April 11-17, 2014
Why faraway Ukraine matters to Asia
Contents April 11-17, 2014
❖ Politics
❖ ANN Special
❖ Life
Why faraway Ukraine matters to Asia
Asia News Network marks 15th year
Rebuilding homes, lives in Yolanda-shattered Bantayan
COVER IMAGE: AFP
Contents April 11-17, 2014
❖ Life Take care of my baby
❖ Life Five years in Hanoi hell
❖ Business
❖ Culture
Music, money and the digital divide
Italian touch on batik
Contents April 11-17, 2014
❖ Culture
❖ Travel
Datebook
Games we used to play
Enchanted in Hinatuan
Happenings around Asia
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April 11-17, 2014
ANN TURNS 15
ANN SPECIAL
The Asia News Network marked its 15th year at the annual board meeting held at the Singapore Press Holdings headquarters in Singapore this week. ANN started with seven members and has since grown into the region’s biggest network with 21 media groups in 19 countries today. ANN editors also held a roundtable discussion with Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong at Istana on April 8. The premier discussed a wide variety of issues. Some excerpts from the exclusive group interview:
ANN SPECIAL
April 11-17, 2014
MALAYSIA’S SEARCH FOR MH370
THAI POLITICAL TERRITORIAL DISPUTES CRISIS
"Our position is quite clear, and that is: We don’t take sides on the merits of the respective "I think your government has had claims, because each country has a very tough time managing this got its explanation and its reacrisis because it is quite unprecesons and its historical narrative dented. You have been searching of why it has a good claim, and now for one month, and you have its legal basis. We are not in any had no clues, or rather, you have no position to judge or to take side. hard evidence of the aeroplane. In Who has a good claim; whose that situation, you have to deal with claim defeats whose; not just the and where the line engineering and the should be drawn. But actual operations of it, what we do have, is an conducting the search, interest in the matter but also the communicabeing resolved peacefultions, with the families, ly, in accordance to inwith the relatives, with ternational laws, includthe international public ing the UN Convention who are watching this. So on the Law of the Sea; it’s a very difficult situation which your govern- SINGAPORE PM LEE HSIEN LOONG TALKS TO (FROM LEFT) NATION MULTIMEDIA GROUP and that countries exCHAIRMAN SUTHICHAI YOON, THE STRAITS TIMES EDITOR WARREN FERNANDEZ, KONRAD ercise restraint and we ment is in, and I think ADENAUER FOUNDATION'S MEDIA ASIA PROGRAMME DIRECTOR TORBEN STEPHAN AND negotiate a Code of they have done a very THE STRAITS TIMES FOREIGN EDITOR RAVI VELLOOR. Conduct with China." manful job." "We are concerned about it because Thailand is a very important member of Asean, and if Thailand is preoccupied with domestic difficulties, you will not be able to contribute your full weight to Asean endeavours and deliberations. And we see this as a very difficult problem which Thailand, the Thai people and Thai society will have to solve."
ANN SPECIAL
April 11-17, 2014
CHINA AND SINGAPORE "We are both very different societies, at different stages of development. You are in very rapid progress, and you have gone beyond the initial take-off now to sustaining that development and transforming your economy. We are a very small microcosm, a small model of how one can do things in a country which is also a city, and you might find something interesting to pick up from us. And we certainly find a lot of fascinating things to learn from China."
HAZE "Stop burning. But to stop burning, you must have the laws and you must enforce the laws. And then you must have sustainable agricultural practices. The climate is changing. We are having more extreme weather, more extreme
droughts as well as rain. And when you have extreme droughts, dry weather, then even if you don’t start a fire, a fire may start by itself. But if you do start a fire, it is very unlikely that you can control it."
April 11-17, 2014
ANN SPECIAL
ANN SPECIAL
April 11-17, 2014
CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS
LEADERSHIP SUCCESSION
"You can import or inherit institutions and constitutions, but you have to adapt them to your circumstances. And for us, multi-racial, multi-religious, small country with not much buffer or safety net, you have to be very careful that you manage it so that it doesn’t go to extremes and then flip over. As Mr Lee Kuan Yew used to say, it’s like wearing a pair of shoes—it’s better to have an old pair of shoes, you mend it, you patch it, you stretch it a bit, rather than buy a brand new pair of shoes and you put it now and you are not sure whether it will fit you or not. So that’s how Constitutions are like, at least for us."
"I think that leaders stay as long as they are able to make a contribution. If they stay beyond that, then they have overstayed their welcome. And in Singapore, we pay a lot of attention to succession planning and making sure that we have a new team ready, and new leaders who are capable of taking charge, so that the country can move ahead and the leaders can be in sync with the country. I can’t say exactly how long I am staying, but I am 62 years old and that’s not young. You must be quite clear what Singapore’s interests are, and you must be able to persuade people
that this is what we need to do together, and people have to be willing to go with you and to say, ‘yes, I trust him, I work with him’." ¬
POLITICS
April 11-17, 2014
Why
faraway Ukraine matters to Asia
JONATHAN EYAL The Straits Times Singapore
C
hina's diplomats have every reason to feel satisfied with their handling of the Ukraine crisis. On the one hand, China expressed its support for Ukraine's territorial integrity, an implicit rebuke to Russia, which seized Ukraine's Crimea region. But at the same time, Beijing has abstained from all anti-Russian votes at the United Nations, and let it be known that it won't be supporting anti-Russian sanctions.
April 11-17, 2014
POLITICS
GREEK CITY AND UNESCO HERITAGE SITE, IN THE CRIMEAN CITY OF SEVASTOPOL.
OLGA MALTSEVA/AFP
A VIEW OF CHERSONESOS, AN ANCIENT
POLITICS
April 11-17, 2014
Beijing's determination to have its cake and eat it, to be caught neither on Russia's side nor on the West's, is based on the assumption that whichever way the stand-off over Ukraine is resolved, China stands to gain from the crisis. Yet, such assumptions are fundamentally misconceived. For the Ukraine episode is a misfortune for Asia as a whole. And China may soon discover that, far from being an indirect beneficiary, the crisis in far-away Ukraine will confront Beijing with new and costly security challenges. It is easy to see why, at least in the short term, China may benefit from events in Ukraine. An isolated Russia subjected to Western sanctions will be far more willing to sell oil, gas and weapons to China on preferential terms; Igor Sechin, Russian President Vladimir Putin's top energy boss, admitted as much in comments to the media last month. All very true but only part of the story. The more one looks at the potential
"FOR IF THE RUSSIANS CAN SUBDUE CRIMEA— A RELATIVELY LARGE TERRITORY WITH TWO MILLION INHABITANTS— IN A FEW DAYS AND WITHOUT FIRING A SHOT IN ANGER, WHY CAN'T CHINA DO THE SAME TO A FEW STRINGS OF UNINHABITED ROCKS?" ramifications of Ukraine, the higher the fears that everyone in Asia—including the Chinese —will be affected by this European crisis. The fact that force was used to change borders in Europe may not alarm China unduly. But the methods that Russia resorted to in occupying Crimea, and the justifications it made for this action, should elicit deep concern, even in Beijing.
