Monday comedy spot/ Wanna be a Kung fu star?

Much as I hate the word kung Fu (as it means result of ones hard work) and martial arts is more wushu than kung fu.....

In the UK the Shitty TVB Chinese channel wants YOU yes you, even Laowai non Chinese readers in the UK to become the next Kung Fu star for TVB. All you have to do is present a 30 second clip of your signature 'move' and be a UK/HK/Chinese citizen of some sort.

The application form is here

UFC and MMA

Dear Chinese guy.

Why are there no prminent Chinese MMA or UFC fighters? Why aren't there some Chinese kung fu masters competing? They might even win!

Joe

Dear Joe

This is my theory and I could be wrong, but it boils down to several things:

One Chinese men are by and large smaller than caucasian and black men, sure we get people like Yao Ming who is massive and Mongolians who can be massive. But these are the exceptions and not the rule.

Apparently I'm a fairly tall Chinese person who is overweight..... I weigh 10 stone, I have to wear weight to skydive and a fast fall suit because I fall so slowly. My English native peers are about 4-5 stone heavier than me and much taller than me.

Take for instance Bruce Lee, he is a pretty small bloke compared to western natives. And he was half German. Or Bolo Yeung, Mr HK a massive massive body builder when stood next to Bruce Lee in Enter the Dragon. But not that big compared to westerners who primarily make up MMA, UFC.

I mean would you fight against a bloke who had 100 pounds on you in pure muscle?

Secondly, a great deal of Chinese martial arts emphasise defence by parrying, blocking and avoidance. I mean look at any wire work Jet Li movie. Yes it is a movie, but it shows him avoiding, blocking and parrying. Compare this to fist fights in Western movies. They pretty much stand there and knock the hell out of each other. Which was lampshaded by Tom Cruise in the film Far and Away. It sort of makes sense, i.e. it is better NOT to be hit than to be hit and to take less damage. I mean would you rather be punched in the face or not? Southern Martial arts based around Wing Chun for instance all emphasise superior blocking and parrying techniques.

But then it sort of like a Samurai sword duel first blow is almost always lethal and is the winner.

Compare to boxers who can pummel each other repeatedly and get used to the pummelling. Ali fighting Foreman took a massive beating for ages and ages. Joe Frazier did the same to Ali. Or Muay Thai Kick boxing, the proper proper art of eight limbs Muay Thai (though even the westernised softened up version seems pretty brutal to me). They pound each other like no tomorrow, they brutalise and train themselves and they get used to it.



Thirdly erm (for laughs)


Granted those people can probably snap my neck in a pinch


Fourthly Martial arts is dying out, the old grandmasters are dying out and people simply don't have the time to practice their skills and hone them. There is little incentive if you are a trainer in China, as very few people get into the training program to be an instructor and when they do become instructors the wages are LESS than working in factories. Thus while there may well be a lot of theory and lots of in action a lot of people simply don't bother. I mean you gonna fight hand to hand against this?

Whats new?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-13923082

Chinese being attacked in Paris...... tbh whats new this has been going on for decades if not centuries......

Asians and Chinese people are seen to be prosperous says the report, what it doesn't go into is the back breaking labour put in to become prosperous. My work week (hence my lack of updates and postings and rantings) has grown somewhat and I average at 80 hours a week now, sometimes going over 100 hours a week.

People see me as 'lucky' to have so much money and they think it just appears in my pocket or something.....meh.... I need a vacation or something

Voting

Dear TCG,

How do elections in Hong Kong work? I know it isn't completely democratic
but can you give more clear explanation than Wikipedia?

凱文



I'm afraid not, namely because I don't actually vote, no I am not a non voting felon either its just that tbh I don't believe in voting and believe it is an activism sponge when really only direct action works.

Wanna be in the Movies (UK only again)

Wanna be on TV (UK only)

Picked this up from somewhere

The BBC3 Series The World's Strictest Parents is looking for British Chinese teenagers (16-18 years old) to feature on the program.

In the series teens get sent to a family around the world for a week this summer where they live by their rules and their cultural expectations. In past series teens have been sent to India, Kenya, Barbados and the USA. We are looking for teens who would benefit from this the most, may it be that they are partying too much, not focusing on their education or not spending enough time with their family.

