
By NBC News' Bo Gu
BEIJING – With more than 170 A-list movie stars from China and Hong Kong, "The Founding of a Republic," is breaking box office records – raking in $33.8 million during its first 10 days in theaters.
But this is nothing like the products pumped out by Hollywood. Instead, it’s a propaganda film made by the state-owned China Film Group.
Launched to mark the 60th anniversary of the communist era, the 135-minute movie depicts Mao Zedong’s rise, tracking the 1945-49 war in which the Communist Party of China (the CPC) led by Mao and the National Democratic Party (the KMT) led by Chiang Kai-shek fought fiercely for power..
The lengthy cast list includes many of the top names in modern Chinese film, including martial arts stars Jackie Chan and Jet Li, Zhang Ziyi of "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," action movie director John Woo, among others. And most of the famous actors took little or no pay for their work – rather, considering it an honor to have just a few brief lines in the film.
Movies in China usually don’t sell a lot of tickets during the so-called "red season," the summer and early fall months that are dominated by national holidays ( July 1 is the Communist Party of China’s Founding Day, Aug. 1 is the People’s Liberation Army Day and Oct.1 is National Day). The films that are released are typically dull, mind-numbing propaganda films only viewed by students or government staff with free tickets.
But "The Founding of a Republic" seems to be an exception. The box office numbers are still skyrocketing the China Film Group says it expects the tally to pass $350 million within the next couple of weeks.
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By Martin Fletcher, NBC News Correspondent
CASABLANCA, Morocco – Casablanca, Morocco’s largest city, conjures images of
Rick’s Bar, couscous and the third largest mosque in the world, built at fabulous cost on land reclaimed from the sea. Only those in Mecca and Medina are bigger.
Critics complain that the close to $1 billion spent in the 1990s on the Hassan II Great Mosque, which has a thousand ton sliding roof and the world’s tallest minaret, could have been better spent on helping people more directly, like cleaning out Casablanca’s legendary slums.
The mosque is indeed spectacular, with praying room for more than a 100,000 people. But the problems of the slums are spectacular too – places of mindless violence, desperate poverty and hopelessness.
All 12 suicide bombers who blew themselves up in Casablanca in 2003, killing at least 33 people, were Jihadist products from the local slums. So were the bombers in 2007 who killed a dozen more.
The government is working hard to move the country’s slum-dwellers to better homes. But to see the lives of the people still left behind, about half a million people nationwide, is truly shocking – yet in a few cases, humbling and inspiring.
That’s because of Boubker Mazoz.
VIDEO: Teaching self-respect in Casablanca's slums
White-haired, mustached, bronzed, slim and charismatic, the 58-year-old voluntary community organizer is a dead ringer for Omar Sharif, the famous actor. Seven years ago, while continuing with his day job at the public affairs office of the American Embassy, he founded an organization with the goal of bringing hope into the lives of the hopeless.
"Education is everything," he said, as we strolled in one of his classrooms among 10-year-old boys and girls being taught English, French and Arabic by high school seniors, all volunteers, many of them slum-dwellers themselves. "They must stay in school, become independent and especially, not be dragged down by all these stereotypes people have of them that they are failures, criminals, the bottom of society."
Mazoz grew up in Sale, a city near Rabat, and was grateful for the educational opportunities that gave him to make a better life for himself. He’s worked at the embassy for the last 30 years – while most of his country cousins are still back in the poor village where his father grew up. When Mazoz came to Casablanca, he wanted to help people make the best of themselves – especially through education.
At the community center I watched as one young girl, her hair covered in Islamic traditional style, enthusiastically pointed at letters. She mouthed them, and two boys and a girl, leaning across the table, one half-sitting on it, stroked the letters with their fingers and imitated her. A drone of English and French and Arabic vowels rolled across the room.
"They’re all from the neighborhoods," Mazoz said proudly. "They are such good kids, they just need a chance."
"Who is the girl teaching them?" I asked. And therein lies a tale.
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By Ian Williams, NBC News correspondent
DONGGUAN, China – "It's been a rough year," Ben Schwall shouted above the rumbling furnaces of a giant Chinese glass factory. He watched as workers, blowing down long tubes, transformed blobs of molten glass into juicers, bowls and lights.
