Here’s What a Vegan Chinese New Year Feast Looks Like

For many Chinese youths, admitting to their parents that they’ve embraced veganism can be a nerve-wracking experience. As a matter of fact, vegan influencer Vivian Chang kept the news hush-hush for the longest time.


“Every time we went home for a Chinese family gathering, I didn’t touch the meat. At large gatherings, no one really notices, right? I didn’t inform them until I decided to open a restaurant,” she says. As you can imagine, the elder Changs didn’t take the news so well.


“My dad was like, ‘Why?’ And my mom told me, ‘You’re crazy.’ Both tried to convince me, ‘Just add seafood — your business will be better.’”


Nevertheless, she stuck to her guns. First founded in Taiwan in 2014, Miss Green will celebrate nine years of operations in 2023.

Based in Shanghai but shipping nationwide, Miss Green boasts a robust virtual presence on the Chinese ecommerce giant Taobao and super-app WeChat, but also runs a brick-and-mortar restaurant called Carrot & Cleaver in Shanghai Center. Come lunch hour on an average weekday, and it’s common to see white-collared professionals queued up outside the eatery, patiently awaiting their power bowls, protein balls between pita, and gut-friendly kombuchas.


Many of Miss Green’s regulars make up China’s vegan community, which is roughly 5% of the country’s population — this might seem like a measly figure until you take the country’s size (1.4 billion citizens) and vegan market (12 billion USD) into stock. In fact, according to a report published by digital marketing agency GMA on August 30, 2022, China holds 53% of the global protein market.


“There are so many reasons why people become vegan,” says Chang, a Millennial mom. “For me, I do it for the sake of my kids, but a lot of people are doing it for religious purposes or for their health.”

Chang, who embodies ‘Miss Green’ herself, was one of the forerunners of the vegan movement in China and has long advocated a plant-based lifestyle before it turned trendy. Today, the industry is nail-bitingly tough, but Covid-19 has had a hand in culling countless contenders.


“We are very lucky. Because we were founded many years ago, we have had enough time to learn and to adjust ourselves. Also, we have a lot of recipes,” says the restaurateur, who works hand in hand with dieticians and doctors to develop Miss Green’s everyday and seasonal menus.


Miss Green Chinese New Year ingredients

A plethora of whole foods and ingredients in Miss Green’s pantry


Whether it’s a whole fish (‘fish’ and ‘abundance’ are both pronounced yú in Mandarin), dumplings resembling money bags or gold ingots, or poon choi (a basin filled to the brim with good eats), Chinese New Year dishes are often associated with abundance. As some learn the hard way, however: You can have too much of a good thing. Acid reflux, heartburn and indigestion — all signs of overindulging — often follow the post-holiday period.


Miss Green’s new Spring Festival menu inspires a new way of thinking: Perhaps abundance should be measured by way of nutrition. After all, isn’t ‘longevity’ one of the tenets of Chinese New Year wishes?


Chinese New Year, Chinese New Year vegan food, Miss Green

Chinese New Year 2023 specials by Miss Green


Ranging from a vegan version of ‘Buddha Jumps Over the Wall,’ an iconic dish from Fujian, to a mushroom-laden stew titled ‘Three Immortals Crossing the Sea,’ the Chinese New Year dishes see a blend of international and regional flavors and ingredients. For instance, the former is served with a coconut-based soup inspired by northern Thai cuisine.


Easy to whip up, the communal dishes encourage clean eating with one’s loved ones and, most importantly, offer vegans a seat at the table where before there was none.


For those based in China, visit Miss Green’s Taobao store or WeChat mini program (search for ‘Miss Green’) to browse and prebook your vegan Chinese New Year dishes.


All images courtesy of Miss Green

Chinese Company Implements 4.5-Day Workweek

China is known for its excessive work culture. The 996 phenomenon, which alludes to the fact that some employees work from 9 AM to 9 PM six days a week, reached its tipping point in 2021 — even the Chinese government publicly condemned it.


Tired of having no work-life balance, many young people in China have adopted the workplace philosophies of ‘lying flat’ or ‘let it rot’ (aka doing the bare minimum at work). Understandably, this attitude does not benefit businesses, and some employers have been experimenting with new ways to boost morale and increase productivity.


