Last month the character for demolish (chai) appeared on the buildings in the “village” near our office. This week, it all came to pass. The copy shop, the mom&pop shop, the donkey burger restaurant, the beauty parlor, the “Fat Boy Noodles” restaurant, the bike repair shop, the Kodak shop—–all gone. Everyone’s had to look for […]
A Qin Dynasty German?
The wire services today published a bizarre story today about a German art student who dressed up like a terra-cotta warrior, snuck into the pit where they are displayed, and stood at attention for a few minutes before he was spotted by police and arrested! Here’s the full story from AP: A German art student […]
Naked Oats
No, that’s not the name of an alternative rock group that plies the underside of Beijing night-life. It’s a term that I spotted numerous times on the menu of a restaurant I was in earlier this evening. As is not usually the case in that part of town, this menu was in both Chinese and […]
Shanghai Sunshine
A friend of mine who writes a monthly article for "That’s Shanghai" magazine has just published another of his great essays on life in Shanghai. This one is titled Here Comes the Sun, and here’s the opening to whet your appetite: There is an environmental disaster of epic proportions looming over the great city of […]
Night Train to Manchuria
I’m off on the night train to Manchuria tonight. Well, it’s not really called Manchuria anymore, but Dongbei (the Northeast). I’m going to Changchun for the weekend. Changchun was the capital of the Japanese occupation in the 1930’s and 1940’s, and thus was the home to China’s last emperor, whom the Japanese installed as a […]
Walking a Chicken?
For the past couple of weeks I’ve noticed a granny sitting on a little plastic stool in the grass outside my building. Seeing grannies sitting on stools watching the world go by is a farly common sight in China, especially out on the streets and lanes. What’s struck me as a bit odd is her […]
