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A cry for help inside Chinese labour camp hidden inside Halloween decoration, read 8,000 kilometres away
The cry for help, a neatly folded letter stuffed inside a package of Halloween decorations sold at Kmart, travelled 8,000 kilometres from China into the hands of a mother of two in Oregon.
Scrawling in wobbly English on a sheet of onionskin paper, the writer said he was imprisoned at a labour camp in this northeastern Chinese town, where, he said, inmates toiled seven days a week, their 15-hour days haunted by sadistic guards.
“Sir: If you occasionally buy this product, please kindly resend this letter to the World Human Right Organization,” said the note, which was tucked between two ersatz tombstones and fell out when the woman, Julie Keith, opened the box in her living room last October. “Thousands people here who are under the persicution of the Chinese Communist Party Government will thank and remember you forever.”
The letter drew international media coverage and widespread attention to China’s opaque system of “re-education through labour,” a collection of penal colonies where petty criminals, religious offenders and critics of the government can be given up to four-year sentences by the police without trial. (Photo: AP Photo/John Leicester,File)
The full-grown bumble-bee bat (Craseonycteris thonglongyai), at about the size of a bumble bee,is considered one of the smallest mammals on the planet. But its comparatively wide wingspan enables the animal to hover and cover long distances, which it navigates, like other bats, with echolocation. The bumble-bee bat inhabits only a certain area of Thailand and Myanmar and is listed as “vulnerable” on the IUCN Red List, because the population of less than 10,000 has been disturbed by human activity in the limestone caves and bamboo deforests where they reside.
Source: University of Michigan and IUCN Red List
(via: TakePart.org)
how do people argue that animals are not intelligent
they are so much more aware than we give them credit for
I love the little pause before it selects the right one as it’s staring at it
As if this cat is thinking ‘HUMAN WHY DO YOU INSULT MY INTELLECT LIKE THIS’
(Source: cineraria, via myfuckinglegends)
Japan’s new super-fast L0 train floats above the ground and can go 500 km/h
This week, the first test runs for Japan’s new 500 kilometre-per-hour magnetic floating supertrain was a success.
The new generation of “L0 Trains” — set to be deployed in 2027 on the Tokyo-Nagoya line — are not the first “Mag Lev” (Magnetic Levitation) trains, but they are the first to regularly break 500 km/h.
The superfast trains use magnetic levitation instead of wheels to reduce friction and to allow the train to run better in all weather. The magnetic trains can also speed up and slow down more quickly than a traditional wheeled train. (JIJI PRESS/AFP/Getty Images)
