Associated Press August 8, 2012 DANANG, Vietnam (AP) — Vo Duoc fights back tears while sharing the news that broke his heart: A few days ago, he received test results confirming he and 11 family members have elevated levels of dioxin lingering in their blood. more
Associated Press July 27, 2012 AN BINH, Vietnam (AP) — Nineteen tigers prowl outdoor cages the size of dormitory rooms, nibbling frayed wire fences and roaring at a caretaker who taunts them with his sandal. It looks like a zoo, but it’s closed to the public. The facility breeds tigers, but has never supplied a …
Yale Environment 360 July 26, 2012 During four of the last 10 summers, more than half of the 800-mile Tarim River in northwestern China ran dry. Landscape ecologist Niels Thevs has been there conducting fieldwork and has watched water shortages take the heaviest toll on downstream cotton farmers, who irrigate six or seven times during …
Christian Science Monitor June 25, 2012 YUHU, CHINA Most Mandarin syllables have multiple meanings, so whenever the American ecologist Robbie Hart greets strangers in China, he explains the meaning behind Du, his Chinese name. “Du as in cuckoo flower,” he says, referring to du juan hua, the Mandarin term for rhododendron. more
Associated Press June 26, 2012 HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — Dao Quoc Huy and his wife joined other anxious parents camped outside Thuc Nghiem primary school at 3 a.m. When the sun came up, the crowd crushed against the metal entrance gate until it fell — hurdling bushes and losing flip-flops in a frenzied sprint to …
The International Herald Tribune June 19, 2012 HANOI — Thanh Chuong Viet Palace, a complex of historic-looking buildings on the outskirts of Vietnam’s capital, does not quite fit its royal-sounding title. But then its owner, a local artist named Thanh Chuong, says it is less a palace and more an interactive attraction that honors Vietnam’s folk …
The International Herald Tribune June 8, 2012 HO CHI MINH CITY — In 2008, Hoang Thi Thu Ha decided to leave Toronto, even though she had recently met her future husband, Jung-Chin Shen. Her father had died two years before and she felt she should return to Ho Chi Minh City to live with her …
Earth Island Journal Summer 2012 Dalian, China, defies the surly stock image of a polluted Chinese city. On a typical weekday, Audi sedans and electric trolley cars glide past upscale restaurants and fancy clothing boutiques in its prosperous downtown. Skyscrapers reflect a blue sky that shows no glaring signs of air pollution. During summer holidays, …
SciDev.Net May 31, 2012 [HANOI] A new study offers a rare glimpse into North Korea’s agriculture and forestry policies, and may open up new international connections with the country, say researchers. more
Associated Press May 24, 2012 Do Quoc Tai is an unlikely pain in the side of Vietnam’s ruling Communist Party. Although the construction foreman earns just $150 per month, he and his neighbors have strong-armed the government, blocking a major ring road that’s a symbol of the country’s push to modernize. more
CNNGo May 8, 2012 Before I visited the Changchun World Sculpture Park, its website nearly persuaded me not to. “Grade AAAA tourist attraction,” a header proclaimed. The online gallery displayed bland stone sculptures with murkily translated titles like “Harmony Continue” and “Picture of Touring in Spring.” But I was traveling through Changchun anyway, so on a …
Los Angeles Times April 8, 2012 Greensboro, Vt. — — Wallace Stegner wrote books about the American and Canadian West, so it’s understandable that people consider the longtime California resident a Western author. Stegner, a prolific novelist, essayist, conservation advocate and professor at Stanford University, was born in 1909 in Iowa and grew up in …
Associated Press April 4, 2012 HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — Nguyen Huong Giang loves to party but loathes hangovers, so she ends her whiskey benders by tossing back shots of rhino horn ground with water on a special ceramic plate. more
Johns Hopkins Magazine Spring 2012 Parents of children who attend Be Van Dan School still remember the rainy November afternoon, four years ago, when Nguyen Quoc Dai attempted to walk home alone. The school lies in a busy district of Da Nang, Vietnam, that residents say is acutely affected by seasonal flooding. Even during the …
Boston Globe February 12, 2012 CHANGCHUN – I attended college in Middlebury, Vt., where on winter weekends I drove to a Nordic ski center in the Green Mountain National Forest and spent long afternoons whizzing across freshly groomed snow. Every winter I still feel the urge to lace up my skis. When I moved to …
Associated Press February 1, 2012 HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — When student Nguyen Hong Nhung saw “Killer with a Festering Head” on someone’s smartphone, she wanted the banned comic book too. Though Vietnam’s censors had yanked it from stores, finding a digital copy wasn’t exactly hard. more
Washington Post January 27, 2012 As our minivan rounded a mountain pass, a gaggle of giggling teenagers appeared at the fringe of a thatched-roof village. Hey, I thought, what’s with the buckets and the water guns? Splash! Ah. more
Los Angeles Times January 15, 2012 Reporting from Shandong Province, China —— A few months before the 2008 Beijing Olympics, I read a blog post by an Atlantic Monthly correspondent about Chinese wine. Chinese what? I grew up outside New York City, where I ate hundreds of pounds of lo mein and pork-fried rice but didn’t see, …
