Child Prodigy

I am so proud of these young scientists. I am also very glad. They remind that this nation still has a bright future. It lies in smart young children and proper education system.

Education is critical to a nation. Nobody would argue about this. Today, in such a technology driven world, a high school diploma is definitely not enough for a decent job.

1000 years ago, a great Chinese poet and politician Wang Anshi told a story about how important education is, even a child prodigy was no exception.

The Pity of Zhong-Yong

In my hometown Jinxi, there was a civilian named Fang Zhong-Yong. His family has been peasants for generations.  At the age of five, Zhong-Yong had never known any writing tools. Suddenly one day he cried and asked for these things: pen, paper, ink, etc.

His father was very surprised and borrowed ones from the neighbor. Zhong-Yong immediately wrote a quatrain Jueju poem, and signed his own name.

His poem was talking about supporting parents and people from the same clan should get along harmoniously with each other in accordance with seniority and the patriarchal relationship. The poem generated big buzz among scholars of entire township.

Since then, Zhong-Yong could immediately complete a poem about any assigned issues and objects. And his poems are of literary talent and sound rationale. People in the whole county were surprised by his incredible talent. Gradually, people started to treat his father as special guest with respectful courtesy; some even paid money in order to ask for Zhong-Yong’s  poems.

His father felt that this was profitable and lucrative. So he let Zhong-Yong visit people one day after another and would not let him study at school.

I’ve heard this matter for a long time. In Mingdao Era, I returned to hometown with my father. At my uncle’s house I met Zhong-Yong. He was already twelve or thirteen years old by then. I asked him to write a poem. His poetry couldn’t meet the reputation of the past.

It took another seven years when I came back from Yangzhou. Once again I came to uncle’s home, asked about Fang Zhong-Yong’s current situation. He replied: “Just like ordinary people.”

Zhong-Yong's talent and pity

Wang An-shi commented: Zhong-Yong ’s special intelligence was gifted at birth. He was endowed with much higher talent than average talented people. However, he eventually became an ordinary person, because he did not receive proper education afterward.

As naturally intelligent to such an extent as Zhong-Yong was, he became an ordinary person without proper education; Well, nowadays, for those who are not born smart,  if they do not receive proper education, could they beat child prodigy Zhong-Yong and still become “ordinary people”?

[Chinese Keywords]
伤仲永

[image sources]: 1. cctcct.com｜ 2. ly321.com | 3. fuzhoutour | 4, 5. cncn.com | 6. jiazi | 7. nipic

Danxia Landform refers to “landform consists of red bed characterized by steep cliffs”, it’s a unique type of petrographic geomorphology and was named in China. — wikipedia

Danxia landform is unique here because it’s a landform defined in China by Chinese scholars. Although there are some Danxia landform areas in western United States, central Europe and Australia, they are most widely distributed in China.

In 1928, Columbia University graduated Chinese mineralogist Jinglan Feng found this unique landform in Renhua County of northern Guangdong province.

Till Jan 2008, there are 790 Danxia Landform areas identified in China. They are distributed in 26 provinces.

March 2009, “Danxia Landform of China” was accepted as “UNESCO World Heritage” candidate. It will be voted in July 2010. Here, let me wish her good luck!

You can view all top 7 Danxia Landform here in Google Earth

1. Mount Danxia 丹霞山: Redstone National Park of China
Google Earth | Wiki | Location: Shaoguan, Guangdong

This is the place where “Danxia Landform” firstly identified and named. It’s a “world famous UNESCO geopark of China”.

Particularly famous are two formations: a stone pillar called the Yangyuan (“male/father stone”) that bears a remarkable resemblance to a phallus and the Yinyuan hole, which (especially to people who visited the Yangyuan pillar before) somewhat resembles labia.

2. Wuyi Mountains 武夷山: Green river & red mountain, best of Southeast
Google Earth | Wiki | Location: Jiangxi & Fujian

World Heritage Sites, both natural and cultural. It is the most outstanding biodiversity conservation zone of Southeast China. It also has many historical places of interest, including the city ruins of ancient Mingyue Kingdom and the cradle of Neo-Confucianism.

3. Lake Dajin 大金湖: Wonders of Danxia above water
Google Earth | UNESCO | Location: Taining, Fujian

The highest and oldest Danxia Landform in southeast China. Lake Dajin was originally a section of Dajin Creek. Its 36 km² water was formed after a dam was built in 1980. Since then, the perfect combination of deep & vast green water and strange red mountains makes it the “World’s No. 1 Lake Mountain”.

