Robert Louis Stevenson is often and fondly attributed to saying: "Wine is bottled poetry."
The Chinese people have a reputation of being able to eat anything - whether it walks, crawls or slithers. The only thing they won't eat with four legs are tables, and the only thing that flies they won't eat are airplanes, or so says an old Chinese saying.
I differ in many ways from most laowai living in Beijing, and one of them is my heavy reliance on public transportation.
Exploited workers are right to expect better treatment A pair of articles in Friday's China Daily quotes two Beijingers about the lives of factory workers in the light of the suicides at Foxconn in Shenzhen.
I have two sets of photographs documenting my patriotic pilgrimages to see the sunrise flag-raising ceremony at Tian'anmen Square.
Sometimes I read some very silly things in a newspaper. I read about how killers are always insane and never simply angry, how the male bra business is perking up, and recently how police were puzzled why a man was hiding in a well. Apparently, he also had mental problems.
I've railed, long and hard, in these very pages about what I consider to be the bad driving habits of some Beijing motorists.
It's summer and, along with gorgeous flora, the Beijing arts scene is blooming. Music festivals in the parks, visiting dance troupes, and theater productions are all there deliciously waiting for the partaking.
On Don't moan, get used to it
I have often wondered what goes on in the minds of Beijingers with the kind of awkward attention I receive on the streets and in supermarkets. I got some clues after reading Ma Chao's contribution in the China Daily of May 8-9.
Here's one of my typical days in Hawaii.
The Summer Palace - a place of beauty. There are few attractions in Beijing that one can truly enjoy as much. Located to the northwest of the city, it is the largest and best-preserved imperial garden in China, and comprises fantastic buildings and a huge lake surrounded and partitioned by bridges and gardens.