Russia claimed to itself a right to use force in any neighbouring country where ethnic Russians may be in danger, and is now distributing Russian passports to all its diaspora in order to reinforce this claim. Russia also held a snap referendum in Crimea in order to justify the incorporation of that Ukrainian province into Russian territory, elevating what it likes to call "self-determination" as a principle justifying territorial changes. Both these ideas are toxic for Asian security. The Russian model of offering "protection" to its "co-nationals" may become attractive to some Chinese nationalists who are already arguing that Beijing has not done enough to protect ethnic Chinese in other countries. But the more someone in Beijing may be tempted to copy the Russian example, the more ethnic Chinese throughout Asia will be treated with suspicion; the nexus between ethnic minorities and their so-called "mother state"
POLITICS
April 11-17, 2014
ALLEY IN THE CRIMEAN TOWN OF SIMEIZ.
AFP PHOTO/ OLGA MALTSEVA
VIEW OF A ROMAN STATUE AND THE CENTRAL
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April 11-17, 2014
was responsible for unleashing two world wars in Europe. And holding referendums in order to decide borders is precisely the kind of principle China does not want to see established. The results of such a vote in, say, Xinjiang or Tibet are fairly predictable. And while China has the resources necessary to ensure these votes never take place, what can Beijing do if the fashion for referendums is picked up in Taiwan and Hong Kong?
Strategic challenges for Beijing
Nor are many of the strategic benefits, which China assumes it can derive from the Ukraine crisis, that real. Take the prospect of increased deliveries of Russian oil and gas as an example. It is true that, as Europe seeks to diversify its supplies away from a hostile Russia,
the Russians will be forced to sell their energy products to China, their next big market. And it's equally true that in this buyers' market, the Chinese will be able to call the price. But shifting supplies away from Europe to Asia is a gigantic task. Russia will have to build the same networks of pipelines it currently has in Europe—an effort that won't leave much change from an estimated US$50 billion, and will require years, if not decades. Meanwhile, China may be called upon to defend the energy resources it has already secured in Central Asia. Until now, the Chinese were winning the battle for influence in Central Asia against the Russians —the region's old colonial masters—in a patient, peaceful way, through offers of trade opportunities that Russia can never match.
But victory in Ukraine may encourage the Russians to reassert their influence in Central Asia, where large pockets of ethnic Russians live. The northern part of Kazakhstan, Central Asia's biggest and richest nation, is entirely dominated by ethnic Russians who can be easily incorporated into Russia proper, especially since, like in Ukraine, Russia can use military bases it already has throughout the region for this purpose. In short, the Ukraine crisis can make China's northern borders with Central Asia less, rather than more secure.
Impact on US pivot to Asia
But the most important error that the Chinese or anyone else in Asia could make is to assume that the Ukraine crisis will translate into a reduced Asian footprint for the US, or in a diminished American global reputation.
April 11-17, 2014
POLITICS MAX VETROV/AFP
A WOMAN WALKS PAST A TRAINLOAD OF UKRAINIAN TANKS WHICH ARE SET TO LEAVE CRIMEAN PENINSULAR NEAR THE CRIMEAN CAPITAL SIMFEROPOL ON MARCH 31, 2014. RUSSIA'S PRESIDENT VLADIMIR PUTIN HAS ORDERED LAST WEEK ALL WEAPONS AND HARDWARE LEFT BY THE UKRAINIAN MILITARY AFTER CRIMEA’S ACCESSION TO RUSSIA TO BE RETURNED TO UKRAINE.
POLITICS
April 11-17, 2014
Barring an actual war with Russia, which nobody currently predicts, the US can contain Russian power in Europe without pouring in new military resources by simply galvanising its European allies in the Nato alliance to do things differently. A shift of Nato bases and soldiers from their current western European locations to the territory of central and eastern Europe will be relatively swift and cheap, but sufficient to pin down the Russian military for years to come. So, the Ukraine crisis may end up having no impact on the "rebalancing" of US forces to Asia, which could continue. Indeed, the pivot may actually intensify if, as a result of the current showdown with Russia, the US Congress refuses to accept the cuts which President Barack Obama has pencilled in for the US armed forces. Nor is it true, as some Chinese analysts have privately suggest-
ed, ed, that the US' decision to do nothing in response to Russi military intervention in Ukraine has devalued the credibility of the US security guarantees to other nations. Ukraine is not a member of either Nato or the European Union, and the US pledge to that country's security was in the realm of the moral, rather than legal. What the Ukraine episode has shown is that, as professor Victor Cha of Georgetown University in the US shrewdly put it, "power matters less than commitment". As powerful as the US remains, it was not committed enough to Ukraine's security to use its formidable strength to defend that country's integrity. Yet, the lesson that Asian nations will draw from this is not that US security guarantees are now worthless but rather,
that in order to make sure that such guarantees remain effective, Washington's Asian partners will have to work harder to reinforce US commitment to their security. And that's precisely what Japan and South Korea—to name but a few of the region's nations —are now doing. Nobody should therefore see the Ukraine crisis as anything but a misfortune, and the response may be a tightening of alliances with the US and a greater quest for regional collective security arrangements, as the only structures capable of preventing a repetition of a Ukraine-like scenario in Asia. That much was clear when the UN General Assembly last week adopted a resolution supporting Ukraine's territorial integrity— the only Asian country that voted with Russia was North Korea. With friends like these, Russia no longer needs enemies. ¬
April 11-17, 2014
LIFE
Rebuilding
homes, lives
TARRA QUISMUNDO
AMERICAN VISITORS DO THEIR PART FIXING BOATS OF FISHERFOLK. INTERNATIONAL VOLUNTEERS KICK-START THE CONSTRUCTION OF 135 DISASTER-RESILIENT HOMES AT A RESETTLEMENT SITE FOR DISPLACED FAMILIES IN SANTA FE, BANTAYAN.
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April 11-17, 2014
BY TARRA QUISMUNDO Philippine Daily Inquirer Santa Fe, Bantayan Island
T
he dark clouds gave way to the sun as the human chain passed hollow blocks down the line, each block a step closer to rebuilding lives shattered by Super Typhoon Yolanda nearly five months ago. The international group of volunteers worked for about a week in March to kick-start the construction of 135 disaster-resilient homes at a resettlement site for displaced families in this community by the sea. “It’s just the beginning and, hopefully, we (will be able to) build better community support and spirit for the people of Bantayan Island. It’s also an opportunity for our employees to contribute and help one of our
Santa Fe, the port of entry into Bantayan Island, lost 95 per cent of its houses when the typhoon plowed through central Philippines on Nov 8, 2013, displacing 4,000 of the 6,700 families in town countries of operations,” said Marc Fancy, executive director of Prudence Foundation, the charity arm of life insurance firm Prudential Corp. Asia (PCA). “[We’re] in the life insurance and asset management business, and that’s about protection, that’s about security and risk management. And so, as what we do for business is about society and looking after society,” said Fan-
cy, who has long been involved in volunteer programmes in different parts of the world. PCA, which operates as Pru Life UK in the Philippines, mounted this year its biggest overseas volunteer programme so far, enlisting some 100 volunteers from its base in Hong Kong and units in Singapore, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Taiwan, Vietnam, Cambodia, the United Kingdom and the Philippines for the Bantayan project in cooperation with Habitat for Humanity.
