• I have no idea what I will do this New Year's Eve.  Having Tony does pose logistical problems.  I will finish work at nine PM.  I have floated the idea with the King to maybe go to a pub for midnight and quickly go home.  He talked of possibly going out for a late supper with our families but my wife put a kibosh to the idea.  "What will we do with Tony?" she said.
• Last night, the King and I did a Wuxi Pub Crawl:  Ronnie's and the Blue Bar.  We first went to Ronnie's and there was about three patrons there.  The regulars were probably resting for tonight.  It being dead, we decided to blow and head off the Blue Bar.  There were more people there (about 20) but even then it was slow.  Of course, the usual Blue Bar lot, including Patterson, was there.  They never rest.
• Patterson told me that his school was off for three days but to make up for it they will have to work three six-day weeks.  We at HyLite, must be the only school open today.  But it makes no difference.  Six day weeks aren't groovy.
• At work, a holiday atmosphere, of sorts, prevails.  Not too many students are here today and classes are small so work seems easy.
• The NFL regular season is done.  My Seahawks are in the playoffs.  They should be hosting the Redskins in the first playoff round.  The Redskins played a part in eliminating my other team, the Vikings, from the playoffs by trouncing them last week at the Metrodome.  My third team, the New York Jets are in the same division as the Patriots,.  The Jets can't blame the fact that they had to play that Super team twice for not making the playoffs.  They just stunk.
• After reading this, I think I will take a look at Fred Thompson.  The fact that he is not hell-bent in his presidential campaign is refreshing from the over done ambition of Hilary.  I think the Republicans have three capable and experience candidates: Rudy, Fred and Mitt, who would make great Presidents.
• The wife and the King's wife went to some shopping event yesterday.  They spent the whole afternoon buying things for our new apartments.  They weren't too happy with us when we went on our "pub crawl" last night.  Though to be fair, we both drank only Colas and were home before 10;30 PM.
• Tony was wailing like a banshee when I had to put him down so I could get ready to go to work.  He smiles at the sight of me first thing in the morning.   Here is Wuxi Tony Update #8.
• On this December 31, my Youtube Video Views are at 102,500 and my MSN Spaces page views are at 42,000.  Will I be able to say 200,000 and 100,000 next year?
• Thinking of my New Year's Eves past, they have all been gruesome.  Now that I have Tony, the best New Year's Eve I could ever have would be to spend it with him and his mother.  Reading Marc Steyn's article about lack of New Year's songs, I realize New Year's is over rated.  And as American Fez says "I've recently received some extremely depressing news: at the chime of Monday's midnight bell we have to go all the way back to bloody January again and do it over".  Amen.

This article says the China's economy is much, much smaller than thought.  It goes on to predict tough times ahead for China.

AKIC Man of the Year 2007

The honor goes to U.S. General David Petraeus, the commander of the Surge in Iraq.  His generalship has lead to use of the word victory.

AKIC Woman of the Year 2007

My Wife, of course.

AKIC Wuxi Expat of the Year 2007

Really, no Wuxi Expats did anything to distinguish themselves this year.  So the winner is nobody.

AKIC Villain of the Year 2007

It can be no one else but Al Gore.  His campaign to spread fear-mongering about supposed Climate Change has resulted in the curtailment of free speech, free scientific inquiry and free markets.  His campaign, if it is not stopped, will do little to solve the problem of pollution; and it will lead to more poverty.

AKIC Day of the Year 2007

August 23, 2007 was a great day for it was the day of the birth of my son Tony.

AKIC Quote of the Year 2007

His majesty, the King of Wuxi, the Liberator of Hans Island said:  "I didn't do much this year except try to be  a good husband and father."

AKIC'S Favorite Blog of 2007

www.seablogger.com.  It was the first site I would visit every time I turned on the computer.  Allan Sullivan is prolific, intelligent and literate.  It amazes how he found the time to be on a boat, and blog so much and so well while battling a serious illness.

Happy New Year!

• China will win more than 30 gold medals at the 2008 Olympics.
• House prices will go down.
• China will go to war with Taiwan.
• House prices will go up.
• The CPI will go down.
• Hilary will win the 2008 Presidential election.
• China will continue to have strong economic growth.
• One female student said she would get a boyfriend in 2008.

