My girlfriend once pointed out to me that Chinese bikes always have the seat quite low. “No one would do that in Holland”, she said, where people take bicycling quite seriously. “You can’t use all your leg strength and you get tired easily”. Of course, it’s a cliche to say that China is a “land of bicycles“. Gone are the fleets that once packed every street, replaced by a thousand honking Volkswagens. But there’s still millions of bikes, and as far as I can tell only one group places their seat high enough to extend their legs fully: sanlunche, or tricycle, drivers. Considering they haul people, furniture and nearly anything else this makes alot of sense. Most other bicyclists appear to keep their seats low in order to maintain a lower center of gravity, something helpful if you’re in congested traffic (read: always) or brake suddenly, but many suffer back problems as a result. Enter inventor Luo Jianping’s two seater bicycle – high seat to speed and energy conservation, low seat for traffic. With this, you may be able to outrun these guys.
Note: Bicycle cops look even dumber when their knees knock their elbows
There are some minor bits of technology that simply never took off in China. For example, here’s an article trumpeting the convenience of the answering machine, in which the author points out he doesn’t have to get out of the bath anymore when his phone rings. Voicemail and answering machines, however, are not at all common in China.
Another one is the clock radio. Though many are made in China, they are not readily available in shops. Consider this blog entry by a Chinese woman living abroad in the UK:
I have seen a cool device used to wake up the dramatis personae in many films in the past. As soon as I arrive the UK I found it called CLOCK RADIO in electronic shop by accident.
After a all night consideration I have decidedt to buy a cheapest one without caring if it is made in China. But, now I have another problem. The clock costs 3.49 pounds but the battery costs the same price!!!
In the end I bought the device and battery~~coz I really want to be woken up by live music in the morning but not the boring buzzer~
I am looking forward to the next morning:P~
That’s right – the clock radio, for most Chinese people, is simply something you see in the movies. Neither the clock radio or the answering machine are gadgets that Chinese people cannot afford or lack access to. These items just simply never caught on. And there are consequences – for example, clock radios gave birth to the witless phenomenon known as “The Morning DJ”.
One phenomenon I’ve stumbled onto in the Chinese internetz is a particular form of nationalism: the map of China revealed in nature phenomenon. It’s as simple as flipping through a baidu search for “Chinese maps” – numerous people and news sources post articles and pictures of rocks, trees and even clouds that look, at least to them, like China’s current territory. Sometimes they even have the appropriately sized pebbles for Taiwan and Hainan, like this one on sale at Taobao for an asking price of a modest 1,000,000 RMB (roughly $130,000 USD). Variousstonecollectors have rocks with markings that resemble China, depending on which historical period you’re thinking of, how patriotic you’re feeling at the moment, and perhaps how much you squint: “Rock found resembling China” seems to also be a perennialnewsstory as well, offering more examples: Of course, there are also those that people have made as well from natural materials, such as tree roots, forests, and DNA: But mostly I’ve come across pictures that are like some sort Rorschach test, where netizens have posted and shared photos of things in which they see China. In previous dynasties, the legitimacy of the Emperor was said to derive from the stars. Some Chinese netizens seem to see China reflected back in other parts of nature, but some even see it in the sky. Frankly, I think it looks more like North America. Perhaps the poster would say “Naturally – you’re an American! As a Chinese, I see China!” Perhaps, but after searching Google I have yet to so easily find even one example on the web of an American saying “Look! That cloud looks like the US mainland!”, let alone “And those little ones to the left are Hawaii!” No, in America, as well as Europe and Latin America, it is not the outlines of nations that appear to us in fuzzy shapes. No, these Rorschach tests reveal a different priority:
Shrine to the Cookie Sheet Virgin Mary that appeared in Houston 3 weeks ago The Glasgow Jesus Ultrasound
Image Courtesy of thetasteyoulove.com David Barbosa phoned one into the New York Times this past week: A People’s Sexual Revolution in China. David’s editors are to be congratulated for choosing a headline that has an honorable heritage stretching back to 1988.
