Asian governments roll out 4-day weeks, WFH to solve fuel crisis caused by war • Hacker News Board

Re: Asian governments roll out 4-day weeks, WFH to solve fuel crisis caused by war

#251

Post by FpUser » Thu, Mar 12, 2026, 8:05 PM UTC

jghn wrote: post #84

neaden wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing I feel like is really important to remember whenever thinking about the world and demographics is that most people are Asian. As in more people live in Asia then outside of it. Conversely when a headline or something mentions Asia, it is rare they actually mean the majority of the continent or people living there.

My favorite is when people say they like "asian cuisine" or "asian food". China alone has several distinct cuisines. Why do we act like this is a monolithic concept?

>" Why do we act like this is a monolithic concept?"

Under "we" you mean white / the westerners? Because the majority of us do not give a flying fuck about other parts of the world. Not important enough. One can easily see how our media reacts to tragedies on one one side comparatively to the other.

As for food. I live in Toronto and can clearly distinguish between quite a few different "Asian" cuisines.

Re: Asian governments roll out 4-day weeks, WFH to solve fuel crisis caused by war

#252

Post by blobbers » Thu, Mar 12, 2026, 8:05 PM UTC

4 day work week would be so rad.

Re: Asian governments roll out 4-day weeks, WFH to solve fuel crisis caused by war

#253

Post by watwut » Thu, Mar 12, 2026, 8:05 PM UTC

recroad wrote: post #24

Why are they calling it the "Iran war". It's more like the US/Israeli War. Or more specifically, the US/Israeli assault on Iran.

That would made it hard to distinguish all the wars US started, threatened or will start.

Re: Asian governments roll out 4-day weeks, WFH to solve fuel crisis caused by war

#254

Post by jghn » Thu, Mar 12, 2026, 8:08 PM UTC

fullstop wrote: post #236

wat10000 wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And I doubt the contents of any of those menus are particularly close to what you'd find in the countries they claim to be from. It's really more like "Asian-inspired."

I often wondered about that. We hosted an exchange student for a few weeks, and he was from Nanjing. Before he left the country, we took him to a Chinese restaurant and warned him that it was likely going to be more like American-Chinese. He went through the menu and pointed out the dishes which were authentic and those which were not. I was surprised at how many were actually authentic -- it was about half of the me…

There's also the question of authentic/traditional to which part of china, in particular in cases where dishes with the same name aren't made the same. But beyond that, just because there's a dish on the menu one recognizes from their homeland doesn't mean it's prepared the same.

Re: Asian governments roll out 4-day weeks, WFH to solve fuel crisis caused by war

#255

Post by tesseract » Thu, Mar 12, 2026, 8:08 PM UTC

jimnotgym wrote: post #240

0x457 wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because there was a lot of cultural cross-contamination between these countries, there is a huge overlap in ingredients due to climate similarities and trade between neighboring countries. I group European & American food into their respective groups as well. > Asia rolls out 4-day weeks, WFH to solve fuel cris... Makes no sense, same with "I'm in a mood for asian food"

Ah I think I get it. Asian food = contains rice European food = contains wheat American food = contains liquefied synthetic cheese?

American food contains maize, obviously. This works for multiple understandings of the word "American" :)

Re: Asian governments roll out 4-day weeks, WFH to solve fuel crisis caused by war

#256

Post by manmal » Thu, Mar 12, 2026, 8:10 PM UTC

nuancebydefault wrote: post #230

bilsbie wrote: post #67

I wish we’d all go to four day work weeks. Over My whole life, 5 out of 7 full days of work always felt so daunting and almost dehumanizing. But 4/7 is mentally close to half and just feels way different qualitatively. If you have a job you mostly like, 4 days a week feels really sustainable.

I work 4 days a week (started because of a medical condition) and I think more people should do that. I even think that in those 4 days i get as much done as most others in 5 days because I can focus better, and sometimes when I feel like working in the non-work day I work a few hours for fun and interest.

I‘m a big fan of the four day workweek idea, but let’s not kid ourselves. 5 days are 5 days. I work 10h days usually and I just wouldn’t be able to fit all that work into 4 days.

