Remember Hong Kong John Lee’s recent warning…
“Foreign intelligence officers and their proxies would use different industries as disguise … Spies may marry and raise a family just like an ordinary citizen, and only commit acts of terrorism or theft of state secrets after years [of hiding].”
National Security Education Day wasn’t confined to Hong Kong…
In a slick video marking the National Security Education Day, China’s top spy agency has a stern message for Chinese people: foreign spies are everywhere.
As ominous music plays, a broad-faced, beady-eyed man disguises himself as a street fashion photographer, a lab technician, a businessman and a food delivery driver – he even sets up an online honey trap – to glean sensitive state secrets in various places and industries.
“In the sea of people, you may have never noticed him. His identity is changeable and his whereabouts are hard to find,” a narrator says. “They are everywhere, cunning… and sneaky, and they may be right here in our lives.”
Eventually, Chinese police catch the spy in a dramatic ambush after state security authorities receive multiple tip-offs from the public.
“They can disguise as anyone. But among the crowds you and I together are protecting national security,” the narrator concludes. “We 1.4 billion people are 1.4 billion lines of defense.”
Hong Kong’s Justice Secretary denies that the authorities have refrained from arresting people in the first month of the local Article 23 NatSec Law to avoid spreading alarm. He says the new legislation will be used only in ‘really compelling circumstances’.
The FT reports that German pharmaceuticals inspectors are refusing to go to China for fear of being arrested for espionage, adding to shortages of drugs supplies.
And behold the teachers’ resource kit for primary-level English with NatSec. The main chapter headings are: Cherishing Food, Chinese Dance and Culture, Saving Endangered Animals, and China’s Space Exploration.
The Cherishing Food subject covers ‘food security’ – plus Professor Yuan Longping and the Qinling Mountains and Huai He. In the part on dance and culture, a supposed magazine article asks ‘Why do people eat mooncakes?’
Not sure whether primary-level kids need to know these things – or whether their parents will think it can help kids succeed in their missions to become doctors or lawyers. But at least I learnt something. (Renowned hybrid-rice agronomist whose curiosity, devotion, perseverance, diligence and selflessness left an unforgettable spiritual treasure to us all, and the line that separates rice- and wheat-growing regions of China. None the wiser on mooncakes.)
All this serves as an important reminder: the third season of Spy X Family should be released in October, and meanwhile there’s the movie to look forward to.
I have been asking the mooncake question ever since I spent my first autumn here nearly three decades ago. Also, surely the things are pies.
“Hong Kong’s Justice Secretary denies that the authorities have refrained from arresting people in the first month of the local Article 23 NatSec Law to avoid spreading alarm.”
Kind of a soft resistance to NOT arrest people in order to alleviate people’s fears, no?
Ng: Hey Wong, what do you have planned this weekend? Shall we stay in Hong Kong and enjoy a night out queueing in line for a couple hours at the newest trendy restaurant and then having a ridiculously overpriced bucket of Kronenbourg 1664 in a not particularly appealing bar with no coherent decoration/entertainment concept in order to help boost Hong Kong’s nightlife economy??
Wong: Ahhh…no thanks. I’m planning on going up to our country for a much more satisfying spread of Sichuan hotpot, free flow beers and then trying to pull some girls from our country at a huge, lively nightclub afterwards and not have to work extra shifts the following week to pay it all off. Wanna join in?
Ng: Fuck yes! Sign me up!! I love our country!!
@Joe Blow
“@Mark Bradley: I know rectum # 4 and I can confirm that he never occupied a position of power in his life. 12 dead-end jobs and 1 and a half careers. Knowing this, you can understand why he is bitter”
Well that’s quite a relief. Someone like rectum # 4 deserves to be shut out 100% from any power position. Unfortunately, oftentimes especially in HK, you see the opposite happen.
So were you the one who told Rectum # 4 about Big Lychee in person or did he find it on his own?
@Mark: I am sure he found out on his own. Some of you who are members of the FCC may know him as well, if not his name then his face. I say no more.
“Why do people eat mooncakes?”
Another question is: Why do Hongkongers eat Kjeldsen’s Butter Cookies at the New Year?
– – – – – – – –
“The astronauts carried out tasks.”
I’m afraid the poor children are being misled. In this case. “out” is an adverb, modifying the verb. “The astronauts carried out the rubbish.” In that case, it’s a preposition.
People do not eat mooncakes.
The last known digestion of a mooncake by a human being was recorded in 1986 in the Kowloon Walled City. Prove me wrong.
Mooncakes are re-gifted in an endless cycle until the packages become so scratched, frayed and covered in greasy fingerprints and spittle that they are dispatched to join their older brethren to form the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.
As any fule no.
@Enzo: ditto those Kjeldsen’s Butter Cookies, those ghastly Ferrero chocolates and those teeth-rotting vile Quality Street toffees. They move in an alternate universe of recycling that targets those people you hate in particular. Actually not a bad thing.