Uncategorized - RADII - Transcend boundaries

Shanghai Has Radical New Recycling Laws and People are Going Crazy

In Shanghai, a new wave is sweeping the city — sorting garbage.

The unexpected trend comes about as a result of the new Domestic Waste Management Law, which went into effect on July 1st. The law requires all Shanghai residents and corporate entities to classify trash into four categories: wet, dry, recyclable, and toxic. If you get caught tossing the wrong trash into the wrong bin, you have three chances to “repent” before paying fines.

“My old classmate in Shanghai just invited me to visit him. I suspect he just needs help with garbage-sorting, so I decisively turned him down!”

Weeks before the day of implementation, the city began wading into a stage of “all-nighter cramming.” Everywhere you go, online or on the streets, you’ll likely find yourself surrounded by garbage-sorting trivia. Napkins? Dry waste. Wet napkins? Still dry waste. Crawfish? Wet waste. What about doggy-do, batteries, unused medicine? The diverse segmentation of garbage has truly formed a thick layer of sludge around the city’s collective consciousness.

Whenever something like this happens, it creates a sense of community amongst the city’s residents — young or old, rich or poor, everyone is affected. And so it’s only natural for those feelings to be expressed.

Sometimes via mobile trivia apps…

…or through virtual reality installations…

…or Peppa Pig infographics…

…or the centuries-old art of trash can drumming:

And if you want to take this garbage-sorting show on the road, Taobao has a belt for that:

It’s pretty evident that the garbage-sorting phenomenon has all but seized the minds of Shanghai’s residents. It’s a hassle, it’s a new responsibility, and it could be a 200RMB fine — but at the end of the day, it’s the city stepping up to help protect our planet. And if we gotta spend a few hours brushing up on our garbage-sorting skills to do that, then so be it.

Event: Faded Ghost + Gouachi Live at ALL (Free Entry)

RADII’s kickoff monthly event at Shanghai’s ALL club — a live recording of our B-Side China podcast with guest Jiafeng — was a great success, despite the best efforts of plum rains to thwart attendance.

For July, we’re switching up the format and bringing you a FREE live music event featuring two Shanghai-based artists close to our hearts. Faded Ghost has been on a roll since performing at RADII’s china.wav showcase in LA in May — we’ll check in to see where her haunted, atmospheric and ritualistic electronic dreamscapes have wandered between then and now. Faded Ghost’s live set will be followed by a DJ set from Gouachi, a fresh and vital force on Shanghai’s club scene whom we last caught up with in January for our RADII Voices short documentary series. The music will be preceded by a screening of that short and a brief recap of our sold-out china.wav event in LA.

When: Tuesday, July 16, 9pm

Where: ALL (2F, 17 Xiangyang Bei Lu,near Changle Lu)

How much: FREE

See you there! In the meantime, learn about/listen to these two artists here:

10 Years of Sound from Shanghai’s YEHAIYAHAN, aka ChaCha (Exclusive Mix)

The stalwart Shanghai singer & producer takes us on a cinematic, 2-hour trek through her sonic memory ahead of her May 3 LA debut at RADII’s china.wav showcase

Article Apr 24, 2019

Watch: High School DJ Gouachi on Music, Family, and China’s Generation Gap

Article Jan 25, 2019

Listen: RADII on KCRW and dublab in LA

RADII hijacked the airwaves to spread our sonic gospel during a recent visit to Los Angeles

Article May 11, 2019

Watch: We Tried Spicy Hotpot Toothpaste

We Tried is a series where RADII staff try out unique foods, experiences, and phenomena in China. Drop us a line if you have a suggestion.

Hotpot, for the uninitiated, is basically a big bowl of bubbling (often spicy, frequently oily) broth into which you dip anything edible. You then proceed to gorge upon the results, in an experience that can last for hours. Sounds refreshing right?

So it was a natural leap for someone to come up with the idea of hotpot toothpaste. All that spicy oily goodness, but in toothpaste form! The product flew off the digital shelves in China, so naturally we had to get our hands on some tubes and put it to the test.

Here’s what happened:

And here’s some more background on the stuff:

Hotpot Flavored Toothpaste is Selling Out in China

Because brushing your teeth with regular toothpaste wasn’t painful enough

Article May 17, 2019

UFC Just Opened “the World’s Largest” MMA Facility in Shanghai

In a country with some of the oldest martial arts traditions known to man, does mixed martial arts (MMA) stand a fighting chance? Seems that UFC is taking their chances with a massive, 9,000-square meter training facility, which just opened in Shanghai this past week.