Re: Asian governments roll out 4-day weeks, WFH to solve fuel crisis caused by war

#257

Post by ux266478 » Thu, Mar 12, 2026, 8:11 PM UTC

jghn wrote: post #84

neaden wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing I feel like is really important to remember whenever thinking about the world and demographics is that most people are Asian. As in more people live in Asia then outside of it. Conversely when a headline or something mentions Asia, it is rare they actually mean the majority of the continent or people living there.

My favorite is when people say they like "asian cuisine" or "asian food". China alone has several distinct cuisines. Why do we act like this is a monolithic concept?

In vulgar American English, "Asia" mostly just refers to the wider Confuciosphere + some parts of Central Asia (though rarely thought about.) Most Americans will look at you funny if you call Pakistan or Jordan Asian, because that's not how we use the word.

> China alone has several distinct cuisines. Why do we act like this is a monolithic concept?

When someone is talking about "Chinese food", they almost certainly are talking about the cuisine established by Chinese immigrants in their country, not food as it exists within China. This isn't unique to China.

More American vulgarism fun facts, "Chinese" wasn't pan-Chinese until somewhat recently. It pretty much exclusively meant Cantonese outside of very specific contexts, like geopolitics. This changed slowly starting in the 1970s, but emphasis on slowly and it still persists in interesting ways today.

Re: Asian governments roll out 4-day weeks, WFH to solve fuel crisis caused by war

#258

Post by 0x457 » Thu, Mar 12, 2026, 8:12 PM UTC

jimnotgym wrote: post #240

0x457 wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because there was a lot of cultural cross-contamination between these countries, there is a huge overlap in ingredients due to climate similarities and trade between neighboring countries. I group European & American food into their respective groups as well. > Asia rolls out 4-day weeks, WFH to solve fuel cris... Makes no sense, same with "I'm in a mood for asian food"

Ah I think I get it. Asian food = contains rice European food = contains wheat American food = contains liquefied synthetic cheese?

Pretty much, but not exactly. There is also a cooking technique (so American will be deep-fried).

Most national dishes are nothing more than adaptation of dishes from another country. Sometimes tweaks to ingredients, sometimes tweaks to techniques.

Re: Asian governments roll out 4-day weeks, WFH to solve fuel crisis caused by war

#259

Post by nkrisc » Thu, Mar 12, 2026, 8:12 PM UTC

jimnotgym wrote: post #240

0x457 wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because there was a lot of cultural cross-contamination between these countries, there is a huge overlap in ingredients due to climate similarities and trade between neighboring countries. I group European & American food into their respective groups as well. > Asia rolls out 4-day weeks, WFH to solve fuel cris... Makes no sense, same with "I'm in a mood for asian food"

Ah I think I get it. Asian food = contains rice European food = contains wheat American food = contains liquefied synthetic cheese?

American food = contains corn (maize), in all its glorious (ex. nixtamalized, unprocessed, flour, etc.) and unholy (ex. high fructose corn syrup) forms.

Re: Asian governments roll out 4-day weeks, WFH to solve fuel crisis caused by war

#260

Post by esseph » Thu, Mar 12, 2026, 8:13 PM UTC

quesera wrote: post #155

esseph wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've lived in over a dozen states and I've never heard either called anything other than EYE-(ran/raq) in conversation. The extremely, I mean extremely rare occasion when someone pronounces it differently on TV, it's almost like they get side-eyed by other people as trying to "talk fancy".

Well, I've lived in four states in the last 20 years. Anecdotally, the pronunciation popularity has split neatly along statewide-prominent political lines. For my four example states, three were correct/respectful, and one wrong/disrespectful. Correct pronunciation has also had an inverse correlation with the rates of active/former military employment, which might be more directly indicative. And a positive correlati…

I've been thinking about this a bit more and I think we're actually talking about two (or more) different pronunciations.

There is a VERY hard "I" that Lindsey Graham does. I think that's the specific version you're talking about, and that one is intentionally offputting. It's like "EYEEE RACK", but that does sound different from "AYERAK" or "EYEROQ".