By RFH Sad tidings this week, via Chris “Devonshire” Devonshire-Ellis, or CDE as many know him. The erstwhile “Baron of Coigach” is leaving China, according to a post on his blog, China Briefing, but remains in touch with the title he inherited, somewhat expensively, in April 2011. As his online CV explains, Chris was one of the first... Read more »
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... Read more »
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... Read more »
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 or five umbrellas apiece – convened at the south gate of Chaoyang Park for a Grumble in Das Jungle.
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 with a tour group can cost a couple-thousand... Read more »
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... Read more »
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... Read more »
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 official Chinese sponsors, a new, Beijing-based, live, streaming porno site offering all users free credits per orgasm that can then be exchanged for Jack Daniel’s, Cheerios and Ray Bans; their site is found at [redacted].
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 chin of the great China news aggregator, but one particular piece about alleged racism at a newspaper, posted on... Read more »
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... Read more »
