Welcome to the first edition of Baijiu Nights, China’s number-three monthly listings guide!

GOING OUT

Open-mic night. Best case scenario: no one dies

Open-mic night Jimmy’s Place, Guangzhou (Wednesdays)
Got talent? Take to the stage. Talentless? Even better. Free

Dialogue: Live The Leprechaun, Beijing (Wed 11, 9pm)
Join Tian Wei, Yuan Rui and others in this unfriendly Irish sports pub, for a live version of CCTV’s popular Dialogue programme. Timed to coincide with the last 30 minutes of a crucial Gaelic Cup semi-final, this should make for bruising viewing. 10RMB

Les Entrees accompanied by Simply Tartan “Only M.E.” tour Mao Steakhouse, Beijing (Tues 16, 8pm)
One of Asia’s favourite Scottish crooners is back in town for an extended tour. Les, accompanied by soulful electro-pipers Simply Tartan, tours China constantly, to promote awareness of the debilitating illness M.E. (better known as Myalgic Encephalopathy). 250RMB

Five-kuai drinks night Shaved Bar, Beijing (Thursdays, from 19)
This perennial nightlife classic brings a regular mix of under-14s and English teachers. Bring a fake ID – both of you. Free

The Red Wanda Cinemas (All month, Mon-Sun, 1430/1715/2030/2310)
Film. A plane carrying a troop of PLA missionaries, led by Li An-Ni Son (Chow Yun-fat), crashes in the Xinjiang mountains, where they are quickly welcomed by a group of remote Wakhi wolf herders, who have yet to convert to Communism. 20-80RMB

DJ Klit Smog Club, Beijing (Fri 20) C-D Bar, Guangzhou (Sat 21, all from 11pm)
Reykjavik nü-house legend, and founder of Burst Eardrum Unit, DJ Klit – aka Lars Olaf – visits China for the second time in six weeks.

An audience with… Yang Rui The Polly Theatre, Beijing (Sat 28, 8-11pm) PLA Opera House, Shanghai (Sun, 29, 9-11pm)
The CCTV funnyman offers anecdotes, recollections and smug self-criticisms from his glittering career. Open bar. 40RMB

STAYING IN

Li Hongmei: marbles

The Li Hongmei Hour (BTV, Saturdays, 8-9pm)
The popular People’s Daily editor and opinion-former (pictured) slowly reads out her outrageous weekly anti-US columns, while sitting snugly inside a small felt bag of marbles.

Late, late, late night with Chen Guangcheng (CNN, Sunday 15, 1am)
Early morning edition. The sunglass-toting chat show host chats to former President Jiang Zemin about his upcoming album and accidentally joins President Bill Clinton on a dinner date.

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Got an event? Let us know at cds@chinadailyshow.com

By Guang Guo
Media Correspondent

L’Oreal’s new anti-frizz formula offers zero-gravity bounce for any hair-based aeronautic disaster, says Gong

BEIJING (China Daily Show) – Confusion has greeted an unexplained decision to suddenly cut  live television coverage of a Chinese spacecraft’s re-entry to Earth.

The launch of Shenzhou-9, a manned orbiter carrying the country’s first female astronaut, Liu Yang, has received little global  interest.

The exception is China’s state channel CCTV, which has broadcast constant, groundbreakingly enthusiastic and astronomically expensive coverage.

But the live  televised feed, which had thus far maintained constant coverage of the mission, was suddenly pulled from all stations at approximately thirteen minutes into the re-entry and landing procedure.

The broadcast was then inexplicably replaced with a rolling series of L’Oreal commercials.

Viewers tuning in to watch the three weary Chinese astronauts emerge from a cramped capsule, bobbing in the Yellow Sea, were instead greeted with actress Gong Li, explaining the benefits of L’Oreal’s range of hair-care product.

In the final image broadcast of the feed, which had a mandated one-hour time delay, a puzzled Yang was seen tapping one of the spacecraft’s landing dials and cursing softly.

The show then cut to the CCTV studios in Beijing, where a surprised-looking anchor, James Chau, seemed momentarily lost for words.

“Well, best not to dwell too much on the glory of the motherland,” Chau then briskly announced. “We’ll be right back after these important messages.”

The remarks were then followed by eight hours of back-to-back L’Oreal commercials, all featuring actress Li.

24 hours after Shenzhou-9 was scheduled to be retrieved, an unnamed China Space Agency spokesman issued a terse statement.

“Everything had gone completely according to plan,” he read. “The brave astronauts are precisely where we intended them to be.

“We have contacted their families and told them exactly what their reaction is,” the spokesman added.

He then left the podium to be replaced by actress Gong Li, who began speaking on behalf of L’Oreal’s new Viscose-Bounce Tonique range of shampoos and conditioners.