We have never featured a teen with Chinese parentage on the series and felt it would be interesting to address this imbalance.

If you are interested or know anyone who may benefit from this please do get in contact with the World's Strictest Parents team on 02074247706 or jamiefranklin@twentytwenty.tv

Thanks and best of luck.

Here is a family from Alabama.



Heh

Lest we forget

sex

Sex in China.

Chinese guy...

I was in Beijing a few weeks ago and stayed in a pretty big hotel near Wangfujin. One thing I noticed that there were large numbers of well dressed what I can only describe as white men who were in the hotel lobbies sat around in the lounge. Sometimes they would leave only to come back a little later on I saw some evenings.

Whats going on?

Ash.

Dear TCG

Why are there so many men in suits lurking around the edges of night clubs in Beijing?

Connie


And others




Dear All

They could merely be employees or guests of the hotels and patrons of the night clubs out to enjoy themselves to kick back and have some fun sometime. However that is a terrifically boring answer so I'll speculate a little.

OTOH they could be ducks. What are ducks then I imagine you may ask. Ducks are gigolos, men who get paid to have sex with women. You read that right men who get paid to have sex with women. Ash is a bit of an androgynous name you could be a man or a woman.

But simply women need some luvin' too.

You might think hold on with the gender imbalances in China why on earth would women go to ducks to get some time in the sack? I mean women can just go to any bar and walk out with a man easy.

While the reverse is less easy!

The thing is this is China, and much like Asia although it is rapidly changing, sex is still rather taboo and kept under wraps. Sex? Whats that? I use artificial insemination mate......

Secondly in China you have what we call well they call left over women. Since TCG sees nothing wrong with dating a woman in her late 20s and 30s. I haven't dated anybody older though so I can't really comment on any age range outside this. Women who simply focused upon other things instead of a love life. Things get in the way like work and education.... they put off love lives or simply don't want love lives and boom they hit a certain age and suddenly men don't want to go out with them. Or so it seems that way anyway. A myriad of reasons. Though TCG sees nothing wrong with not being married and absolutely hates the way in which being married is seen as a milestone everybody has to achieve in their lives.

*Cough*


Part of this is something else though. Kazuo Koike & Ryoichi Ikegami wrote something similar in the 1980s Manga Crying Freeman about Emu Hino. Her father was a uber rich businessman and as a result men would be afraid of her father. Thus nobody would dare approach her to ask her out. Thus the power and money isolates this person.

I mean remember this is China, money = power (yeah ok so money makes the world go round everywhere) And Tbh to make big piles of money you have to generally do things which are shall we say questionable. Like IBM's creators and stock holders being in bed with Hitler. Or Tony Blair who made millions from Iraq and tried to cover it up. Sure sure you get exceptions like erm......

Give me a moment.....

I'll think of one sooner or later.

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Moving swiftly on... (feel free to provide examples)

Sort of like Mr Burns from the Simpsons who fictionally has done a ton of questionable things. Anyway Money in China is power as it is in many places around the world. Thus it can be risky.

As lampooned in Red Dwarf where they find an escape pod. 6 minutes and 40 seconds into this video



Death or a date.

While on the otherside, the wealthy woman is worried about attracting the wrong kinds of people. I.e. male gold diggers (all is fair in love and war right?) and thus even if there is some guy willing to be her partner she can't be sure if it is true feeling or if it is money. This has been played straight in various movies from Mainland China recently. Which are copies of the Eddie Murphy film Coming to America

Anyway before I go on another wild tangent, thus to get some erm ...lovin' SOME people have to turn to this avenue as flicking the bean would probably get old sooner or later.

On the other hand they could merely be guests of the hotels and men just out to have some fun in night clubs. I mean for quite some time I used to stand around the edges of night clubs until I felt more confident.

Perhaps to confirm you could ask them, I take NO LIABILITY if you get punched in the face for insulting them though.

Busy

Sorry I've been away for a while, one of my family passed away and some ritual customs have to be performed, they are on going.

Although I don't believe in life after death thinking once you're gone thats it is over a bleak view many say. I still have to do these sorts of things because of social custom.

twins

Source

Hi Chinese Guy!!

