The Beijinger gives some perspective on Singles Day:

For most Chinese youth, today’s date has nothing to do with a far-away war that ended 90 years ago. In recent years, the repetition of the digit 1 in 11/11 has been taken by many as a good enough as an excuse as any to celebrate Single’s Day or 光棍节 Guanggun Jie. To mark the occasion, various speed and blind dating events will be taking place across town while other singles will use the day to display their pride in their singledom.

However, according to a poll that is getting a lot of coverage in today’s papers, more and more people (especially young professionals) are wishing that they didn’t have to celebrate the special day anymore. The results, of what was no doubt a highly-suspect and totally unscientific poll conducted by zhaopin.com, revealed that men want to be married by the time they are 30 and 62.1% of respondents thought that women should be getting married before they’re 28. The poll results also indicated that 70% of single professionals are worried about their single status and yearn to find a partner….

Memoirs of a Geisha star is the latest Chinese to be branded a traitor, for her defection to Singapore:

A decision by one of China’s most famous film stars to take Singaporean nationality has set off an online furore with many ardent nationalists branding her a traitor and a shame to her native country.

Gong Li, the 43-year-old star of such Hollywood movies as Memoirs of a Geisha, Miami Vice and Farewell My Concubine took the oath of citizenship at the weekend along with 149 other new citizens. Her husband, the Singaporean tobacco tycoon Ooi Hoe Soeng, accompanied her.

Beijing does not allow its people to hold double nationality and the star will be obliged to give up her Chinese citizenship. This means she will no longer be eligible for membership of an advisory body to the Chinese parliament – a largely honorary position that the government confers on many celebrities, successful businessmen and famed academics and scientists. …

Singles Day posts: top 10 lists, poems, bachelor rentals.

Students at China Central Academy of Fine Arts put together a stop-action, human version of the old Street Fighter video game, complete with sound effects, power meters, and some amazing moving scenery.

A girl who wrecked a KTV room in June was given a four month sentence last week.

White Rabbit candies are back on shelves in limited numbers

China’s popular White Rabbit Creamy Candy has returned to shelves in Shanghai with a green “Quality” sticker to ensure consumers that it’s melamine-free. Shoppers so far seem to take a forgive-and-forget attitude, according to the company that makes it.

White Rabbit candy (Photo courtesy Shanghai Guan Sheng Yuan Food Ltd.)
“Our promotion in Shanghai First Food Mall was a big success” Thursday, said Wang Yiyi, spokeswoman for Shanghai Guan Sheng Yuan Food Ltd. By four hours into the return-to-stores promotion, 20,000 yuan ($2,900) of the candy was sold, she said. “The candy was in such short supply that we need to get more batches from the factories to meet demand.”

The candy will first be sold with its new melamine-free packaging in Shanghai, then in other Chinese cities before being sold overseas again…

A preview of the new Hunan TV series “Ugly Wudi,” adapted from the American comedy “Ugly Betty.” The show premiered on September 28.

“‘Am I in big trouble this time?’ Zou Kaiyun was bursting to ask a reporter yesterday afternoon. He claimed he didn’t expect this situation to arouse the attention of so many people.”

Commentary on China’s ubiquitous cheer, ‘Jia You’:

“Jia You is not a bad cheer. It’s simple, catchy, and easily customizable to any team, country, or individual. The literal meaning of jia you is ‘add oil.’ It doesn’t make a lot of logical sense, but then again most good cheers don’t. It works like this. The leader shouts out the name of the team, for example ‘China’ and then the others shout ‘jia you.’ The leader then shouts ‘jia you’ and the others reply with ‘China.’ My beef with jia you is that it is the only cheer in China, and is cheered on auto-pilot at virtually every event where China is competing. In fact China has added so much oil this Olympics that it makes one wonder whether it is the impetus behind China’s rapidly rising gas prices.”

“Welcome to Hooters Beijing!” Marina Hyde gets a good look at one of Beijing’s newest imports:

“Lying toward the east of Beijing in the Chaoyang district, the Workers Stadium was one of the Ten Great Buildings commissioned in 1959 to mark the 10th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China. These are somewhat different times, though, and so it is that a new face in town has parked itself right across the street. As this establishment’s waitresses shriek in unison at arriving customers: ‘Welcome to Hooters Beijing!’ Behold the new face of Chinese capitalism. And please try to stay looking at its face…
Hooters not translating as a pun in Mandarin, Rachel is unaware that the word emblazoned across her vest refers to something other than the owl that goggles away in its logo, as she takes orders beneath a large sign reading ‘Caution: blondes thinking’…”