4TH VOLUNTEER PROGRAMME
Held from March 24-28, the “Bantayan build” was the fourth international volunteer programme for Prudence Foundation, which also gathered its employees from around Asia to build houses and clear debris following the 2009
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earthquake in Padang, Indonesia; in Ishinomaki, Japan, after the 2011 quake, tsunami and nuclear disaster; and in Mae Ai, northern Thailand, in 2012, months after widespread flooding struck the region. “The real catalyst was Padang in 2009 where we were hosting an event in the main hotel… and the event had 80 people. Four of the people who died were from our office, from our company. That hit us personally as an organisation,” Fancy said in an interview with the Inquirer. “In a disaster, when you’ve lost everything, hope seems to diminish. But if you can give people a bit of hope and the opportunity to rebuild their future when they’ve lost everything, it’s a nice feeling,” he added.
PUMP BOATS, PEDICABS
As part of a package of assistance for Santa Fe town, Prudence Foundation also gave 183 pump boats, or outriggers, and 140 pedicabs to families who had lost
their livelihood due to the storm. “We wanted to make sure that we weren’t just providing shelter but that we were also giving people livelihood, an opportunity to have sustainable income in the future,” Fancy said. The livelihood aid is part of the US$2 million in assistance that the foundation has so far provided for Yolanda survivors across the disaster zone, including emergency relief, education and aid to disaster risk reduction programmes. “These programmes are not oneoffs. We’re trying to look for how we can contribute as a foundation, as an organisation, so we will be able to
help in the rehabilitation in the Philippines,” Fancy said.
OTHER VOLUNTEER GROUPS
At least three other groups, including Islamic and Christian organisations, are also working on the ground to provide new houses for coastal families in Santa Fe who are not allowed to rebuild on their old lots. Their contributions support part of the local government’s goal of building 216 new houses on a newly acquired, 2.3-hectare property in one to two years, said Maria Arsenia Perez, Habitat’s procurement officer for the project. With a floor area of 30 square metres, the homes will be built to withstand winds of 270 to 300 kilometres per hour, and an Intensity 8 earthquake, said Nonoy Floresca, Habitat’s resource development and strategic partnership manager.
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Santa Fe Mayor Jose Esgana said Prudence Foundation was the first organisation that had committed to provide both housing and sources of livelihood for the displaced residents. Santa Fe, the port of entry into Bantayan Island, lost 95 percent of its houses when Yolanda (international name: Haiyan) plowed through central Philippines on November 8 last year, displacing 4,000 of the 6,700 families in the town, Esgana said. Current shelter needs are placed at 2,300 homes. Thousands of families, including those in island villages, are still living in tents and makeshift homes. “You’d be lucky if you’d see one house standing out of every 20 houses,” Esgana said.
RECOVERY UNDER WAY
Despite the still enormous need for aid, recovery is under way in the town. Beach resorts have
rebuilt their facilities to start attracting tourists again—and they are coming—with some 200 of the 354 rooms affected by Yolanda now already available for occupancy, the mayor said. While other hotels continue to rebuild, the local government is encouraging homeowners to open their houses for homestay programmes for tourists. The goal is to maintain, if not exceed, the 100,000 tourist arrivals that the island used to receive yearly, the mayor said. Fishing boats can be seen on the shore, indicating that fishermen are ready to go to sea. Porters await arriving vessels at the dock. Children are playing on the beach. And while the tents remain, the sight of some newly repaired homes in the villages shows that the people of Bantayan are moving on.
PERSONAL MISSION The PCA volunteers were ferried to the island on choppy waters on March 23. It was a rainy morning a day after vessels were barred from crossing from the main island of Cebu province to Bantayan due to Tropical Depression “Caloy”. But the weather improved on Monday morning as the team began to work. Members of the Azkals, the Philippine football team, came later in the week to lend a hand, including star players Emelio 'Chieffy' Caligdong and brothers Phil and James Younghusband. For others who signed up, it was an opportunity to help on the ground. “It’s different when you yourself are there instead of just your money or the goods [you have sent]. This is a privilege for me rather than a sacrifice,” said Jessie Rigor, a Filipino volunteer who heads a branch of Pru Life UK in Makati City.
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TARRA QUISMUNDO
Chanvit Rompothong of Eastspring Investments Singapore, the firm’s asset management arm, shared the view: “Traditionally, when you hear about these types of disaster, you just give money, there’s really no opportunity to directly go and help. This is a chance to do that, to really rebuild and take part in the charity work.”
FAMILY TRADITION
Malaysia’s Mukesh Ramani found Bantayan build an opportunity to take part in work that has become a family tradition. “My family has always been involved in volunteer work in the children’s home, animal shelter, so I thought this was a wonderful opportunity to come and meet people … I think the reward comes when you see the houses come up and the community comes in,” he said. It was a chance to give back for Eastspring Investments Japan’s Hiroko Omote, who saw how her
colleagues work together in her home country months after the 2011 tsunami. “In Japan, when we had this programme, people wanted to come to help my home country … I was so impressed. And whatever I could do for other countries, I thought I should do,” said Omote, who also helped raise
funds for Yolanda survivors in the early part of the relief operations. “I don’t know how much this can be of help to the community but, I believe, the home is the core of your life. You need to have a comfortable house. I think what Habitat is doing is wonderful and I am glad I can do something to contribute,” she said. ¬
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April 11-17, 2014
MO WEINONG FOR CHINA DAILY
Take care of my baby China’s safe havens for abandoned babies bring mixed reception DONG FANGYU China Daily Beijing
I
t was about 4am when four men jumped out of a taxi and left a baby at a small, nondescript house in Tianjin. A letter tucked inside the child's clothes simply noted its birthday and medical record. Unlike those left outside in the cold or in a dumpster, this baby was lucky.
THIS COUPLE FROM GUANGZHOU CAME TO THE HATCH INTENDING TO GIVE UP THEIR BABY DAUGHTER, BUT LATER ABANDONED THE IDEA.
The 13-square-metre house is warm and cozy. A crib, an incubator, an air purifier and ventilating equipment are lined up against the pink wallpaper, dotted with moons and stars.
By mid-March, the Tianjin baby hatch, which only opened at the start of the year, had received 35 abandoned infants. Situated at the gate to the Children's Welfare Institute, a gov-
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ernment-run orphanage, the baby hatch—also known as a babies' safety island—allows desperate parents to leave unwanted newborns, press an alarm button, and depart anonymously. After a delay of about five minutes, someone from the institute will arrive to retrieve the child. But facilities such as this have come under fire recently. While some people have embraced the idea, saying it protects the lives of unwanted children, critics argue that it encourages the unscrupulous to abandon such infants, which is illegal in China. For some, the influx of abandoned babies simply highlights defects in the child welfare system. It's difficult to obtain statistics about the number of abandoned children in China, but the 2010 China Child Welfare Policy Report, released by the China Philanthropy Research Institute, estimated that 100,000 babies are abandoned ev-
ery year, most of them with disabilities and illnesses. In July, when the Ministry of Civil Affairs launched a pilot project to set up baby hatches across China, Tianjin was one of the first cities to launch a facility. To date, there are 24 baby hatches in 10 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions. A further 18 regions are preparing to open facilities by the end of the year, according to the China Centre for Children's Welfare and Adoption.