4. Mount Longhu 龙虎山: Red cliffs where Taoist alchemists make medicines
Google Earth | Wiki | Location: Yingtan, Jiangxi

It is famous for being one of the birthplaces of Taoism, with many Taoist temples built upon the mountainside. It is particularly important to the Zhengyi Dao as it the Shangqing Temple and the Mansion of the Taoist Master are located here.

Mount Longhu also has cultural significance has a historical burial site of the ancient Guyue people, who placed their dead in hanging coffins on the mountains cliff faces.

5. Zi River – Bajiao Mountain Fortress – Langshan Mountains Danxia Landform 资江-八角寨-崀山丹霞: Green peaks & red cliffs, soul of Danxia
Google Earth | Wiki | Location: Ziyuan, Guangxi

Bajiaozhai-Langshan region has very rich formation of different types and different stages of Danxia landform. So it is known as the “Soul of Danxia landform.”

At the top, there is a platform about 3000+ square meters in area. Tianxin Temple was built here since Song Dynasty. For 1000+ years since then, it has been a popular Buddhism place.

6. Zhangye Danxia Landform 张掖丹霞: Palace-like Danxia made by nature
Google Earth | Wiki | Location: Zhangye, Gansu

“Five Color City”. Unlike those Danxia landform in south China that have only red cliffs and green trees, Zhangye Danxia landform is truly colorful. In less than 10 square kilometers you can find red, yellow, orange, green, white, schungite, dark gray, gray and white and other bright colors everywhere.

7. Chishui Danxia Landform 赤水丹霞: Red Cliffs reflected on Silver Waterfalls
Google Earth | Wiki | Location: Chishui, Guizhou

China’s Jurassic park. As the largest Danxia landform region, it covers more than 1000+ km².

[Scenic Splendor of China Series]
This is one post of the Scenic Splendor of China Series. In 2005.10, Chinese National Geography (CNG) selected 114 “most beautiful places” covering 17 different types of scenic patterns. The complete list is here. In Chinese. These scenic places will be covered individually in future.

[Chinese Keywords]
中国最美的地方 丹霞

Name: Crystal Cup
中文名: 水晶杯
Dated to：475~221B.C.
Culture: Warring States Period
Unearthed: 1990@Warring States Tomb, Shitang Village, Banshan Town, Hangzhou, Zhejiang
Current Location: Cultural Relics Archaeological Research Institute Of Hangzhou, Zhejiang
Dimension: height: 15.4cm

Open mouth, slope wall, round bottom, outward circle foot. a plain design with no decorations; transparent; and surface was well polished; the middle and bottom of the vessel has natural sponge-like crystals.

A Precious Drinkware

This cup is a treasure drinkware made of high quality natural Quartz crystal. Its amazing production techniques and technological level is rare among domestic relics.

The Crystal Cup is the oldest and the largest crystal cup among archaeological finds in China. It is very similar to a contemporary glass.

Unraveling the Mystery of the Age of Hangzhou City

The exact age of Hangzhou City is still unknown. People always say Hangzhou City has a long history of about 2000+ years. However, 2200 years ago, east to West Lake, where Hangzhou City is located now, is still under water. So the ancient Hangzhou city should be originated in the hills to the west and south of West Lake.

With the discovery of this crystal cup, which is a precious vessel that symbolizes the owner’s unusually high social status, historians hypothesis that Banshan Town region (where this cup was unearthed) might be the original location of ancient Hangzhou City.

[Forbidden Treasure of China Series]
This is the 15^th of 64 culture heritages that the government of China forbids to exhibit abroad. The complete list is here. In Chinese.

[Chinese Keywords]
国家一级文物 禁止出境

Although New Year pictures are produced everywhere throughout China, there are four most famous schools: Yangliuqing, Tianjin; Wuqiang, Hebei; Taohuawu, Suzhou, Jiangsu; and Yangjiabu, Weifang, Shandong. They have different features, advantages, and leading positions. Taohuawu and Yangliuqing paintings represent art appreciation of people in the cities; Wuqiang new year pictures arise from rural areas as pure peasant art, and has a strong rustic country flavor.

Here I collected a few sets of Yangliuqing new year pictures. Hope you will like them. If you want know more about new year pictures from Yangliuqing, you may read this great article provided by chinaculture.org here: Yangliuqing New Year Pictures.

A Yangliuqing new year picture company in Tianjin called Wen Sheng Ge (literally means “Art Prosperity Loft”) also have a great collection of yangliuqing new year pictures. Due to copyright issue, I cannot put them here. You can view them at these two webpages: Wenshengge Yangliuqing new year pictures set1 and set2.