I first fell in love with China when I visited in 2007 and can't wait to go back there in the near future, I miss it! Especially Beijing, they love white (I'm not tanned AT ALL) girls with blonde hair over there! I can't believe how many people wanted to touch me and have their photo taken with me! I saw a fortune teller in HK in mid November of 2007 and he told me I would have a baby boy "next year". November 2008 I had a baby boy. I'm sure he mentioned I would have 3 kids although I only ever wanted two. I can't rememeber what he said exactly but I think it was a girl then another boy. I thought to myself I would make sure I don't fall pregnant a 3rd time so I just had a boy and a girl. Perfect pair. Well, I'm pregnant with TWINS aren't I?! They are due any day now and we have not found out what we are having. I believe I'm having a boy
and a girl. Just wondering what the Chinese think of twins? Are they lucky? Is it luckier to have a certain set like identicals who are the same sex?

Thanks!
Nays

Twins have no special luck to them. Or any other luck, I had to ask around for this. I've two aunts who are twins and they were not considered to be lucky in any manner. However many Chinese people are fascinated with twins and will do the typical foot in mouth asking awkard questions in the western world where social ettiquette does not allow us to ask! Things like how much do you earn is NOT to be asked in the UK.

There is also something along with the thinking two is better than one. I'd add anedotally some Chinese people think that twins are good because no matter how far away they are they can always reunite. Just like if you separate them as far apart as you can they will come back together, and there have been fairly big stories about reunited twins here and there in China after long separations.

However if you were in China and happened to be the Han Majority then it would be considered lucky since this is a perfectly legitimate method to get around the one child policy without any repercussions (which vary from area to area). Other than that nope.

HTH

Eww

I don't believe lots of women do this in Asia EVERY single day....

Nowt wrong with our eyes folks.... ok we have to put up with bafoons like Prince Philip whose gaffes are actually sometimes funny due to the way he constantly puts his foot into it. (The ultimate irony is that our Royal Family is a bunch of Germans who changed their names around WWI so we wouldn't lynch them)

Maybe it's because I saw a video nasty when I was about eight. Where I saw a man get red hot pokers on a minature railway track inserted into his eyeballs (the screams haunt me to this very day). But eww...

Banana!

Stuff is keeping me busy here and there thus I'm severely neglecting this site.

But here is something interesting for you to read, about how some people are simply not Chinese enough.....

I have a different take though, as I speak English many people automatically assume I am completely illiterate and cannot speak various flavors of Chinese. Which is good in a way as people will reveal all sorts of stuff and talk behind your back in front of you, which is funny because they think you don't understand.

The thing is though about the article is that she wants to fit in and be one of them.... I forget the film maybe army of darkness or the evil dead or something. (Anybody know the name?) Where there is a chanting bit where it goes:

One of us one of us in a creepy sort of way.

Why fit in why be normal? Be yourself and forget what people say to belittle you!

Crap in China 2

As a runner to the previous post China has launched its first aircraft carrier, the refitted Varag, which some how a Macau firm bought it from the Ukraine, and told the Ukrainians they were going to turn it into a casino. Its supposed to be a training carrier, and they're going to cut their teeth on it. But then again this is one of 4 Carriers China is currently building, the fact that it has no battle group and because it has no catapult (thus lighter launches) the Nimitz would eat it for breakfast.

TBH I think its a dick waving contest as its a pretty exclusive club. What with the Americans (11) The Russians (1) Brazilians (1) India (2) and the French (1). Meh the UK no longer has any of the mini carriers anymore.

But what boggles the mind is that it goes again an old Chinese parable. In that China was humiliated in 1999 over Taiwan when they rattled sabres at Taiwan. The USN 7th fleet had a little cruise around Taiwan. In that China has been spending years on designing weapons specifically to take out carriers. While at the same time stockpiling Russian ship killers like the Moskit which apparently can defeat the Phalanx CIWS of the USN.

An in joke from a Navy buddy from Plymouth, he said if you ever hear the Phalanx open fire you should jump overboard in direct contradiction to this video:




Anyway the parable is of a travelling salesman (a euphemism about a bloke who sells guns in the UK) during the three waring states period. Think snake oil salesman in the Midwest of the USA claiming to sell a tonic or to make rain. Anyway this sales man was pretty bad. Who quite frankly was dumb. First he woo'd the villagers with a shield which was indestructible and could not be penetrated by anything. He then advertised a spear which could penetrate absolutely anything and no armour and no shield would offer any protection. While he was proudly advertising his products, a man in the crowd asked him "what if I stab your shield with your spear? Bewildered by his own words, the craftsman was at a loss for a suitable reply. The crowd broke up laughing and booing.

