SARS, Autumn Tiger, and MSF...

By Jian Shuo Wang on 2003-08-26 23:10 · Sars

I was frightened that there become rumors that SARS cases emerge again in west part of China. Is it true? I hope not.

Shanghai is still hot, exteremely hot. I started to be completely wet even when at 7:30 AM in the morning - we call it “Autumn Tiger” for this kind of hot weather after the begining of fall season. I heard that it is called “Indian Summer” in English. True?

Thank God that I passed MSF Practitioner Exam today. I didn’t prepared well for it, just like previous TOEIC test, but thank God, I passed it. About 2000 people in the world passed this exam now and about 5 of them is in China. Thanks for my friend Fang for take the initiative to pass it first and inspired me to give it a try.

6 Comments
Congralations!I never heard such rumor,but anyway,each one still should be careful,and more important,Hope Government can learn some lessons from this epidemic and take actions to improve national public sanitary system as possible as soon.
— Rebecca · 2003-08-27 08:56
Wow, now you are among the top 5 IT professionals in China ! let's pull out the cork of champagne... pop !
— Xu · 2003-08-27 14:08
I must say congratulation two times one day.

I lived in xi'an,western part of China,but I didn't hear about such rumor before I saw youe passage.

I think we had experienced the crisis,I maynot fear it again.Being careful is enough
— Toufu · 2003-08-27 21:37
"Autumn Tiger" is a wonderful name for the extra hot days that sometimes come before the real season of Autumn begins! You're correct that here in the US (I'm not sure about in other English-speaking countries) we do refer to "Indian Summer". I have always assumed the origin of the term had something to do with Native American Indians, but your question made me curious enough to look it up and I found this reference:

"Ships traversing the Indian Ocean loaded up their cargo the most during the "Indian Summer", or fair weather season. Several ships actually had an "I.S." on their hull at the load level thought safe during the Indian Summer."

That explanation makes much more sense to me than the others I found purporting to explain where the term originated, but I still think "Autumn Tiger" is best of all!
— Carroll · 2003-08-28 11:40
see you again sometime..
— Jette Sue · 2004-09-10 16:55
very nice and informal comments
— Sweety · 2005-04-20 17:41