[Show as slideshow]

[View with PicLens]

A show of walking on stilts

Stealing celestial herb

Carp leaping in lotus pond

Wild with Joy

Be abundant every year

Having fun with a katydid

Giving birth to many sons

Over abundance of things in successful years

Three blessings

Be abundant forever

Wish you a long life

Wealthy and Peace

Five children trying to seize lotus

Rich harvest

Shibuxian a manchu theatrical performance

Qin qiong and Yuchi Gong (Door gods)

The Gods of Good Fortune Longevity and Official career

Four blessings

Lotus carp

Rooster and child

12►

Due to high turnover and its single use home decoration purpose, new year pictures are hard to preserve and very few ancient new year pictures can be found nowadays. I have a collection of 7 pictures here. They are all from Qing Dynasty, more than at least 100 year ago:

[Show as slideshow]

[View with PicLens]

As an important traditional Chinese culture and valuable intangible culture heritage, Yangliuqing new year pictures have also been featured on postage stamps issued by China Post:

[Show as slideshow]

[View with PicLens]

Do you know any great Yangliuqing new year pictures? Please share with us here.

I have finished a series of 6 posts about Chinese Music Classics of 20th Century. They are here:

• Chinese Music Classics of 20th Century – I/VI: Songs
• Chinese Music Classics of 20th Century – II/VI: Songs
• Chinese Music Classics of 20th Century – III/VI: Choir & Opera
• Chinese Music Classics of 20th Century – IV/VI: Instrumental Solo
• Chinese Music Classics of 20th Century – V/VI: Chamber, Concerto, National Orchestra
• Chinese Music Classics of 20th Century – VI/VI: Ballet, Orchestra

Now in this post, I have removed review commentary and compiled all tables into a complete list. For your convenience, I put songs, opera and choir to the end in case that you have problem understanding Chinese in these vocal music.

In this list, I included video links (from youtube.com, youku.com tudou.com, etc.) as long as I can find one. But not all of them are available online. I cannot find some less popular ones. If you know some good video/audio links, please advise me. I appreciate that.

This is a long list. Indeed, it’s somewhat controversial. But it is still a very good representative list of Chinese Music in the transitional and eventful 20th century. So I am sure you will get a comprehensive understanding of Chinese Music through this list.

Get a cup of coffee or tea. Turn on your speaker or put on your headphone, please enjoy!

Instrumental Solo | Chamber | Concerto | National Orchestra
Ballet | Orchestra | Opera | Choir | Song

Instrumental Solo

Chamber Music

Concerto

National Orchestra

Ballet Music

Orchestra

Opera

Choir

Songs

Some stats about Works from Taiwan vs. Mainland

Reviewing the above list, we can find it’s roughly objective and representative. Opening up the “classic” heart knot, this list is indeed helpful to establish an overall concept of Chinese music in 20th century.

As painstaking as these efforts are, we can take it as musicians’ “big show of the century”, or a “rewarding ceremony”. Now they are on stage, and we might give them some applauds.

Once this drama is over, the list of works were exposed in light, musicians are no longer hidden dragons, and their works are no longer high on the shelves. Now the era of appreciation and criticism has come.

With report card (the list) in hands, the audience will sure evaluate the merit of these works; and Chinese Music will enter a very different musical era.

Ballet Music

Red Detachment of Women Ballet

Orchestra

[Chinese Keyword]
二十世纪华人音乐经典

Recently, this blog is getting lots of referring traffic from a website called ChinaOnTV.com. First, I appreciate its referrals. I couldn’t find out which page it referred me. Then I realize it is also a member of China Blog Network. So I got random referrals when people click the CBN widget on its Partner page.

After browsing the website, I think I should review briefly and introduce it to you.

According to their “About Us” page:

ChinaOnTV.com is a U.S. based online video network that produces and collects English videos from all around and about China. In a time when all media about China tends to blow too hot or too cold, we hope to provide some middle ground. Our mission is to continually increase the public’s awareness of China’s history as well as contemporary Chinese life and achievements.

In my previous post, I introduced a youtube video channel – chinesecivilization, which also features lots of China-related videos. Unlike chinescivilization which seems to be maintained by individual, ChinaOnTV.com is much more formal and more like a business or enterprise. This is reflected in its content quality & resources as well as its overall website design.

Although the logo says it’s still in “beta”, apparently it already has lots of quality content. It’s a pure video website. You cannot find much introduction text. Videos are categorized in seven different channels:

Business | Culture | Learning (Chinese) | Travel | City Focus | Cuisine | Cartoon

As plenty in quantity, its video quality is also excellent. It has lots of partners all around the globe which provide them with copyrighted videos. According to a Chinese news report, chinaontv.com was considered a marketing opportunity for Chinese media to get international exposure.

