wow, i'm not international yet, although since the internet, i have friends all over the globe.

but as far as your host company saying they have no control over what their customers put on their websites, that sounds a little flimsy. when i started my bulk email blast service i did not realize my host company would not handle that kind of activity. They got on me right away about it. A good host company can tell by the bandwidth whats going on with a website. I'm glad my host company set me straight about it. I now use a Lyris bulk email host company and they take care of not only the bandwidth issues but any other kind of spam issues. Its great.

good luck with China -- i think you thought of a great work-around with gmail -- good old USA ingenuity -- they may be the firewall but we are still the light (thank God)