March 25 – March 31
We launched a new weekly series called Three Shots With. Our first two videos: with the Beijinger‘s backpage columnist George Ding, and Smart Shanghai/Beijing editor Morgan Short. Also check out Greg Donohue’s inaugural Pedagog column, about teaching English in China.
Someone wrote another “Why I’m Leaving China” piece — it was ridiculous — and CNN Money actually published it. A huge sinkhole in Shenzhen swallowed a man and killed him — it was, shockingly, all caught on tape.
A couple of Peng Liyuan photos got censored on Chinese Internet this week. (During better times, here she is singing in Russian.) A suspected mistress in Lanzhou, Gansu province was publicly stripped and beaten.
A bus driver escaped serious injury after a pole crashed through his windshield. Foshan police say they didn’t beat a driver, but they were filmed beating him! Map that breaks down social media usage by country is cool, shows China is self-isolating.
Here’s a motorcycle crashing into a van, and exploding. North Korea is still playing Brood War while the rest of the world has moved on to Heart of the Swarm. Six Danes take a leak outside their bus on an overpass in Shanghai. Squid bombs are real, as are sausage double beef burgers from McDonald’s.
Fan Bingbing will appear in a China-only version of Iron Man 3. The most wonderful picture from the BRICS Summit is here. David Beckham slipped and fell while trying to take a free kick in Wuhan, and The Guangdong Southern Tigers won the CBA title on Friday. Good for them.
Finally, go look at this GIF of North Koreans pumping their fists.
Comment of the Week:
Herbie, on the two Peng Liyuan photos deleted off Chinese Internet (including one of her serenading troops on Tiananmen Square in June 1989):
Ironically, back in 96, I was Dj’ing at the cavernous Oriental No.1 club in Beijing and for some reason the boss hired in the central band of the PLA. They’d march up and down the dancefloor playing the Radetsky march then pause and play the national anthem as a huge flag was raised.
For a month my first tune as they marched off the dancefloor and the crowd pushed through was none other than Public enemy’s “Fight the power”… lol, if only they knew.