"Orders are picking up. Things are getting better," he said. "The telephone is starting to ring again. Everybody feels there is something coming back."
We were in Dongguan, in the manufacturing heartland of southern China. Frequently called the "workshop of the world," the region was battered last year when the world stopped buying and exports collapsed.
Schwall supplies Chinese lighting equipment to the United States, linking American buyers with Chinese factories. Before the economic crisis, he was shipping 70 containers a month, but then his business fell by nearly two-thirds.
Thousands of factories across China closed last year, and some 20 million migrant workers lost their jobs.
Suddenly, though, this region is buzzing again. Factories are being renovated and are hiring. Vast public works and infrastructure projects have transformed parts of the area into sprawling building sites. Shops are full, with electronic goods flying off shelves; car sales have almost doubled over last year.
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By Mike Mosher, NBC News Producer
BUKIT LAWANG, North Sumatra, Indonesia – It’s said one should not take work along on vacation. "Leave the BlackBerry at home!" my supervisor insisted. But, no way was I going to leave behind the camera with the opportunity to spend a week on an eco-tour in Indonesia.
In the forests of North Sumatra, Indonesia, there's a delicate balancing act going on, witnessed by a few eco-friendly tourists every year. It's not easy to see, but well worth the trip. And you might even see a little piece of yourself looking back at you from high in the trees.
The location was new for me and the trip was special, hardly work, particularly when I can share the experience (through the video links here) with others.
I set out to find a critically endangered species, the orangutan, in their native habitat before they become extinct. Its estimated just 6,600 Sumatran orangutans remain.
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By Adrienne Mong, NBC News Producer
KABUL, Afghanistan – If there was ever one "foreign devil" on the Silk Road who most fascinates amateur history buffs, it must be Sir Marc Aurel Stein.
The Hungarian-born British archaeologist’s career sparked an obsession of mine – and no doubt of countless others – with the history of the Silk Road, a series of trade routes linking China to the Mediterranean.
So upon hearing Stein was buried in Kabul, I made a beeline for his gravesite as soon as I arrived here.
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| Adrienne Mong / NBC News |
| The British Cemetery sits on a dusty road in central Kabul. |
A race for ancient artifacts
Born in 1862, an era when archaeologists could still raise funds for lavish expeditions and gallivant about the globe, Stein single-handedly put the Silk Road back on the map, as it were, with a series of incredible discoveries in his later life.
The fruits of his excavations and scholarship shed new light on the region by tracing the original trading routes along the Silk Road and, most importantly, documenting the spread of Buddhism from India to China.
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By NBC News' Warangkana Chomchuen
BANGKOK, Thailand – Paper plane champ Mong Thongdee returned to the Thai capital Monday with a bag full of trophies after competing in a Japanese paper airplane contest – but the young boy’s joy may be fleeting.
The 12-year-old boy, who has no official nationality, brought home a third place win in the division for elementary school students in the Chiba, Japan paper plane competition. And his three-person Thai team also won first place in a group competition where the young contestants had to quickly fold their planes and then throw them into the air.
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| Koji Sasahara / AP |
| Mong Thongdee prepares to release his paper plane during the team indoor flight duration competition at the All-Japan Origami Airplane Contest near Tokyo on Sept. 19. |
Mong glowed while cameras flashed as he greeted his Myanmar migrant parents – whose trip to Bangkok from their home in northern town of Chiang Mai was made possible by a last minute sponsorship from an airline.
Mong’s story captured media attention when he appealed for travel document to compete in Japan, where he would represent Thailand.
The initial rejection of his request to travel – on the grounds that he isn’t a Thai citizen and can’t leave the country without losing his temporary residence permit – brought to light the complicated issue of thousands of people who live in Thailand, but have no citizenship or official status.
At the airport on Monday, Mong thanked all Thais for giving him endless support throughout his journey and said he wished to give his medals to the Thai king.
But after going all the way to win his paper plane titles in Japan, Mong returned home to the same state he’s been in: a stateless boy in the country he calls home.
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By Amna Nawaz, NBC News Producer
LAHORE, Pakistan – Religious piety isn’t something you normally associate with McDonald’s. But during the holy month of Ramadan, everybody gets into the game.
