Chicken Talking to Duck （雞同鴨講）
Sometimes, almost always, the below kind of conversation is funny, yes surreal. But not when I’ve spent all day on a bus full of people with, shall we say a relaxed relationship with personal hygiene →
Suddenly Can’t Connect
After a quick stopover at my (visually) favourite spot in all of China, Jiayuguan Fort in Gansu province, I speeded into Xinjiang province where the language was: Nothing. The whole province has been completely shut →
Communication
This could never happen in Hong Kong. No, not some geezer talking on his mobile you berk, but sticking up in the middle of a four-lane highway with only a single traffic cone for protection. →
Hurtling Towards the Wild-ish West
At last! I’m almost on the train which will bring me to Lanzhou, transport hub of the northern provinces of China, and thence to the innermost reaches of inner inner everything, as far from the →
Dumbing Down of Chinese Culture
When the communists, soon after they came to power in 1949, introduced simplified Chinese characters, it was ostensibly to reduce illiteracy on the mainland. However, their real objective was to enable peasants and other illiterates →