What’s Going On Here?

Man humps statue
Don’t know, don’t care. But don’t let me stop you from leaving your best guess in the comments section. Via China News (H/T Alicia)

Restaurant In Harbin Employs Robots, Including WALL-E

Robot restaurant 1
The singularity approaches ever closer. At a restaurant in Harbin, Heilongjiang province called Haohai Robot Themed Restaurant (昊海机器人主体餐厅), robots greet customers, cook and serve food, and generally charm. Even WALL-E, the lovable protagonist in the Pixar movie by the same name, calls this place home*. We’re told that the restaurant employs 18 robots, each with... Read more »

A Bad Day For Nanjing’s Street Enforcement Officers

Chengguan and watermelon vendor
We’ve documented here that chengguan — China’s urban management/street enforcement officers — are not generally favored by the people. You might think it unfair to call them street thugs, but that’s the reputation they’ve built for themselves, and while some chengguan, surely, are decent, it’s unfortunate that it will almost always be the bad apples who... Read more »

Another Riot In Guangdong, Caused By Teens Fighting, Reportedly With Casualties [Video]

Shaxi riot 1
Less than an hour after posting about the upheaval in Zuotan, Foshan, Guangdong province, I realized there was a bigger, concurrent riot in the province, in Zhongshan City. According to NetEase via the website Democracy and Law Network, the fight started Monday around 6 pm when, in front of a primary school, a 13-year-old got beat up... Read more »

Upheaval Over Land Dispute In Guangdong

Guangdong upheaval 2
China Digital Times curates a news story from Caijing reporting that yesterday before dawn, thousands of residents clashed with hundreds of riot police in Zuotan, part of the city of Foshan, Guangdong province. According to Caijing: “Zuotan officials secretly arranged for the sale of land in three neighborhoods to developers. The officials thought they could claim... Read more »

This Is Why You Should Never Play Real-Life Frogger

Boy plays Frogger featured image
This is not the first time within the last four months that someone playing real-life Frogger in China has been captured on video losing. In March, there was this (I added the music... it seemed appropriate at the time), in which a man sprinting across heavy traffic gets nailed by a van in the furthermost lane. Apparently that video wasn't enough of a deterrence, a clear message that real-life Frogger is a bad idea.

Grandmother Chops Off Eight-Month-Old Granddaughter’s Hands

Baby in surgery
Not sure why this news story exists, existentially speaking, but earlier today, Shenzhen Media Group reported that on Saturday, a grandmother in Jinan, Shandong province cut off the hands of her eight-month-old granddaughter before trying to commit suicide (she survived). What does one do with a story like this? The Daily Mail picked it up... Read more »