The moral is that you should not hold a contradictory position.

Kind of like this



Simply if you've spent billions on developing a missile to take out carriers, why exactly are you building carriers yourself?

Chinese Teeth 2

Hi The Chinese Guy,
I read your post about Chinese Teeth and i wanted to ask why do Chinese people throw there teeth on to the roof of their house when they fall out?

Curious Collector


Dear Curious.

It varies from place to place as not all families in China do it, and even then it can vary. I remember seeing it in my youth here and there but with no real consistency. Heh I suppose in the future it won't happen at all what with the children wanting money from the tooth fairy. I never got any smegging money from the tooth fairy, though granted most of my first teeth ended up being punched out from rampant violence and bullying over the years.

IIRC you wrap a lost tooth carefully in white paper and then toss the bottom teeth onto the roof while you toss the top teeth under the bed or at the foot or the head of the bed. It changes depending on who you ask. You know sort of like Chinese whispers...... except in China we merely call them whispers heh. Or how each house hold has different rules and or traditions

This is purely superstition thing whereby if you do this your new teeth if you are a child I suppose. Your teeth will grow out to be straight and not crooked.....

TCG dislikes crooked teeth more unpleasantness are teeth which grow in rows, urgh... If a dream woman approached me and was perfect in each way other than this I would probably refuse to date her.... but yeah I'm shallow whats new? In the USA and the UK crooked teeth are sorted out using braces or IIRC called in the USA retainers. (Whenever I hear that I always think of a deposit on something you want to buy or something)

As with the last post obeying a superstition = free.
Dental braces are expensive as is all dental work that is required. Especially so in China.

A particularly hideous variation is teeth lost are thrown into a well.... which is supposed to make them whiter.... but I've only heard of this second hand. But if I didn't have pumped purified and drugged up water (UK tap water contains various 'additives') it would make uncomfortable. I.e. you go out for your water pop it in the kettle and boil it. You then make some tea or coffee out of the water and something hard yet brittle floats over your tongue. You reach in and find a smegging tooth. Yeesh.

Here is a video of Simroid for aspiring orthodontists

Yawn more pish poor journalism

Ruthlessly stolen from gamespot

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12885271

Precis China to overtake the USA on science.... i.e. the number of published papers.... but the thing is its quality NOT quantity... Ok ok Stalin did once say quantity has a quality all of its own but the days of mass infantry wars like Korea and Imjin river are over.... or are they?? This applies to EVERYBODY not just China though. Like that Korean bloke who cloned a human and was found out to be a fraud. Or the fraudulent actions of the Climate Change unit in the UK.

I digress, I mean research has to be worthwhile for starters I mean look at the things on this list here

Termination of intractable hiccups with digital rectal massage.

What? So somebody somewhere carried out research in that sticking a finger up your bum can cure hicupps......

Ducks can be homosexual necrophiliacs too (winner, Biology, 2003)
"The First Case of Homosexual Necrophilia in the Mallard Anas platyrhynchos (Aves: Anatidae)", Deinsea: Annual of the Natural History Museum Rotterdam, 2001.

One of the greatest sentences in modern science writing: “Next to the obviously dead duck, another male mallard… mounted the corpse and started to copulate, with great force.” Take that, March Of The Penguins.

Suicide rates are linked to the amount of country music played on the radio, winner, Medicine, 2004
"The Effect of Country Music on Suicide", Social Forces, 1992

If you knew there was something profoundly unacceptable about Billy Ray Cyrus, but you could never quite put your finger on what it was, here is your answer. The man makes people kill themselves.

Dog fleas can jump higher than cat fleas, winner, Biology, 2008
"A Comparison of Jump Performances of the Dog Flea, Ctenocephalides canis (Curtis, 1826) and the Cat Flea, Ctenocephalides felis felis (Bouche, 1835)," Veterinary Parasitology, 2000

Presumably the research team set up some sort of tiny high-jump bar for the fleas to Fosbury-flop over. It’s not entirely pointless; knowing which that dog fleas jump higher tells you that buying a dog is more likely to lead to getting bitten yourself.