• A rare treat for me.  Because the NFL is having a late Saturday Night Game in North America, I can watch the game live here in China (thanks to the TVU player).  The Patriots are playing the Giants and, as I type, they are beating the Giants 38 - 28 late in the 4th quarter.  It looks like the Patriots will have a perfect regular season record.
• This morning, I went to McDonalds for breakfast.  They were playing a crude Hip-Hop song on their loudspeaker system.  The language I heard.....  Ouch!!
• It is cold Sunday Morning in Wuxi.  But it is a nice crisp sunny day cold.  I love it.  I have my long underwear on and there is no danger of overheating.
• Leo and I squabbled about a bet to make for the Giants - Patriots game, and so never did make one.  Leo didn't believe what I told him were the Vegas lines on the games.
• Wuxi Tony Update #7
• Next to the McDonalds by our school, there is a pharmacy.  The pharmacy had a lineup of 200 old people this morning.  Why, I had no idea.  Something to ask the students.
• Many people in China have three days off in a row for New Year's.  So the school is dead today.
• I took this photo of the sunrise this morning from my 21st floor apartment.

Normally, the smog is too thick to see the King of Wuxi's Head.

I walked past the grounds of Big Bridge Middle School in downtown Wuxi and this is what I saw at 900 AM.  You would never see this in Canada.

• The authorities in Pakistan are saying that Benazir Bhutto was not killed by gun shot or bomb shrapnel, but by fracturing her skull as the shockwave of the bomb exploding happened to strike her and push her head into a sunroof lever as she was ducking from the gunfire.   Already, the conspiracy theorists are doubting the explanation.  Is the government trying to make it look like it was Bhutto's fault for putting her head outside the armored vehicle instead of their fault for providing inadequate security?  Was she killed at the hospital?  After all, initial reports said she was not injured in the incident....
• Eternity Road  wants to bring back the gold standard.  Simply put, the blogger sees it as a way of keeping governments honest by tying them to an independent standard and stopping them from using the printing press to take away people's hard-earned savings.  But value is subjective.  That is the genius of the supply-demand curve.  You can manipulate people's thinking about the value of things, so there is no independent standard that can stop it.  That is my argument against simply put.   But there is something to be said for the discipline of it.

• I finished reading a Louis L'Amour novel, the first of my life.  I have seen his books everywhere till I got to China.  Now, I have an urge to read them.
• The windows are full of condensation this morning.  It is a cold one out there.
• When to get out of bed?  At first, I was to get up at 700 AM, then 715 and finally 730.
• Now, I am reading a Tom Clancy novel: Without Remorse.  Again, back in Canada, I wouldn't have stooped.  Now, I grab any of his novels I can find.  I need reading material.
• My sources tell me that the Blue Bar was packed Christmas Eve.  I imagine it will be the same for New Year's.  I think I will be staying home that night.  Somewhere on the Internet, I came across an interview where someone said nothing good happens after midnight.  I would have to agree with that whoever.
• My general thoughts about the Bhutto assassination are that Bhutto probably wasn't a shining martyr for anything and that Pakistan will carry on being screwed up.  I was also wondering how how the assassination would be pinned on Bush.  Seablogger shows Obama taking a stab at it.  Like shock and indignation, someone-on-the-left's next reaction is to blame Bush.

• The Who's Who of Wuxi Expatdom have been joining Facebook.  For instance, I am now Facebook friends with the King of Wuxi, Niels, Adam Lang and Peter Malik.  Impressive!
• Here is a interesting article about China and Darfur and China's Southern neighbors.  Read it here.  It opens with this quote: 

  “People say China is a sleeping giant, but it’s wide awake. It’s the elephant creeping up behind us. Only, it’s so big we can scarcely see it moving.”

• I am surprised.  Some of the students had heard about the assassination of Bhutto.  Most of them don't care about news unless it has something to do with China.
• One of the students named the leader of North Korea as his man of the year.  Said the student: Kim Il Jung did the sensible thing and let his nuclear activities be supervised.
• I had another student tell me that his favorite Western Comedian was Socrates.  I also asked the student if he ever made jokes about foreigners.  He replied that he didn't because he didn't know what made them laugh.  It turned out, he thought I meant make jokes to foreigners.  It took me ten minutes of fruitless conversation to figure this out.
• Here are the latest Wuxi Tony Updates uploaded to Youtube.  I am making so many of them now, I am losing count.

 I beleive I am up to six (since I started counting).

• Thankfully, I have grandparents living a long way away so I can justify Tony's seeming overexposure on Youtube.

It was raining in Wuxi Wednesday.  Nothing much for me to do but upload videos to Youtube.

