As the US cuts funding and suspends graduate admissions, China’s leading educational institutions are offering new academic pathways.
Next week’s annual “two sessions”, or lianghui, will be closely watched as China’s political elites and lawmakers set the policy agenda for regaining economic growth and charting a course through the evolving trade war and hi-tech race with the US.
Top political advisory body the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference meets from Tuesday, with the National People’s Congress, the country’s legislature, opening its session a day later. Proceedings are expected to last about a week.
The meetings will deliberate on and approve the policy plans that will guide China’s economy, military, trade, diplomacy, the environment and other strategic areas in the months ahead.
A Chinese graduate from the University of Cambridge became a zookeeper in Shanghai for better health, but her career choice has left many people awestruck.
Ma Ya, 25, from eastern China’s Jiangsu province, made a bold decision to give up her higher-paid job at a biopharmaceutical company and now works as a zookeeper at the renowned Shanghai Zoo.
The average monthly salary for a new researcher at biopharmaceutical companies is around 10,000 yuan (US$1,400), while that of a zookeeper is about half of that.
Netizens in China have applauded a toddler who told her mother to treat her nicely in front of people to save face.
The girl’s mother, an online influencer with 75,000 followers, posted a video she filmed a year ago of her three-year-old daughter, Mibao, on February 16.
The woman from northern China’s Inner Mongolia autonomous region, surnamed Wang, said she was touched by the old video and decided to share it.
In the video, Mibao tells her mother not “to scold me and support me when other people are around”.
She said she wanted to cry whenever Wang treated her rudely in public, because she did not want other people to laugh at her.
Doctors praise determination and persistence of mother-to-be during difficult birth which sees baby daughter delivered safely, healthily
DeepSeek’s AI magic lies in its unique blend of literary expertise and advanced algorithms, former employees and industry experts say.
It’s seen as significant progress in geometric measure theory, and she could be in the running for a Fields Medal.
The former Meta researcher joins Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou where he will focus on optimising network efficiencies.
Couriers in control: rigid digital oversight vs. human ingenuity (eastisread.com)
Zhuang’s research is particularly relevant and compelling in its examination of how digital systems have reduced workers to mere units of labour and behaviour—monitored, calculated, punished, and controlled down to the minutest detail. He highlights, for instance, how these systems and algorithms fail in—or are incapable of—accommodating real-world complexities such as difficult customers, unpredictable delivery conditions, or heavy workloads, all while rigidly enforcing delivery deadlines. As a result, the burden of delivery pressure and rule violations falls “directly and brutally” on the couriers.
The good news is, that couriers have been navigating the rigid digital system through social connections and informal strategies. They build relationships with recipients, establish tacit agreements to make shortcuts and workarounds, and negotiate complaints to avoid penalties. Despite algorithmic control, they have managed to assert autonomy, and their humanity shines through in an otherwise dehumanising system.
Chinese are using AI everywhere ... even in picking durians in grocery! (substack.com)
Chinese people are using AI everywhere, even when picking durians! I came across this video today. Although I knew that Chinese people had started to use AI in various aspects of our lives, it was the first time I learned that it was being used in grocery shopping!
In this video, the young lady used the DeepSeek app which is free to download. She took a picture of the durians first, and numbered every one of them. Then she asked DeepSeek which one is the best. DeepSeek told her No. 10 and No. 12 are recommended and gave the reasons, such as shop assistants usually place the riper fruits in the position closer to the outside of the counter, where they can be easily reached by customers, and judging from the depth of color and the smoothness of the thorns, No. 10 and No. 12 fruits are riper, etc..
This weekly newsletter is put together by DeLisle Worrell, President of the ABCF. Visit us at Association for Barbados China Friendship | (abcf-bb.com).
Thanks to everyone who sent contributions for this week’s Update. Please send items of interest to me via the contact page at ABCF-BB.com or to info@DeLisleWorrell.com
The ABCF mission is to build a deeper understanding between the Chinese people and Barbadians and Caribbean people from all walks of life. The association’s focus is on personal experiences, people-to-people contact, cultural exchanges and exchanges of ideas, and the facilitation of travel, business and study. From the outset we aim to learn from and build on the experiences of the Caribbean and China, and to develop mutual understandings and support that will be to the benefit of both sides.
