Chinese history

Actor Lawrence Wong, who plays Hai Lan Cha in ‘Story of Yanxi Palace’, believes the show was such a big hit because of the various characters that viewers love to hate, and love to love. Photo: Instagram @ohohlawrence

Meet actor Lawrence Wong, Hai Lan Cha in ‘Story of Yanxi Palace’

The star with a boyish smile and effortless charm talks about filming the period drama, the superpower he’d like and what he’d do with a penguin in his freezer

11 Oct 2018 - 2:06pm

Yang Fuxi with one of his traditional Chinese ox-horn bows, in Beijing’s Panjiayuan Market last month. Picture: Steven Ribet

Bow makers bringing traditional Chinese archery back from the brink

6 Oct 2018 - 3:07pm 4

Social media erupts over screenshots of derogatory messages described as anti-Chinese hate speech

Foreigners accused of racial slurs and insults in China WeChat group

3 Oct 2018 - 8:14pm 39

After years of discussion, work is due to begin soon to recreate key parts of Stratford-upon-Avon in a development which will also pay homage to ‘China’s Shakespeare’ Tang Xianzu and Spain’s Miguel de Cervantes

China’s replica of Shakespeare’s birthplace coming in 2022

3 Oct 2018 - 2:50pm 1

Lavishly illustrated volume lifts the veil on life in the Forbidden City by looking at the robes, jewellery, and accessories empresses wore and the sensuous paintings that adorned their walls

Tasteful erotica from Forbidden City feature in book on empresses’ lives

1 Oct 2018 - 7:39pm

Stretching from the Roman empire to Asia, the ancient trade route lured invaders, migrants and merchants to China, and left artefacts rich with multicultural meaning

Centuries-old silver jug conjures up mysteries of the Silk Road

1 Oct 2018 - 3:27pm

Modern renderings of the four men historically recognised as the most beautiful in ancient China. (From left) Wei Jie, Pan An, Ji Kang and Prince Lanling. Images: mafengwo.cn

‘Sissy man’ look has been flaunted for centuries by celebrated figures

30 Sep 2018 - 3:01pm 1

A print of a work titled “Work well, so that comrade Stalin will say thank you!”, by Vladislav Grigoryevich Pravdin. Picture: Alamy

How Chinese word for ‘comrade’ came to refer to LGBT community

28 Sep 2018 - 3:29pm

Tsui Hark’s latest blockbuster highlights how the legendary legal defender’s image has been reinterpreted in contemporary media

A Tang-dynasty ‘whowasit’: the mystery of the real Judge Dee

27 Sep 2018 - 9:52am

The world’s tallest Confucius statue will be formally launched on Monday in Qufu, east China’s Shandong province. Photo: Xinhua

World’s largest Confucius statue to open in sage’s east China home

21 Sep 2018 - 5:21pm 5

Consorts of the Qianglong Emperor take centre stage in the Chinese drama The Story of Yanxi Palace. Photo: Handout

What The Story of Yanxi Palace says about China’s attitude to feminism

19 Sep 2018 - 10:07am 5

Activists in China this week rallied to push for same-sex marriage. Photo: Reuters

Gay sex in China: communist puritanism meets colonial baggage

15 Sep 2018 - 10:15am 13

A Buddha head from the Tang dynasty may have originated from a world heritage monument site

Was ancient statue pulled from Sotheby’s stolen from China?

14 Sep 2018 - 10:20pm 4

Chinese actress Tan Zhuo as Gao, an imperial concubine in The Story of Yanxi Palace.

The four most powerful women in The Story of Yanxi Palace

10 Sep 2018 - 2:57pm 1

“The Story of Yanxi Palace” is an imperial romance drama co-produced by iQiyi in China. It focuses on the 18th century emperor Qianlong.

Concubine-loving emperor was an art vandal with dubious taste

6 Sep 2018 - 8:30pm 6

Hong Kong has been slower than some Chinese ports to trumpet its role in the history of East-West maritime trade, but a new exhibition at Hong Kong’s Maritime Museum shows the importance of places such as Tuen Mun and High Island to ancient mariners and is a timely reminder of the broader benefits to society of trade

When Hong Kong was a way station on China’s Maritime Silk Road

4 Sep 2018 - 12:38pm

Exhibition ‘Digital Dunhuang – Tales of Heaven and Earth’ at Hong Kong Heritage Museum brings famous Mogao cave art to life, and allows public to appreciate murals from caves where visits are highly restricted

3D images give Silk Road’s Dunhuang cave art new life

29 Aug 2018 - 7:47am

A portrait of Chen Yuanyuan, concubine of general Wu Sangui. Her abduction by a rival general led Wu to open a gate in the Great Wall and allow the Qing army from Manchuria to capture Beijing and topple the Ming dynasty. Photo: Alamy

Five concubines whose exploits changed China's history

29 Aug 2018 - 11:29am 2

The Five Great Mountains of China – from the notoriously difficult Huashan to Mount Song of Shaolin Temple fame – have been inspiring artists, poets and writers for several millennia

Hanging temple, cliff paths: pleasure, peril on China’s sacred mountains

24 Aug 2018 - 11:34am

Timely book recalls how early Chinese migrants were pushed to the margins of American society, then excluded, and the reaction of some whites to attacks on Chinese, such as the pastor who said: ‘My God, is this America? Why do we stand and do nothing?’