Via Shanghaiist, China’s very own beatbox website bboxcn.com. They’ve got a whole bunch of mp3s for download as well, like The Roots’ Do You Want More?, and a graffiti photo album. Worth taking a closer look at…
Above is the satellite that China is launching into orbit around the moon later this year, named Chang’e One, after the goddess of the moon, Chang’e. The satellite, among other things, will broadcast 30 Chinese songs, including Who Doesn’t Say Our Hometown is Good《谁不说俺家乡好》 and Love My China《爱我中华》. No word on whether “One Night in Beijing” will be included. After the satellite, China plans to land a moon rover, which by all rights ought to be named Jade Rabbit. A recent article said that there are 13 designs competing to be the actual rover. Some of the possible competitors spotted online:
Rover entry by the Chinese Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC)
Shanghai Communication University, Harbin Industrial University projects
And then there’s the plans to follow the rover; the “third phase when a module will “drill out” moon material and bring it back to the earth”; the fourth is a manned lunar landing by 2017. And then? Well, the Chinese press is dragging out what look like classic Space Age illustrations to make their point: I’m sure this illustration is from some American space race literature – the moon rovers look like something from the more recent NASA moon rover art concepts. And there’s other times NASA art has been lifted:
Two weeks ago was the funeral of Murat Nasirov, Kazakhstani Uyghur pop singer in Russia. He died on January 19th when he plummeted from his apartment balcony. There are conflicting stories as to how he died. Officially, it was ruled a suicide. One report in the Russian media claimed that he had been at a nightclub, where one of his friends spiked their drinks with LSD, which led to Murat to behave erratically. His wife, meanwhile, insists he would never commit suicide and was poisoned. In an interview (blocked) with RFA’s Uyghur language broadcast, Natalia Nasirov said that Murat had plans to release a new album and was a proud Uyghur nationalist.
Nasirov’s fans within Xinjiang have remarked on his death as well. On the Uyghur language BBS forum Diyarim, a fewthreads have opened about him, as does the XabnamBBS (also in Uyghur Arabic script). Some Uyghurbloggers (blogging in Chinese and Latin alphabet Uyghur) have videos from YouTube and Tudou. And an entire page devoted to mourning the singer appears to have been set up at 163888.net (Chinese, with long written sections in Uyghur posted as images).
The largest thread on Diyarim has one very interesting post on Page 3: an essay by Nebijan Tursun titled “Murat Nasirof and I”. I am not fluent enough to tell you anything about the essay’s content, but I can tell you who Dr. Nabijan Tursun is: he was one of the contributors to the book Xinjiang: China’s Muslim Borderland, probably the most comprehensive collaborative work on Xinjiang. Together with James Millward, he co-wrote a chapter on the history of Xinjiang provocatively titled “Political History and Strategies of Control, 1884-1978”. Reportedly both authors have since been denied visas to China, and one contributor once told me they had heard a rumor that the book was angrily condemned within Zhongnanhai, and banned as subversive.
Murat Nasirov recorded one album of songs in the Uyghur language, Qaldim Yalghuz, a compendium of nakshisi (traditional folk songs), with a Russian pop twist. You can download them, using a proxy if you are in China, here. It is not clear how long these links will last.
Finally, here’s a video of a Russian song by Murat, which appears to be an upbeat pop song sang on a soundstage made to look like the dead Aral Sea, with cameos by members of the Addams Family.
While I’m waiting for China’s answer to the Matrix to come out, I look forward to seeing China’s “first fantasy” TV show, Magic Cellphone (魔幻手机). The hero gets his powers from his cellphone “robot” (3G?), according to Shanghaiist, which “travels through a time tunnel … and arrives in ancient times, where she meets characters from Chinese mythology such as Monkey King. Then she is brought back to 2006.”
Yeah, but the real question is when does he fight Hiro Nakamura from NBCs Heroes?
I have to agree with Shanghaiist – how they call this the “first” fantasy TV series is beyond me, especially since it will feature the Monkey King, who really has gotten enough TV shows already. Seriously. Stop it.
Above: Senator Robert Byrd shows how a legislative body in a real democracy does it. To be fair, American congressmen don’t often sleep in session. Instead, they just stay home.
China Digital Times has the links for five videos from the Crazed Migrant Workers (民工也疯狂), a trio of performers who lip sync to songs like Hotel California (加州旅馆) and Fearless (霍元甲). But my favorite has to be Curse of Golden Flowers (黄金甲) because of the guy in drag with balloons substituting for Gong Li’s cleavage. The video ends with the players, which include a real live migrant worker, introducing themselves.
My girlfriend once pointed out to me that Chinese bikes always have the seat quite low. “No one would do that in Holland”, she said, where people take bicycling quite seriously. “You can’t use all your leg strength and you get tired easily”. Of course, it’s a cliche to say that China is a “land of bicycles“. Gone are the fleets that once packed every street, replaced by a thousand honking Volkswagens. But there’s still millions of bikes, and as far as I can tell only one group places their seat high enough to extend their legs fully: sanlunche, or tricycle, drivers. Considering they haul people, furniture and nearly anything else this makes alot of sense. Most other bicyclists appear to keep their seats low in order to maintain a lower center of gravity, something helpful if you’re in congested traffic (read: always) or brake suddenly, but many suffer back problems as a result. Enter inventor Luo Jianping’s two seater bicycle – high seat to speed and energy conservation, low seat for traffic. With this, you may be able to outrun these guys.
Note: Bicycle cops look even dumber when their knees knock their elbows
