In Hong Kong, what doesn't kill you is good for eating. So when some namby-pamby Government study says barbecued meat might be bad for you, most are going to ignore it. Apparently charcoal grilled meat contains a bunch of chemicals with names like benzo[a]pyrene, benz[a]anthracene and dibenz[a,h]anthracene in toxic concerntrations. Who comes up with these snappy names? It's high time chemistry got savvy and started calling these things more approriate names like "death-start cancer causer" and "explode on impact with DNA" - names that really strike a chord with the man in the street. It's no wonder chemists have the reputation they have...

Now where was I? Oh, that's right - BBQ meat. Our cavemen (and women) ancestors managed to live to a ripe-old age of 30 eating BBQ meat. If it was good enough for them, it's good enough for me. The food industry already has it tough in Hong Kong. McDonald's is caving in to pressure and changing its cooking oil leaving hundreds of small food shops that buy second-hand oil from McD's forced to actually use this healthier oil too. Why was there no public consultation? Where is LegCo? If I want to eat McDonalds, I want it to be as bad for me as possible. That's why many eat Mickey Ds - because it's a treat, a walk on the wild side of the food train tracks*. Bring back the beef tallow. Otherwise the hoardes of tourists won't be coming back.

While on this random rant China is yet again under threat, this time by India. China's one child policy is working to contain its population, but at a cost. The SCMP reports:

Maintaining a sex-ratio balance should become one of Beijing's social planning priorities, a think-tank has warned, saying the nation's growing shortage of women could spiral out of control.
Xie Zhenming , deputy director of the State Family Planning Commission's state population and development research centre, said China had entered a critical stage where it needed to prevent the disproportionate number of male babies being born from getting worse...

China has the highest sex-ratio imbalance in the world, with 100 females for every 120 males nationwide, according to the 2000 census. The world average is 100 girls against 107 boys.

* _{The intention to mangle as many cliches as possible is deliberate.}