Lap dancers get higher tips when they are ovulating, winner, Economics, 2008
"Ovulatory Cycle Effects on Tip Earnings by Lap Dancers: Economic Evidence for Human Estrus?" Evolution and Human Behavior, 2007

This research might be hard to put into practical use – unless you’re a lap dancer – but you imagine the (all male) research team put in an awful lot of field work.

Rats can’t always tell the difference between Japanese spoken backwards and Dutch spoken backwards, winner, Linguistics, 2007
"Effects of Backward Speech and Speaker Variability in Language Discrimination by Rats," Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, vol. 31, no. 1, January 2005

The Linguistics Ig Nobel winner in 2007. In fairness to the researchers, they were trying to find similarities between human infants and other mammals, in order to better determine the evolutionary origins of speech. But what they actually did was show the world that rats don’t speak backwards Japanese. A miss, really.

You can extract vanilla flavouring from cow dung, winner, Chemistry, 2006
"Novel Production Method for Plant Polyphenol from Livestock Excrement Using Subcritical Water Reaction," International Journal of Chemical Engineering, 2008

Riiight

Why woodpeckers don’t get headaches – winner, Ornithology, 2006
"Woodpeckers and Head Injury,", Lancet, 1976; "Cure for a Headache," Ivan R Schwab, British Journal of Ophthalmology, 2002

It is pretty baffling, when you think about it. Woodpeckers headbutt trees for a living, experiencing impact deceleration of more than 1000 times the force of gravity. So how do they prevent catastrophic brain injury? The difference between ordinary people and good scientists is that where we just wonder, the scientist finds out.

(The answer, if you were wondering, is: brain more tightly packed into the skull; a smooth brain surface to maximise impact surface area; and minimal side-to-side movement. So there you go.)

Malaria mosquitoes are as attracted to limburger cheese as they are to human foot odour – winner, Biology, 2006
"On Human Odour, Malaria Mosquitoes, and Limburger Cheese," The Lancet, 1996 (paper requires log-in)

Next time you go to Africa, don’t bother with insect repellent or mosquito nets – just take a nice ripe limburger, leave it outside your tent, and presto! A bite-free night.

Does any body have the video of?

Twenty years ago I remember seeing a video like this.



Except it was hillarious rather than the mostly unimpressive stuff seen in the video above. Sure sure the spears to the throat is impressive, so is the spear to the belly but everything else is a variation on the vagrants tricks.


No what I am after is a video I saw sometime in the 1980s it showed Shaolin monks who really proved their powers and ablities. Not like above but in more dangerous (yet sickenly hillarious ways). For example they proved they could resist ANYTHING. So what does the smegging presenter do? He heats up a hot vat of cooking oil, fries a piece of meat in it to prove it is seriously hot. He then scoops up some of it and while the monks are meditating as hard as they can he pours it over the heads of the monks. It was sort of like the end of a Jackie Chan film when they show outakes of Jackie Chan breaking his head open for the 10th time or something. Where it was Chinese propagada videos where they showed the out takes.

Granted it is uber schadenfreude but I spent 8 hours today at work filing stuff due to lack of business..... and I always remember how comical these films were

Maneki Neko

Dear TCG,


I notice that in all Chinese owned businesses I see these sculptures of beckoning cats everywhere. I know they're supposed to bring good luck, but why? and why a cat?


These cats are called Maneki Neko.... in Cantonese we say Chew Choi Mao (fortune bringing cat sorta). The thing is they are not Chinese at all they are a Japanese invention and somehow crossed the straights of China and Japan to become popular in Chinese homes. It's a cat because in some folklore cats with their good vision are able to see in the dark. Thus they are able to see and scare away evil ghosts.

They are supposed to 'claw' good luck and protection towards you hence the beckoning paws, but really they are a product of Chinese polytheism.

Where they cherry pick bits and pieces of religions in an attempt to make sense of the crazy universe we live in. For example in the old Chinese woman's home down the road family members home they have a small altar which venerates their ancestors. A bowl of fruit and fake electric incense is placed to venerate your ancestors.