I heard about Bhutto's assassination through a blog and then watched Fox News on the TVU player for updates.  Here is a list of links I had prepared previously:

• The Economist talks about China hosting the 2008 Olympics.  I used to read the Economist a lot.  It has declined in the past few years.
• An intelligent posting about the perils of Universal Health Care.  China is the only country I have ever been to that has a user pay system.  It has worked fine when I used it.  However, sanitary conditions leave lots to be desired.  China has to have a user pay system because it does not have the resources to even think of adopting Universal Health Care.  The Chinese have smartened up enough to realize that Central Planning was a disaster for the Economy.  They have probably realized the same thing about Health Care.
• Romantic Landscape Painting.
• Mug Shots of Arrestees with Goofy T-Shirts
• Britain's Lost Cities: a story of town planners gone mad.  I wonder who is planning Wuxi.
• Maps and Chaps
• The official site of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea
• Libel Tourism comes to Canada
• Will Smith and Adolf Hitler
• Descartes for Breakfast

• Building continues across the street from our apartment complex.
• I see that Dairy Queen has opened in the basement of Parkson's.  A small Blizzard will cost you 16 rmb.  The addition of DQ to the Parkson's basement is part of a recent renovation.  Parkson's Supermarket has wider aisles but its selection hasn't changed at all.
• We walked through a park...

• ....And saw this crowd of men.  I never did figure out what they were up to.  It seemed as if they were listening to one man talk. 
• Right after taking this photos in the park and as we walked to the Carrefour Baoli, I saw a man get beaten and thrown about like he was a rag doll.  Just before seeing the incident, my wife decided to buy some bananas off a street vendor.  She gave me one.  I looked down to peel it and then up to see a man stomping on a prone man's stomach about twenty feet or so ahead of me.  The sight was enough to make me feel awkward eating the banana.  For there I was snacking away like I was watching WWF wrestling on the television, except that what I was seeing was real and pathetic.    I then quickly finished off the banana wondering what do with the peel.  It was about then that I saw the man, whose stomach had been stomped on, get picked up and slammed down on the pavement, again like in WWF.  But this sad fellow was getting thrown down on hard asphalt.  The last I saw of him, he was sitting on a curb, his head resting in his arms as he quietly sobbed.  His assailant stood nearby talking to some companions.  One of the companions had held the assailant's jacket so he could administer the beating.  The beating was witnessed by many passers-by.  I asked the wife what had happened, she told me that the man was drunk.  I assumed she meant the victim.  This was not the first street fight I had witnessed in Wuxi, but it was the most WWF-like.  I threw the banana peel on the street on the wife's suggestion.  She said not to worry because someone would pick it up.
• I finished the second season of The Wire.  Still high quality stuff.  As I watched, I never had the sensation of getting bored with it.  I watched four straight one-hour episodes on Wednesday night and couldn't turn it off.
• I saw one third of WuxiLife, the Danish part, at Baoli Carrefour.  He told me that Tony looks like the wife.  I don't see Niels much these days but he was looking good.
• The wife made some great mashed potatoes Wednesday evening.  The second best thing she has done for me other than having Tony.
• We are looking for a babysitter for Tony.  Anyone interested?  Anyone know where I can find one?  He would be a joy and pure ease to look after.
• Meanwhile in Canada, my nephew and niece got Ipods for Christmas for which they are very excited.  It only seems like yesterday that they were as small as little Tony. 
• Following the U.S presidential election can be dizzying.  Rudy G was up; now he is going down.  John McCain is now a rising star when before he was going no where.  Huckabee was last week's star but now people realize he is from the same state as Bill Clinton (so he can't be trusted).  Fred Thompson's entry was a splash but nothing else happened for him.  Romney and Edwards are the Hair guys.  They could go up the middle and win.  Hilary was supposed to be dead certain.  But then I heard talk that Obama will overtake.  But then someone says don't count Hilary out just yet.  Meanwhile, Ron Paul and Mike Bloomberg (another NYC mayor) are maybe going to make third party runs.  All this talk and speculation only shows what can happen when an election is too long as this presidential election is.  I believe the length is an unforeseen result of the Election Campaign spending laws that instead of curtailing spending only made it the campaign longer.  Candidates now have to spend more time canvassing donors instead of canvassing voters.

