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January 07, 2009
1:16
Thought of the Day!
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I can attest to this piece of wisdom. How precise!

Keep only cheerful friends. The grouches pull your down.
--Anonymous

A big thank-you to all my cheerful friends out there! Happy New Year.

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January 03, 2009
4:13
Inner World in 2009
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I believe my new year will bloom in a more subtle way, for I feel really peaceful, happy, and in touch with my spiritual strength. Thanks to all the holiday blessings from my friends!

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December 27, 2008
4:53
Is This My Hometown?
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CASS buiding is blocked by Chang'an Theatre and 贡院六号。奇形怪状的摩天楼让本来壮观的北京站和中信大厦显得渺小。

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4:47
紫禁城被酒店包围啦！ ...
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紫禁城被酒店包围啦！

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4:43
金融街上的名店商城里汇集全球的高档消费品，价格远超北美。让我想起那些图书馆里翻烂了的儿童书。 ...
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金融街上的名店商城里汇集全球的高档消费品，价格远超北美。让我想起那些图书馆里翻烂了的儿童书。

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3:53
Weekend in Beijing
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Tried to finish the journal of my trip to Beijing by the end of 2008. During this holiday season, I have been wearing the agate from Rosa.

I only had the weekend to spend with my best friend in late October. Rosa picked the Tibetan resturant near American Embassy. As usual, our chat touched my heart and brought me mental retreat. I am proud of having Rosa as a close friend and admire her calm and elegant style in this hectic city. Leading the Asia-Pacific branches of this global corporation, she is not only successful but kind. Her next goal is to retire young and volunteer in the poor western region. Above all, she never stopped learning and thinking on how to act as a daughter, a wife, a mother and a friend. I am learning as I grow and hoping to work with her after ten years.

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December 25, 2008
1:49
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
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As 2008 comes to the end, I feel grateful and joyful. I am grateful to all my friends, new and old. I am joyful that I survived 2008, and I know in my heart that 2009 (and the years after that) will be a lot easier.

In the past few days, I counted my blessings:

--My friends, from different part of the world and different part of the country, from different color, sex, race and age groups, comforted me, consoled me, held my hands, and pulled me through the darkest alley.
--My son, who toughed it out with me, still remains by my side when I act irrational and emotional.
--The authors who wrote so many wonderful books that made me cry, laugh, think and survive. I am so grateful that I can read.
--My workplaces and colleagues. Working makes me feel normal and valuable. Being busy at work is a blessing.

I also learned (and reaffirmed) some life lessions:
--Be kind and compassionate to others because the kindness and compassion will be returned many times over when you need them.
--Friends are my family and my backbone.
--God/Lord only helps those who help themselves.
--Do not feel sorry for yourself because it does not do any good.
--Count your blessings and be grateful for what you have.
--You don't always get what you want, but you can decide what you do not want.
--Surround yourself with happy and positive people, and they will bring joy to your life.

All the best, friends! Take care.

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December 18, 2008
11:50
河北师范大学
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I was invited by the AUL, Shaorong, who was in my class for the Sino-American Librarians Workshop in 2005 at Wuhan U. She was working for Fudan Library then. I enjoyed exchanging emails with her when I prepared for this trip to Beijing. I was suprised by my own reply to her invitation and the trust between us. Kind of relieved when she approached me right before I presented at the Capital Normal U. She told me about her library's plan for a new building (or learning centre) and subject librarians. Shaorong even bought me round-trip tickets to Shijiazhuang.

石家庄留着我童年的记忆。当年在郊区的大院里无忧无虑地成长，根本不知道有个师大这所名校。突然接到Cathy的电邮，说大连的明德新馆开放。但师大的邀请在先，只好忍痛割舍大连啦。石家庄自然不能与上海和北京比，但是让我感动的是同行们对我演讲的浓厚兴趣。大会场之后是小型的座谈，问题互动效果极佳，反馈回来也对我颇有启发。馆长最后不得不打断大家，我才意识到已经连续讲了三个小时，都是我的日常工作。我真觉得累极了！到此两周的公事结束了，其中有多少文化和国情的区别，又有多少相见恨晚的新朋好友，不虚此行。