Move a little to the left and you see a massive fake plastic golden sycree which if was real gold I would need an extra large bank passbook to fit in all those 00s and I would retire walking into the sunset and never return...

Move nearer the TV and you have three statues Fuk Luk and Sau. They are displayed together, and their presence is said to ensure wealth, authority, respect, long life and good health. While if you go to the doorway you'll see Ba gau. A taoist symbol..... move a little back and you'll see a some shrunk mellons of some kind.

Thus people pick and choose, I know my dad did (my dad is an ancestor worshipping, Taoist, karma believer.

1950s USA is China?

You know this reminds me a lot about my own youth not so long ago. The person speaking talks about China feeling like the 1950s USA. In that my visits sporadically to China make me feel this way sometimes. Though of course I wasn't even born in 1950s USA. Nor do I know if the USA is how the podcaster describes either as it could be completely different. I do know though that the UK economy is absolutely on the ropes. Pay cuts all round announced today.... bugger...

Although I know memories play tricks on us, I recall the 1980s.

Back in the 1980s it felt a lot freer, I'd walk home alone from school, I'd arrive home alone. We would vanish off for the whole day on bicycles and nobody would really care our parents would say be careful and we would go out graze our knees and generally get hurt but have fun.

Maybe it's all the responsibilities I have these days which mean I'm jaded, or the way I'm constantly encouraged to move over to China, a job or two every week pops up in Longgang or Zhuhai now and again which I think I could do that....

Maybe it's the feeling of greener grass maybe it's just nothing, as I read the Korean's post and felt my experience differed greatly from his experiences...

Maybe I'm just probably rambling.

No wonder car drivers all hate us

There is often animosity between two wheeled folk and car drivers.....

Sure we can filter through traffic, and generally use less fuel as well as look cool (sometimes). But when you see this it makes you think blimey



India



We should get some of these guys into MotoGP

Three drunks and the wine story

Somebody asked me what this story was a few days ago. Unfortunately I sort of lost the email and the name of the person who did the asking.... I do sort of remember the gist of the question though and it asked what is the Chinese parable of three men and the wine story?


There are many variations of this story and like all stories it changes with the times..... 200 or so years ago it was Chinese men who were drunk who found a jar of wine. In the 1980s it was the Nintendo power glove. In the 00s I'm not sure what it would be. But there will be quite a lot lost in translation. But as per usual it is a tale about saving face...

But the tale is this:

Once upon a time (when was the last time you read that?) There are three good friends who are really really happy, they had been celebrating a good harvest. To celebrate they had been drinking heavily at the local bar and had been drinking all night. The bar was closing and they were asked to leave.

"The night still young!" Shouted one of the men..."lets find another place to drink!"

The searched in vain and did not find another open bar, and had travelled full circle back to the bar they had been kicked out of...... one of the men spotted a wine storage shed was unlocked and found a large jar of wine like this.


The men can't believe their luck and one of the men grab the jar and drinks a mouthful..... he instantly realises that it's not wine. It's urine..... he isn't happy about it. He instantly says, GREAT WINE.

The second man not wanting to miss out grabs the jar and also tips a large amount into his mouth and again instantly realises that he is drinking urine... he too isn't happy about it... but again he said GREAT WINE.

The third man noticing the 'wine' is quickly being drunk grabs the jar and chugs the rest of it, but quickly realises that he is drinking urine. Again he says GREAT WINE..

All of them embarrassed shuffle off into the night.

The parable is supposed to teach us a few things. Firstly that saving face is not always as great as it is made out to be, in that although you saved your own face (if you were one of the first two to drink) you also dragged others down with you.

Secondly try not to laugh at the misfortune of others as they may well too attempt to save face and bring this misfortune onto you.

Or something like that, I was 14 and trapped on a boat on the Yangtze River last time I heard it. Though because of the crudeness of this story, it isn't often told either.

I is stumped

What in the world is that chime called. I saw one at Stones and Bones Natural Art Store in Savannah Georgia ten years ago. This fountain or waterfall or whatever you call it was a nice walnut box with oriental designs on it and it contained hundreds of ball that when you turned the fountain over, the ball fell across chimes for like a half hour. I'd like to find one.

Thanks and regards.

JJ


Erm anybody out there know the answer? I sure don't