“SARS” masks – Asians wear surgical masks in everyday life, a tendency that has become known in the states as wearing “SARS Masks.” The association between wearing surgical masks and SARS is entirely constructed by the media. When the SARS pandemic began, major television media outlets needed a depiction of the situation in Asia, so they dug into their archives to get videos of people wearing surgical masks while walking through the street. However, this is common practice in Asia for a few reasons:

1. The Dust Cloud – Every Spring in Beijing, there are terrible dust storms so people wear surgical masks to keep themselves from choking on the dust.
2. Pollution – Asia has terrible pollution and people don’t want to always be breathing it in.
3. Cosmetic – Asian women wear surgical masks more often than men. This is because the wind and weather is bad for their skin. In China, there is still an aesthetic of “the more milky white the better”, which is reflected by their commercials and print advertisements. This cosmetic aesthetic is complicated, as they want milky white, but not pale. This explains the popularity of red clothes, another stereotype of the Chinese. Indeed, Chinese people don’t like wearing red because they are communists. They like it because it brings out the color in their cheeks and lips.

I’m sick and I have been in bed all weekend, which is not much fun. I haven’t been talking much to people but instead have been watching bootlegged movies that I bought and trying to lie down.

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This just in – In a somewhat miraculous turn of events, my health has improved. I was extremely ill, and as I was writing this post even thought that I ought to have taken more precautions against the bird flu.