刘绍荣第二天又要回北京开会。听她谈对复旦的怀念和对新馆的憧憬，对燕赵文化古籍的责任，对家庭的付出，我的精神开始放松。

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December 17, 2008
8:49
Library of Central National University & Wanfang
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十月二十一号下午我们来到中央民族大学图书馆。校园的绿草坪上欢跳的喜鹊们让我的精神一振。2003年落成的新馆高耸入云。该馆提醒了我在北美的英文环境中,中国信息服务的种种难处，因为它的一大特色就是少数民族文字的藏书：蒙、藏、维吾尔、哈萨克、柯尔克孜语、朝鲜、彝语等等。出乎我的意料的却是22万册的珍贵古籍，和管理这些宝藏的学姐李婷。两周来的疲劳似乎被学姐的激情介绍赶走了。大家把李婷团团围住，不停地提问，她似乎也被我们的强烈兴趣所感染，从本馆特藏讲到全国的珍本收藏情况。离开的时候大家意犹未尽，无奈为了赶万方的场。下次回京最想登门求教的就是这位学姐，浑身书卷气，见面又很亲热，顿时让我觉得找到组织啦！

万方的年轻人逐个介绍了新产品，人民日报社的电子产品也很棒，只是我的精力有些不济，为Heinrich 博士的翻译也越来越差，会后她提前回饭店休息。她的谢辞和拥抱勾起了大家分别前的感伤。我甚至没有勇气和他们道别。好在明年三月芝加哥会重聚！

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November 20, 2008
11:12
Like turning a real page
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Digital content development of the NLC is impressive. I finally found time today to go through the ppt notes and tested the Rubbings and MinGuo Collections, which are still growing.

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10:51
Brand New NLC
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We met Dir. Zhan Furui at the National Library of China on October 21 in its new building, followed by a series of PPT presentations on digital libraries and overseas Chinese study projects. I am glad to learn that Mr. Zhan just signed the World Digital Library agreement at LC.

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November 05, 2008
10:38
October 20, TTOD & CAS
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Monday morning, we were greeted by Mr. Ke and Mr. An at the main entrance of Tsing Hua U. Ms. Zhou Mengzhi, who is in charge of the legal department, presented the organizational chart of TTOD, the digital publishing platform of CNKI and its overseas market share. Among all types of institutional users, over 2,000 hospital libraries made up the largest group. CAJ and CJP are TTOD's major products so far followed by e-yearbooks. CNKI is one of the branches of American Tongfang with staff of 1,600. Mr. Ke reported that they have been working on the following areas after we met in July at the Summer Institute: Born digital resources, such as dissertations and conference proceedings; Integration of different formats; Value added services, such as authority control and tracking title changes, etc.

Then Mr. Dong Fei presented the Yearbook Database followed by the reference book database demo by Ms. Li Xiaohong. All presenters emphasized on the cross-database searching, but our group members worried how much we could afford, when such an integrated and large-scaled digital product is presented to our users who may request for the full-text that our library is not capable to subscribe to. I also worry the overlap among different e-content providers.

We started the afternoon meeting with Dr. Zhang Xiaolin at 2pm in the National Library of Science, which serves the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). CAS has 103 research institutes in 28 cities with 25,000 staff and 3,5000 graduate students. Dr. Zhang asked us to promote the plan of hiring 100 librarians worldwide and sending his staff to work at North American academic libraries. Their services impressed the group especially the cross-domain search system, real-time virtual reference and desktop infor-tools （e划通）, which is a desktop retrieval tool that allows to search the third party's or commercial databases from personal documents, such as pdf or ppt files. Since the average distance between the central library and users is 1,000 km, easy access and document delivery are emphasized. Dr. Zhang emphasized the interactive information services and looking for what the users don't know what exactly they need. 他强调“去馆舍化，去层级化，提供研究人员还不知道的信息源。" Library's metadata has been provided to Google Scholar. The Chinese Science Citation Database has been integrated into the ISI Web of Knowledge, which will help to promote the Chinese scientific research worldwide.

The library tour after the meeting reminded us what Dr. Zhang said. The building is quiete and empty except for the first floor. We rushed to one of TTOD's processing centre where many young people work day and night to scan and process newspapers, journals and disserations, etc. They work in different shifts to keep the scanners and computers running all the time. The group was impressed by their efficiency.

