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Asia Times
a day ago
- General
- Asia Times
A 16th-century Chinese writer's take on workplace burnout
We are in the middle of a global workplace burnout epidemic. Korean-German philosopher Byung-Chul Han has aptly coined the term 'burnout society.' Four centuries ago, late-Ming Dynasty scholar-official Yuan Hongdao (1568–1610) shifted from state administrative work to xiaopin — brief, personal essays celebrating everyday pleasures like gardening, leisurely excursions and long vigils beside a rare blossom. Today, his Ming Dynasty-era practice resonates with uncanny urgency within our burnout epidemic. The cover of The Burnout Society by Byung-Chul Han (Stanford University Press). Amid the Wanli Emperor's neglect and escalating bureaucratic infighting in Beijing, Yuan turned away from what today we call a 'toxic workplace.' Instead, he found refuge in Jiangnan's landscapes and literary circles. There he exchanged hierarchical pressures, administrative tedium and cut-throat careerism for moments of unhurried attention. Yuan's xiaopin , alongside those of his contemporaries, transformed fleeting sensory moments into radical acts of resilience, suggesting that beauty, not institutions, could outlast empires. The late Ming Dynasty (1368–1644) was an era of contradictions. While Europe hurtled toward colonialism and scientific rationalism, China's Jiangnan region — the fertile Yangtze Delta in today's Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces — flourished via merchant wealth, global silver trade and a thriving print culture. Bookshops lined city streets like modern cafés. They peddled plays, poetry and xiaopin volumes like Meiyou Pavilion of Arts and Leisure (1630) and Sixteen Xiaopin Masters of the Imperial Ming (1633). The imperial examination system, a civil service written exam — once a path to prestige — had become a bottleneck. Thousands of scholars languished in bureaucratic limbo, channelling their frustrations and exhaustion into xiaopin 's intimate vignettes. Chinese imperial examination candidates gathering around a wall where the results are posted (painting by Qiu Ying, c. 1540). Photo: .National Palace Museum) In his preface to Meiyou Pavilion , editor Zheng Yuanxun (1603–1644) praised the genre's 'flavor beyond flavor, rhythm beyond rhythm' — a poetic nod to its rich sensory detail and subtle musicality — rejecting moralizing orthodox prose by embracing immersive aesthetics. Against neo-Confucianism's rigid hierarchies, xiaopin elevated the private, the ephemeral and the esthetically oblique: a well-brewed pot of tea, the texture of moss on a garden rock and incense wafting through a study. Wei Shang, professor of Chinese culture at Columbia University, has noted that such playful texts flourished among late-Ming literati disillusioned with the era's constraints. The texts reframed idleness and sensory pleasure as subtle dissent within a status-obsessed society. Long before French poet Charles Baudelaire's flâneur used dandyism and idle promenades to resist the alienating pace of western modernity, Ming literati such as Chen Jiru (1558–1639) and Gao Lian (1573–1620) framed idleness as defiance. Drawing on Daoist wu wei (non-action), Gao praised the 'crystal clear retreat' that scrubbed the heart of 'worldly grime' and cultivated 'a tranquil heart and joyful spirit.' For him, human worth lay not in bureaucratic promotions but in savoring tea, listening to crickets or resting against a well-fluffed pillow. A hanging scroll, ink on paper of a plum blossom branch by Chen Jiu (1558–1639). Photo: Yale University Art Gallery/S. Sidney Kahn, 1959 / Christie's, lot 677, 1983 / Bones of Jade, Soul of Ice, 1985), CC BY Hung-tai Wang, a cultural historian at Academia Sinica in Taipei, identifies xiaopin as a 'leisurely and elegant' esthetic rooted in nature's rhythms. Chen Jiru, a Ming Dynasty-era painter and essayist, embodied this framework by disallowing transactional logic. In one essay, Chen lauds those who possess 'poetry without words, serenity without sutras, joy without wine.' In other words, he admired those whose lives resonated through prioritizing lived gestures over abstract ideals. In the late Ming's burgeoning urban and commercial milieu, xiaopin turned everyday objects into remedies for social isolation. In the Jiangnan gardens, late Ming essayists saw landscapes infused with emotion. At the time, essayist Wu Congxian called it 'lodging meaning among mountains and rivers:' moonlight turned into icy jade, oar splashes into cosmic echoes. Chen Jiru had study rituals — fingering a bronze cauldron, tapping an inkstone — and curated what he termed 'incense for solitude, tea for clarity, stone for refinement.' This cultivation of object-as-presence anticipates