Safeguarding babies
Safe havens for abandoned babies bring mixed reception "The baby hatch guards an unwanted baby from harm and increases its chances of survival," said Zhang Min, head of the Tianjin Children's Welfare Institute. Xu Shuming, who is in charge of the reception of unwanted children and their subsequent
adoption at the institute, is also in favour of the project. "Before the baby hatch came into use, the babies we took in were usually brought by the police. They had been found at bus stations, public rest rooms, or parks; it could be anywhere. One baby we received last year was almost frozen to death," she said. On the face of it, baby hatches can only be a good thing. Last year, an abandoned baby was found with ants crawling on her face in Henan province; in another case, a newborn child was trapped in a sewer pipe after his mother gave birth above a squat toilet in Zhejiang province. Contrary to many preconceived ideas about the Chinese preference for male offspring, gender discrimination is not the sole reason babies are abandoned. According to Xu, all 35 babies left in the Tianjin hatch have severe disabilities and illnesses, such as
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Down syndrome, cerebral palsy, and congenital heart disease. "Not a single baby left at our hatch has been in a good condition. Some (of the illnesses) are fatal and emergent; some will have to be cured through years of treatment," said Xu. Many welfare experts said families too poor to pay for expensive medical treatments believe that dropping a child off at the baby hatch may be the last gateway for survival. "Some babies left in the hatch came with letters, cash, medical records or souvenirs such as a bracelet or an amulet tucked inside their clothing," said Xu. The message may only be a few lines scribbled on a scrap torn from a cigarette pack, marking the date of birth, or it could be a letter that runs to thousand of words, depicting the family's desperate predicament. "For our part, we hope parents will leave more information with their unwanted babies, such as med-
ical records (usually handwritten to preserve anonymity) so that we can understand the real situation, avoid repeated medical checkups, and save time," Xu said.
The last resort
Tianjin residents expressed contrasting views about the baby hatch. "It sends out the wrong message to society," said one man who was passing by the baby hatch. "Parents will have an excuse to leave children to the government and go away without feeling too guilty. It's a way of shirking parental responsibility." Another resident was more supportive: "What can a low-income couple do if they have to pay 300,000 yuan (US$48,400) for surgery? The baby hatch is the last resort for desperate parents." Gao Yurong, director of the Child Welfare Research Centre at Beijing Normal University, said: "Abandoning babies is illegal in China, irrespective of where you leave them.
But that doesn't justify not having baby hatches. They are two different things. The baby hatch does not protect parents from being condemned; it protects the lives of the babies." The first baby at the hatch in Tianjin was left on the floor in a handbag, well below the crib. "Those who came to abandon their babies were too nervous to even put the baby into the incubator or the crib," said one guard at the children's welfare institute who preferred not to be named. "People were aware that their behaviour was disgraceful, so they usually came to drop off the babies and ran away quickly," he said. "Some wrapped scarves around their faces and wore hats pulled low over their eyes." Zhang Min of the Tianjin institute said the baby hatch opened on January 1 and the institute had received 35 babies by March 12, compared with 66 adopted by more conventional means during the whole of 2013.
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Huge numbers
Compared with other pilot cities in the programme, Tianjin has seen the lowest number of abandoned babies. The hatch in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, opened on
MO WEINONG FOR CHINA DAILY
"The baby hatch is intended for newborns, but we were shocked that children as old as six have also been abandoned, because the guaranteed anonymity means few restrictions," said Zhang Min. Zhang Shuwen, who oversees the Tianjin institute's nursery for children aged three or younger, said the large number of abandoned children is posing severe problems. "The situation at our institute is a big headache. Few beds are available now. We are figuring out ways to build more beds and employ more dry nurses. Sometimes, three dry nurses have to look after a room of more than 10 babies with illnesses or disabilities," she said.
A FATHER FROM A COUNTY IN THE NORTHERN HILLS OF SOUTH CHINA’S GUANGDONG PROVINCE SAYS GOODBYE TO HIS BABY OUTSIDE THE HATCH IN GUANGZHOU.
January 28. By March 16, 262 babies had been left there, said Xu Jiu, head of the Guangzhou Social Welfare Institute. A lack of facilities to support the overwhelming number of abandoned babies forced Guangzhou's welfare authorities to suspend its baby hatch on March 16.
But the discussions prompted by the programme have not stopped. "Even if there were no baby hatches, kids would still be abandoned, maybe in a dumpster. With baby hatches, we see a more-accurate number of abandoned babies, but that doesn't
April 11-17, 2014
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mean more babies are being abandoned, neither does the programme encourage such an act," said Wang Zhenyao, head of the China Philanthropy Research Institute and a former senior official at the Ministry of Civil Affairs. "The baby hatches provide a humane facility," he said. "But the tragedy of scores of babies being abandoned is another thing altogether. It's mainly a result of the lack of an inclusive severe-disease insurance or aid system to help children in China. In most cases, the families are expected to bear most of the medical costs for their babies," he added. For Gao, the closure of the Guangzhou baby hatch has been frustrating. "I feel sorry and ashamed about it. But the publicity surrounding baby hatches has highlighted the weaknesses in China's child welfare system and prompted the authorities to improve the sys-
tem. That's a good thing." Wang Zhengyang, a migrant worker at a hardware factory in Guangzhou, borrowed money from every friend and relative he could contact to raise funds for the treatment of his two-month-old daughter, Huihui, who was diagnosed with congenial biliary atresia, a life-threatening liver condition. "Because we have rural hukou (household registration), the new rural cooperative medical system only reimburses about 10 per cent of our medical expenses," he said. But even if Huihui had an urban hukou, biliary atresia is not included on the list of diseases covered by the severe-disease insurance system. "Many people encouraged my wife and me to give up our baby. But we didn't," Wang Zhengyang said. "We went all-out to tell our story online, looking for any possible help. Luckily, Huihui got the chance of a liver transplant thanks to public
donations raised by an army of volunteers and the media attention. "The transplant happened about six months ago, and Huihui is now alive and kicking, just like any normal kid, except she's on lots of medication. But there are many families poorer than we are, whose children are now in danger without timely surgery," he said. For mainstream welfare experts, the crucial task that governments must now address to establish a unified health allowance or insurance system to help children with severe illnesses and disabilities as soon as possible, so that far fewer will be abandoned. "It may not be a matter of money, but a matter of how the money is spent. The country should put more effort into subsidizing families with severely ill children. After all, children should grow up with their families," said Wang Zhenyao from the China Philanthropy Research Institute.
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Feathers of the Heart
Hu Zongqiang, 40, is an airplane mechanic at an Air China maintenance base in Tianjin. But his work goes far beyond that of a regular maintenance technician. Since October 2012, Hu's voluntary work team has been raising money for newborns with biliary atresia, a life-threatening liver disease, whose families are too poor to pay for medical treatment. To date, Hu's team, called Xinyu, or Feathers of the Heart, has raised approximately 3 million yuan ($484,000), which has helped to pay for 34 babies to have liver transplants.