For one month every year, Muslims around the world fast from dawn-to-dusk during the ninth month on the Muslim lunar calendar. Every day, from sun up to sun down, millions aim to practice restraint by abstaining from eating, drinking, smoking and indulging in anything in excess.
It’s meant to be a time of reflection, modesty, and spirituality, but the mass-market appeal is hard for retailers to ignore.
McDonald’s pushes a dessert deal called "Sweet Blessings." Pizza Hut offers a "Ramadan Special" all-you-can-eat buffet after sundown. Even Dunkin Donuts has a "Ramadan Feast" meal package on its menu.
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| McDonalds's |
| McDonald’s advertises a special dessert deal during the holy month of Ramadan called “Sweet Blessings” as a treat for people breaking their daily fast. |
According to Pakistani writer and blogger Asif Akhtar, corporate marketing teams across all industries latch on to this idea during Ramadan.
"Cell phone companies have Ramadan packages where you can call a certain number and get Quranic verses sent to your phone," said Akhtar. "Radio stations, instead of playing more hip and happening party songs, they start playing more religiously oriented music."
The pressure to adhere to religious practice can be intense. Even those not fasting feel they must at least pretend to fast in public, so as not to incur the wrath of others. One young man in the capital city of Islamabad said that despite the fact that he’s unsure of his faith, and therefore chooses not to fast, he keeps up appearances in public because it’s easier than the alternative.
"Chewing gum in public will get you some dirty looks," he said, asking not to be named because of the sensitivity of the subject. "Drinking water in public may lead someone to say something disapproving or nasty to you. And eating in public? Forget it."
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A suicide car bomber killed six Italian soldiers and 10 Afghan civilians Thursday in the heavily guarded capital of Kabul.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for the deadliest attack for the Italian contingent in the country. Violence has increased since the U.S. sent thousands more troops to push back the resurgent Taliban and bolster security for last month's still-unresolved presidential election. It's the fourth major attack in five weeks in Kabul. NBC News' Adrienne Mong reports from Kabul.
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The Obama administration has eased travel restrictions to Cuba -- making it easier for Cuban-Americans to fly to the communist island. NBC's Kerry Sanders reports.
By NBC News' Warangkana Chomchuen
BANGKOK, Thailand – Mong Thongdee is a rare champion.
The 12-year-old boy lives just behind Chiang Mai airport, in northern Thailand, and makes paper planes for hobby. That’s where he gets scolded by his father for littering the place and wasting papers.
"I barely have enough money to buy notebooks for school and there he was, tearing papers to make airplanes," said his father, Yoon Thongdee.
Mong’s parents, who came from Shan state in Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, earn $7 a day from construction work to feed their family of four. They all squeeze into a tiny square room in a row house where their neighbors are other migrant workers.
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| AP |
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Mong Thongdee, left, poses with Thailand's Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva and paper airplanes during a meeting in Bangkok, Thailand on Sept. 3, 2009. |
At the national paper plane contest late last year, Mong’s dart floated 12.5 seconds in the air and made him a winner. Ever since that victory, he’s been training two hours a day to prepare for the origami airplane competition in Japan this month, where he will represent Thailand.
But when Mong requested to have a travel document to go Japan he was rejected. Even though he has lived in Thailand since he was born, he is still a son of migrants and doesn’t have citizenship. Like his parents, Mong resides on a temporary permit – which will be terminated when he leaves the country, and turns him into an illegal immigrant if he returns.
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By Paul Goldman, NBC News Producer
RISHON LEZION, Israel – By 10 a.m. on a recent morning, the line of people in an underground parking lot in this Tel Aviv suburb, was getting longer and longer. The frustration level was intensifying along with the rising temperature – it was hot and sticky with no fresh air.
But, for many, it was a line worth waiting in. The Pitchon-Lev organization was handing out the basic needs for the upcoming Jewish New Year – Rosh Hashanah – which begins at sundown this Friday, Sept. 18 and will be observed on Saturday.
While there are some signs of hope that the global recession may be receding, for many of the people on line here, hard times are here to stay.
Tal Eisenbaum, manager of the Pitchon-Lev aid center, left a cushy hi-tech career for this grueling job of helping the needy and the poor.
