Two Days in Guangzhou
Host your own lion dance and dodge alligators in grand restaurants while you explore this South China megalopolis
Andy is Web & Multimedia Director for The World of Chinese, where he's worked since 2009. He loves Sanmao, worships the Beijing stamp museum, and eats up anything to do with Chinese sports movies of the '50s and '60s (see 女篮5号 and Girl Divers).
Did you know Beijing has a troop of elephants, trained to kneel and bow as officials walk by?
Host your own lion dance and dodge alligators in grand restaurants while you explore this South China megalopolis
This dark comedy—a still hilarious and irresistible love story—may not seem like a milestone, but “Street Angel” (《马路天使》 Mǎlù Tiānshǐ) was the first Chinese movie not about high society. For the first time, it gave voice to Shanghai’s laboring classes. It was produced in 1937, and tells the story of a pair of sisters, […]
THE WINTER OF SANMAO China’s answer to Charlie Brown, Little Rascals and Li’l Orphan Annie, but very, very weird. The Winter of Sanmao was the first film to be released in Shanghai after the founding of the People’s Republic of China, and it’s a dark comedy about an orphan struggling on the streets of old […]
Hidden behind the beaches and beer is a gorgeous old city of steep hills, staircase sidewalks and anachronistic architecture
In any traditional Chinese pharmacy, one of the first things to strike a foreigner is always the ingredients… Frankly, they’re a little strange: dried sea horses, geckos, snakes, worms, a stuffed deer and one lone owl gazing down from above. Meanwhile, they’re hovered over by serious pharmacists in lab coats, consulting giant medical tomes. It […]
Your first book was about geography, your second was about history, what’s “Country Driving” about? Development and economics. All three books are about China, but I wanted them to have a different feel and a different emphasis. “Development and economics in China?” Aiya. Sounds like I’ve heard it before. What’s going to make it different […]
It’s green and hilly and hidden in jungle. It’s crowded and fast and obscured by skyscrapers, with one foot stepping back to the slow ancient temples and the other running hyper speed into the future. Tucked away somewhere between Manhattan and the future lies this oasis, split both in personality, and in geography: right through […]
This Inner-Mongolian band will have you dancing along to their tunes, but we suggest leaving the throat singing to these experts
A hotel with giant statues of ancient dudes. Why not?
Jia Zhangke last touched the screens with his meditative “Still Life,” a mesmerizing film about migrants and factory workers displaced by the damming of the Three Gorges. It was a realist masterpiece, hailed around the world as a work of art. Reviewers rarely penned a paragraph without making reference to Antonioni or Rossellini. “Jia Zhangke […]
