The information that follows was compiled by BJC editor-at-large RFH after a chat with the shadowy Tan Guan, whose position at Global Times is unknown. All views expressed below are to be... A certain article in a particular newspaper has caused some people on the Western Internet to debate so-called “virginity values." Yesterday, even the WSJ China editor chimed in on Sina Weibo: “How was a misogynistic ar ...

Foreign commissioning editors get a lot of pitches like this: "The Chinese are now watching Homeland / eating caviar / behaving like us." These activities usually owe to the fact that a few ultra-wealthy Chinese have found some new, pointlessly expensive Western habit -- like high-end gold hi-fi aficionado clubs, or bottles of purified Moon water with powdered diamante -- and taken them up. The reasons behi ...

By TAR Nation and RFH Ed's note: TAR and RFH have diametrically opposed opinions about Aaron Sorkin's The Newsroom, starring Jeff Daniels as a news anchor who, in one lapse of honesty, sees his world turned upside-down. Characters sing "arias of facts," as the New Yorker's review put it, which sounds a lot like what news organizations closer to home -- in China -- do. So, TAR and RFH set aside their disagre ...

By RFH Idea for an honest advert: Scene: A log cabin in remote woods. Five teens of mixed ethnicity/affability convene in a spooky basement to investigate a noise. Suddenly, the cast-iron stove in the back noisily cranks into action, pipes groaning. The teens gather round as, inside the stove, coals glow red-hot and wisps of smoke emerge. Suddenly the door bangs open, startling everyone. Inside, some kind o ...

Two exhibitions opened in Beijing this weekend, both small yet worthier of a visit than many of the major ones held at, for example, the National Museum of China (unless you have a pressing interest in Louis Vuitton luggage). Saturday saw the launch of “Art, Design, Culture: The History of Penguin by Design,” first exhibited at London’s V&A. It recounts the history of the paperback (or Penguin’s at least), ...

By RFH You've probably wondered how the Chinese public bathroom experience could be made any less savory. We've seen a few methods: stinging nettles around an earthen hole; a local pensioner eyeballing the foreigner's bowel movement. Routine stuff. But how about an unwelcome penis being jabbed in your eye? Head out to the Chanping public bathroom, close to their shooting range, where you'll find what is -- ...

By RFH Sad tidings this week, via Chris “Devonshire” Devonshire-Ellis. CDE – not to be confused with CBE (Commander of the British Empire, a British honour bound to come his way soon, one way or another) – has announced that he is leaving China in a rambling post on his otherwise unheard-of blog, China Briefing. Mostly, readers are treated to a lengthy exegesis of his CV -- emphasis on lengthy -- with added ...

By RFH Recently a doctor on Weibo recalled the story of a patient – a kabob (chuanr, in Beijing patois) seller – who came in with stab wounds in the 1980s after getting into a ruckus with a customer. Upon surgery, his problems were found to be far worse than previously assumed. His stomach was riddled with tapeworms. What prompted this tale? Mr. Xie from Yongkang, Zhejiang called up Zhejiang Online this wee ...

By RFH If you're planning a holiday to Guangxi this summer – home to to what's considered China's most picturesque landscape – here's a heads-up before you go swimming. There are man-eating piranhas in the river! According to the local fishery's department, the carnivorous South American fish is commonly found in the rivers of the province. Like New York's apocryphal sewer gators, the fish were originally b ...

What happens when you’re a socialist Chinese blowhard and you get your ass handed to you by a girl after challenging her to fisticuffs in a Beijing park? You tell everyone you won, of course. In one of those weird "This is China" moments, while the rest of Beijing came to a grinding halt over some light rain at 1 pm on Friday, a whole bunch of Web users and bloggers – all of whom were carrying at least four ...

[caption id="attachment_3801" align="alignnone" width="301" caption="Original picture from Global Times"][/caption] By RFH Reuters's anonymous sources (reliable, surely) may tell us that the upcoming 18th Party Congress – aka Xi Jingping’s coronation – will be delayed, but our reading of the tea leaves yields a different conclusion. If you can’t afford to visit North Korea this summer (where a long weekend ...

By RFH There's a new Paul the Octupus in town. In China. And he's a llama – no, not that kind. For some reason, and despite having fuck-all to do with Euro 2012, Tianjin Zoo is attempting to lure thrill-seekers to its no-doubt already white-knuckle zoological experience with a llama that can predict the actual results, thus saving many the effort of actually watching the game.  ...

We’ll have to wait until July before the results of the gaokao – national university entrance exams – are announced. When they are, state media's response will be as predictable and reflexive as British media et alia sticking an attractive blonde celebrating her A-levels on the front page (and pages 2,3,5,8 and 9). The top scorers become instant overnight celebrities. No craziness is spared, with "posters a ...

Louis CK played a show in Beijing last night; he spoke for just over an hour. Here’s what we can’t talk about – the organizers. Even though they were in season and up on stage last night, handing out the shout-outs like skittles, after midnight, they became as shy as hedgehogs and asked us not to even mention their names. So, thanks [redacted], [redacted] and [redacted] and special thanks to Louis’s officia ...

[caption id="attachment_3194" align="alignnone" width="450" caption="Who's the cat that won't cop out when there's danger all about mainland China?"][/caption] By RFH The 100 Days campaign has been providing many freelancers the opportunity to convince editors back home that there’s some kind of slash ’n’ burn bender going on. A lot of these articles have been boilerplate mush, oozing from the c ...

By RFH When the Chinese don’t have the time or money to visit a foreign country, they bring the foreign country to China. And they do it their way: at the Beijing World Park, for example, you can see Niagara Falls as it should have been (roaring into the Grand Canyon), learn that Southwark is a semi-autonomous region in South London, and see the default Chinese view of Africa – penis gourds and poverty, mos ...

By RFH Confounding even the most grounded of numerologists, the movements on today's Shanghai Stock Exchange have caused a minor stir. The index opened at: Open: 2,346.98 Day Range: 2,308.23 - 2,348.20 Year To Date: +4.96% Previous Close: 2,373.44 52-Week Range: 2,132.63 - 2,826.96 1-Year: -15.38% That's 2,346.98 as in 23 years since 4/6, which took place in '89. [Ed's note: For you Americans used to seeing ...

By RFH Will the UK media be waiting at the airport to greet the British "attempted rapist" (or molester, drunk lecher or whatever you believe) – or will he slip away into obscurity? That’s what we’re left wondering as the book closes on one of the ugliest chapters in foreigner-China relations in recent months, which has included a 100-day foreigner crackdown, a wave of anti-foreigner nationalistic sentiment ...

The Briton currently in police custody over allegations of sexual assault may be in plenty trouble - the Beijing Morning Post says he faces a "trial" in China, and his sorry story has even been reported by Reuters, in the New York Daily News and Kotaku – but so too may be the chaps who assailed him as he lay flat and out for the count on the highway near Xuanwumen on the night of May 8 (not, as Shanghaiist ...

An update of the story earlier today of the man accused of sexually assaulting a Chinese girl in Beijing: There's scant information that's verifiable. For example, a photograph has been offered up on Weibo (above) that purports to show the same man – or at least a man wearing the same trousers and shoes – accompanied by the following wholly unsubstantiated claim: "我次傲，这个社会真是乱了套了，出这些外国贱货，地铁上公开对女性性骚扰，车厢里来回窜，直 ...