On January 3, Chinese video-streaming platform LeTV announced that it would offer its employees the option of four-and-a-half day workweeks. Every Wednesday, the company’s staff can take half a day off — no salary cuts expected.


four-day workweek at LeTV

LeTV’s work calendar, which notes the days that employees can take a half day off. Image via Weibo


A hashtag related to the news immediately started trending on the Chinese microblogging platform Weibo, amassing more than 130 million views at the time of writing. And based on the comments, it seems many netizens are jealous of LeTV’s new working arrangement.


“What’s the email address of their HR? I want a job there,” joked one Weibo user.


Another user pointed out that LeTV is taking a page from many European companies’ playbooks.


In countries such as Belgium and Iceland, managers have seen great results since introducing four-day workweeks. Research has proven that in addition to improving employees’ mental and physical health, a four-day workweek is also beneficial for company earnings; the revenue of some surveyed businesses has risen by an average of 38%.


However, a few Chinese netizens remain skeptical about the new policy.


“My friend’s company had a four-day workweek policy, but the company went bankrupt in two months. Companies on the rise have employees working overtime because they have too much to do. Only failing companies [can implement four-day workweeks] because they don’t have much business to deal with,” wrote one Weibo user.


LeTV has been dealing with financial hardships in recent years and was forced to delist from the stock market in 2020. However, Zhang Wei, CEO of LeTV, shared in the open letter that the company shifted to four-and-a-half-day workweeks because it has achieved financial stability.


With LeTV taking a pioneering approach to modern-day work culture in China, it remains to be seen if other Chinese companies will follow suit.


Cover image via Depositphotos

6 Technology Trends in China to Watch for in 2023

To call 2022 a tough year for China would be putting it lightly, what with continuous citywide lockdowns due to Covid-19, event cancelations or postponements, and a stagnant job market.


However, the advancement of technology hasn’t slowed. If anything, people depended on the internet more than ever while stuck at home. With Covid-19 restrictions finally easing up, and people gearing up to enter a post-pandemic New Year, here are some of RADII’s predictions for the tech world in 2023:

1. More Metaverse and Virtual Reality

You can’t talk about technology in 2022 without bringing up the metaverse. In fact, the word holds the second spot on Oxford’s Word of the Year list. You’ll probably see even more of the metaverse in your everyday life in 2023, as the trend seems to be growing stronger in China.


The terminology was first introduced to China in 2021, and soon gained popularity among members of the tech community. With support from central and local government, the industry boomed this year, and will carry on growing with continued investments.


China seems to have set its mind set on taking a leading role in the development of the metaverse. During an interview with RADII, Alvin Wang Graylin, president of electronics company HTC Corporation, expressed his belief that China will be the first country in the world to achieve a nationwide metaverse. More than 15 cities in the country have established 29 different policies supporting the industry’s growth.


College students can even declare a major in metaverse studies at a university in Nanjing in Eastern China. A blueprint mapped out at a recent metaverse conference revealed that the industry aims to generate 200 billion RMB (around 28 billion USD) in revenue in the near future.


VR

China’s top VR brand Pico collaborated with celebrities to promote immersive World Cup-viewing experiences using VR headsets. Image via Weibo


The metaverse’s success largely depends on VR technology, which is dominated by a few tech giants. In 2021, TikTok owner Bytedance acquired Beijing-based VR company Pico, and launched a new line of headsets called Pico 4 globally. Pico has collaborated with Chinese influencers and celebrities to market its robust gaming and entertainment content. Something to look forward to in 2023: Pico is scheduled to release its own metaverse platform called Project Pico Worlds, which will work in tandem with the brand’s headset devices.


“There are going to be more and more companies saying that they do metaverse things,” said Eric Liu, chief technology officer of China-based metaverse company DIGITWIN Technologies, in an interview with RADII.


According to Liu, the metaverse will make its presence felt in areas beyond the video game industry, infiltrating our everyday life. He believes that true change will happen when Apple releases its version of AR glasses.


“We all know [the Apple AR glasses] are coming,” said Liu. “My friends at Apple, they all say that the energy is basically like the first time the iPhone was about to come out.”


