See China

As China’s most important “lianghui”, or Two Sessions of the Year: the National People’s Congress and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, open in March, we want to encourage our readers to raise YOUR questions that are most intriguing to you as for the understanding of China and her people’s contemporary life (or history, since we all have the impression that someone is making it somewhere in this country everyday…), so as to “communicate” with this country and her extremely diversified communities of people. Please send them to seechina10@gmail.com…

Outspoken artist, author and critic, Chen Danqing (陈丹青) will talk about the influence of western music on China in a book salon jointly hosted by Trendslounge and Guangxi Normal University Press from 19:00 to 21:00 on March 3rd, 2010. The venue is Trendslounge, L214, Building 2, No. 9 Guanghua Road, Chaoyang District (朝阳区光华路9号时尚大厦2楼L214), SeeChina Club members and readers will be welcome to this event.

The Lantern Festival on February 28, 2010, or the 15th day of the 1st lunar month by Chinese calendar, is the finale of the almost one-month-long Chinese New Year celebrations. While the SeeChina videographer Janek is busy shooting videos at Qianmen, the rest of the team decide to relax and savor the last drops of the holiday wine…

Had enough of imperial architecture? There are numerous museums in Beijing that handle subjects other than various dynasties and their palaces. For a taste of the artistic and the literary, try these museums, many of which are found in secluded hutongs — themselves worth the journey and exploration.

China’s biggest internet portal Sina published its “Best Books of the Month” for January of 2010. Li Chengpeng’s book on Chinese soccer scandal, Xiong Peiyun‘s reflections on Chinese society, Chen zhiwu’s financial analysis on Chinese modernization and economy, Mo Yan’s novel Frog and Dan Brown’s the Lost Symbol, among others, were on top of the list voted by both readers and celebrated critics.

As students come back to school from Spring Festival holiday around China, an amateur handicam video about a maverick secondary school student doing funny exercises becomes very popular. Many called him “cao di” （操帝）, or “King of Exercises” out of mischieveous admiration. Note: in China, students in primary and secondary schools are required to do exercises between classes as a means to physical fitness.

How many mother tongues do the Chinese speak? Since Feb. 21 was proclaimed by UNESCO as the Intenational Mother Language Day, it is befitting to introduce the 80+ dialects and spoken languages now used by the 1.3 billion Chinese population across this vast land.

One of China’s spring Festival traditions is putting up couplets of verse on doors and gates of residential houses, restaurants and businesses. Chunlian（春联, also known as duilian 对联)，or spring couplets, are composed of two lines of verse written on vertical strips of paper put up on each side of a door, plus a horizontal one on top of the door.

Qian Chunqi (钱春绮)(1921-2010), one of the most repected Chinese translators of foreign literature, passed away on Feb. 3 in Shanghai at the age of 89.
During his prolific life, Qian has translated more than fifty prominent works of literature from Europe, including those of Goethe, Heine, Schiller, Nietzsche, Baudelaire, Hesse and Storm. Among these works, Faust, Thus Spoke Zarathustra and Nibelungenlied were among the most challenging works for translators of all languages around the world.

Chinese New Year 2010 begins from today! People will prepare sticky sweets to bribe Zaoshen who will report their family conducts to the Jade Emperor in the Heavenly Palace. And dumplings will come to the table to herald in a series of festive preparations: haircuts, house-cleaning, shopping, papercuts, doorgods, couplets, firecrackers, etc. It’s also the best time to have a rushed wedding before end of the lunar year without being bound by too many dos and don’ts!