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8:53
鸟巢、聚会、珍本
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星期六晚上与杨爱东久别重逢，她一定让我见识一下当今北京人的周末晚宴，害得我翘了人大的宴请，打车奔往东城大董烤鸭。果然名不虚传，前厅里到处都是等位子的老外，人手一杯鸡尾酒。每一道菜都像一幅画，但我们有太多的话题，好像美食对我没有太多的魅力。几位老同学都不见老，话语幽默，情绪饱满。半夜爱东开车送我回家，这是回国后第一次回家，放下行李，赶紧打车回海淀，因为第二天又是行程满满。

October 19th, Sunday, CIBTC arranged the visit of the Bird Nest, the only sightseeing during the two weeks. An elementary school was having its sport festival. While we were walking inside of the Nest, I've got a phone call from 张超，她正在鸟巢开运动会，多巧呀，还那末牛！在她的带领下我们去小崔俯瞰鸟巢的新家指手画脚一番，午饭又吃得简单而精彩。姐妹4个得意忘形把个小餐馆感染得只听得到我们的声音。打工的小妹小弟们都上来问我们为何这末高兴。

珍本的老板刘军一席讲演，让我中午的激情继续燃烧，也让我从中了解到中国书商的运作规则和困难。这家民营企业与大三家有着太多的不同。光天把珍本安排进来大家都无怨言反倒受益匪浅。

晚饭后临时上门的中央文献研究室的领导面对的已经是精疲力竭的我们。他们勇于面对国外学者主动寻求合作的态度让我感动。与人大图书馆形成鲜明的对照。 The unscheduled meeting with Ms. Zhang Peng and Zheng Zhaohong from the Party Literature Research Center were important. I need to make the note here and inform Prof. Cheek, Nick and Yoel about my findings and encourage them to benefit from the Center.

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8:13
Renmin University Forum
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Saturday, October 18th. We walked through campus in the morning breeze to visit the library and the Information Centre for Social Sciences. We have been subscribing to its series that offer value added resources and waiting for its online version. But comparing with other digital content providers, the Centre came to the late start, faces challenge of opening the oversea's market. The library is in traditional setting, and pretty empty that Saturday morning. I was quite disappointed at the meeting. The leaders, Ms. Liu and Song, didn't sound that welcoming for use of their special collections from Yan'an.

The afternoon forum was too long, and the copyright officials' presence made me wonder if they were the reason that the Centre could not digitize their products sooner. The head of the China Archives of Publications provided an interesting presentation focusing on AV materials. It sounded like that users can benefit from its collections on the web. But we were not given time to ask questions.

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November 03, 2008
12:50
CIBTC MARC Creation
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11:49
China Film Archive, Apabi and CIBTC
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Our delegation boarded the bus on time for October 17th visits. The Film Archive has just started various projects as the world has growing interest in Chinese films. The National Film Archive Database is one of them. I enjoyed the tour of the compact stack and the digital processing lab. I asked for a list of the reference books published by the library, that I hope to buy in the near future. Mr. Zhao, the head of the library said that we could order movie posters as well.

Apabi's content has been shown in Seattle the Summer Institute, and its price model has been changed and sounded like more flexible. I would like to use recent reference requests to test out the databases. Several of us had headache; the conference room was too hot and dry. Starbucks coffee helped us to survive the day, but Stephen was obviously quiet and sick.

The most exciting visit of the day was to see how the books were sorted and processed in the suburban clearing house. CIBTC provides shelf-ready books to many libraries in the world. The scale and the speed shocked us. Wang Tong introduced the head, who looked like in early 20's, and her staff looks even younger. They work like crazy and completely ignored us as visitors. No wonder China is growing so fast. Wang Tong brought a projector to the resturant to show us her new online order system, which had been improved according to our comments in July.

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November 02, 2008
3:26
Everson's Talk and Chinese Writers' Visit
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Prof. Michael E. Everson from U. of Iowa talked on issues in Chinese literacy learning. As Prof. Duff introduced, we don't have any scholars in Canada like him, who has studied that deep on the issues. Besides the K-16 Chinese language teaching in the US, teaching and research programs in American universities are way ahead of ours. One thing came out of his talk to me is that the library should start to change our collection development policy to meet the needs from our students.