“I can't wait for the day when I wake up, and instead of looking at my phone, just put on a pair of glasses so that I can go about my day but still experience and access all this information without staring at my phone,” said Liu optimistically.

2. NFTs Will Still Be a Thing

In late September 2021, the Chinese government officially banned all cryptocurrency transactions in the country. However, NFT products or ‘digital collectibles’ (数字藏品), as they’re called in China, exist in a grey area without clear and comprehensive regulations.


As such, tech giants like Alibaba and Tencent introduced their own NFT platforms in 2021, and digital tokens boomed in early 2022. Brands hopped on the opportunity to release viral digital collections; take Li-Ning’s collaboration with Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC), for example.

However, NFTs in China has taken a big hit in 2022. Tencent even closed its platform Huanhe after only a year after its launch. Despite the temporary setback, the market is still projected to see growth. According to a report from iResearch, a market research and consulting company in China, the country’s digital collection market reached about 280 million RMB (around 40 million USD) in 2021, and might hit 28 billion RMB (around 4 billion USD) in 2026.


In the coming year, more brands might try to combine NFT with physical products so customers may feel like they’re getting more than just a 2D image. Nike recently launched its own Web 3 platform for future NFT trading, signaling that brands are still optimistic about the future of digital tokens.


Even though Donald Trump’s new NFT collection that was released in mid-December has made the concept uncool again, more youth and artists have been embracing the art form and building their careers around it. A perfect example of this, as RADII has reported on, is high schooler Alice Miao, who has made a name for herself designing virtual reality dresses. We should be expecting to see more creativity in the field of NFTs in 2023.

3. Revival of the Gaming Industry

If anyone has truly struggled in 2022, it would be personnel in the gaming industry. Revenue in the industry has dropped three quarters in a row, gaming giant Blizzard terminated its services in China, and Chinese gaming company Lilith dissolved its entire team for its fantasy mobile game Art of Conquest 2. Not only were gaming licenses suspended, but the government has also made an effort to limit gaming time for all minors in the country.


That being said, gaming enthusiasts will be presented with more entertainment options as Covid-19 restrictions loosen up in China. After all, China is still home to the largest esports market in the world and boasts a growing female audience.


genshin impact

Genshin Impact by Chinese gaming giant Mihoyo is the third highest-grossing mobile game in the world. Image via Twitter


Despite being a tough year, 2022 still brought us the billion-dollar mobile game Sheep-A-Sheep or Yang Le Ge Yang (羊了个羊). So can the gaming industry dig itself out of its current slump, and see a successful overseas run with Honor of Kings and Genshin Impact? We’ll have to wait and see.

4. More Creative Livestreaming

With continuous lockdowns happening all through 2022, livestreaming has remained a favorite form of entertainment or means to purchase products in China. From Taiwanese singer-personal trainer Liu Genghong aka Will Liu’s sudden fame to the return of lipstick king Li Jiaqi, China’s livestreamers have been doing well for themselves.


In the coming year, however, livestreaming needs to evolve in accordance with new trends. As mentioned prior, the metaverse has been trending, and merchants have been coming up with creative ways to utilize AI avatars. Many brands, big or small, have tried using AI-generated avatars instead of real people to host livestreaming events for obvious reasons: AI personalities come cheaper and can ‘work’ 24/7 without resting or complaining.

5. AI Takes Over the World?

Certain topics have been trending on Chinese social media this winter.


AI art generators are one of them. Chinese netizens, who have been having a lot of fun with such platforms, have shared their hilarious art fails on Chinese social media platforms like Xiaohongshu.


Another trending topic is the AI chatbox system called Chat Generative Pre-trained Transformer or ChatGPT. Hoping to find shortcuts to finishing their homework, some high schoolers tried using the system, but ended up with some funny answers.


ai art

An AI art generator fail. Image via Xiaohongshu


However, the fast advancement of AI has also raised concerns over whether it will completely take over human jobs. The viral art generator and chatbot all have received criticism for hurting creative industries.