Indeed, there’s still much room to improve for this “beta” website, such as web design, user interface, navigation, text content, etc. Let’s see how it will look when it’s out of beta phase.

Note: I found this site a little sketchy that I have to warn you here.

This website already attracts heavy traffic (alexa rank: 4322 as of 02/27/2010) so far. It seems like a well known respectful website. However, two evidences make it worrisome:

1. Google search hints: when you type chinaontv, google will give you hints like “virus”, “malware”, “spyware”, etc. I guess, it had used these bad things to promote the website.

2. alexa referrals: alexa’s chinaontv.com page shows 77% referring traffic to chinaontv.com was from whatseek.com, which is a marketing site. Usually, you will see most traffic is from search engine or social network.

Anyway, it seems to be a safe website for now and has lots of good stuff. Why not check it out!

So far, more than 90 countries and territories in the world have issued Chinese zodiac stamps. Here, I present a few tiger zodiac postage stamps which are dedicated to the world’s “Tigers”. Best wishes to everyone a healthy and happy year of the tiger!

This year is a Geng-yin (Sexagenary cycle) Year of the Tiger. It is interesting that 60 years ago on last Gengyin Year of the Tiger, the world’s first Chinese zodiac stamp was born in Japan – of course, it was a Tiger stamp (right picture).

It was issued by Japan Post in 1950. Tiger drawing is taken from a masterpiece “Painting of Dragon & Tiger ” by famous Japanese painter Maruyama Okyo. Its face value is only 2 yen, but its significance is undoubted.

In the beginning, there was controversial in philatelic community about this stamp. There were other countries that had issued tiger themed stamps earlier than this Japanese one. So some argued that this one issued in 1950 cannot be considered as the earliest Chinese zodiac stamp.

However, soon other scholars pointed out that although animal themed stamps by other countries were earlier, they had no relationship with Chinese zodiac culture.

The 12 Chinese Zodiac animals were spread to Japan as early as 1000 years ago. Japanese still have exactly the same zodiac animals culture and folk custom with China. Year 1950 was indeed a Chinese Lunar Year of the Tiger. Japan has issued zodiac stamps for more than 50 years from 1950 to 2009.

So there are sufficient grounds to conclude that this tiger stamp is the “ancestor” of all Chinese Zodiac postage stamps.

Above: Tiger stamps issued by China in 1986, 1998, 2010.

Above: Tiger stamp issued by Macau.

Above: Four more tiger stamps issued by Japan in 1998.

Above: Tiger stamps issued by other Asian countries: Bhutan, Singapore, Korea, and Vietnam.

Above: Two Year of the Tiger Stamps issued by USPS. See news for current 2010 USPS tiger stamp.

Above: And last, can somebody tell me which country is this set of tiger stamps from? Any ideas?

View more beautiful cloth tiger images at 52hansheng.com, part I (14 images), part II (16 images)

Chinese folk cloth tiger is one of the most widely circulated toys. In a Chinese mind, tiger can help drive off evil and avoid disasters, is an auspicious symbol of peace, and also can protect one’s wealth.

Fifth day of in May of Lunar Calendar Year is Dragon Boat Festival. One of the popular customs is to make cloth tiger for children, or to paint a tiger face on the child’s forehead with Realgar. It means healthy, strong and brave.

Cloth tiger has a variety of forms. There are single-headed tiger, double-headed tiger, four-headed tigers, mother-and-child tiger, pillow tiger, tiger sets, etc..

Materials and processes in producing cloth tiger can also be different from each other.

The most common ones are made to shape with cotton, silk cloth, and then loaded with sawdust or bran inside. The outside depicts a tiger’s facial features and patterns with various methods such as painting, embroidery, cutting, pasting, and patching.

Cloth tiger usually have big head, large eyes, large mouth, and big tail to highlight their courageous demeanor. Tiger-head and facial features are often naive and childlike, just like the innocence of lovely children.

In addition to the Dragon Boat Festival, on the Spring Festival, Lantern Festival and other festivals, as well as newborn baby’s “3rd Day Bath”, “Hundredth Day”, 1st birthday, 2nd birthday, etc., people often make various forms of cloth tiger, with the same blessings and wishes.

52hansheng.com has 30 beautiful images of cloth tiger. I selected 4 here. You can view more at the original posts. They look so cute, aren’t they?

[Show as slideshow]

[View with PicLens]

View more beautiful cloth tiger images at 52hansheng.com, part I (14 images), part II (16 images)

Happy Tiger New Year | by {link:http://nipic.com/dongzhizao}dongzhizao{/link}