Interesting News Of The Week - 21/05/2012

Hello Thursday, looks like it's time for another post.

I was debating on whether to post this yesterday, seeing as it was my birthday or leave it until today, but I thought I'd keep the tradition of Thursday's.

Beijing sets 'two flies only' guidelines

The first story this week is a story from the Beijing and is taking place in public toilets.
Yes you did hear me right, Beijing's public toilets.

So basically the authorities in Beijing have set some new standards for their public toilets, including my favourite one, they should contain no more than two flies.
Yeah that's right they are only allowing there to be two flies in their toilets, it sounds ridiculous really, but its the truth.

The main toilets they have applied the rules for is in places such as tourist spots, but it is not clear whether failing washrooms will be punished and if so, how.
I have an idea, why don't they just build a mini security system for them, like at the airport, where they have to check in and out with there own little passports, with little bee guards in case more than two get in, I mean come on, really?

The new rules also cover cleaning, the use of equipment, training for attendants, odour and cleaning litter bins, so there's going to be little fly-ports everywhere, yay!

Funny thing is despite all these new rules there's only a sort of rule covering what the government referred to as "discarded items" (so in our terms, tampons and condoms etc.), and that's that there should be no more than two in any public convenience (two at a time please ladies and gentlemen).

The new standards also require signs in both Chinese and English to be installed in the toilets, well that's nice at least they accounted for us, what about all the other countries in the world though?

The Beijing Municipal Commission of City Administration and Environment had something to say about all the new rules and that was that the regulations aimed to standardise toilet management at places such as parks, railway stations, hospitals and shopping malls.
Oh brilliant, why don't they just rename themselves "Flies R Us", and they can have "Fly-less Parks", "Fly Rails" and other related fly names.

An unnamed (hidden) official from the commission told local media that the guidelines on flies were meant for easy monitoring, on the flies or on us?

However media reports cast doubt over whether the guidelines could be enforced properly, I really hope they are, could be funny to see how they manage it all.

A commentary published in the Beijing News said one central Beijing district implemented a similar rule in 2008 when the city hosted the Olympic Games, but sanitation and hygiene still varied from toilet to toilet.
Effort should be invested on educating the public to use public toilets in a better manner, said the commentary.
So looks like Beijing are going back to potty training.

Here's the BBC's coverage of the story (please forgive the man's voice in the video):

'Don't win Eurovision' Spain

The second story this week is to do with the Eurovision song contest, at the moment this story is taking place in Spain.
This stories a bit of a short one, sorry.

Spain's Eurovision contestant has admitted the country would struggle to host the event if it were to win the competition.
So directors from broadcasters TVE joked to Pastora Soler, who will represent them on Saturday, "Please, don't win the Eurovision!"
Surely it should be "Please, don't win the Eurovision!", but no, she has been told Not to win. 

She told ABC Punto radio (a radio station, hence radio) "If we won, I think it would be impossible to stage the next edition because it costs so much money,".
So in other words Spain is going to save money by, not winning the Eurovison, sounds like an idea, why didn't we think of it?
I mean its not like we are going to be able to afford it thanks to the Olympics this year, so yeah, lets not win.

Spain last won the competition in 1969, when it shared a four-way tie with the UK, the Netherlands and France, so who actually hosted it, Spain? France? The UK?
None of them, it was the Netherlands, what happened to a tie?

Spain also won the contest the year before (1968), 12 years after it started, with singer Massiel's song La La La (very creative song title).

Soler will sing her ballad Quedate Conmigo (Stay With Me) at the final in the Azerbaijan capital Baku on Saturday.
It is written in the contest rules that the public broadcaster of the nation that wins must host the following year, so in other words, Spain your being told to not win.

"I think it is not the moment, neither for Spain nor for Spanish public, to win Eurovision," Soler was quoted as saying by the AFP news agency, so in other words your going to fail on purpose?

The Spanish government has slashed spending in public television, resulting in the cancellation of several popular programmes, so they are not covering it as much, so there win (loss) will not be shown.

There's no video for this news story, I know it's even more of a let down, but here's the logo for this years Eurovision, Eurovision 2012:

Summary for this week

So the summary for this weeks news stories is Beijing are introducing fly security, Spain have decided not to win the Eurovision song contest this year, and Spain aren't doing too well in the current economic climate.