PeOPLe

“The weakness in high-income countries is dampening developing-country growth, but strong domestic demand and growing South-South economic linkages have underpinned developing-country resilience.”

Hans Timmer, Director of Development Prospects at the World Bank, after the Washington-based bank released its baseline economic forecast on January 15,predicting that the global economy would grow at a rate of 2.4 percent in 2013

“We are finding that people born under the one-child policy are less likely to be working in risky occupations, in self-employment or in the financial market.”

Lisa Cameron, an economics professor at Australia’s Monash University, revealing on January 11 the results of a study involving 420 people, half of whom were born in the few years before China implemented the family planning policy in 1979 and the rest after

“In a transformative period when an old system of trust is broken in the absence of a new one,people’s trust in others diminishes.”

Yang Yiyin, a researcher with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, expounding on a survey that reveals the Chinese public as having a trust score of 59.7 against the total of 100, on January 12

“I would have no privacy when it comes to my salary, which would inevitably lead to quarrels.”

Xia Tong, a 29-year-old married man in south China’s Guangdong Province,responding on January 11 to China Merchants Bank’s “capital accumulation” service,by which the wife can check the husband’s account periodically and transfer any funds exceeding a previously designated amount to the wife’s account

NOMINATED DIRECTOR

Director Ang Lee’s 3D fantasy fi lmLife of Pireceived 11 nominations ahead of the 85th Academy Awards, including for best fi lm and director, as announced on January 10 by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

The award ceremony will be held on February 24. Lee won the Academy Award for best foreign language fi lm forCrouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon(2000)and won the Oscar for Best Director in 2006 forBrokeback Mountain, becoming the fi rst Asian to palm the title.

TAI CHI MASTER

Chen Xiaowang won an award for spreading Chinese culture abroad on January 11.Chen, born in 1945, is the 19th generation lineage practitioner of Chen-style Tai Chi. He fi rst learnt the style at age 7 under his father’s tutelage and later under that of his uncles upon his father’s death. Chen was crowned the Tai Chi Champion at the First International Martial Art Competition in 1985. He moved to Australia in 1990 and established the Chen Xiaowang World Tai Chi Association. With 100,000 current members, the association has over 50 branches in more than 30 countries, dedicated to spreading the philosophy of Tai Chi.