The thought of being replaced by robots can be scary. (If you really enjoy chilling thought experiments regarding a robot apocalypse, Google ‘Roko’s Basilisk.’ RADII takes no responsibility for the nightmares.) However, we for sure will see more use of AI in our daily lives in the coming years. Forbes magazine listed AI as the number one technology trend to watch for 2023. The ethical questions that come with the advancement of AI will always remain a hot topic.

6. The Crossover of Different Technologies

As you have probably guessed from the five points above, most new tech innovations are interconnected. For instance, there would be no metaverse without VR or AR technology, and AI is absolutely necessary when programming avatars that are used during livestreaming.


“For example, you can imagine how ChatGPT [could be] integrated with some type of photorealistic avatar, where human beings can be talking to these avatars,” said Liu, CTO of DIGITWIN Technologies. “It’s gonna be hard to distinguish if it’s a real person or not.”


Such merges could really streamline things when put to good use. Imagine building an avatar with the skills of a mental health therapist, which works around the clock.


However, AI and avatars are also a double-edged sword, and many have raised concerns about online scams and identity theft. China will roll out new regulations banning all AI artwork without watermarks from January 2023 onwards. However, the internet is a hard thing to control, and the regulation’s efficacy will be put to the test.


Cover image designed by Zhouhan Shao

10 New Music Releases to Kick Off 2023

New Music is a monthly RADII column that looks at fresh Chinese music spanning hip hop to folk to modern experimental, and everything in between. To ring in the new year, we introduce you to new material from DBZ, Lexie, Penicillin, and others.


It took long enough, but 2022 is finally coming to a close. It’s been a hectic year mentally, physically, and existentially for people in China. One silver lining has been the onslaught of new releases from artists and bands, which has helped us get through the year with our sanity intact.


December has seen drops from both internationally recognized acts as well as some of the local scene’s best-kept secrets. So crank up those speakers as we welcome 2023 with some new tunes.

1. DBZ — Wabi-Sabi Romance (侘寂罗曼史)

DaBozz, a Nanjing-based hip hop singer, reinvented herself a couple of years back, and now goes by the moniker DBZ. She has turned her music into dreamscapes full of hip hop swag, trip-hop pulp, and art pop ambition.


Her third full-length release Wabi-Sabi Romance finds the artist opening her heart — leaving her bare and vulnerable — as she reckons with the act of love as both a dissipating and afflicting force of nature that one nevertheless gravitates toward.


The new album is all about hushed transgressions, impassioned pleads with one’s self, and pining wrath coming together (yet DBZ’s poetic pose never comes off as gimmicky), finding solace in a lovesick world.


2. Stolen 秘密行动 — Eroded Creation (侵蚀体)

Chengdu techno rockers Stolen follow up their genre-smashing internationally recognized sophomore release Fragment (which got them to tour with New Order) with the even bigger and bolder Eroded Creation.


Produced by Mark Reeder and Micha Adam in Berlin, the six-piece band’s stylistic melding of synth-filled electronica, elaborate prog rock, jagged metal theatrics, and psych-filled rock feels wider in scope with tracks like the cinematic ‘Shirt Of Darkness’ and ‘Hibernation Pod’ recalling Son Lux and Muse in equal measure, finding both cerebral sonic catharsis and arena rock conviction deep within its exoskeleton.

3. Lexie 刘柏辛 — The Happy Star (幸福星)

The Mandopop scene has been reeling from the sudden drop of singer-songwriter Lexie’s latest album The Happy Star. The whiplash feeling can be extended to the artist’s shape-shifting sound, which finds her evoking everyone from Grimes to Charlie XCX as she wades into the waters of hyperpop, electro punk, and more.


Slick, buoyant, and still maintaining her distinct zeal and personality (where else can you find someone who seamlessly switches between singing in English, Spanish, Sanskrit, and Chinese!), the pop star seems pretty much posed to tackle the international stage with her latest.

4. The Cheers Cheers — ‘Circle’

Started by Wang Keguan (王客观) in 2016, The Cheers Cheers has become one of China’s indie pop scene’s best-kept secrets for both its C86-inspired sound and minute output.


In 2021, the Zhejiang-based act expanded with the addition of vocalist Zhang Xun (张寻). Over the summer of 2022, the band put out its first LP, Analog Love. Since then, the band members have been busier than ever, putting on shows and releasing a slew of singles while continuing to make their way via their label SJ Records.