When Chinese migrants to US felt the lash of white vigilantes

20 Aug 2018 - 9:00pm 6

Ceremony at the Chinese section of Anfield Cemetery in Liverpool, England, to commemorate five Chinese labourers who served on the battlefields of the first world war, on August 10, 2018. Photo: SCMP/Hilary Clarke

Britain commemorates China’s forgotten war dead

16 Aug 2018 - 10:11am 9

A Beijing cultural bureau said it had not approved Airbnb’s plan to allow competition winners to spend a night on the Great Wall of China. Photo: Handout

Airbnb’s Great Wall of China competition crumbles to nothing

8 Aug 2018 - 11:21pm 1

A botched restoration job that painted over Buddhist sculptures in Anyue township, Sichuan province, has drawn harsh criticism. Photo: ThePaper.cn

China’s technicolour Buddha joins botched repairs wall of shame

8 Aug 2018 - 12:35pm 9

Hong Kong professor David Faure believes looking beyond official accounts and studying Chinese society is increasingly essential in a fast-changing world

What 30 years in China taught a social historian about its future

5 Aug 2018 - 3:43pm 5

Invented to expedite communication for travelling Buddhist monks, hand gestures eventually evolved into a less honourable means of communication and today are largely the preserve of mobsters

What Buddhist monks and discreet dealings have in common: hand signals

3 Aug 2018 - 9:58am

Peng Zhuying, 90, was taken to a military brothel in 1944, six years after being blinded. Photo: Handout

Chinese former ‘comfort women’ tell of brutal treatment by Japanese

23 Jul 2018 - 6:52pm 46

Dr Leo Eloesser (right) operating on a patient in Spain in 1937, at the height of the Spanish civil war. Picture: courtesy of the Tamiment Library, New York University

‘Medical Marco Polo’: American doctor who lost his heart to China

27 Jul 2018 - 12:49pm 1

Organisers of 2019 art exhibition announce its title, May You Live in Interesting Times, as ‘an ancient Chinese curse’, while acknowledging the attribution is false. A Hong Kong art professional denounces its use as ‘an absolute disgrace’

Venice Biennale using fake Chinese curse called ‘schoolyard racism’

17 Jul 2018 - 8:31pm

Contestants in a chilli-pepper-eating competition in Ningxiang, Hunan, have their fill on July 8. Hunanese food, known as Xiang cuisine, is well known for its spicy flavours. Photo: AFP

It’s shameful how little we know about China

18 Jul 2018 - 12:42pm 1

You may also like

It will take a strategic, decades-long US effort to manage a power rivalry with China, but none appears to be in the cards, Ankit Panda writes

China

How Trump’s partisan policies rubbed salt in wounded China-US ties

6 Oct 2018 - 10:39pm 16

The new seven-fret Jamstik 7 smart guitar, which can be used to create the sounds of almost any instruments you can think off.

Self-taught musicians hit high notes on app-connected instruments

From arms to energy, Russian influence in the region is growing ever greater – and key to Moscow’s route to dominance is its unique relationship with Beijing

Long Reads

Balance Trump, cosy up to China, Koreas: Russia’s play for Asia

24 Sep 2018 - 4:14pm 22

Wealth Management Services with Chinese Characteristics

Wealth Management Services with Chinese Characteristics

While fans focused on the race last week, others were revelling in a world where there’s a fine line between romance and remittance … and tourism officials weren’t happy about it

Society

How Singapore’s F1 fling with sugar daddies turned sour

26 Sep 2018 - 5:50pm 17

Yoga ball murder victim Wong Siew Fing (left) and her younger sister Wong Siew Fong, aged eight and six respectively. Photo: Handout

Hong Kong

Yoga ball murderer was a manipulative, bullying husband: sister-in-law

24 Sep 2018 - 3:01pm

Jeongja Han, director of Tail Project, a company that specialises in cleaning out and disposing of property accumulated by the deceased, after completing a clean-out job. Pictures: Noriko Hayashi for Bloomberg Businessweek

Post Magazine

Dying alone in Japan: the industry devoted to what’s left behind

24 Sep 2018 - 10:11am

Hung, 66, plies her trade in Sham Shui Po, a popular ground for ‘street stall grannies’. Photo: K. Y. Cheng

Hong Kong

‘Street stall grannies’ a sign Hong Kong elderly falling through cracks

22 Sep 2018 - 12:17pm 8

Xiaolongbao : Shanghai dumplings made the old fashioned way

China

Xiaolongbao : Shanghai dumplings made the old fashioned way

Sep 20th 2018, 12:05pm

Tencent has frequently added innovations to WeChat, designed to drive growth and loyalty, the latest being mini programs

Business

The WeChat story: how Tencent's super-app changed China

16 Aug 2018 - 3:39pm 4

Redcore, which recently raised 250 million yuan (US$36 million) in funding, said on its website that its browser had ‘broken the American monopoly’

Business

‘100pc China-developed browser’ is built on Google’s Chrome, CEO admits

17 Aug 2018 - 9:17pm 205

A model displays a Chinese passport and mainland ID card, similar to the one that will be issued to residents of Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan. Photo: Weibo

Hong Kong

New ID card will give Hongkongers access to public services on mainland

20 Aug 2018 - 11:37am 35