八八吧 · 88 Bar

I have visited a few hutong houses. While some of my former Microsoft expatriates like the exotic feelings and the bragging rights of living in the hutong houses, I would not want to live there. These hutong houses usually have no private bath room, no heating and no insulation. The temperature of Beijing can drop to as low as -10 C in the winter.…

Continue readingA different point of view on the last of the hutongs…

Stunning photographs from Craig Mod of his semi-recent trip to Tibet, including monks eating French fries…

See more here.

Banco Santander is planning a $400 million+ joint venture with China Construction Bank to develop rural China. One possible perk, China South America points out, is that they may be able to bypass the 20% ownership limit for foreign ownership of urban banks.

See China South America for more details.

Retro 80s:

Via the NeochaEDGE newsletter.

Chinayouthology has a piece over on their blog explaining who the Chinese hipsters are. The term of “hipsters” in Chinese is 潮人, which literally translates to “trendy/hip person” and sounds a bit like 超人 (“super man”). The term is more straightforward than the American word “hipster” and not as unique a classifier. (Arguably, the term…

Continue readingDissecting China’s “hipsters”

I found this many months ago but it is still relevant. From a Reuters article on the one-child policy:

China’s famous “one child” policy is actually less rigorous than its name suggests, and allows urban parents to have two offspring if they are both only children. Rural couples are allowed a second child if their first is a girl.

…

Continue readingAdding some nuance to the one-child policy

Leung Chun-ying writes in the Hong Kong Journal about Hong Kong’s future as “Asia’s world city” and the two key problems it faces:

1. Local income disparity: “Restaurant workers today earn 4% less than they did 17 years ago. Workers in fast food outlets earn 19% less. Those driving container lorries earn 30% less.” + “Barely a quarter of Hong Kong…

Continue readingA review of Hong Kong’s future

He is singing about Chinese New Year. It is awesome.

Via Adri.

招财童子 (the wealth-bringing-seeking children) are a suite of Chinese-themed, adorable, cartoon characters. For example:

Since I profiled their Opera-themed siblings in 2007 (here), they’ve become famous enough to appear on T-shirts, silly Flash animations and phone cards:

Happy preemptive Chinese New Year folks!…

Continue readingSome cute for Chinese New Year

According to CNNGo:

“Live like the pleasant goat, and marry someone like the big big wolf.” That’s one of China’s most well-known catchphrases since the cartoon “The Pleasant Goat and the Big Big Wolf” (喜羊羊灰太狼), the first domestically produced Chinese cartoon, was broadcast in 2005. The characters starring in nearly 600 episodes,…

Continue readingA look back at China’s first domestically produced cartoon