The association has 301 volunteers from across China and their ages range from 21 to 45. "They come from various professions, including doctors, teachers and business-people. But our common goal of saving these babies unites us," said Hu. "Many hands make light work." Hu contacted volunteers from around the country via social networking sites such as QQ, Sina Weibo, and WeChat, and also, as an active auto blogger, from online auto online communities. Now the association aims to expand its range and help poor families with newborns with other potentially fatal illnesses, including congenial
heart disease, hydrocephalus and leukemia. "Some poor families only gave their children up when faced with expensive surgery fees," he said. Hu said the association is a grassroots voluntary group. "We are very careful about the use of donations and try to be as transparent as possible. "What we are doing is not about demonstrating how socially responsible we are, but about respect for life. Having seen all the medial traumas and dramas, you learn about the strength of life," he said. "You can find the greatest satisfaction in the innocent smiles of babies." ÂŹ
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April 11-17, 2014
PHOTOS BY YVONNE LIM/ASIA NEWS NETWORK
IN HANOI A Vietnam War veteran tells his story of surviving imprisonment and torture in the infamous Hoa Loa Prison, Hanoi
HOA LOA PRISON, WHICH IS NOW A MUSEUM IN HANOI.
LIFE
April 11-17, 2014
WONG KIM HOH The Straits Times Singapore
WAX FIGURES DEPICTING LIFE IN HOA LOA PRISON.
L
ast month, Lee Ellis stood in front of the infamous Hoa Loa Prison in Hanoi, overcome by a maelstrom of emotions. The place holds dark memories for the war veteran. As an American fighter pilot during the Vietnam War, he was tortured and imprisoned there for five and a
hald years after his F-4C Phantom was shot down and he was captured on Nov 7, 1967. His trip last month was the first time in 41 years that he had gone back to Vietnam, and to the place he calls the pits of hell. As Ellis, 70, and his wife were about to enter the premises—now
a war museum—the authorities stopped him from bringing in his video camera because it "looked too professional". Arguing that he had a letter allowing him to do so cut no ice with the staff. "It just set me off, and brought back all the fear and sense of oppression and control," he says.
LIFE
April 11-17, 2014
Once he was inside the building, his discomfort grew. Many of the cells where prisoners of war (POWs) were tortured were gone. There were, instead, exhibits and pictures showing how well American soldiers were treated. "I feel a lot of resentment because of the lies told. Every time a lie is told, it undermines freedom. You need truth for freedom to really exist," says Ellis, who stopped over in Singapore after his Vietnam trip. Although frustrating, he says, the trip reminded him that he has to persevere with what he has set out to do. "I probably understand the importance of truth and the danger of lies better than the average person, and I want to challenge others to live the truth." Ellis, now a leadership expert, has written several books on the subject. In his latest, "Leading With Honor", he uses stories and anecdotes from his time at Hoa Loa to illustrate the importance of virtues such as conscience,
WAX FIGURES DEPICTING LIFE IN HOA LOA PRISON.
courage, trust and honour for corporate leaders today. Trim, alert and looking at least a decade younger, the engaging septuagenarian says he was bent on becoming a fighter pilot from the age of five after seeing a World War II fighter plane in a park. The younger of two sons of a food service manager and his science teacher wife, he grew up on a remote farm in North Georgia and learnt to
be independent at a young age. "I took care of the hogs, chopped wood for the fires, worked in the fields," recalls Ellis, who ordered his first rifle by post for US$9.33 when he was 11. "When I was 14 or 15, I would sometimes take my shotgun and shoot two or three quail for dinner." At the University of Georgia, he enrolled in the Air Force Reserve Officers' Training Corps
April 11-17, 2014
LIFE
A STONE BUST DEPICTING HOW PRISONERS AT HOA LOA PRISON WERE TORTURED.
April 11-17, 2014
VIETNAM WAR VETERAN LEE ELLIS, NOW A LEADERSHIP EXPERT, IS THE AUTHOR OF "LEADING WITH HONOR".
THE STRAITS TIMES
(AFROTC), a college-based programme for training commissioned officers of the United States Armed Forces. "My mother wanted me to study medicine since her brother was a doctor, but the moment I got my pilot's licence, I switched my major from pre-med to history." Upon graduation in 1965, he was selected as a Distinguished Graduate of AFROTC and commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the US Air Force. "Three days later, I went to flight school and 53 weeks later, I got my wings as an airforce pilot. I went from ploughing a mule to flying a supersonic jet in less than five years," he says with a laugh. The training—which included stints in survival schools near the Canadian border and in Florida—was rigorous. As soon as he was combat-trained, he was shipped off to Danang, located between Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi in North Vietnam.
LIFE
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April 11-17, 2014
The dangers of war were not something he had thought about. "When you're young, you feel invincible; you think you can do anything. Besides, fighter pilots are all adrenaline junkies," he says. That was despite the fact that nearly a third of the fighter pilots in the Vietnam War never made it home. "At that time, the rule was that you had to fly for one year, or if you flew over North Vietnam, complete 100 missions before you could go home. Usually, you could fly 100 missions in nine or 10 months," he says. He was 24 and on his 53rd mission when he was shot down. He and his co-pilot Ken Fisher were on a mission to bomb the guns which protected a strategic ferry when their F-4C Phantom jet was hit. "I knew the airplane wasn't flying, the stick was stiff and there was smoke in the cockpit," he recalls. "If we stayed in the plane,
we were going to die. The plane was going to hit the ground at 400 miles an hour." They ejected. He could hear shooting on the ground as he was landing. "My mind went, 'Evade, evade, this is your worst nightmare.' There was no time to think, I was just doing," he recalls. He scampered into a bomb crater not far from where he landed, and activated his radio to relay his bearings even as he saw figures darting from bush to bush. Ironically, all he could think of was a scene from the war movie The Bridges At Toko Ri, in which actors Mickey Rooney and William Holden play pilots who land in a ditch after being shot down behind enemy lines, and are killed after a shootout with North Korean communists. He was soon surrounded. "In survival training, we were taught that the guys who capture you were the least well trained to han-
dle prisoners so that was your best time to escape. I took out my revolver and fired a tracer round above their heads just to scare them off," he recalls. "Any good cop would have shot me right on the spot." Instead, his captors pointed their rifles at him. "One of them pulled out something from his pocket; it had a picture of an American soldier on one side, and Vietnamese phonetics on the other. He read, 'Sherrender no die, sherrender no die. Hands up'." Tied and stripped to his boxers, he was marched and bundled into the back of a truck. The two-week trip to Hoa Loa, nicknamed by American soldiers as the Hanoi Hilton, was terrifying. On several occasions, some of his captors tried to kill him. "We were also bombed three times on the way to Hanoi. I was in a foxhole, watching the bombs
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April 11-17, 2014
come down," says Ellis, who also had to spend a couple of nights in bamboo cages with other captured American soldiers. In Hoa Loa, he was put in a cell measuring about 2 square metres with three other POWs. "We had six months of thin watery pumpkin soup with a piece of bread or a cup of rice. Sometimes, there would be a spoonful of pumpkin stew," he says. He remembers being hungry and cold, especially in the winter months. Interrogations during which POWs were kicked and beaten were regular occurrences. As he was the youngest and a junior officer, he did not get it as badly as the more senior men. "They would always go for the senior guys because they thought if they could break them, they could break the organisation. But our seniors told us, 'If you heard anything, it's because they tor-
tured us until we could not resist any more. It's a lie; don't pay attention.'" He soon found out what it felt like to have his will broken. One day, after he refused to fill in a questionnaire, his interrogators shackled his feet and forced him to kneel with his arms over his head for the entire night. Each time he moved to lower his arms or sit, he would be hammered, each beating more brutal than the last. He succumbed the next morning, and filled in the questionnaire with wrong and misleading information. "It was a terrible psychological and physical ordeal. Not being tough enough to do what I wanted to do was very shameful. I cried when I gave in. I felt I was a worthless soldier," he says. Several POWs did not survive. "Some were tortured a lot; they
went on a hunger strike, went too far and lost touch with all reality. They wouldn't trust us, wouldn't trust the enemy, wouldn't eat and just went crazy and died." Ellis' training and the steeliness of his seniors in Hoa Loa helped him through. "Pilots are optimistic. We believe in the future, believe in solving problems and we believe that in the end, we will win because we are competitive. "In the prison, I also believed God kept me alive for a purpose so I told myself I had to stay alive and go home." To while away the time, he started learning German, polishing his French, memorising poems and solving maths problems by working out building costs for an imaginary farm in his head. "I started out with a farm and 40 acres; one month later, I had the whole county," he says.
