S. Korea sends out squads to bust kids for...studying...

[Placid Dingo]

Jenne is on the correct motorcycle.

Also it sucks that the bit Khara bolded reffers to creativity as a 'soft' skill. Ffs.

[Jenne]

Thanks, PD.  memy and deadfong--yes yes yes.

My husband's family is a clear example of overreaching.  His brother came here from Afghanistan via Pakistan in 2005 expecting to be a doctor.  I took one look at him and his personality, let alone his ability to grasp intellectual, analytical and bicultural issues/facts/whathaveyou...and said NAW.  He should move on and find something more suited to what he can do, not what he believes he SHOULD DO.  Fast-forwrad to today, and though he's spent 5 years in post-secondary enducation and has a BS in Biology, he's not one step closer to any real career, and having failed the MCAT *TWICE*, he has finally figured out he needs to do "something else."  :/

ONE thing that these folks trying hard to shoehorn their very traditional culture into the American Way of Life^TM is that they have not brought it to the other side of the spectrum:  act according to what you are suited most for, not just what you(r parents) aspire to be...  That sort of practice, living vicariously through your kids, is somewhat frowned upon here, still.  Luckily.  Or unluckily, since we have the opposite problem with our kids--all the confidence and none of the learning to show for it...hyuk hyuk.

But for some reason, when it comes to Westernized education in the Eastern lands...they have yet to tumble to ABILITY being a huge factor in what career/subject, etc.  a student should model him or herself after...let alone motherfucking INTEREST.

These parents don't understand that the world needs TEACHERS, CAR MECHANICS, TV REPAIR GUYS, SALESPEOPLE, HOTELIERS...etc. as much as it needs doctors, lawyers and engineers.

[Dalek]

Weren't S. Korean teenagers the guys that kept killing themselves over F's? Or was that japneese people?

[deadfong]

I think the answer is "all of the above?"

[Jenne]

I haven'td vetted this article very much or carefully, nor the reporting agency, but I'm guessing you mean reports like this:

http://news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=c2b8f3a43bbe3e0445f23274028d24a7

[deadfong]

Three Chinese-American students at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have killed themselves in the last three months. Two died by helium asphyxiation and the cause of death of the third student, though deemed a suicide, is yet to be determined.

I wonder if the deaths of those two was intentional.  It reminds me of an incident I read about a few years ago, three guys asphyxiating in a car because they thought it would be a good idea to roll up all the windows and then open up the valve on a canister of nitrous oxide.

At least they died laughing 

[Jenne]

Well ok.  Not the reaction I would have had, but death can be...funny/weird in ways, I guess.

[Cainad (dec.)]

Weren't S. Korean teenagers the guys that kept killing themselves over F's? Or was that japneese people?

Both, and it happens in American universities too. Cornell doesn't like to talk about their rate of student suicide...

[Triple Zero]

Three Chinese-American students at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have killed themselves in the last three months. Two died by helium asphyxiation and the cause of death of the third student, though deemed a suicide, is yet to be determined.

I wonder if the deaths of those two was intentional.  It reminds me of an incident I read about a few years ago, three guys asphyxiating in a car because they thought it would be a good idea to roll up all the windows and then open up the valve on a canister of nitrous oxide.

At least they died laughing 

Helium is actually the recommended method by the Church of Euthanasia (crazy "save the planet, kill yourself" organisation). I suspect if you're really serious about suicide (as opposed to the call-for-attention type) you'd research it on the Internet. It's relatively easily obtainable, certain, safe (for others), clean and painless.

As opposed to the kids in the car, who are merely dumb. The effect of nitrous is because of oxygen deprivation in the brain, so it's kinda important that you start breathing normal air again after you took a hit ...

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Three Chinese-American students at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have killed themselves in the last three months. Two died by helium asphyxiation and the cause of death of the third student, though deemed a suicide, is yet to be determined.

I wonder if the deaths of those two was intentional.  It reminds me of an incident I read about a few years ago, three guys asphyxiating in a car because they thought it would be a good idea to roll up all the windows and then open up the valve on a canister of nitrous oxide.

At least they died laughing 

That sounds like an urban legend.

[Triple Zero]

Could be, though like CO poisoning, with NO it's very possible that you don't realize you're suffocating until it's too late to do anything, like having enough strength or coordination to open up a window. Especially if you're expecting a "high".

I do wonder whether one canister of NO is enough to fill a car.

And I'm not sure, but if you run the AC on internal circulation, there shouldn't be too much oxygen coming from outside in, right? Plus the entire point of NO is that it drives out oxygen.

Which now makes me wonder why don't people get lightheaded from running the AC that way on a long ride with a lot of people in the car?

[deadfong]

Three Chinese-American students at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have killed themselves in the last three months. Two died by helium asphyxiation and the cause of death of the third student, though deemed a suicide, is yet to be determined.

I wonder if the deaths of those two was intentional.  It reminds me of an incident I read about a few years ago, three guys asphyxiating in a car because they thought it would be a good idea to roll up all the windows and then open up the valve on a canister of nitrous oxide.

At least they died laughing 

That sounds like an urban legend.

That got me wondering whether it was or not, then I found this, from 2005:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article596797.ece

In September, a man and a woman died in Sydney after they locked themselves in a car with friends and set off a cylinder of laughing gas. They died from hypoxia, a condition in which the body is starved of oxygen, a side-effect of inhaling too much of the gas.

That might be what I read, but fuck if I remember.

[deadfong]

Three Chinese-American students at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have killed themselves in the last three months. Two died by helium asphyxiation and the cause of death of the third student, though deemed a suicide, is yet to be determined.

I wonder if the deaths of those two was intentional.  It reminds me of an incident I read about a few years ago, three guys asphyxiating in a car because they thought it would be a good idea to roll up all the windows and then open up the valve on a canister of nitrous oxide.

At least they died laughing 

Helium is actually the recommended method by the Church of Euthanasia (crazy "save the planet, kill yourself" organisation). I suspect if you're really serious about suicide (as opposed to the call-for-attention type) you'd research it on the Internet. It's relatively easily obtainable, certain, safe (for others), clean and painless.

As opposed to the kids in the car, who are merely dumb. The effect of nitrous is because of oxygen deprivation in the brain, so it's kinda important that you start breathing normal air again after you took a hit ...

I was unaware of this use of helium.  Makes sense that overly stressed Caltech students would research the best/easiest way to do it beforehand.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Three Chinese-American students at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have killed themselves in the last three months. Two died by helium asphyxiation and the cause of death of the third student, though deemed a suicide, is yet to be determined.

I wonder if the deaths of those two was intentional.  It reminds me of an incident I read about a few years ago, three guys asphyxiating in a car because they thought it would be a good idea to roll up all the windows and then open up the valve on a canister of nitrous oxide.

At least they died laughing  

That sounds like an urban legend.

That got me wondering whether it was or not, then I found this, from 2005:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article596797.ece

In September, a man and a woman died in Sydney after they locked themselves in a car with friends and set off a cylinder of laughing gas. They died from hypoxia, a condition in which the body is starved of oxygen, a side-effect of inhaling too much of the gas.

That might be what I read, but fuck if I remember.

When I searched, I found several similar references to people dying in a car, but no original articles about it. More suspiciously yet, the number, genders, ages, and location of the people were very flexible.

But no original article. Just references in hype articles about how awful nitrous oxide is.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Cars, BTW, are far from airtight. If they were airtight, they would be as safe as being locked in a refrigerator.