"I was a C.E.O of a software company, I have a third degree in marketing and I came here because of my conscience, I decided to work for a few years for the community, to feel good with myself," said Eisenbaum. "I see that I’m actually helping people and it feels good."
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By Adrienne Mong, NBC News Producer
BEIJING – After a short summer break, I returned to Beijing to find the city under siege.
At least that’s how it looks these days – two weeks before the National Holiday on Oct. 1 to mark the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China.
As I rode through central Beijing over the weekend, an armored vehicle was poised on the corner of the Dongsishitiao roundabout. A soldier was sitting on top of it, wearing a balaclava and with a machine gun at the ready. Pedestrians stopped, stared, and then took photos with their cell phones.
Police checkpoints now ring Beijing’s outskirts, monitoring traffic from the surrounding provinces and inspecting vehicles entering the capital. Busloads of troops have been unloading around the city. And jets screamed across a beautifully clear sky over Tiananmen Square on Saturday morning.
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| Adrienne Mong / NBC News |
| With increased security in Beijing, some officials who are new to the city try to find their bearings. |
The square itself, the Forbidden City opposite it, and the major road arteries flowing south of Chang'an Avenue – which bisects the capital – were all closed to the public this past weekend.
What sounded like half-hearted fireworks sputtered through the late evening near the Workers' Stadium, but with the high visibility of soldiers and police, you’d be forgiven for thinking it was gunfire.
A party for the Party
In short, authorities here are taking no chances.
After all, it’s a big anniversary. It’s especially significant because in Chinese culture sixtieth anniversaries are a big milestone – their significance is equivalent to that of a centennial elsewhere.
But anyone under the impression the celebration is for the people might want to think again. This is a party for the party – the Chinese Communist Party.
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By Sohel Uddin, NBC News Producer
KABUL, Afghanistan –I was led into an office at the British Embassy this morning, where an official was going to help us with some consular issues. The officer was trying to get rid of two men in the room so we could have the privacy to deal with our matter.
One man left immediately, but the other took his time, engrossed in filling out a form.
I took a second look at him; it was Stephen Farrell, the British-born New York Times reporter who was dramatically rescued from a Taliban hideout Wednesday. While he survived, his Afghan colleague and a British soldier were killed in the raid.
Farrell was not wearing the traditional Afghan clothes and hat in which he was shown in photos after news of his release – and his beard had disappeared, too.
Having briefly met him before during previous reporting assignments, I asked how he was. He shook my hand and gave me a despondent, withdrawn look as he told me what a difficult time it has been for him.
The temptation to ask more was interrupted by the consular official anxiously ushering him out of the room.
As he left, it struck me how big the story was surrounding this subdued figure.
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The U.S. soccer team is only one match away from qualifying for the FIFA World Cup finals and England assured it's place after beating Croatia Wednesday.
But how prepared is South Africa to host this biggest of all soccer tournaments? ITV's Martin Geissler reports from Johannesburg.
ANALYSIS
By Jim Maceda, NBC News Correspondent
Aunt Dee is the real pundit of my family – an opinionated, 80-year-old independent spirit if there ever was one. You never know whom she’ll target next, so getting an e-mail from our own gadfly is always special.
Her latest feint and thrust – on the war in Afghanistan – came about two weeks ago: "Well, I have to get started on dinner so will close this now. We see nothing about that war in Afghanistan. It’s like it doesn’t exist. And, no one is asking Obama, ‘What are we doing there?’"
Since that e-mail, it’s as if every politician and editorialist – on both sides of the Atlantic – is reading Aunt Dee!
"What’s the mission?" asks one. "To prevent another 9/11," answers another. "To build a viable Afghan state," chimes in a third. And on and on...
Some analysts wonder why we’re even in Afghanistan at all, when most "terrorists" and terror attacks are in, or originating from, Pakistan. Other experts rejoin that if we withdrew from or failed in Afghanistan, then Pakistan – and the rest of South Asia with it – might implode.
A maelstrom of opinion has burst wide open, and in its wake, even traditional positions have shifted.
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Richard Engel, NBC News Chief Foreign Correspondent
KABUL, Afghanistan – It is a brutal first impression. The moment my feet touch the sand as I step out of a Stryker armored vehicle, I hear an explosion. It’s far away; about half a mile. I hear a big deep thud and look over my shoulder. I see a cloud of brown dust expanding in an Afghan village.