• Lucky Me.  Boxing Day is a day off for me.  It is a good thing.  I was up late last night doing a video call on the MSN with my parents.  They got to see the Tony live instead of on video.
• Speaking of Tony's, I heard Tony Blair converted to Catholicism.  What does it mean?  One take is that it represents how Henry VIII has been undone.  There are now more practicing Catholics in England than Protestants.
• Beckham, like me, lets his wife dress him.  I should say "cave in" instead of "lets". 
• I had a witty remark but I can't remember what it was.  It was some play on words.  I hope it comes back to me.
• WuxiLife magazine did a review of digital cameras in its' Christmas issue.  I await eagerly their review of mobile phones.
• Today, I will pick up some good bread from Bolter's restaurant.  The King picked up his Christmas turkey from the restaurant yesterday and I used the opportunity to order bread.
• We had a traditional Christmas Dinner at his Majesty's household.  There was turkey, gravy, stuffing, mashed potatoes, veggies and apple pie for dessert.  Yummy!
• The New England Patriots will play the New York Giants in their final regular season.  There is nothing at stake, title-wise, for each team in this game.  Both have clinched playoff spots.  A win or loss won't change their post-season seedings.  But for the Patriots, it is about achieving a perfect.  What should the Giants do?  This New York writer says they owe it to the world to play to win.
• Time magazine has made Vladimir Putin its' person of the year for 2007.  I will announce AKIC's 2007 honors on December 31.

• The King of Wuxi was praising the spandex underwear that his sister sent him from Canada for Christmas.  He said he couldn't get over how comfortable they were.
• The King of Wuxi also liked the books I bought him for Christmas.  If you have ever hung out in the King's bathroom, you will know that half of his library gets left on the floor.  It wasn't hard for me to find trashy sci-fi and fantasy novels for him when I went to Shanghai.  Only thing was I had to hope he didn't already own the ones I bought.  One of the novels I bought looked a lot like a novel he had in his bathroom.  Fortunately, it was a different volume from the series.
• Tony couldn't have cared less about Christmas.  He just screamed for attention from his mama and papa.
• Take the Global Warming Test.  A ten part test with results that aren't politically correct.  Did you know that: The world's natural wetlands produce more greenhouse gas contributions annually than all human sources combined; the greenhouse effect is primarily caused by Water Vapor; less than 1/10th of 1% of the Earth's atmosphere is comprised of CO2; and there has historically been much more CO2 in our atmosphere than exists today?  Probably not.
• Here it is.  My official Christmas 2007 Video, starring the Toner and the King of Wuxi, uploaded to Youtube and ready for you to watch. 
• That is my 250th Youtube Video.  Just in time to celebrate 100,000 views on my Youtube Channel.  Thank you, rare readers, for watching them.
• Here is Ronald Reagan's 1981 Christmas Message.

• I spent Christmas Eve at home in a very melancholy manner.
• I am spending Christmas morning surfing the Internet.
• Here is a link to a Thomas Sowell article.  It is about intimidation of teachers by students in America.  That is why I would never teach in North America.  I think of the mob of drugged-up or drunk high school you would see in Junior and Senior High Schools back in North America and I know I wouldn't last a minute.  Why did this happen?  How is that Schools have taken on the grim atmospheres that resulted in those Columbine attacks?  As Sowell says in his article, a lack of respect of authority brought on by a lost of nerve in authority brought on the situation where intimidation or fear of confrontation results in the moaners getting all they want. 
• There was a big crowd attending Christmas services last night at the Church near our school.  It is good to see manifestations of religion in China.  Although, I have heard that these churches are authorized by the government.  It proves that no government or authority anywhere can successfully clamp down on religious impulses.  Orwell, in his essays was not a Christian and he always criticized the likes of Chesterton and CS Lewis.  But he knew that the first impulse of a totalitarian or authoritarian regime was to clamp down on religion and encourage Atheism.  Churches and temples are a sign of human freedom. 
• The New England Patriots are 15-0.  I won one rmb off Leo because they won by more that 19.5 points (28 - 7 final score).  But it was part of a null result, because I also bet an over-under of 45 with Leo being the under.
• Is Rudy G's star falling?  I hope not.
• John Derbyshire for Ron Paul.  I wish the other candidates for U.S. president would be as libertarian as Ron Paul is.  There has always been a large group of Americans for who the U.S. government is too large. The best government is one that governs the least.  They want to be free from Public Education, Tax-payer sponsored Football Stadiums, welfare programs, subsidization of illegal immigrants, as nauseam.  Unfortunately, Ron Paul is clueless on foreign policy.  America has its on self-interests to look after.  It needs a strong military.  As does the world need a strong American military.  Other countries do look after their own interests too but they try to go through the pathetic United Nations.  The examplars in Asia of what Ron Paul believes in are protected by the U.S. military.
• Is TCM based on Magic?  TCM stands for Traditional Chinese Medicine.  In a class we do on TCM at school, I have had a hard time soliciting information from most of the students about it.  They prefer western medicine.  Now, I have never asked them if these is an idea of magic in TCM.  Maybe, next time I will.  My Chinese wife has encouraged me to eat things that are good for my bald spot and libido.  My in-laws in the countryside do have a big jar with a snake soaked in some liquid in their business.  The concoction or snake oil is sold occasionally but for what purpose I don't ask.  Thinking of this makes me happy I don't see the in-laws all the time unlike many Chinese couples who have one pair of them living with them in their home.
• The Myths of Vietnam.  America was fighting in Vietnam to make South Vietnam what Taiwan, South Korea and Japan are now: fully functioning democracies.  That they failed was a tragedy.  The result was the killing fields of Cambodia and the reeducation camps of Vietnam.  What happened in Cambodia was proof positive that Joseph McCarthy was right to fish out Communists from the U.S. government.  Say what you like about his methods, but compared to the Stalinist purges, McCarthyism was a pillow fight.  You could make the argument that the Vietnam War was really a war between a mini 1967 China (North Vietnam) and a mini 2007 China (South Vietnam).  America lost this battle but ultimately it won the ideological war.
• International Law.  Somebody has to enforce it before the concept would mean anything.  Typically, the people who love the concept, aren't interested in justice at all, but sticking it to the U.S.A.   It has only been the U.S. that has lately tried to enforce grievous infringements of international order like Iraq's invasion of Kuwait and Saddam's repeatedly thumbing his nose at U.N. weapons inspectors.  But people want to take the U.S. to the docket for it.  Unbelievable!
• The only hope for humanity is that the Bali agreement is unenforceable.