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April 11-17, 2014
The torture stopped two years after he entered Hoa Loa. "Ho Chi Minh died in the fall of 1969, and and they quit torturing a few weeks after that," he says, referring to the leader of the Viet Cong. "The last three years were live and let live. If I had to go through another two years of what happened earlier, I don't think I would have been able to come home as physically and mentally solid." He and the other POWs spent a lot of that period "decompressing". He says: "We realised we had to get rid of our bitterness before we went home." On March 14, 1973, he finally checked out of the Hanoi Hilton. The ordeal had changed him. "I knew I could just about do anything I needed to do," he says. He went back to the army. Over the next two decades, he held several positions—from flight instructor to chief of flight stan-
dardisation and evaluation to flying squadron commander—and retired as an air force colonel in 1990. Since then, he has been devoting his time and career to an interest which had taken root when he was at Hoa Loa: the study and research of optimal human performance and leadership under difficult circumstances. After working with a non-profit organisation to develop career assessment, he started a leadership consultancy in 1998. Besides executive training, he now runs leadership schools and develops leadership assessment for outfits running the gamut from Fortune 500 companies to non-governmental organisations. Asked if leaders are born or made, he says: "You can be born with leadership characteristics but leaders need to develop and continue to grow. And all leaders can get better. We all have things
that hold us back from becoming good leaders—a mindset, a belief or a fear." It takes courage to be a good leader, he says. "It's what we need most today—the courage to do the right thing and to be who we really want to be," says Ellis, who is married to a therapist. They have four children and six grandchildren. Candidly, he admits that he has had to learn to admit to and work on his own failings—anger problems, verbal harshness and the tendency to keep a tight lid on his emotions. But he adds that he is the better for having done so. "The reality is, we have choices; we can go this way or that way. Humility is the way of suffering, it's living life the hard way and making the hard choices and you need courage to do that. But in the long run, that's where the payoff is." ¬
d n t h a e d y igit en
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Music, mo
April 11-17, 2014
BUSINESS
CHINA HAS BEEN DUBBED THE GREAT NEW HOPE FOR THE LICENSED MUSIC MARKET, BUT SWITCHING USERS FROM A FREE TO A PAID MODEL MAY BE CHALLENGING
BUSINESS
April 11-17, 2014
T
he growing appetite of music fans worldwide helped drive trade revenue growth in most major music markets in 2013, with overall digital revenues growing 4.3 per cent. The findings were detailed in the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry's annual Digital Music Report. The report also announced that revenue from streaming and subscription services leapt 51.3 per cent globally, crossing the US$1 billion threshold for the first time. As for China's music market, which has been in the doldrums due to rampant copyright violation, there is good news. The report calls China "the new hope for a
CHEN NAN China Daily Beijing
BUSINESS
April 11-17, 2014
licensed music market". "The landscape for the music industry in China is changing. Over the past two years, major record companies and some independents have licensed eight of China's major online music services. Most of them were previously infringing copyright," the report says. China's music revenues in 2013 were estimated at US$82.6 million, ranking 21st in the world. The opportunity for the music industry lies in China's vast Internet population, with 618 million users in 2013, of which 81 per cent were connected to mobile phones, according to the report. In 2011, a landmark agreement was made between three international record companies and China's Internet giant Baidu. The agreement involved the settlement of anti-piracy litigation and a commitment by Baidu to
close its service that infringed. "The Baidu deal was a trigger that led to other Internet companies changing their approach and becoming licensed," says Sunny Chang, president of Universal Music Group International's China region. "We believe that in three to five years, the market will be open and China could be one of the top markets in the world." There are also challenges ahead. According to Song Ke, one of China's most prominent music industry veterans, a study published by the China Music Industry Committee in 2012 found that the total estimated value of the digital music sector in China was about 30 billion yuan ($484 million), but it also estimated that a very small share of that revenue, less than 3 per cent, was being shared with copyright holders. Song also made a comparison with China's booming film
industry, in which box office returns are being plowed back in for re-investment into local film productions. "A paid model will encourage investment in local artists and help develop a thriving Chinese music business. But nowadays, it isn't just piracy that is our problem. We have to get a fairer distribution system that motivates our industry, just like in the film industry," Song says. Song, the former head of Warner China and now the general manager of Evergrande Music, launched the Evergrande Star Music Festival that played 60 dates in 60 cities around China last year.
BUSINESS
April 11-17, 2014
The festival breaks with the traditional format of outdoor music festivals in China, which usually just tour big cities, such as Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. To attract audiences, tickets for the music festivals cost about as much as a movie ticket— less than 100 yuan. Earlier this month, Song announced the 2014 festival dates, which will continue last year's format. "In China, a majority of people now use legal music, which is a very good environment, but the big question is how can we transfer consumers from free to paid," says Lei Ming, CEO of Kuwo Music, one of the leading services in China, which runs a paid offering alongside its free streaming service. Baidu, China's largest search engine, offers a free music streaming service and a paid-for tier offering expanded cloud storage space and high-quality larger
files. Like Kuwo Music, the vast majority of Baidu's users choose the free-to-consumer option. Kaiser Kuo, director of international communications at Baidu, says: "Baidu has an ad-funded model and our core strategy is based on online advertising and dominating consumers' main points of entry to the Internet." The largest digital service is China Mobile, with 700 million users in total and 50 million active paying ring tone customers. In addition, there are 20 million paying subscribers to the operator's subscription and limited-download music service, Migu Music. "It is not just recording companies and musicians in China who want to get to this paid-for model—it's the objective of the operators, too," says Liu Yuxing, assistant of the general manager of China Mobile Music Base. The Chinese government has
given support to the paid model. "The time for paying for music in China has already come. This is not just a principle, but also a necessary practice," says Yan Xiaohong, vice-minister of the National Copyright Administration of China. "But what is also important is that, whichever way we choose, whether it be the paid or advertising-supported model, we must make sure that rights holders are rewarded." Yan also says the government has stepped up actions both in enforcement and promoting consumer awareness of intellectual property rights. "Nine years ago when I started in this role, we were talking about copyright theoretically but since then dramatic changes have happened. Criminal penalties for copyright infringement have been strengthened and enforcement against illegal sites intensified," Yan says. ÂŹ
CULTURE
April 11-17, 2014
Italian touch on batik Batik has a big chance of setting world fashion trends, with its rich patterns as its main strength to draw global interest PHOTOS BY ADE RIZAL
UP CLOSE : DESIGNERS FROM THE INTERNATIONAL FASHION ACADEMY KOEFIA WATCH THE BATIK-MAKING PROCESS IN SURAKARTA, CENTRAL JAVA.