Anchored by soothing, enveloping synths and steady bass lines, their latest single taps into bittersweet downtempo pop sensibilities with restraint and melancholic fragility.

5. Awake Mountains 醒山 — ‘Afterlight’ (后来的灯火)

Beijing’s Awake Mountains, which is known for its magnetic and deeply felt metalcore sound, has updated one of its more temperate acoustic single ‘Afterlight,’ which had initially been released two years prior.


Juxtaposing its guttural razor-sharp aggression with the melodic, impassioned, and pop-laced catharsis, the band mixes metal, emo, and post-hardcore sounds with solemn sincerity, allowing its swirling emotions to elevate the genre’s more extreme aesthetics. As the band states in the logline for the music video, “different times, different moods.”

6. DalDa GO!东九 — RainBowRain

Up-and-comer DalDa GO!东九 (formerly Barrel Barrel), which is made up of musicians from Dalian and Qingdao, is the latest act to team up with indie pop imprint SJ Records.


Specializing in jangly, upbeat, funk-flavored pop, the band feels both contemporary and timeless, and pays tribute to its jazzy forefathers as well as the wide, eclectic world of Korean and Japanese indie pop.


Korean Chinese singer Nan Enhua (南恩花) often sings in Korean, including on the last track of the latest EP. The band’s breezy, supple, and twee pop centers on the minutiae of life and all its refractions.


7. punx — ‘Pray for Nothing’

Known for his dense, sprawling live sets, techno producer punx has been making a name for himself here and abroad for some time, welcoming listeners into his icy cool, intoxicating labyrinth of electronic world-building that’s as immersive as it is effortless.


Ominous in its slow-burning patience yet persuasive in its tone, the track ‘Pray for Nothing’ is just one of seven off of the producer’s latest solo effort Reforge, which was released with Chengdu-based electronic label Crater Monde. Much credit to the mind-blowing 2D hand-painted music video for the song, from animator DaDazoo.


Expect a strode-heavy, consciousness-spilling, acid trip from the song:

8. Hardcore Raver in Tears (白纸扇) — ‘New Everlasting Regret’ (新长恨歌)

Wuhan’s new wave, disco-punk outfit Hardcore Raver in Tears (led by Lu Yan of AV Okubo fame) joins forces with filmmaker and artist Chris Zhongtian Yuan for the single ‘New Everlasting Regret’ (新长恨歌).


Doubling as the theme song for Yuan’s black and white, 16mm film Cloudy Song (commissioned by Somerset House in London and the Alan Turing Institute as part of a virtual exhibition), the content fits right in with Lu’s output.


According to Yuan, the song and the film envision a “world where the lines between past and future, humans and artificial intelligence, homeland and exile continue to blur” as our main characters look to “piece together forgotten memories through music and stories.”

9. Taiga — Taiga

Based out of Chengdu, electronic duo Taiga finds bliss by merging of psytrance and world music on a self-titled EP. With its members hailing from Xinjiang and Mongolia, the act is as inspired by the traditional nomadic music of their ancestors as the dance floor.


Taiga utilizes an array of ethnic instrumentals (from the morin khuur to the doshpuluur) and techniques (throat singing) to synthesize an organic yet propulsive soundtrack tailor-made for the club, or better yet a moonlit jungle festival.

10. Penicillin (盘尼西林) — Ephemeral (浮生若梦)

The Britpop hopefuls behind Penicillin, which rose to fame after a stint on the first season of The Big Band in 2019, continue to evoke their idols on their latest album Ephemeral (浮生若梦). They even went as far as to record it in Yellow Arch Studios in Sheffield, England in the first half of 2022. The studios’ cofounder Colin Elliot also served as the producer, backing vocalist, and instrument player for the album.


While similarities to acts like Oasis are impossible to shake off, the three-piece band has beefed up its sound considerably, and, as evident on the track ‘Morning Song’ (黎歌), know their way around a catchy melody.


