The Asian reporter., August 18, 2014, Page Page 16, Image 16

Page 16 n THE ASIAN REPORTER
ASIA / PACIFIC
August 18, 2014
Chinese theaters won’t hire
drug-linked performers
By Louise Watt
The Associated Press
B
SWIMMING TO SCHOLARSHIP. Indian student Aruna Bariya, 14, center, and her friends walk to cross
the Heran River to get to their school located on the other side, at Sajanpura village in the Chhota Udepur district
of Gujarat state, India. The absence of a bridge over the river leaves Aruna and 60 other children with no choice
but to swim about 50 feet across the shoulder-deep waters to reach the other side of the river, where their high
school is located. The students say the swim is worth it for an education that can help lift them out of poverty in
India, where at least 700 million people live on less than $1.25 per day. (AP Photo/Ajit Solanki)
Swimming to school
in western India
By Ajit Sulanki
The Associated Press
S
AJANPURA VILLAGE, India —
It’s a long, wet journey to school for
61 teenagers in part of western
India. If they want to learn, they have no
choice but to swim.
The boys and girls carry books, papers,
and changes of clothing in plastic bags or
buoyant jugs as they cross the Heran
River, shoulder deep in places. Parents or
other adults sometimes accompany them
on the 50-foot swim.
The girls put on their dry clothes in a
small changing room, while the boys
change on the riverbank.
The students then walk up to three
miles to their high school in Gujarat state’s
Narmada District. It’s shorter and quicker
than the alternative: A road with a bridge
takes a circuitous, 16-mile route. There’s
no public transportation.
The students say the swim is worth it for
an education that can help lift them out of
poverty in India, where at least 700 million
people live on less than $1.25 per day.
The Utavali High School principal said
the students from the villages across the
river are so determined to get to class, they
have swum the river during heavy rain
that made the currents more tumultuous.
The school is trying to accommodate
them by forgiving late arrivals, and
sending them home early if the weather is
bad.
“We have asked for a bridge time and
time again,” principal Rajendra Purohit
said.
Pope’s small car
fascinates South Koreans
By Youkyung Lee
AP Business Writer
S
EOUL, South Korea
— Pope Francis’
choice of wheels
during his five-day South
Korean visit surprised
many in the painfully self-
conscious country, where
big shots rarely hit the
streets in anything but
expensive luxury cars.
After his arrival last
week, the pope left the
airport in a compact black
Kia that many South
Koreans would consider too
humble a conveyance for a
globally powerful figure.
In a live television
broadcast,
the
pope
climbed into the backseat
of the boxy Kia Soul, rolled
down the window, and
waved. Surrounded by a
few bigger black sedans,
the pope’s compact car
headed toward Seoul.
Francis’ frugality and
humble demeanor have
received wide coverage in
South Korea, a fiercely
competitive country that
celebrates ostentatious dis-
plays of status and wealth.
This national trait can be
seen in booming industries
such as private tutoring
and plastic surgery.
The images of the
smiling pope in his little car
struck a chord online, with
PETITE POPEMOBILE. Pope Francis waves from a car after his
arrival in Seongnam, South Korea. The pope’s choice of wheels during his
five-day South Korean visit surprised many in the painfully self-conscious
country, where big shots rarely hit the streets in anything but expensive
luxury cars. (AP Photo/Yonhap, Shin June-hee)
many playing on the car’s widely reported that the
name. One South Korean pope
requested
the
user tweeted: “The pope smallest South Korean car
rode the Soul because he is during his visit. The Soul is
full of soul.”
Kia’s
second-smallest
For the man called “The model
and
reportedly
People’s Pope,” the choice provides more leg room
makes sense. He has than other compact cars.
eschewed the bulletproof
Though not everyone
“popemobiles” that his loves the Soul’s funky
predecessors
used
on design, it appeals to a niche
foreign trips and urged of young, practical drivers.
priests around the world to It has never, however,
travel in low-key cars.
been a car of the rich and
Inside the Vatican City, powerful.
the pope prefers a blue
Already bubbling with
Ford Focus, or when he’s excitement over the first
out in St. Peter’s Square, a papal visit in 25 years,
white open-topped vehicle South Koreans appeared
that allows him to literally fascinated by the humble
reach out and touch the papal car.
masses.