• Merry Christmas to all AKIC readers!  I meant to do something more elaborate to mark the day in my blog but my plans have been scuttled.
• Seablogger talks about Russia and China.  The Guardian talks of these two countries forming an order threatening to the U.S.  It is a Left Wing Wet Dream.  It won't happen. 
• US presidential election musings:  The talk I have heard about Hilary Clinton is going down has resulted in counter talk saying to don't write her off just yet.  Meanwhile, on the Republican side, there seems to be no clear front-runner.  Rudy G., my choice, has been taking his shots.  Seablogger talks about an article that practically labels Rudy as a fascist.  I have always been impressed by Rudy.  He struck me as a tough s.o.b.  America needs its presidents to be tough and unapologetic.  Instead of caving in to the moonbats of the world as the Democrats want to do, America should ignore them or put them in their place.
• The Toner is officially four months old, yesterday.  It was instructive for me to go to the hospital last week and see all the new-borns.  Tony has come a long way in the short time he has been with us.  For me, he is a Christmas present and Birthday present all rolled into one.
• I don't know what I will be doing tonight's Christmas Eve.  As I hinted, my plans have been scuttled.  I have not trained my wife to know the importance of Christmas.  It seems a needless expense to her. 

Sunday afternoon, I went to Tianyi Middle School to do an Olympic English talk for a selected group of students.  The group was not as big as I had been lead to believe but there were about 200 to hear Justin and I talk.

Before performing, I was able to walk about the Tian Yi campus and take some photos.

The campus is big and clean.

The auditorium, we spoke at, is plush and spacious.

A lot of students go to this school.  The photo below is of one of the student dorms.  I don't think the photo below conveys the effect of seeing so many clothes being hung to dry from the balconies.

The man in uniform shaking Hu Jintiao's hand was an honors student at Tianyi.

The Campus ground has many of these orange and blue signs.

It also has a statue of a big apple.

The School Christmas Party on Saturday Night was well attended.

Tony dressed up like Santa for the party.

So did I.

Tony was the center of attention.

It was all too much for him.

• It is raining Cats and Dogs Today in Wuxi.  Tonight, we are having the school Christmas party.  I have heard that as many as 300 students will attend.  It will be a Christmas Party with Chinese characteristics.  Students and Staff will be performing plays and songs, most of which will have nothing to do with Christmas.  One student is going to sing the dreaded pop song that goes I'm a big big girl in a big big world.  I agreed to play Santa Claus because it gets me out of playing a woman in a traditional Chinese play that our study assistants are performing.
• Yesterday morning on my walk to school, I saw all the students, of this experimental bilingual primary school, dancing arm-in-arm with partners on the school ground.  I wish I had brought my camera with me.  It was boy and boy, girl and girl, and sometimes boy and girl.  I remember once in my Junior High days, learning square dancing in P.E.. class.
• This morning on my walk to work in the cold downpour, I saw a poor man, a hobo type, walking with his arms in a shivering gesture not carrying an umbrella.  He was wearing sandals and threadbare clothes.  It was a pathetic sight.
• Thanks to John Derbyshire,  I have a link to a very thoughtful article about China.  It opens with this quote from Dr. Sun Yat-Sen:

The Chinese people have only family and clan solidarity; they do not have national spirit…they are just a heap of loose sand…Other men are the carving knife and serving dish; we are the fish and the meat.