Rushed back from the CRCLLE, I was happy to see the display thanks to Phoebe and our vendor for express delivery. I met Alison who brought the four gentlemen in the lobby. They were suprised to see their works re-designed to a variety of new products. 格非 said that he'd rather spend a year to go through our collection. 两位其他本家，刘震云和庆邦也感叹修身养性的好环境。除了在书库里流连忘返也赞美四周高耸入云的水杉和鲜艳的枫叶。

下午的讨论会上，白烨先介绍国内的文坛现状和三位作家。庆邦强调劳动和诚实在他写作过程中的重要性。格非则讲，在生活中左右都逢源的人往往想不到写作，而失败者用写作与人交流。震云将小说比喻成两个朋友灯下谈心，谈得投机分手时能达到心智的替换。想起我六年前产假后的一段写作经历，觉得三位的讲法都很实在。他们也分别提到自己独特的经历和感受，如震云的外婆，庆邦的母亲，以及格非生活中的低潮。

I like them all. Besides theｉｒ strong interest in the library and books, they are sensitive and curious, amazed by all witches and wigs in the library. Above all, they are experiencing the world with their mind. Have to skip theｉｒ dinner, for I have promised Qi and the kids to see the fireworks in South Arm.

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November 01, 2008
1:23
CRCLLE's Official Opening
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Ponderasa F is warm and crowded this rainy Thursday night. Although I received the invitation many times for the opening, I didn't know much about the Centre. Hanban made a commitment of half million?! Sister Xu, way to go!

Chinese Consul General, Shugen Liang, commented on the lovely rain in Vancouver, and it would be appreicated if spreaded to China. Dr. Farrar, UBC Provost, and Dr. Tierney, Dean, Faculty of Education joked about the big movement from Australia to BC, for Mr. Liang just arrived from Melbourne. Madame Xu Lin's name was mentioned many times. Dr. Tierney told the large audience that China related programs have grown from a few to almost 30 in Education, covering all provinces in China. Dr. Patricia Duff also mentioned a few programs in details.

Some people from Asian Studies and Libraries were there. Prof. Swatek got excited when she heard about my recent adventure in Beida. The Peking Opera personal notes and manuscripts of the major actors I have seen in the rare collection made her jealous. "I really need to read them before I die!", she said. Hope I can find time to write down my experience in China soon.

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October 31, 2008
5:49
Peking U, Superstar & CNPITC
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Wake-up call worked loudly at 6 am on October 16th. It's a bright and warm day. Our visit started in the new building of Peking U Library. 肖珑老师的笑腼仿佛窗外的徐徐微风。她提纲挈领地介绍了全馆的发展历程，并带领我们来到古籍阅览室。乃文先生的京腔和对古籍善本的激情感染了我们。伴随着他的介绍是一阵阵的惊叹！程家的戏谱又为北大增添一宝，但愿我们的教授也能受益。 I am suprised that they have the money to continue to purchase rare materials and they have the space to keep all the card catalogues. What I really like is that they are investing more on document delivery and ILL, the service fee sounds reasonable.

在超星，大家齐赞读秀，并像实现商量好了似的起劲bargain，as a team first and then in smaller groups。史超和朱平摆出海外的市场实在微不足道的架势，告诉大家“好商量”。

I didn't have enough time to ask whether we could buy direct from the bookstore in Vancouver owned by CNPITC. The company has made transition online. Hope we can place orders online soon.

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October 30, 2008
12:08
Thinking about the students from CHIN 105 in Beijing
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I enjoyed talking to the non-heritage class right before I took this trip. Their eyes in blue, green and brown colors all showed sympathy when I told them that I would take the trip on Thanksgiving to Beijing. "I could use Peking duck to replace turkey" I joked with the class, and that started a bit debate about whether the Peking duck in Vancouver is real.

When I saw the real Peking duck in Beijing, I was thinking about the lovely class, and told my peers how popular Chinese classes are at UBC. What a surprise! A thank-you card is sitting in my mailbox first day when I returned to work, from CHIN 105! The students wrote in Chinese: "意思极了！”“你是个好老师！”“你很漂亮！" Feel like still flying in the clouds...

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October 16, 2008
12:02
Text will be added soon
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I am jetlaged and feel like in a dream. Time to make the note of my trip. Arrived in Beijing on the 13th, on Thanksgiving.

When I went to the registration desk from the airport directly, I didn't even know how to answer their questions and I didn't have enough RMB to pay for the conference. A beautiful young lady walked by and recognized me, "Jing Liu, from UBC?!"

I knew I met her before but her name didn't come back to me fast enough. Gayle from HKU, we met in Shanghai years ago. Then Deng Shi came to the registration and gave me a bear hug. Good to be back, where people know your name!