ADE RIZAL, CONTRIBUTOR The Jakarta Post Surakarta, Central Java
O
ne of Italy’s oldest fashion schools, Koefia, has not only included batik fashion in its curriculum, but has also paraded its stylish designs on the catwalk. Two young designers and the school’s graduates, Giuseppe Perri and Giorgia Donia, claimed they were captivated by the beauty of batik and its motifs as well as amazed by the rich philosophical meaning behind the fabric’s intricate patterns. Perri believes batik has a big chance of setting world fashion trends, with its rich patterns as its main strength to draw global interest.
CULTURE
April 11-17, 2014
PHOTOS BY ADE RIZAL
PERSONAL TOUCH: ITALIAN YOUNG DESIGNER GIORGIADONIA LEARNS TO MAKE BATIK IN LAWEYAN BATIK VILLAGE, SURAKARTA, CENTRAL JAVA.
“The more distinctive the motifs being offered, the easier for batik to find its foreign market,” he said. He said designers who exploit batik for their fashion creations should not be at pains to make batik appeal to the global community. “They just have to preserve the identity of batik as a genuine part of Indonesian culture and the world will be very fond of batik,” Perri says.
The International Fashion Academy Koefia, which is located in Rome, has included batik in its curriculum as part of a cooperation programme with the Indonesian Embassy in Italy to enrich its batik design to breach the international market. Since the cooperation began three years ago, the fashion school students have been assigned to create designs using batik fabrics brought from Indonesia, especially from Surakarta and Pekalongan in Central Java. Some 200 designs have been created —each given the renowned Italian fashion touch. Following a selection process, 40 of them have been made into fashion pieces that have been displayed at different fashion shows in Italy. Yenny Lioniwati, a representative of the Indonesian Embassy in Italy, said the cooperation would hopefully further promote batik to the world. She said the school had an impressive learning method where the students were taught to apply haute couture techniques and dressmaking skills, which in a way,
CULTURE
April 11-17, 2014
PHOTOS BY ADE RIZAL
ITALIAN DESIGN: DESIGNER GIUSEPPE PERRI SHOWS OFF HIS AWARD-WINNING BATIK DESIGNS.
April 11-17, 2014
resembled the meticulous batik-making process. The weakness of batik designers, as noticed by their Italian counterparts, lies in the lack of attention to details, she added. “We need to learn from the European fashion designers,” she says. Perri’s batik wear designs have even won a fashion design contest. For his pieces, he transformed batik cloths with motifs of Punakawan, the four comical characters in Javanese shadow puppet play, into stylish pieces. Perri said that in the beginning, he saw batik as just another fabric. But after learning about the batik-making process and the rich philosophical meaning behind its motifs, he could not hide his admiration. “After delving deeper into batik, I learnt the meaning behind every motif,” he says. It was in the hope of further understanding batik that the two designers recently came to Indonesia to observe the batik-making process up close.
CULTURE
“In my opinion, batik is not just any textile. It has a deep philosophy inherent in its motifs. By grasping the meaning behind a pattern, I hope I can make designs as profound with its motif,” said Donia when visiting batik production centres in Surakarta and Pekalongan. Unless a designer takes into account the profound philosophy behind batik when creating a design, she said the created piece would be no different from regular clothing. In a move to make batik popular among young people, she said batik motifs should be applied to popular materials like glossy leather to give a modern touch. In Surakarta, the designers visited Laweyan batik village where they watched how to produce handmade batik and printed batik. They also tried applying wax from canting onto cotton cloth. After working on some motifs, Perri said he had visualised his own batik motifs. “It’s traditional Javanese patterns with Italian-style strokes,” he says. ¬
April 11-17, 2014
CULTURE
ERASER BATTLE
Games we used to play Top 10 games that kept Malaysian children entertained before the advent of mobile devices and electronic applications
April 11-17, 2014
CULTURE
ROCK, PAPER, SCISSORS
April 11-17, 2014
CULTURE
CONQUER
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April 11-17, 2014
NOEL FOO The Star Petaling Jaya CONQUER
O
f many memories we have of our school days, some that stand out the most are the games we used to play. Before video games, children had the most fun playing games that make use of materials sourced from around them, such as stones and erasers. The Star relives some of these childhood games.
1. Tag
Tag is by far the most famous game in the world among children that is still played today. Though the origins of this game may be uncertain, tag has spawned many variants. Some of the more popular ones include “Cops and Robbers” and “Freeze Tag”, better known locally as “Ice and Water”.
2. Lat Tali Lat
This unique Malaysian hand game is played by three players or more. It is often played when there is a need to decide how to split
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April 11-17, 2014
multiple players into two teams when playing other games. Two popular versions of the chant in this game are “Lat tali lat tali tam plom” or “Lai lai lili lai tam tom”.
3. Five Stones
This game is better known in Malaysia by the name, “Batu Seremban” (Seremban Stones). Mostly played by girls, it is a good test of dexterity and handeye coordination. Though it can be played with actual stones, colourful hand-made sand-filled batu seremban were also popular.
4. Rock, paper, scissors
This popular hand game between two players was said to have been invented in ancient China. The local version of the game is sometimes referred to as “One, two, jus” or “One, two, som”. This game is sometimes played with ‘punishment’ variants.
5. Hopscotch
Another popular game worldwide, the roots of hopscotch dates back to ancient Rome. Though it seems to be more popular among girls, both genders enjoy the game. Hopscotch is also known in Malaysia as “Ketingting”.
6. Eraser Battle
This classroom game gained popularity about 30 years ago. Children would take turns flipping their erasers with the aim of landing on their opponent’s eraser. They used to collect cheap fancy erasers with country flags on them for this purpose.
7. Conquer
Yet another modern classroom game, based on the traditional Japanese board game, “Go”. Mathematics exercise books with gridlines are used to play this game, where two players take turns drawing their selected symbol to surround the other player’s units. The game requires a lot of strategy.
8. Galah Panjang
An age-old Malaysian game that is played by larger groups of children in two teams, often on a badminton court or playing field. The “attacking” team tries to make its way across the field while the “defending” team tries to stop other players from crossing their boundaries.
9. Pepsi-Cola
No one seems to know how the name came about, but this game seems to have gained popularity from the 1990s onwards. Standing in a ring, players chant “Pepsi-Cola!” and jump apart. Taking turns, players must try to kick the foot of another player who tries to dodge him, eliminating each other until one winner remains.