This new facility is three times bigger than their Las Vegas flagship institute. UFC announced last year at a press conference in Beijing that it would be “the world’s largest, state-of-the-art MMA training and development facility” that aims to train up some of China and greater Asia’s top fighting talent in the Octagon.

Here’s a tour of the new facilities:

Though in China, many still see MMA as a “violent bloodbath,” the nation is producing some of the fastest-climbing (and notoriously outspoken) fighters in the world.

Female fighter Zhang Weili recently came crashing into the UFC’s Top 10, indisputably making her one of the best MMA fighters in China. After her nineteenth straight victory at UFC 235 against veteran fighter Tecia Torres, she’s now ranked seventh in the world in her category.

Related:

“I Wanted to Be an Example for People”: Meet UFC Champion Zhang Weili

While her male counterparts struggle to break through their weight classes, MMA fighter Zhang Weili has risen to become one of UFC’s top-ranked fighters

Article Apr 08, 2019

And amateur MMA fighter Xu Xiaodong has made it his mission to take down fraudulent “kung fu masters” in the ring, one match at a time. His highly publicized pummel-fests have caused a lot of stir on Chinese social media.

Related:

Chinese MMA Fighter Obliterates Another Kung Fu Master, Incites Further Anger

The MMA fighter on a quest to expose kung fu fakery is back in the limelight, ending his most recent challenge match in under one minute

Article May 21, 2019

Through their new Shanghai base camp and this crop of homegrown fighters, UFC is banking on a growing fan following for mixed martial arts. Which begs the question…

Is China Ready to Embrace MMA?

Article Jul 02, 2018

Watch: We Tried Queuing for Hours for Limited Edition White Rabbit Milk Tea

We Tried is a series where RADII staff try out unique foods, experiences, and phenomena in China. Drop us a line if you have a suggestion.

White Rabbit is an iconic item of confectionary in China — the delicious, milky, rice paper-wrapped candy traces its origins back 60 years and the Shanghai-founded brand induces nostalgia in people of all ages.

But White Rabbit milk teas — are they delicious, drinkable, or disappointing?

The candy company recently teamed up with milk tea brand Happy Lemon for a limited-edition series of milk teas that practically made our mouths water when we heard about them. These teas have been selling like hotcakes in pop-up shops around China, most of which have upwards of four-hour wait times. In this latest episode of We Tried, RADII staff Mayura Jain and Jake Newby braved the queues to see if these milk teas lived up to the hype.

Here’s What China Will Be Doing With Its New Space Station

How does DNA mutate in space? How are dust clouds and incipient stars arranged in the outer reaches of the cosmos? These are the questions scientists aboard the China Space Station (CSS), set to be completed around 2022, will attempt to answer.

A successor of China’s two prototype space stations, Tiangong-1 and Tiangong-2, CSS will be bigger, last longer, and better facilitate experimentation in space. It could even become the sole low-orbit space laboratory depending on the fate of the International Space Station (ISS), which rests on continued funding from the United States, according to Nature magazine.

Related:

You Can Livestream the Last Moments of China’s Out of Control Space Station

Article Mar 28, 2018

Nine futuristic research projects involving scientists from over 17 countries were recently selected by China to be conducted aboard the space laboratory. The projects will explore topics ranging from astronomy to fire dynamics to biology.

One will study how microgravity and radiation affect DNA in 3D organ-mimicking biological structures – also known as “human organoids”. Another will research how solar cells (which together make solar panels) perform in open space.

A gamma ray sensor called POLAR-2 will be used for detecting distant cosmic bursts and radiation associated with the curvature of spacetime, also known as “gravitational waves”, and an observatory placed aboard will use ultraviolet light to detect and map out dust clouds and regions that will soon give birth to stars.

China also made an effort to involve countries with less experience in space exploration, like Mexico and Kenya. One noticeable absence from the list of participants was the United States, whose scientists were involved in some project applications that weren’t accepted.

At about one-fifth of the size of the ISS, the CSS won’t be the most spacious of space labs, but there may well be some substantial scientific developments that happen there.