Cover image designed by Haedi Yue

Creatives in China Give Hotel Quarantine Meals a Fine Dining Touch

To this day, many are haunted by the memory of mealtimes at central quarantine hotels in China. Think unidentifiable morsels of meat, limp greens stripped of any nutrients, lukewarm soup the color of ditchwater, and the like. After days or weeks on end, it wasn’t so much the quality of food that was depressing, but the monotony of the spread — there are only so many times one enjoys baozi for breakfast before beginning to long for the buttery aroma of a croissant or something, anything remotely different.


Unable to alter the truth of her circumstances, creative Camden Hauge came up with a brilliant idea to inject some fun into her centralized quarantine stays. As French draughtsman Henri Matisse is famed for stating, “Art is an escape from reality.”


The co-founder of Social Supply Shanghai — which is responsible for throwing events such as Shanghai Supperclub, Feast, FeastCon, and most recently, a collaboration with the Museum of Hangovers — packed a few extra things in her suitcase, namely serving ware and seasonings. Come mealtime in her hotel room, she replated her drab meals and documented the process on Instagram.

Shanghai Hotel 1927, the name of her tongue-in-cheek project, provides a snapshot of meals from four different hotel quarantines in Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Nanjing (Covid-19 or not, Hauge had to travel frequently for work), and is christened after her first hotel and room number.


“It was the Shanghai Hotel on Wulumuqi Lu, and room 1927. The vibe was retro, so it seemed perfect,” says the creative, who describes her pet project as “Shanghai’s newest pop-up, an insouciant take on the captive dining experience.” Little did she know that it would start a small movement.

Tickled by the idea, Jesper Larsson, a friend of Hauge’s and the founder and creative advisor of No Problem Business Consulting, decided to follow in her footsteps. Like her, the Shanghai-based Swedish national equipped himself with knives, a cutting board, and a plate before disembarking from Hong Kong International Airport and surrendering to an eight-day quarantine in a vacant apartment in Hangzhou.


“One of my creative principles is to always do more with what’s already there, so I found Camden’s concept of ‘quarantine fine dining’ especially inspiring,” says Larsson. “It also includes all the phases of a classic creative challenge: Surprising and limited resources to work with, having to think of ideas, experimenting, making mistakes, producing and styling something photogenic, coming up with a creative and ‘pretentious name,’ and finally, documenting and publishing the results.”

Larsson is particularly proud of how his ‘deconstructed bird’s nest egg’ turned out. In fact, the latter inspired a third culinarian’s own ‘quarantine plating’ (see cover image).


Sarah C and Astrid Chan, who collectively run Mais Oui Food, a food content studio focusing on photography, food styling, and recipe creation, were next to take up the baton in the ‘quarantine plating’ challenge.


After a whirlwind trip of eating their way around Europe, C, who was culinary trained at Le Cordon Bleu Paris, and Chan, a skilled photographer, returned to their home base of Shanghai, excited for a challenge.


Chinese food, quarantine meals, China quarantine

Sarah C and Astrid Chan turned their hotel vanity table into a makeshift workstation. Photos courtesy of Mais Oui Food


“During the quarantine pop-up, I was looking forward to 8 AM, 11 AM, and 5 PM, when our lunch boxes were delivered. It felt like I was in restaurant mode, where I had to check in on the daily ingredients and see what was available to create. It was a lot of fun,” says C, who plated each of the dishes, which Chan then photographed.


While everyone’s visuals overflow with creativity, their captions are marked by hilarity and poke fun at fine dining culture, which may occasionally take itself too seriously. Hauge’s cheeky side comes through in her dish descriptions, like “yeast-leavened steamed bun” and “lacto-fermented milk” instead of simply saying “baozi” or “yogurt.”


Likewise, Larsson put a lot of thought into the “ironically pretentious naming” and chuckled over coming up with new terms, such as “beef walled” (see below).

The creatives even scaled down their serving sizes to keep with stereotypes of fine dining portions.


“I was taking the piss a bit with the minimal plating, which was mostly inspired by cliché ideas of what fine dining has recently produced, but some dishes were specific references,” Hauge tells RADII.


Take, for instance, her homage to French icon Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s iconic ‘egg caviar’ dish, which sees an egg precariously perched atop the lid of a thermos. Instead of sturgeon roe, chunks of chili crown the lockdown ‘counterfeit’ of what is possibly one of the most expensive egg dishes (388 RMB or approximately 56 USD) in the world.