American literary scholar Bill Brown's 'thing theory,' in which everyday items invite embodied contemplation and challenge the subject-object binary that enables commodification. The Ming Dynasty-era scholar-connoisseur Wen Zhenheng (1585–1645) turned domestic minutiae into philosophical resistance. His xiaopin framed everyday choices — snowmelt for tea, rooms facing narrow water, a skiff 'like a study adrift' — as rejections of abstraction. Through details like cherries on porcelain or tangerines pickled before ripening, he asserted that value lies in presence, not utility. Wen suggests that exhaustion stems not from labour but from disconnection. The Garden of the Inept Administrator (Zhuozheng Yuan) by Wen Zhengming, 1551. Wen painted 31 views of the site, each accompanied by a poem and a descriptive note. (Gift of Douglas Dillon, 1979/MET open source collection), CC BY Just as xiaopin turned domestic rituals into resistance, today's movements recast the mundane as a mode of defiance. In April 2021, China's tang ping ('lying flat') movement surfaced with a post by former factory worker Luo Huazhong: 'Lying flat is justice.' The message was simple and subversive: work had become intolerable, and opting out was not laziness but resistance. In a backlash against China's '996' work model extolled by tech moguls like Jack Ma, tang ping rejects the sacrifice of dignity and mental health for productivity and casts idleness as a quiet revolt against exploitative norms. In the West, the Covid-19 pandemic sparked similar reckonings. The 'Great Resignation' saw millions leave unfulfilling jobs. And 'quiet quitting' rejected unpaid overtime and emotional labor. These movements emerged as a soft refusal of hustle culture. As anthropologist David Graeber argues in Bullshit Jobs (2018), the 'moral and spiritual damage' inflicted by meaningless work reflects a profound political failure. Just like the late-Ming literati who poured their lives into a state that repaid them with hollow titles and bureaucratic decay, today's workers withdraw from institutions that exploit their labor yet treat them as disposable. Unlike French philosopher Michel de Montaigne's introspective self-examination in his Renaissance-era Essays , xiaopin refuses utility. In doing so, it inverts the contemporary self-help trend critiqued by Byung-Chul Han, which co-opts personal 'healing' as a form of productivity through neoliberal logic. Xiaopin proposes resistance as an existential shift beyond (self-)optimization. Its most radical gesture is not to demand change but to live as if the system's demands are irrelevant. Xiaopin asks: What is progress without presence? Its fragments — on lotus ponds, summer naps, a cat's shadow — prove that resistance need not be loud. Like Japanese writer Haruki Murakami's vision of contemporary literature as 'space of individual recovery,' the genre shelters us from 'hierarchy and efficiency.' Here, time is not spent but reclaimed. To pause in an age of weaponized ambition is in fact revolt. Tracing a petal's vein, sipping tea until bitterness fades, lying flat as the machinery of productivity grinds on — these are not acts of shirking reality but defiant gestures against the systems that feed on our exhaustion. They are affirmations of agency: microcosms where we rehearse what it means to belong to ourselves, and thus, to the world. Xiaopin 's revolution awakens in a flicker of attention: a reminder that presence, too, is a language — one that hums beneath the buzz of progress, waiting to be heard. Jason Wang is a postdoctoral fellow at the Modern Literature and Culture Research Center, Toronto Metropolitan University, and Xiao He is a master's student in the Department of East Asian Studies, University of Toronto. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Reuters
2 days ago
- Business
- Reuters
Bullish bets surge on Asian currencies as US-China thaw, trade deals rattle dollar
May 29 (Reuters) - Investors piled up bullish bets on Asian currencies, including the yuan, as easing U.S.-China tariff tensions, new trade deals and a growing unease with U.S. policies prompted them to pull out of dollar assets, a Reuters poll showed on Thursday. Investors sought long positions across the board, with those in the Taiwanese dollar and Philippine peso climbing to their highest since the end of 2020, according to the fortnightly poll of 10 respondents. All responses were collected before a U.S. trade court on Wednesday blocked President Donald Trump's sweeping tariffs, ruling he overstepped his authority by imposing duties on countries with trade surpluses against the United States. Long bets on the Chinese yuan were the highest since October last year - a month before Donald Trump was re-elected as the President of the United States - buoyed by signs of renewed dialogue on trade between Washington and Beijing after months of posturing and threats. The yuan rose 1% this month. Trump's tariff flip-flops and the mounting worries over a ballooning U.S. deficit have dented confidence in American assets, piling pressure on the dollar and driving investors toward Asian currencies. "Asian currencies are likely to stay firm against the U.S. dollar (USD) due to diversification outflows from USD assets into Asia, with investors being concerned over U.S. trade policy and its fiscal trajectory given proposed tax cuts", said Wei Liang Chang, market strategist at DBS Bank. Southeast Asian leaders have also reached an understanding that any bilateral agreements they might strike with the United States on trade tariffs would not harm the economies of fellow members. Parisha Saimbi, an FX strategist at BNP Paribas, said Asian currencies would remain somewhat supported, helped by the U.S.-China de-escalation and bilateral trade deals being reached. Meanwhile, the Taiwanese dollar has gained more than 6% in May to record its best ever monthly gain. Taiwan's president dismissed "false" claims of currency talks with Washington earlier in May, after the Taiwan dollar spiked on speculation the U.S. had pushed for its appreciation, fuelling market jitters over potential FX policy shifts. The South Korean won has also jumped more than 4% this month amid a broad dollar selloff, with Seoul officials confirming currency policy was on the table during recent talks with U.S. counterparts in Milan, fuelling speculation of joint FX moves. Bullish bets returned to the Indonesian rupiah for the first time since October 2024, as some investors looked past ongoing fiscal concerns and bet on policy direction stabilising. Elsewhere, bullish bets on the Malaysian ringgit and Thai baht rose to their strongest levels since October 2024. The Asian currency positioning poll is focused on what analysts and fund managers believe are the current market positions in nine Asian emerging market currencies: the Chinese yuan, South Korean won, Singapore dollar, Indonesian rupiah, Taiwan dollar, Indian rupee, Philippine peso, Malaysian ringgit and the Thai baht. The poll uses estimates of net long or short positions on a scale of minus 3 to plus 3. A score of plus 3 indicates the market is significantly long U.S. dollars. The figures include positions held through non-deliverable forwards (NDFs). The survey findings are provided below (positions in U.S. dollar versus each currency):
India.com
3 days ago
- Business
- India.com
After giving weapons to Pakistan, China makes another SHOCKING move, trouble for US due to...
(File) Pakistan economy: China has enhanced its military and economic support to Pakistan after the latter suffered a humiliating defeat at India's hands in the recent military conflict, in which Pakistani forces employed Chinese-made weaponry, including fighter jets and long-range air-to-air missiles. According to reports, after weapons, Beijing has now opened up its coffers to bolster Islamabad, approving a commercial loan of $3.7 billion for the cash-strapped country, which will be made available before the end of June. China approves $2.4 billion loan to Pakistan However, apart from its primary purpose of boosting Pakistan's ruined economy, China's loan, which includes a $2.4 billion payout maturing in June, is being seen as another move by Beijing to counteract the dominance of the US dollar in global trade as the loan is will be made available in Chinese RMB, instead of USD. Citing government sources, Pakistan-based Express Tribune reported that Beijing has assured Islamabad in recent meetings that it will refinance loans maturing between March and June 2025. Pakistan has already repaid a $1.3 billion loan to the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ISBC) in three installments between March and April this year, the report quoted officials as saying. Pakistan forex reserves Meanwhile, the foreign exchange reserves at Pakistan's central bank stood at $11.4 billion after the International Monetary Fund (IMF) approved a $1 billion loan installment earlier this month. Islamabad's forex reserves are expected to rise to $12.7 billion after it receives the latest tranche of Chinese funds, the report said. The $2.1 billion or 15 billion Yuan loan will be sourced from three commercial banks, and China has extended it for three years, it added. Economists point out that a timely refinancing of Chinese funds was crucial for Pakistan to main its forex reserves in double digits by June end, failing which the country's foreign currency reserves would have fallen below $10 billion. Pakistan's deal with the IMF mandates that it boosts forex reserves to around $14 billion this fiscal year.
