While Malaysia and China are sinking millions of yuan and ringgit into space programs, in Singapore plans are afoot for a privately developed spaceport:

Singapore may not have a space program like neighbour Malaysia but very soon it will have an integrated spaceport that will offer suborbital spaceflights, as well as operate astronaut training facilities and a public education and interactive visitor center. Spaceport Singapore will be developed by Space Adventures, a company that has launched private explorers to space and a group of Singapore companies.

Technorati Tags: asia, east asia, singapore, southeast asia, spaceport

AsiaPundit has has a long day and is too tired to write. In lieu of words, AP is pleased to present images.

Via ‘We Make Money Not Art,’ links to Almond Chu’s Wet Wet Kid Cosplay Generation:

Almond Chu photo exhibition at the Shanghai Street Artspace.

And Keitai Girl:

In Keitai Girl (2003), Yamaguchi Noriko wears a body suit crafted from cell phone keypads, large headphones and is draped from head to toe with wires. Certain guests are given the phone number of her body suit and can dial her up from their own cell phones and talk with her during her performances. This suit—a full-body prosthetic that turns her into a walking and talking cellular device—to investigate the future development of the human body and its interaction with technology.

Via 3Yen, a nude Chinese ice skater on Japanese television (usual disclaimer: this is not porn, this is an international incident):

The Torino Olympics have been a total failure for the Japanese teams for far …so the Japanese have broadcast a naked Chinese iceskater to cheer things up.

Right now Japanese broadcasters have given up on promoting the Olympics. Low TV ratings have given the Japanese broadcasters a nasty hangover because the public is angry and bored with the worst Japanese showing in 30 years—Japan has yet to win any Winter Olympic medals.

Watch the video here on furl.com.

Via Indcoup, Dayak Tattoos:

… tattoos and death are inextricably bound in Dayak beliefs. When the soul (beruwa) leaves its human host, it journeys through the murky depths of the afterlife in search of heaven - the land of ancestors. Dayak souls encounter many obstacles on their supernatural flight: The River of Death the most formidable.

According to tradition, only the souls of tattooed women who provided generously for their families and headhunters who possessed hand tattoos - a token of their success - were able to cross the log bridge that spanned these dangerous waters.

Technorati Tags: asia, china, indonesia, japan, northeast asia, southeast asia

At Cambodia Morning, a partial reproduction of a Tribune item on Pol Pot’s brother.:

PAILIN, Cambodia - Brother No. 2 sees few visitors at his home in the jungle. He is old now, and something in his chest whistles when he laughs at the word "genocide."

Nuon Chea is the most senior surviving leader of the Khmer Rouge, the Cambodian utopian movement that swept to power in 1975 behind revolutionary Pol Pot, known as Brother No. 1, and led one of the 20th Century’s most extreme and enigmatic frenzies of bloodletting.

For years, the question of why it happened - and how it might be prevented from happening again - has met only silence or denials from the few who hold the answers. But the world is about to find out whether these secretive former leaders will unravel the mystery of why Cambodia killed nearly a quarter of its population.

"I acknowledge there was killing," Nuon Chea said at his two-room wood house beside the heavily mined border with Thailand. "But who controlled it?"

(Image stolen from this 2002 PBS item)

Technorati Tags: asia, east asia, cambodia, southeast asia

Via Boing Boing, Malaysia’s Bigfoot seems to be a variety of at least three Bigfeets Bigfoots:

Loren Coleman reports that the Bigfoot-type creatures reportedly spotted by locals in the Endau-Rompin National Park, Malaysia, seem to represent several kinds of hairy hominids. (The news media here and abroad have been all over this story. Link, Link, and Link.) At Cryptomundo, Loren puts the various reports in context and lays out the three "sizes" of giants that are thought by some to be running around in the Malaysian forest. (Ilustration of a "Typical True Giant" by Harry Trumbore.)

Technorati Tags: asia, bigfoot, east asia, malaysia, southeast asia

Google was accused by the Beijing News of having .:

Google.cn, launched during the Spring Festival, and is sharing an ICP license with Ganji.com, a Chinese information Website, the Beijing News reported today.

The matter has aroused "concerns" from the Ministry of Information Industry. The regulator who will be probing the issue, the newspaper said.

The search engine operator told the newspaper that their practice is not the first of its kind in China. Yahoo in China is also using the same ICP license as 3721.com.

However, the News said, citing an unnamed source in the ministry, Yahoo and Google are different entities. Yahoo wholly owns 3721.com, but Ganji.com is not one of Google’s partners in China.

According to China’s rules, to operate an internet service without an ICP license is illegal. A foreign company must hand over its operation in China to a Chinese partner, or set up a China-based subsidiary to run the business. 

Google has said that it is doing nothing abnormal and is that its China operations are legal.

BEIJING (AFX) - Google Inc has rejected news reports that it is operating without a valid Internet content provider (ICP) license in China, saying its partnership with a Chinese information website means it has gone through the proper channels.

‘Google has a partnership with Ganji.com, through which we have the required license to operate the Google.cn service in China,’ said a Google spokeswoman who asked to remain unnamed.

Instead of its own ICP license, Google.cn is using the same one as that of Ganji.com, it said.

Regulations covering the internet and media in China are formed by more than a dozen ministries and regulators. It’s entirely possible that Google is in violation of one ministry’s rule and fully approved by another. It’s common to launch a service prior to receiving full approval from all official regulators - this holds true for a number of industries. Google is possibly following the normal process and has received necessary regulatory approval, but it could still be in violation of a law or regulation - which would likely be one that its competitors also violated without anyone noticing.

PayPal China was not fully licensed at launch, and even brick-and-mortar ventures such as auto finance companies operate under conflicting regulations. Waiting for regulatory clarity in China can mean never entering the market (which may not be a bad thing for some companies).

It’s also worth noting that the servers for Google.cn are still in Mountain View, California. So, Google could be operating the China portal without a license but is doing it from the US. How that could that be in violation of Chinese law escapes me.

Bill Bishop : "It is quite possible (the Beijing News item) is a hatchet job planted by one of Google’s competitors. News reports in many publications, even some very well-known ones, are fairly easy and cheap to buy in China."

Bill also points to a venomous article in the China Business Times, , accusing Google of being a rude party crasher.:

"But the China Business Times, a business paper with a sometimes nationalist slant, blasted Google for even telling users that links are censored.

"Does a business operating in China need to constantly tell customers that it’s abiding by the laws of the land?" it said, adding that Google had "incited" a debate about censorship.

The paper likened Google to "an uninvited guest" telling a dinner host "the dishes don’t suit his taste, but he’s willing to eat them as a show of respect to the host.""

Damn that Google, how dare it come to China and incite debate!

As amusing as that article is, after the treatment Google has received in recent weeks from the Western press, Congress and Wall Street, the company surely can’t be enjoying the prospect of the Chinese press joining in the chorus (no matter how different the perspective).

Slightly better news for Google, Becker and have joined the company’s defenders.

Technorati Tags: asia, censorship, china, east asia, , northeast asia

Following up the popular DIY subtitles for Japanese commercials, here’s DIY Bollywood subtitles.:

Technorati Tags: asia, india, south asia