The Week May 28, 2010

Saved by his ears?

The traditional saying is that he won by a nose. But in this case, a six-year-old boy was saved by his ears. Little Ming Ming slipped through the window bars at the apartment of his grandfather in Hubei province. Luckily his ears got stuck in the bars. Firefighters rescued the dangling little boy to the cheers of neighbors, and also won him front-page notice this week on weirdasianews.com.

Shhh!

This week's editions of China Daily published an article on how far Beijing will go to keep it quiet for students studying for their college entrance exams in June. Beginning on June 1, Beijing will ban construction work between the hours of 10 pm and 6 am. The city is also asking for suggestions from the public on how to “keep it quiet”. I've got one that won't stop Beijing's fast-pace growth. How about handing out earphones to the students?

Is your office chair killing you?

Is your office chair killing you? BusinessWeek magazine reports that office chairs can be dangerous to your health and there is plenty of new research to back it up. Sitting too long in an office chair can ruin your circulation, wreck your health and make you gain weight. So what are office workers doing about it? The Week investigates …

Watermelon mania

Yes, it's watermelon season. In Central China's Henan province where they grow tons of watermelons each year, they celebrated this week with watermelon eating contests and even watermelon races.

In fact, when it's watermelon season, you can find people not just in China, but all over the world, eating watermelon.

Carving watermelons is a special art. They carve them to look like the moon, a turtle, or even fine art. But if you're not an artist, you can still decorate a watermelon with a banana.

You can even find singing watermelons on the Internet. This one was posted by American Jim Meth:

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About the broadcaster:

Renee Haines is an editor and broadcaster at China Daily. Renee has more than 15 years of experience as a newspaper editor, radio station anchor and news director, news-wire service reporter and bureau chief, magazine writer, book editor and website consultant. She came to China from the United States.