YeinJee's Asian Journal

The Sanlu brand’s contaminated milk formula has caused four infants’ deaths in China and the number of infants diagnosed with kidney stones or other problems after consuming the Sanlu milk has hit 6200 mark, with 158 of them suffering acute kidney failure. (Last updated September 19, 2008)

Chinese authorities have arrested 19 people since the scandal was exposed last week. Two brothers who run a milk collection centre in Shijiazhuang, Hebei province, have admitted that they added melamine into the milk they supplied to Sanlu.

The brothers began mixing their milk with melamine in late 2007 to pass Sanlu’s quality test after their supplies were rejected a few times by the company and resulted in huge losses. Melamine is a chemical which is often used in plastic industry; reports suggested that it could make the milk appeared rich in protein.

Sanlu might escaped the blame for causing the contamination, but the public is questioning their slow response. New Zealand’s Fonterra Co-operative Group, which owns 43% of Sanlu Group, stated on Sunday that it has urged the Chinese company to recall since early August 2008.

Chinese news also reported that the first Sanlu related kidney stone case was discovered in early March 2008; while some reports quoted from a high rank government officer in Hebei province said that Sanlu knew about the use of melamine in its milk as early as 2005.

The scandal has rocked Chinese food safety concern yet again. In 2004, at least 13 babies died in Anhui province after drinking fake milk powder.

Update (Sept 17) – melamine found in more milk… 22 products from various dairy food firms are found contaminated by the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ).

Back in my school days I was taught that a person could live for 3-4 weeks without food but with water; the teaching is still applicable… but there are other factors that dictates the surviving period.

Mental strength, health condition, body weight, climates and some other factors play their part in determining the survival length; under optimal circumstances a person could live without food for 6-8 weeks or even longer in extreme cases.

I am not sure if there’s any official record for the longest survival without food; the longest record that I managed to find is 73 days during the 1981 Irish hunger strike. A total of 10 prisoners had died after 46 to 73 days of starvation in the strike.

Laurence McKeown survived the strike for 70 days, which could be the record for the longest period for a person to live without food and still surviving.

Hallyuwood.com is running a contest in celebration of Chuseok holiday; the prize… a Korean pop star Lee Hyori’s style-book (five to be won).

Not sure how nice the book is, but it’s something that is not easy to grab hold of if you are not from Korea. It’s a chance not to be missed for Hyori and K-pop fans.

Just head over, follow the instructions and stand a chance to win the prize. The contest expires on the last day of Chuseok, which should mean by the end of Monday (Sept 15); the clock is ticking… hurry up :p

Chuseok (추석 – Full Moon Harvest) is a Korean festival celebrated on the 15th day of the 8th month in lunar calendar (Sept 14 in 2008).

Chuseok is one of the two biggest holidays in Korea (the other is Seollal the Korean New Year). It is considered the Korean equivalent of Thanksgiving and a time to honour ancestors with newly harvested grains and fruits [more on KoreaNet]

As for Korean entertainment fans, it’s the season to see their favourite Korean celebs in traditional Hanbok wishing everyone a happy Chuseok. Sharing a few pics of some all-girls Korean pop groups (image from Newsen and Star)…

Jewelry

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Music video collection of Japanese singer-songwriter YUI. The Fukuoka-born star made her professional debut in 2004; her music career started off reasonably well, but not really an instant hit… but she gradually build her fame and is now one of the most popular female artists in Japan.

Good-bye Days

YUI’s breakthrough came in 2006 with “Good-bye Days”, which was used as the theme song for movie “Midnight Sun” (Taiyou no Uta) in which she played the leading role…

YUI actually received the best newcomer award from Japan Academy Prize, but she didn’t wander much into acting, and the movie is the only film she has made so far.

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Forbes has compiled a list of Hollywood’s best and worst movie stars according to the return on investment vs the money they are paid. I’m not going into details on the criterias and figures, heading straight to the list instead…

Top 10 best movie stars for the bucks

1. Vince Vaughn (pic)
2. Tobey Maguire
3. Julia Roberts
4. Brad Pitt
5. Naomi Watts
6. Matt Damon
7. George Clooney
8. Jennifer Aniston
9. Hugh Jackman
10. Ben Stiller

Top 10 most overpaid movie stars

1. Nicole Kidman (pic)
2. Jennifer Garner
3. Tom Cruise
4. Cameron Diaz
5. Jennifer Lopez
6. Jim Carrey
7. Nicolas Cage
8. Drew Barrymore
9. Will Ferrell
10. Cate Blanchett

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the world’s largest and highest-energy particle accelerator complex, has started its first test on September 10, 2008.

The LHC was built by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) and lies underneath the Franco-Swiss border near Geneva, Switzerland. It is funded by and built in collaboration with more than 8000 physicists from over 85 countries as well as hundreds of universities and laboratories.

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Suicide issues again take headlines in South Korea for the past few days following the death of actor Ahn Jae-hwan.

State-run Korea Youth Counseling Institute released a poll finding on Tuesday (Sept 9) indicating that six in every 10 South Korean teenagers have thought about taking their own lives at least once [via Yonhap]

According to the survey of 4,700 middle and high school students, 58.8% of the respondents had thought of suicide; and 11.1% of the respondents attempted suicide.

The National Statistical Office (NSO) earlier said that there were 12,174 suicides representing 5% of all deaths in 2007. It’s also said that an annual average 23.6 Koreans committed suicide out of 100,000 people in the last five years, which is one of the highest levels in the world.

I almost didn’t want to believe the news report at the beginning, because the figures are a bit overwhelming for me… that’s like more than 30 Koreans are dying each day from suicide; the Korean government needs to treat this issue with serious urgency.