Associated Press writer Nicole
South Korean media
Winfield contributed to this story.
EIJING — Performing arts
associations in Beijing have
pledged not to hire any actors
connected with drugs, state media have
reported, after an actor became the latest
Chinese celebrity detained in one of
China’s sternest crackdowns on illegal
drug use in two decades.
Gao Hu, 40, who had a small part as a
soldier in Zhang Yimou’s 2011 movie The
Flowers of War, was detained by police for
possession and use of marijuana and
methamphetamine, the official Xinhua
News Agency said. Beijing police also
announced the detention in a brief state-
ment.
Several celebrities have been detained
on drug charges following a declaration in
June by President Xi Jinping that illegal
drugs should be wiped out and that
offenders would be severely punished.
The Beijing Times reported that 42
Beijing performing arts associations and
theater companies have signed a pledge
not to hire any artists that had used drugs
to “purify” the performing arts environ-
ment. It said the signing was organized by
the capital’s Narcotics Control Office and
the Beijing Cultural Bureau.
Illegal drug use has ballooned in China
in recent decades, after being virtually
eradicated following the 1949 communist
revolution. Narcotics began to reappear
with the loosening of social controls in the
late 1980s. In more recent years, rising
wealth and greater personal freedoms
have been accompanied by a growing
popularity of methamphetamines and the
party drugs Ecstasy and ketamine. They
are often bought on social media forums
and consumed in nightclubs, leading to
periodic police crackdowns.
The number of officially registered
addicts in China was 1.8 million at the end
of 2011. That is about one-tenth the
number of Americans seeking treatment
for drug problems each year.
In June, Beijing police said they
detained screenwriter and novelist Chen
Wanning, whose pen name is Ning
Caishen, for possession of drugs in an
apartment in Beijing. He tested positive
for methamphetamine, they said.
That same month, film director Zhang
Yuan, who made the 2006 film Little Red
Flowers set in post-revolutionary China,
was detained for drug offences at a Beijing
DRUG CRACKDOWN. Actor Gao Hu poses on
the red carpet during the award ceremony of the Ce-
lebrity Citizens in Beijing, China. Gao, 40, who had a
small part as a soldier in Zhang Yimou’s 2011 movie
The Flowers of War, has become the latest Chinese
celebrity to face drug charges in a wave of detentions
that an official said is one of China’s sternest crack-
downs on illegal drug use in two decades. (AP Photo,
File)
railway station after he tried to evade a
random drug check, according to a report
on the Beijing police’s microblog.
Both received administrative detention,
which is a maximum of 15 days.
Pi Yijun, an anti-drug adviser for the
Beijing government, said the drug
crackdown is one of China’s biggest in two
decades.
He said demand for methamphetamines
has spiked for people under age 35, and
that it has become easy to obtain. Pi said
police were relying heavily on informants
to identify users, who are then targeted by
officers in drug test sweeps.
Courts sentenced 39,762 people for
drug-related offenses in the first five
months of 2014, up more than a quarter
from the previous year, according to the
Supreme People’s Court.
Police said they detained Gao, who
starred this year in the Hong Kong film
The Man from Macao, along with three
others, and seized about seven grams of
marijuana and one gram of metham-
phetamine.
Associated Press writer Christopher Bodeen and
news assistant Zhao Liang contributed to this report.
Give blood.
To schedule a blood donation
call 1-800-G IVE-LIFE or
visit HelpSaveALife.org.
Department of Consumer & Business Services
Building Codes Division
The Oregon Department of Consumer and Business Services,
Building Codes Division (BCD) ensures safe building construction
while supporting a positive business climate.
Hiring a licensed electrician or plumber helps ensure that the person doing the work is qualified. To check
on whether a person you wish to hire is licensed, visit our website at bcd.oregon.gov, then click on
“license holder search.” For more information about obtaining a license, please call (503) 373-1268.
BCD also wants to remind you that permits help protect the safety and value of your home.
You may need a permit if you are:
a room
Building a fence taller than 6 feet
Remodeling a kitchen or bathroom
Adding electrical circuits
Building a deck 30 inches above ground
Building a shed
Adding
Call your local building department or check our website, www.PermitsProtect.info,
to find out when you need a permit for your building or remodeling job.
www.bcd.oregon.gov