Random China-related news

-The city I work in (Newark) is considering a sister-city relationship with Huangshi, China (黄石市). Oddly enough, Huangshi (which, of course, no one, not even the mayor, can say correctly!) is quite close to Wuhan in Hubei Province. For the record, Columbus' sister city in China is Hefei, Anhui Province (合肥).

-The Washington Post reports that China is cracking down on media freedom during the run up to the 17th Party Congress, which will be held this fall. An interesting read, but none too surprising for those of us familiar with the Chinese media. Just go to the English-language national paper's Web site here and look around for a few minutes. You'll see what I mean.