The haute urban fad that is White Collar Boxing spread to China earlier this year, culminating in bouts that doubled as a black-tie charity event (November 17 in Beijing, December 1 in Shanghai). The highlight video for the Beijing event, "Brawl on the Wall," was just released to YouTube yesterday. More than 500 people reportedly attended to watch eight fights by amateur boxers who had spent the previous three months training.
Despite our initial assessment of the "international" magic carnival that happened from Saturday to Monday in Beijing, magic is actually pretty cool, as are magicians. ITN has highlights of performers doing their thing.
Image taken from People’s Daily’s infamous and now deleted slideshow (seriously) Last week, Time Magazine opened a reader poll for its Person of the Year, prompting us to ask whether Bo Xilai should win. Turns out, that was the wrong question. The question should be: by how many votes will Kim Jong-un win by? Because... Read more »
Are you sick of Christmas yet? The tawdry lights, varnished commercialism, snowy cliches? Has the inner cynic in you roused like the rough beast slouching toward Bethlehem?
Then this story is for you. Via the Washington Post:
To celebrate the Sackler Gallery’s 25th anniversary, Cai Guo-Qiang, the Chinese artist famous for his Olympic pyrotechnics display and his gunpowder art, plans to ignite a daytime fireworks show on the Mall that riffs on the Christmas tree lightings taking place around the country.
Chen Guangcheng, in a measured, carefully scripted nine-and-a-half minute speech that was just released on YouTube, name-drops two dozen activists and dissidents while calling on world leaders to focus more attention on China's human rights. "Dear Mr. Xi Jinping, the whole nation is watching you," he says. "Whether you will follow the call of heaven and people to carry out reform, or kidnap the government and maintain the power of the Communist Party, is a matter of whether China will have the transition in a peaceful way or a violent way."
Talentless but big-breasted Gan Lulu, who skyrocketed to infamy when her mother filmed her naked last year -- then wore a diamond dress at the Beijing Auto Show in April -- is back in the news. She and her younger sister, Gan Maomao, along with their attention-starved mother, Lei Bingxia, were recently guests on Jiangsu Educational Television's game show Bang Bang Bang when the three vixens began exchanging profanities with an audience member who asked if Gan has damaged China's morality.
After I wrote about the the Henan AIDS epidemic still haunting this country, Sonja Jo tweeted at us the above video by activist Hu Jia, uploaded yesterday. It shows Henan petitioners gathered around the Ministry of Civil Affairs office in Wangfujing on Thursday, some wearing red ribbons on their coats or lapels. The video description says the petitioners were there for three days, tailed by Beijing police the whole time. Officials did not come out to address their concerns.
Maybe China isn't so upset at Elton John after all. Here is the man talking to China Central Television anchor James Chau for CCTV News (English edition). Via CCTV:
Huge, rolling flames. Xinhua reports that the fire began just after 7 pm around Xihongmen subway station in Daxing District. The thick smoke rose more than 10 meters. Firefighters were able to control it relatively quickly. About 300 square meters of property were damaged, but there were no casualties. The cause of the incident is still under investigation.
Dudes wearing creepy, creepy masks pulled down their pants, held orange-red plastic pails over their privates, and masturbated while scantily-clad female models did sexually suggestive things, including with dildos and blow-up dolls. And it wasn’t for a porno — a terrible, terrible porno that no one would watch. Who wants to explain? “On the afternoon... Read more »
