Job seekers in China go under the knife to boost prospects
SHANGHAI -- When Nancy hit a rough patch in her job at a Chinese beverage company, the 26-year-old decided to see if a facelift and nose job might help her weather the storm.
It sounds like a drastic solution, but in a country where 6.1 million new college, university and vocational school graduates are just coming onto an already depressed job market, these qualify as drastic times. Young job applicants and entry-level workers are looking for whatever kind of leg up they can get.
Add to that the fact that cosmetic surgery "worked" so well for Nancy when she was looking for her first job out of school, that it took her no time at all to decide to go that route again.
The waif-thin Chinese woman said that in 2004, after she had double eyelid surgery, her new wide-eyed appearance was her ticket to success. "I had more opportunities for jobs and I was more accepted in all sorts of ways," she marvelled.
Two days out of her latest surgery, an intravenous drip still attached to her arm and bandages covering much of her face and ears, Nancy will only reveal her "English name," lest her co-workers and friends discover what she's done. Like many Chinese, she grew up with Confucius' exhortation ringing in her ears: "The body, hair and skin are inherited from one's parents. Do not dare to injure or wound them. This is the beginning of filial piety."
Nancy's secretiveness does not imply regret, however. She has none.
"I hope to become more beautiful," she said. "It will make me more confident." And that, Nancy said, will boost her performance at work, where she is constantly meeting new clients.
According to Dr. Zhao Jun, assistant director at the International Centre of Shanghai's Ren-ai Hospital, the cosmetic surgery business at his hospital is up 10 per cent over last year. The friendly plastic surgeon doesn't want to categorize that as a "boom," because while the economic hard times are convincing some to go under the knife, others can no longer afford to do so.
Zhao admits, however, the growth is healthy and he easily identifies where it is coming from: young people.
About 30 per cent of the centre's clients are students and a full 60 per cent are what he calls "young people" who want to make improvements on nature, rather than stop the aging process. He said one of the reasons they seek out surgery is to boost their job prospects.
A few kilometres away, at the Shanghai Time Plastic Surgery Hospital, young people are also very much on the minds of administrators. They are now running an online promotion offering a 10 per cent discount on all cosmetic surgery for college students, and they have even sweetened the deal with a contest to select 10 Shanghai students "who wish to improve their appearance and become more competitive in the job market." The prize is free cosmetic surgery.
Not just anyone can get a pretty face for free, however. The ad also stipulates: "Students excellent in morality and study will be given priority."
The most popular cosmetic procedure in China - and throughout Asia - Zhao said, is double eyelid surgery. For $500, young males and females alike can have a "crease" added to their eyelids and will be - in theory - able to open their eyes wider.
"It makes you look more alert, more awake," a young, single-lidded woman said.
Also popular is surgery to make your nose thinner and re-sculpt your face.
"The Chinese/Mongolian face is very broad and flat," Zhao said. "The current idea of beauty is a longer, narrower face and a longer nose."
Chinese men are nowhere near as sold on the need for cosmetic surgery as the women are, but when they decide to make the leap, it is often to get hair implants. Scalp implants are fairly popular, as going bald is a major issue in a society where most men keep their hair.
Facial hair is also in demand in the land that stubble forgot. Moustache implants, in particular, are popular among certain sets in Shanghai.
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1.6 million fans enter draw to attend Michael Jackson memorial
July 4, 2009
Jackson family spokesperson Ken Sunshine speaks at a news conference announcing details of the Michael Jackson public memorial service in Los Angeles July 3, 2009. Concert promoters AEG announced July 4, 2009, 1.6 million people entered the draw for tickets to attend the service.
LOS ANGELES — It may have been America's favourite holiday on Saturday, but the minds of many were apparently on a memorial day of a different kind: the one where Paul McCartney and Diana Ross may perform and the one where an entire city police force will be on tenterhooks hoping that its crowd-control expertise and the good will of thousands of Michael Jackson fans will thwart what could be a disaster in the making.
Because if Michael Jackson's Neverland Ranch was a circus, and it literally was, you can bet his memorial service Tuesday at the Staples Center in Los Angeles will be a bona fide Barnum & Bailey event.
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HACER, Hispanic American Center for Economic Research
Monday, July 6, 2009
Honduras: The Pro-Dictatorship Anti-Democracy President - Investor's Business Daily
Manuel Zelaya, a Hugo Chavez wannabe, was elected president of Honduras in November, 2005. He wanted to serve a second term. But there was a difficulty. Under the constitution of Honduras, the president may serve only a single four year term.
Mr. Zelaya proposed to circumvent that difficulty by holding a popular referendum on whether he should be allowed to run for a second term. But there was a difficulty with that, too.
The constitution of Honduras provides only one way for the constitution to be amended. That is by a two-thirds vote of all the members of the National Congress in two consecutive regular annual sessions.
The Supreme Court of Honduras ruled the referendum was unconstitutional, and the National Congress passed a law forbidding referenda within 180 days of a national election. (Honduras' next is this November.) But Mr. Zelaya pressed on.
When the army -- acting on an order from the Supreme Court -- refused to distribute ballots for the referendum (which had been printed in Venezuela), the president fired its chief of staff. The Supreme Court unanimously declared the firing illegal, and Honduras' attorney general asked congress to oust the president.
Push came to shove on Sunday (6/28). The army, acting on a warrant issued by the Supreme Court, arrested Mr. Zelaya and sent him into exile (in his pajamas, to Costa Rica). This was described as a "coup" by the news media, and was denounced by, among others, Hugo Chavez, who threatened military action to restore Mr. Zelaya to power, and the Obama administration.
It's the Obama administration's view the coup was an "illegal and illegitimate act that cannot stand," White House officials, briefing on background, told journalists. Mr. Zelaya must be returned to power, they said.
"Knowing trouble was brewing in Honduras over several weeks, the Obama administration warned power players there, including the armed forces, that the United States and other nations in the Americas would not support or abide a coup," the AP quoted "officials" as saying. "They said Honduran military leaders stopped taking their calls."
It seems more accurate to say that Mr. Zelaya, with Venezuelan help, was trying to execute a coup against the Honduran constitution than to accuse the military -- which was acting on orders from the Supreme Court and with the support of the legislature (124 of 128 deputies in the unicameral congress endorsed Mr. Zelaya's removal Sunday afternoon) -- of having done so.
Daniel Lopez Carballo, a retired Honduran general, told CNN that if the military hadn't acted, Mr. Chavez, the Venezuelan dictator, would have been running Honduras by proxy.
Typically in a coup, the military seizes control of the government. But the military quickly surrendered power to an acting president -- from Mr. Zelaya's own party -- chosen by the National Congress.
The streets of Tegucigalpa were quiet after Mr. Zelaya's removal, perhaps because not many Hondurans like him. In a Mitofsky poll taken in April, Mr. Zelaya had an approval rating of 25 percent, the lowest of 18 regional leaders.
So Mr. Obama is intervening on the wrong side. But if you take him at his word (a dangerous thing to do), the wonder is that he is intervening at all. This is the guy, you'll remember, who was so concerned about being perceived as "meddling" in Iran's internal affairs that he, alone among Western leaders, refused to denounce the blatantly stolen election in Iran, or to express support for those who protested the theft.
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