The village walls and houses are all made of mud. One of the houses has just exploded into a brown cloud. American soldiers were inside the booby-trapped structure. Within seconds, we hear radio traffic.
One American is dead. Others are wounded. The radio calls are urgent, but formal. No names. They don’t use names so soldiers who listen to the radio don’t become upset in the midst of what is now a rescue operation to save the wounded soldiers.
I’ve been here for less than five minutes.
The Medevac helicopters fly in. They take away the wounded first. Nothing more can be done for the dead. The wounded are the priority.
Part of the surge in Afghanistan
In my blue spiral notebook I start to take notes to figure out where I am, and what’s going on.
The notes are short:
I’m in the Arghandab valley, just outside Kandahar.
It’s a Taliban stronghold.
It’s mostly desert with a few green orchards around the mud-walled villages.
I’m with the Army’s Stryker brigade. These soldiers were supposed to go to Iraq. Some learned Arabic before they were diverted to Afghanistan in February.
One soldier is dead. He’s the seventh soldier the Stryker brigade has lost in three weeks.
I write a number 7 in my notebook and circle it.
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By NBC News' Bo Gu
NANJING, China – In the middle of Yuhuatai Martyr Memorial Park in Nanjing, southeast China’s ancient capital, is a small building called the "Jiangsu National State Security Education Museum."
The sign in front of the gate is likely to trigger the curiosity of any passerby – but especially foreigners. It warns would-be visitors: "This exhibition service is available to Chinese citizens ONLY."
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| Bo Gu/ NBC News |
| The entrance to China's spy museum warns that "This exhibition service is available ONLY to PRC citizens." |
As a Chinese citizen, I was permitted to enter, so I did.
The museum’s exhibition halls display the history of China’s security techniques and spy equipment dating back to the 1920s, when China’s Communist Party came into being and began its battle against the Chinese National Party led by Chiang Kai-shek.
One of the largest exhibits focuses on the decades-long spy war between mainland China and Taiwan – both before and after Chiang Kai-shek lost the battle for China and fled to the island with his followers in 1949.
The exhibition rooms are full of large photos of Communist Party spies who successful concealed themselves as Nationalist Party members and infiltrated their ranks. One of the most prominent photos was of Shen Anna, a Communist spy who managed to disguise herself as a stenographer and sat in on many of the Nationalist’s high-level meetings.
The museum features a large display of Cold War era spy tools that are reminiscent of early James Bond movies. The exhibit includes tiny pistols disguised as lipsticks, a calculator with a radio microphone hidden inside and a camera sewn inside a suit pocket so it could secretly take pictures of important documents.
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By Adrienne Mong, NBC News Producer
BUREN SOUM, CENTRAL PROVINCE, Mongolia – In Beijing, we're used to hearing about the problems of desertification.
Roughly 400 million people in China and a third of its land are affected by desertification – the consequence of several factors that include not just climate change but misguided farming policies, deforestation and drought. Some estimates say, at this rate, roughly one million acres of grassland in China are being devoured by the desert each year.
But desertification knows no boundaries, especially when it entails the Gobi Desert. Not only is Asia’s largest desert expanding from north to south across China, it’s creeping south to north, too, farther into Mongolia.
"Seventy percent of our territory is affected by desertification," said Tsognamsrai, a project officer with the United Nations Development Fund (UNDP) in Ulaan Baatar. (Like most Mongolians, he goes by just one name. But fortunately, for tongue-tied Westerners like us, he has a nickname: Namsrai.)
Adapting to the Gobi’s spread
An ecologist by training who used to teach at the Agricultural University of Mongolia, Namsrai has seen first-hand the impact of the growing Gobi.
For two years now, he's been working with local communities in the Middle Gobi – the northernmost reaches of the desert – to help them combat desertification.
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Rickshaws, that ancient human-powered mode of transportation, has long been the backbone of India's local transportation system. Even as they are criticized for not being modern enough and for causing congestion, rickshaws have caught the attention of environmentalists. NBC's Ian Williams reports from Delhi, India.
Amid celebrations marking Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s 40 years in power, government officials in Britain are calling for a full investigation into the early release of convicted Lockerbie bomber Abdel Baset al-Megrahi. NBC’s Tom Aspell reports from Tripoli.