Whether or not they approached the challenge with prior culinary experience, each personality had a grand time of it and took away something new.


“I have never worked as a chef, so I learned that you can surprise yourself when you take the time to fully focus on something new, and that a more sustainable way of life or doing more with less is possible,” offers Larsson.


“I learned that you can be creative with all types of cuisine, especially with Chinese food. Usually, Chinese cuisine is served right out of the wok, and it needs to be piping hot and served fast, so not a lot of plating is involved,” observes C.


Chinese food, quarantine meals, China quarantine

Think like a chef: Sarah C transformed the contents of two meal boxes into cold dishes like Ebi Sushi and Drunken Cold Chicken


Very recently, China announced that from January 2023 onwards, inbound travelers will no longer be subjected to hotel quarantine. But while the world heaved a collective sigh of relief, Hauge felt a slight sense of loss.


“I’m currently out of town and knowing that there will be no quarantine when I get back makes me a tiny bit sad, because I did kind of look forward to the challenge [of quarantine plating],” she laughs. “I was wistful leaving without having packed my ‘tools,’ like my plates, bowl, knife, and seasoning packs.”


Cover image courtesy of Mais Oui Food

‘The New Yorker’ Honors 2 Chinese Films Among Year’s Best

On December 5, The New Yorker movie-listings editor Richard Brody released his picks for the best movies of 2022, a list that includes two Chinese films — Saturday Fiction and A New Old Play.

Saturday Fiction (兰心大剧院)

Saturday Fiction is a black-and-white drama directed by screenwriter-director Lou Ye. The film premiered at the Venice International Film Festival in 2019 and was later screened on the Chinese mainland in October 2021.


Poster of Saturday Fiction. Image via IMDb

Poster for Saturday Fiction. Image via IMDb


The film is a spy thriller set in Shanghai at the beginning of the Second World War. It tells the story of a renowned actress who comes into town for a stage play while secretly carrying out undercover tasks.


Saturday Fiction features an impressive cast. Its female protagonist is played by Gong Li, a world-famous actress who starred in Ju Dou, the first Chinese movie nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1990.


The film also features Taiwanese-Canadian actor and model Mark Chao, French actor Pascal Greggory, and Japanese actor and musician Joe Odagiri.

Born in 1965 in Shanghai, Lou Ye is commonly referred to as one of the sixth-generation directors of Chinese cinema.


His films have a unique artistic style and often shed light on marginalized groups in Chinese society. Many of his productions are banned in the country, and only five of 11 films he made over the past three decades successfully secured domestic theatrical releases.

However, Lou has been making waves on the global stage for years. His debut film, Weekend Lover, had a world premiere in 1995 at the Internationales Filmfestival Mannheim-Heidelberg, where it received the Rainer Werner Fassbinder Award. Lou won international prominence with his third film Suzhou River in 2000.

A New Old Play (椒麻堂会)

The other Chinese film to make Brody’s list, A New Old Play, tells the epic story of an actor who performs Sichuan opera, a type of Chinese opera originating in Southwest China’s Sichuan province around 1700.


Qiu Jiongjiong, a Sichuan-born contemporary Chinese artist and filmmaker, wrote and directed the movie, which is based on his grandfather’s life.


The three-hour-long film follows an actor who passes away and enters the afterlife, where he vividly experiences key moments from his life one final time. He relives his own journey, as well as that of his troupe and society as a whole, from the 1930s to the 1980s.


Poster of A New Old Play Image via IMDb

Poster for A New Old Play. Image via IMDb


Born in 1977 in the city of Leshan in Sichuan, Qiu is often praised as “one of China’s most innovative, critical, and entertaining artists/filmmakers.”


Prior to A New Old Play, his first fiction feature, Qiu made several documentaries such as Mr. Zhang Believes (2015), Ode to Joy (2007), and Madame (2010).

This masterpiece, which premiered at Locarno International Film Festival 2021, has brought Qiu worldwide acclaim. It has won four awards and eight nominations at film festivals around the globe.


Cover image via IMDb