10. Ceper
A local game that is especially popular with boys, it is played using five metal bottlecaps. Rules may vary but the game is a good test of dexterity and accuracy. A points system exists, though it is often played just for fun. ¬
TRAVEL
April 11-17, 2014
Enchanted in Hinatuan Several divers, professional or otherwise, have attempted to reach the bottom of the Enchanted River but no one has succeeded so far
MINDANAO DESK Philippine Daily Inquirer Hinatuan, Philippines
H
idden behind towering rocky mountains near the Pacific Ocean in this sleepy town of Hinatuan in Surigao del Sur in southern Philippines, a mystical river continues to enchant residents and tourists.
Accessible through a dirt road, tourists usually doubt if it is worth it to travel several kilometres from the city and risk taking the road less travelled. But as the dust settles after the retrofitted motorcycle “ha-
bal-habal� halts at a relatively unadorned gate, visitors will be quickly transported to a mystical world called the Enchanted River. Palm trees and indigenous flora surround a placid river with clear bluish water.
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On one side, a deep chasm, believed to be at least 80 feet deep, bids reverence and invites those who are bold to explore its complicated network of underwater fissures. Huge fish of different species swim idly in clear blue waters, ignoring tourists taking a dip or taking “selfies”.
Hymn at noon
And as the clock hits noon, the Hinatuan Hymn is played over loud speakers. Like an ancient ritual, people who are swimming immediately paddle back to land while the fish assemble near the riverbank. Felecisimo Baguasan, caretaker and lifeguard at the Enchanted River, starts throwing cooked rice and minced octopus meat in the water, which the fish start to gobble up like there is no tomorrow. “I have been feeding these fish like my children for more than three years now. These fish are
important,” Baguasan said. Baguasan said the one thing different in Enchanted River was that it remained the same through the years. “It almost never changed. But several things have also pro-
gressed, like the cottages and a portion of the road going here that is already being cemented,” Baguasan said. He said that when they were still young, they listened to tales about fairies and mermaids and their sup-
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posed roles in protecting the river and giving it its mystical colour. “Different generations and witnesses have different versions of their stories. But what we are sure about is that spirits live here,” Baguasan said.
Mystery
Baguasan added there were many anecdotes wherein some visitors felt “unexplainable” body pains, boils or itches after taking a bath in the river. “Some, most especially those who are irreverent and noisy, will acquire afflictions that cannot be explained,” Baguasan said. However, Baguasan said, tourists must not be afraid of the mystical powers of the river, adding that they should only respect Mother Nature and the spirits around it.
Several professional divers have attempted to explore the brackish waters and the underwater compartments in the river. “Many foreigners attempted to reach the bottom but until today, no one has ever reached it,” Baguasan said. The Department of Tourism and the local government of Hinatuan are trying to bring in more development to the area to attract more domestic and international tourists to be enchanted by the river. Cottages are already built while local fishermen sell fresh fish, crabs and lobsters, which they are more than willing to cook for visitors. For children, a portion of the river was transformed into a kiddie pool. The entrance fee is 30 pesos (about US$0.67) while vests can be rented for 100 pesos ($2.25) each.
Ban logging
However, Baguasan has an appeal to the government, residents and tourists. “To preserve the mystical beauty of the Enchanted River, we must take care of the environment. Massive logging must be stopped because this will destroy everything,” Baguasan said. Logging and mining operations, which are primarily blamed for successive disasters in Mindanao, still continue in the province of Surigao del Sur. Baguasan said the river was able to withstand the devastation of typhoons, but that he was not sure if the river would continue to enchant people if these destructive and extractive activities continued. ¬
DATEBOOK
April 11-17, 2014
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ÂŹ Bangkok Bullet for My Valentine in Bangkok A Welsh metal bank from Bridgend, Bullet for My Valentine, is staging a concert in Bangkok on May 1. The band is composed of Matt Tuck [vocals, guitar], Michael "Padge" Paget [guitar], Michael "Moose" Thomas [drums] and Jason James [bass]. They've excelled at getting their point across with a bang since forming back in Wales in 1998. In 2006, they became an international phenomenon with the release of their debut album, "The Poison", which became certified Gold for sales in excess of 1 million. In 2008 their second full-length, "Scream Aim Fire", peaked at #5 on the Official UK Album Chart and debuted at #4 on the Billboard Top 200.
When: May 1, 2014 Where: Centerpoint Studio Thailand 11 Sukhumvit 105, Lasalle Rd, Bangna
April 11-17, 2014
ÂŹ Manila Aerosmith in Manila The bad boys from Boston, Aerosmith, will perform in Manila, concert promoter Pulp Live Productions announced on its YouTube channel.
When: May 8 Where: SM Mall of Asia (MOA) Arena
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ÂŹ Seoul Bonnie & Clyde Bonnie & Clyde, the musicale, was based on the book of Ivan Menchell that centers on Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow, the ill-fated lovers and outlaws whose story has been infamous since they achieved folk hero status during the Great Depression. Music is by Frank Wilhorn while lyrics are by Don Black. The Korean cast are Ki-jun Um, Key, Hyung-sic Park, Kahee.
When: April 15-June 29, 2014 Where : BBC Theatre, Seoul Info: ticket.interpark.com
April 11-17, 2014
¬ Jakarta Jakarta Enam Senar Concert - Maaf Kami Lupa Jakarta Enam Senar (JES) is a guitar ensemble established since 2001 under the patronage of Badan Eksekutif Mahasiswa (BEM), the Department of Music, State University of Jakarta. In this concert, JES will present “Maaf Kami Lupa” (Sorry, We Forgot) in collaboration with Linda Sitinjak (soprano), Sigit Arditya (violist), Septian Dwi Cahyo (mime), RB Satrio (clarinetist), and Daniel (dancer).
When: April 30 Where: Gedung Kesenian Jakarta Jl, Central Jakarta Info: www.jakpost.travel/events
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¬ Kuala Lumpur 1M4U "Reach Out" Convention and Celebration 201 An initiative to nurture volunteerism among Malaysian youth is back with more inspiring talks and performances. Speakers at this year's event includes Andy Ridley (Earth Hour co-founder), Rob Dyer (Skate4cancer) and Efren Penaflorida (CNN Hero 2009). Not to be missed are performances by YouTube sensations Kina Grannis, David Choi, Jason Chen and JinnyboyTV.
KINA GRANNIS
When: April 5 Where: Taylor's Lakeside Campus, Subang Jaya Info: www.im4u.my
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ANDY RIDLEY
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JINNYBOYTV
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¬ Kuala Lumpur 11th Genting World Lion Dance Championship 2014 Spectators will once again be treated to a stellar show of intense agility and heart-thumping acrobatic feats as the Genting World Lion Dance Championship returns with its 11th instalment this April. Known to be one of the most globally recognised high-stilt lion dance championship, the competition will see 32 professional lion dance troupes from all over the world competing to earn the Eastern and Western Lion King awards. Malaysia’s 2013 defending champion Pertubuhan Tarian Singa dan Naga Hong Teik Alor Star, Kedah will also be competing against some of the strongest international opponents.
When: April 18-20 Where: Arena of Stars, Genting Highlands Info: resortsworldgenting.blogspot.com
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