By Adrienne Mong, NBC News Producer
HOVSGOL PROVINCE, Mongolia – Bayanjargal laughed as she watched the three of us from NBC News turn on our cell phones for the first time in 24 hours and maniacally start emailing and texting. We probably were a ridiculous sight – hungry, dishevelled, basically slightly worse for wear after having flown two hours and then bumped along another ten hours inside a Russian UAZ van. But that wasn’t why Bayanjargal was grinning so widely.
"I’m happy to see you on your cell phones," said the 40-year-old, who like many Mongolians goes by just one name. "It means there is a signal up here!"
"Up here" was Tsagaannuur, the northernmost town in this part of Mongolia, where we had stopped briefly during a strenuous three-day journey to the taiga, a subarctic area on the Siberian border. The region ranks amongst the most isolated and harsh environments in the northern hemisphere. It’s so remote there are no power or phone lines. But there is cell phone service, which became available this past year.
Mongolia’s smallest ethnic minority
Bayanjargal moved to Tsagaannuur when she was eight, but she still misses the taiga despite annual visits.
"It’s my parents’ birthplace," she told us over mugs of hot tea and coffee as we stretched out our legs. "I miss the environment, and I miss especially the reindeer milk."
Yes, reindeer milk.
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By Adrienne Mong, NBC News Producer
ULAN BATOR, Mongolia – You won’t see Michael Phelps at these Olympic Games.
Sometimes billed as the Nomad Olympics, the Naadam festival in Mongolia features competitions in the three "manly" sports – horseracing, archery, and wrestling.
The event dates back 800 years, to the days when the great warrior horseman, Genghis Khan (known as Chinggis Khan in Mongolia), and his men swept down from the grassland steppes to conquer empires in Asia, Russia, the Middle East, and as far as Europe.
It’s believed that Genghis came up with the festival to keep his men in fighting shape when they weren’t conquering new lands. Today, the three-day event marks Mongolia’s independence from China in 1921 and Tsarist Russia. Everyone takes off work to watch – whether in front of their televisions or in person.
A couple of days before the festival earlier this summer, we noticed Mongolia’s bright blue and red national flags springing up on cars all over the country
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| Adrienne Mong / NBC News |
| Wrestlers at the National Stadium on the opening day of the Naadam festival in Ulan Bator. |
Families in Ulan Bator, Mongolia’s capital city, shopped for live goats or sheep from shepherds, who had traveled long distances to reach the edge of the city with their herds.
And at least in Ulan Bator, Mongolia’s capital, the recent festival had a state fair feel to it – lots of food, families, and fun. Smaller-scale, local Naadam festivals also are held all across Mongolia.
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By Arata Yamamoto, NBC News Producer
TOKYO – Sunday's landslide victory for Japan's main opposition, Democratic Party of Japan, or DJP, is being heralded as a new beginning for Japanese politics, squarely putting an end to the near continuous postwar rule by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP).
The Liberal Democrats only lost power once before in 1994, when a center-left coalition took over the helm of the nation for six months. But that was quickly followed by two years of a pseudo-comeback for the LDP when they combined forces with the polar opposite Socialist Party – but had to give their leader Tomiichi Murayama the front seat to run the nation.
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| Itsuo Inouye / AP |
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Yukio Hatoyama, leader of Japan's main opposition Democratic Party of Japan, speaks with red rosettes attached on victorious candidates' names in the background during the ballot counting for the parliamentary elections in Tokyo on Sunday. |
But Sunday’s election was a particularly stunning defeat for the incumbent party of Prime Minister Taro Aso with an unprecedented voter turnout of 69 percent, overwhelmingly ousting 181 politicians from the Liberal party, including former ministers, and replacing them with 143 freshman opposition candidates.
Still given the entrenched power of the Liberal Democrats, many voters are welcoming the change of party, but tempering their expectations.
"I don' have any high expectations for the Democrats. They're inexperienced and I don't think things will work out so smoothly," said 59-year-old office worker Kazuo Sasaki. "But it’s worth giving them a chance. We need to change the way things are done here."
Yasuhiro Tanaka, 28, agreed. "It was a process of elimination," he said. "There was absolutely no hope with the LDP."
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