My presentation went smoothly, although I spent some extra time, which I don't usually do, but I do like to be fare to all audience, so I spoke in both languages. No time for Q and A. As soon as I stepped out, a few people followed and called me "Teacher Liu". We were connected by the Sino-American Librarians Training Program in Wuhan. I felt flattered being remembered by these Chinese librarians. I didn't expect any classmates, so I was really shocked and happy to see Jianyuan, who became an AUL at the Union U. in Beijing. See how happy I was reunited with my school friend!

Our delegation started to work this evening at Da Zhai Men. Presentations on new e-resources were provided at dinner time: Dragoninfo 龙语瀚堂，中文在线, 国学宝典，周文业老师的古典小说据说也很好。

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October 10, 2008
2:05
Why has China grown so fast for so long?
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Dr. Khalid Malik has been appointed as UN Resident Coordinator and UNDP Resident Representative in China since August 2003. He came to UBC meeting with China specialists and delivered a well-attended lecture. As one of the department head mentioned, every department at UBC has some projects related to China going on.

China has made greatest sustained economic expansion in human history by not following the policies that others made. Dr. Malik thinks that China has strong institutions gradually changing to meet the reform needs. He mentioned about social capital and strong cohesion thanks to historic equality. Sadly, China has become the most unequal society in the world.

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October 09, 2008
2:25
Prof. Lee on Africa's Chinese Enclaves
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Ching Kwan Lee's talk at Departmetn of Sociology drew a big audience. It was about her fieldwork in Zambia and Tanzania on two Chinese investment projects. What impressed me the most was that she emphasized on the class struggles against casualization instead of tensions between races. Some interesting points she made: Chinese managers abandoned socialism and they are fully convinced that they know how to develop a poor country. China's uniqueness is not because what it does but the attention it has received.

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2:23
Disserations from Taiwan
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I have got this request again after a few failed requests I sent to Taiwan last summer. Prof. Joyce Chen mentioned the tricky copyright issue. Wondering if that is the reason.

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October 01, 2008
11:22
Zhang Hong's Painting on Ximen Bao
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It was stated in a couple of sources that the Ming painter, Zhang Hong, painted the 西门豹破河伯图, but they were not clear. 张宏是吴派山水画家，但他的人物画不太被重视。It would have been digitized and available online if it's somewhere in Taiwan. I assume it's hidden some where in a museum in Beijing or Shanghai. Will have to go through their catalogues tomorrow.

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11:22
Zhang Hong's Painting on Ximen Bao
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It was stated in a couple of sources that the Ming painter, Zhang Hong, painted the 西门豹破河伯图, but they were not clear. 张宏是吴派山水画家，但他的人物画不太被重视。It would have been digitized and available online if it's somewhere in Taiwan. I assume it's hidden some where in a museum in Beijing or Shanghai. Will have to go through their catalogues tomorrow.

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11:22
Zhang Hong's Painting on Ximen Bao
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It was stated in a couple of sources that the Ming painter, Zhang Hong, painted the 西门豹破河伯图, but they were not clear. 张宏是吴派山水画家，但他的人物画不太被重视。It would have been digitized and available online if it's somewhere in Taiwan. I assume it's hidden some where in a museum in Beijing or Shanghai. Will have to go through their catalogues tomorrow.

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September 13, 2008
14:11
New Jobs
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I am really happy for Qi and Lili who graduated last May. They both brought their strong technical skills to major Canadian companies. Several people mentioned about their new jobs to me when we first met this term. So it definately deserves a post. Lei is another one. He has been working for an American corporation in town that is interested in Chinese market. At our next gathering, we will be able to learn from these corporate folks. By the way, U. of Chicago just posted a position of Chinese Studies Librarian.

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September 02, 2008
13:11
Olympic Opening Ceremony and Book History
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Cheng Huanwen said in his Blog: 北京奥运会开幕式不过是上了一堂空前绝后的中国图书史教学课！Darn! Missed that part. Hope to get a DVD soon, for myself and UBC students.

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August 20, 2008
6:53
The Northeast Project of China
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Dr. Shao Dongfang brought some scholars from CASS for a conference at the IAR on the Project. I walked into the room with the interpretor, Mr. Kwan, who looked exhausted. There's a debate about Kogoryu history between Chinese and Korean speakers. I stayed for Mark Byington's (Harvard) presentation although I was reminded about "closed conference". There're lots of interesting issues around China's border regions and neighbors. Related books should be added to our collection.

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