China Society

A man in southern China’s Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region was filmed putting his three-year-old son on the conveyor belt of a security scanner at a train station. In a hurry to board a train, he mistook the boy for a piece of luggage.

A woman from China composed a song to urge her single 33-year-old son to find love. The song took the internet by storm, amusing millions online. Correction: An earlier version of this story misspelled ‘ditty’ as ‘diddy.’

Shanghai is preparing to celebrate its first Lantern Festival in six years, as workers prepare a large display to be held in the Guyi Garden from February 3-9, 2020. The annual festival, which also marks the conclusion of the Lunar New Year, has been a muted affair since a deadly stampede on New Year’s Eve 2014 led authorities to ban large public gatherings.

A Chinese charity has come under fire after it admitted that a large amount of money donated by the public did not reach a poverty-stricken college student suffering from complications due to malnutrition. She eventually died. The case of Wu Huayan, 24, who became ill because she had been subsisting on only rice and pickled-peppers for years, highlighted the challenges that China faces in its drive to eradicate poverty by 2020, which is a major policy goal for the Communist Party.  China has managed to successfully pull a large portion of its population out of poverty since it began market reforms in the late 1970s. However, the country now has one of the most unequal economies in the world,

A research paper filled with praise for the author’s supervisor was met with a wave of ridicule and anger online in China’s latest academic scandal. The paper published in the Journal of Glaciology and Geocryology seven years ago suddenly went viral last week, after some internet users posted screenshots of the article on social media.  Many people were shocked to find that the article on ecological economics was actually filled with extravagant praise for the author’s supervisor Cheng Guodong and Cheng’s wife Zhou Youfen.  Cheng was also the chief editor of the Journal of Glaciology and Geocryology.  The 35-page paper by Xu Zhongmin, a specialist in frozen ground and permafrost with the sta

A sinkhole suddenly opened up in northwestern China’s Qinghai province, swallowing a bus just before evening rush hour. At least six people were killed and four are missing.

A mother was filmed using a strawberry to trick her two-year-old son into taking medicine in eastern China’s Jiangxi province.

Thai authorities confirmed on Monday the first case outside China of a patient infected with the new virus behind the Wuhan pneumonia outbreak. The woman, 61, is identified as a Chinese tourist from the city in central Hubei province.  She has been receiving treatment in a hospital in Nonthaburi near Bangkok since January 8, but is now recovering, according to Bloomberg and Thai media outlets. An expert said if further investigation found she had not been to Huanan Seafood Market, associated with the outbreak in Wuhan, it would suggest that the virus had spread to other parts of the city. The news came as Hong Kong health officials arrived in Wuhan on Monday to gain first-hand knowledge of t

A viral blog that attacked Australia’s failure to stop the months-long bush fires and implied Chinese firefighters were braver and more patriotic has stirred vigorous online debate. The post, published on China’s Facebook-like WeChat, contrasted the situation in Australia with China’s largest-ever wildfire, which lasted just under a month in 1987.  The article quickly racked up more than 23 million views, but was criticized by high-profile media commentators for insensitivity and using nationalism to generate cheap viral clicks. Friday’s article, titled “If it weren’t for the Australian bush fires, I would’ve never known that China was so powerful 33 years ago,” also suggested that Australia

The last thing Shanghai man Tony Qian expected while walking with his wife on grassland below the 28-floor residential buildings of their community was to be hit by a falling piece of dog excrement. And yet, as he looked up to see where the foul missile had come from, he saw a tissue fluttering to the ground which, on closer inspection, was stained with the same muck which had struck him on the shoulder. Qian was lucky. There have been numerous reports in recent years of critical injuries and deaths caused by people flinging dangerous items – including a bicycle, stroller and even a kitchen knife – from their high-rise windows. But his efforts to bring the poo perpetrator to justice went now