Daily Tribune
5 days ago
- Business
- Daily Tribune
AI Data Lake Solution launched at Huawei summit
TDT | Tashkent At the 4th Huawei Innovative Data Storage Summit, Huawei introduced its new AI Data Lake Solution, designed to help industries implement artificial intelligence more effectively. The announcement came during a keynote address titled 'Data Awakening, Accelerating Intelligence with AI-Ready Data Infrastructure,' delivered by Yuan Yuan, Vice President of Huawei Data Storage Product Line. The AI Data Lake Solution integrates four main components—data storage, data management, resource management, and AI toolchain—to help deliver AI corpus data and improve model training and inference capabilities. In his address, Yuan provided details about the products and technologies: Data storage: continuous innovation in performance, capacity, and resilience • Accelerated AI model training and inference: The Huawei OceanStor A series high-performance AI storage delivers exceptional performance. For instance, it enabled the AI technologies developer iFLYTEK, among others, to significantly boost cluster training efficiency. Its advanced inference acceleration technology enhances inference performance, reduces latency, and elevates the application user experience, accelerating the deployment of large-model inference applications in production environments. • Efficient storage of mass AI data: The OceanStor Pacific All-Flash Scale-Out Storage offers a high-capacity density of 4 PB/2 U and ultra-low power consumption of 0.25 W/TB. Designed to manage exabytescale data with ease, it is well-suited for data-intensive workloads across education, scientific research, medical imaging, and media. • AI corpus and vector database backup: Huawei's OceanProtect Backup Storage provides 10 times higher backup performance than other mainstream options and boasts 99.99% ransomware attack detection accuracy, safeguarding key data of training corpus and vector databases in fields like oil and gas and MSPs. Data management: data visibility, manageability, and mobility across regions Huawei's Data Center Management (DME) platform incorporates the Omni-Dataverse to help reduce data silos across geographically distributed data centers. Its data retrieval system can process over 100 billion files in seconds, helping organizations access and utilize their data more efficiently. Resource management: pooling of diverse xPUs and intelligent scheduling of AI resources The Datacenter Virtualization Solution (DCS) platform uses virtualization and container technologies to provide xPU resource pooling and scheduling, helping to improve resource utilization. The DataMaster in DME offers AI-powered operations and maintenance with AI Copilot, including features such as Q&A, O&M assistance, and inspection tools to support IT operations. With the full arrival of the intelligent era, data has become the core resource driving the development of artificial intelligence. Shahin Hashim, Associate Research Director at IDC pointed out, 'In the AI era, building ultra scalable, efficient and sustainable data infrastructure is crucial, and the key lies in achieving performance at scale, frictionless data mobility, strong governance, and resilience by design.' Addressing enterprises' critical data storage demands in the AI era, Jun Liu, Vice President of All-Flash Storage Domain, Huawei Data Storage Product Line delivered a keynote speech and unveiled the next-generation OceanStor Dorado converged all-flash storage. This innovative solution is designed to accelerate enterprise digital and intelligent transformation through converged, resilient, and intelligent all-flash storage capabilities. With emerging technology trends like AI, new security threats such as ransomware attacks have also surfaced. Yahya Kassab, General Manager - KSA, Gulf & Pakistan, Commvault, stated: 'Business-critical IT data infrastructure must demonstrate greater resilience against potential security threats. Commvault and Huawei OceanProtect have built a joint solution that comprehensively safeguards data security and reliability through backup, ransomware detection, encryption, and other technologies.'
India Today
5 days ago
- Sport
- India Today
French Open 2025: Jasmine Paolini battles past Yuan Yue to reach second round
Fresh off a historic title run in Rome, Jasmine Paolini carried her momentum into the French Open, grinding out a tough first-round win over China's Yuan Yue at Roland Garros on world No. 4 and fourth seed had to dig deep to get past Yuan, eventually prevailing 6-1, 4-6, 6-3 on Court Suzanne-Lenglen. The result extended Paolini's winning streak to seven matches and underlined her growing authority on looked in full control early on, racing through the first set with commanding baseline play and solid serving. But Yuan, a former Top 40 player, grew more aggressive in the second and capitalised on a patch of unforced errors from Paolini to level the match. Yuan carried that momentum into the deciding set, breaking Paolini to go up 3-2 and threatening to pull off the biggest win of her career. But Paolini held her nerve. The Italian broke back immediately and reeled off the final four games to close out the the win, Paolini moves within one victory of matching her career-best winning streak. Her form has surged since lifting the Internazionali BNL d'Italia title earlier this month, becoming the first Italian woman in four decades to claim the Rome resurgence on clay has been a key storyline on the WTA Tour. Last year, she reached her first Grand Slam final in Paris, the first Italian woman to do so since Flavia Pennetta won the 2015 US Open. Weeks later, she backed it up with another deep run, reaching the Wimbledon final."It was tough," Paolini said. "I won quite easy the first set but then she started to play better. A bit of emotions came out."I was then 3-2 down with a break but I did it. Hopefully I will play better then next round. We will see."In the second round, Paolini will face either Ajla Tomljanovic or Maya Joint, both from Australia. She has never played either on Sunday, 18th seed Donna Vekic - a finalist at the Paris Olympics - battled past Russia's Anna Blinkova 7-5, 6-7(4), 6-1. Vekic struck nine aces during the match, while Blinkova failed to register any, underscoring the Croatian's edge on Watch