• David Warren  talks about the U.S. and China.
• Tony was in a good mood Friday night.  I had him laughing and smiling.  He still has a deep chesty cough, but otherwise he looks handsome and healthy.  His complexion is better.  I like how he can smile at me from six feet away.  I am sure he recognizes and loves me. 
• The King of Wuxi has joined the Wuxi Expat Facebook Group.  You should too if you don't want to be eternally unworthy.  The King of Wuxi has been given admin privileges in the group but he will use it only for the good of humanity.
• I am going to do a show for 500 students at Tian Yi Middle School.  My biggest audience ever.  Nervous am I?  No.  I just hope I can fill the unforgiving 80 minutes with 4800 seconds worth of distance run.  That way, mine will be the Earth and everything in.  Or to be more modest, I will have the audience in the palm of my hand, slave to my every whim.

• Back to work.  It is like I never got away.
• Tony slept well last night.
• The wife is going to fire the maid this morning.  The woman has been getting slack.  How did 830 to 1130 slowly become 845 to 1100?
•  Yesterday, I was carrying Tony in a baby pack or pouch.  We now have two baby pouches for carrying Tony about.  The one I was using yesterday is bigger than the other one we have but with yesterday's my neck took all the baby's weight.  The other model is smaller but it straps to your shoulders.  Very uncomfortable to have your neck take Tony's weight.  Comparing his size to the newborns yesterday, I saw how much he has grown.
• Here is a photo of the Toner being carried by his father.  I am wearing the pouch but you can't see it in the photo.

• This video I did is practically viral.
• The Drummond Family lent us a Santa suit that fits Tony.  Expect photos.
• Last night, I went to B & Q, Wuxi's version of Home Depot.  The place is alright but I get bored in those kind of places very easily.  Last night, we chose the kitchen for our new apartment.
• To honor a dead person, we saw a family burn a twenty foot tall by twenty foot long by six foot wide paper house in the park near our apartment complex.  By doing this ritual, it is believed that the dead ancestor will have a house in the afterlife.  The result of this ritual, yesterday afternoon, was to see lots of burnt pieces of paper fall on Renmin Road traffic and pedestrians.  I have a photo of this on my mobile phone which I will download later.
• I am reading The Trail to Seven Pines by Louis L'amour.  It is a Hopalong Cassidy Story.  I never knew that Hopalong was a L'amour creation till I bought the novel.  I find Westerns (cowboy stories)are a story genre that I have been silly not to look into for most of my life.  Western stories are character driven and always interesting.
• It is cold and damp in Wuxi this morning.

• I am not the only Andis Kaulins who has a presence on the net.  The other Andis Kaulins has a posting about the problem of being Kaulins.  He also talks about how good a reputation the Kaulins name has in Latvia.  Hard to say if it has a good reputation in Wuxi.

I don't think I advertise my virtues at all.  After meeting some many charlatans telling me how great they are, I have decided to briefly rebel against my policy of reticence on the manner.  As Rush Limbaugh says, "it ain't bragging if it is true."

You can go to the other places and get information about the best sauce, the best hippity hoppity noise coming out from Paint Bucket Swensen or ABV Sprocket, and 100 things that rednecks do that other people don't do, but here at AKIC, we like to deal in the universal and eternal truths.  The fashions of the moments don't impress us one iota.  We are not interested in the latest ephemeral attack on classical taste.  We are not interested in following the latest panics.  We are interested in honor and other values that are true at all times for all people everywhere and anytime in history and before.  We want AKIC to be the blog for the ages.  We want AKIC to an epic blog.  We want AKIC to be an heroic blog.  This a blog about the endless cycle of life and death.  This blog is a celebration of existence and the universe.

That is why, we are proud, like Homer was proud of the Iliad and Odyssey, to be the first place on the Internet you can see photos of Amy Grant, daughter of Simon and Nicole Grant. 

Thursday Afternoon, the Kaulins family went to Wuxi People's Hospital Four to take the historic and exclusive photos.

And of course, video....