A queer feminist anthropologist exploring the realities of culture, gender, and sexuality in contemporary Asia
This has been a whirlwind of a year. In the past 12 months, I've truly settled into a happy, fulfilling life in China. I've got a lot to be proud of, much of it a result of hard work, some of it springing from luck. But it didn't all go smoothly. I began the year [...]
Unlike some contemporary Giselle being performed in the West, National Ballet of China’s version harks back to the delicacy and romance of the 1841 original. The choreography performed at Beijing’s NCPA last Friday was strikingly beautiful, wonderfully capturing the profound emotion of the piece. This performance resonated profoundly; National Ballet of China set the bar [...]
Beijing is shrouded in a pore-clogging, snot-blackening blanket of horrific pollution. And has been for days. It hangs over the city, blocking the view in every direction, permeating every inch of space. The "fog" blurs the edges of buildings, casts an eery light in daytime and, at night, neon street lights and car headlights alike bleed [...]
Convenience is a myth for the majority of Chinese people. A myth lived out only by the elite, those rich enough to consider time more important than money. For everyone else, it is a long perpetuated lie cast by the shadow of capitalism hanging over the lives of 1.4 billion people. A lie many no longer believe will ever come true.
In Chinese, there is an expression: 酸甜苦辣 Pronounced: Suan, Tian, Ku, La It literally means as Sour, Sweet, Bitter, Spicy and translates as the joys and sorrows of life. I love this phrase. It is true to life anywhere in the world. But it seems to lend itself particularly well to life in China. As my Chinese tutor explained to [...]
Desert Years Tin Moe Tears a strand of grey hair a decade gone In those years the honey wasn’t sweet mushrooms wouldn’t sprout farmlands were parched The mist hung low the skies were gloomy Clouds of dust on the cart tracks Acacia and creepers and thorn-spiral blossoms But it never rained and when it did [...]
Stepping off the plane in Hong Kong was a huge relief. As the subtropical heat washed over me, it swept away the tension that only weeks of sitting in unheated Beijing apartments and classrooms can bring. We had a cold few weeks before the government decided to switch the heating on (originally it was meant [...]
We slowed down as we passed a group of people collecting on the streets, shaking large silver bowls at us, rattling whatever was in it already. Were they collecting alms? Sitting astride a motorcycle, I leaned forward to ask my driver and thought better of it. No, they were not monks. People danced as they [...]
Last Friday, a first blanket of snow covered Beijing for a few hours. I was safely tucked away, out of the cold, in a classroom on the third floor, overlooking the university's playing fields. The more curious of the class peered out of the windows at the heavy dollops of snow coming down past the silvery trees [...]
What time is it? It's Chinese Dentist Time! When I was a kid, just as ten to ten became Cowboy Time (ten to ten to ten ten ten..., two thirty became tooth hurty - Chinese Dentist Time. It was years before I realised the racism of this joke. But it has nonetheless been circling my head for the [...]
Zhēn de Gender 