Reporters on the Job
VANISHING BREED: As part of his reporting on today's story about controlling the Internet in China (page 1), the Monitor's Beijing-based Robert Marquand went back to the Feiyu (Flying Universe) cafes where he had witnessed an internet police bust (see Dec. 7 Monitor). "This time, the entire block, just past the South Gate of Beijing University, was flattened. A whole strip of Internet cafes has been replaced by a wall. I found one building of cafes left, around the corner," says Bob.
Apart from a few up-scale cafes located near hotels for foreigners, he says it isn't easy, even on the Web, to find cafes in Beijing. He found 20 locations on Sina.com, using the category of "new listings." But only two of 12 phone calls yielded a place in business, and one of these was four computers in a bookstore. "What my interpreter and I mostly heard was, 'They've moved. I don't know where they went.' "
TEMPLE MOUNT PROTEST: Reporter Ben Lynfield says that watching the Temple Mount and Land of Israel Faithful (page 1) is like "watching a sinister carnival. They're very theatrical. They march around, chanting "Death to Arafat" and sing the Israeli national anthem. And they arrive blowing a ram's horn, which is usually used on Jewish high holidays as a call to repent. In this context, it almost seems like a call to arms."
Western journalists are often considered by Israeli hardliners as biased, and lately, foreign reporters have been the subject of public denigration and personal attacks. But Ben says this group welcomed his attention. "They seem to operate on the assumption that any publicity is good."
Still one aspect of the story puzzled Ben: the main prop in their demonstration. "The 4 1/2 ton marble slab they drag out every now and then is billed as the cornerstone for a new temple," he says. "But for some reason, the rest of the year it's parked in front of the US Consulate in East Jerusalem. It's so provocative, you'd think someone would remove it."
- David Clark Scott
World Editor
Mail to: One Norway Street, Boston, MA 02115 via e-mail: world@csmonitor.com