This morning, Chinese Internet searches for the words ‘Shenzhou-9’ ‘capsule,’ ‘spacecraft disaster’ and ‘flaming ball of death and wreckage,’ returned no results.

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By KUO LAO
Society Correspondent

‘China is like a Lamborghini,’ says Li. ‘Fast, elitist and mostly yellow’

SHANGHAI (China Daily Show) – A flamboyant plutocrat has lambasted Western “outsiders” who criticize China with little understanding of its complex internal dynamics.

Eric S Li, a Harvard-educated venture capitalist with offices in New York and Tokyo, says that most foreign people simply don’t understand ordinary Chinese.

“Chinese people are happy, sometimes even very happy. Whenever I see the guy who washes my Lamborghini, he’s always smiling,” Li said. “Actually, I think he’s probably a simpleton. I can’t understand his accent at all; it’s sad. His soap ‘n’ wax is faultless, though.”

One of the problems, Li says, is a complete disconnect between lofty Western critics, with their absolutist ideals, and the day-to-day struggles of ordinary laobaixing — the regular folk who really matter.

“When I’m back in Shanghai, I see Chinese people almost every other day from my balcony. And I interact with ordinary, non-wealthy Chinese constantly. The other night, I asked my PA, Lynn, who is Chinese, if she was ‘happy’” says Li. “She replied, ‘Very happy, Mr Li. Please, can I go home now?’”

“Those were her exact words. Not ‘I lack suffrage’, not ‘there’s no rule of law’, not ‘everything I buy is either fake or toxic’ — her primary concern was getting back home in time to wake up the next morning to come back to work,” Li recalls. “I was so pleased with her answer, I said she could go home early after she’d finished washing Ted, my Tibetan mastiff.”

Chinese people also don’t care about democracy, Li says, except when it comes to important matters – like Super Happy Girls, a reality-style TV show in which viewers vote for their favorite pop act. Li says that corruption is sometimes a problem.

“The authorities need to look into that show,” he seethes. “Oh my God, did you see who won? That guy, Duan Lixi? I totally voted for Liu Xin. That was so rigged. I mean, come on.”

Despite his fervent defence, Li concedes that China does face problems.

“Some of my friends do complain about inflation, inattentive staff and fuel prices. But them’s the breaks, I say – if you drive an SUV, you’re going to have to take a little hit on gasoline,” he said. “And you can always just hire new staff.”

Overall, he says, those who criticize China simply do not understand Eric S Li.

“China rewards those who work hard and know the right people,” says Li,whose father is a high-ranking PLA officer and co-owner of a Hello Kitty franchise. “I’m proof the system works for me.”

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With a retinue that includes two female chauffeurs, Li says he understands the pain of supporting an extended family

By LAO SHOUXING
History Correspondent

Queues are rare in modern China, but when they do form, etiquette demands they be as intrusive and uncomfortable as possible

HENAN (China Daily Show) — Archaeologists excavating a site near the Shang Dynasty (1766-1050 BC) capital of Yinxu made a startling discovery this week, when fossilized remains of a trio of Chinese citizens, apparently in the form of a line, were sensationally uncovered.

Dr. Charles Whitmore, visiting paleontologist with the Chinese Academy of Sciences, says the discovery represents “a paradigm shift in our understanding of the Chinese people.”

The scientific community has long believed Chinese people to be “genetically unwilling to file singly,” Whitmore explained. “But this discovery suggests we may have been wrong and that they may have once been willing to form a line quite patiently.”

“To think that perhaps as recently as 3,000 years ago, the average Chinese might have possessed the faculties to align his – or herself – directly behind another flies in the face of everything we’ve assumed,” Whitmore continued. “Today, such linear audacity by the Chinese is only observed in excruciating military processions and firing squads.”

Millennia of sociological research has reinforced the original conclusion, most recently in the notorious 1994 Tsinghua University “Bus Stop” experiment, where students were asked to remain in single-file as a bus, driven by researchers, pulled up. The researchers then watched as the 12 students pushed, jostled and trampled each other on to the vehicle, even though it was empty and had ample seating.

The discovery is being hailed by Western scientists as an anthropological milestone tantamount to the Java Man and the Chauvet cave paintings and could cause researchers in other areas of Sinology to rethink scores of cherished theories, including the controversial suggestion by Whitmore that large swathes of early Chinese may have enjoyed lunch at “any random interval of time between, say, eleven and three?”

One Harvard history professor has claimed for years to have written evidence of a Ming Dynasty dinner party that “didn’t end awkwardly and abruptly just before ten.”

There is little consensus, however, among Chinese academics, who remain skeptical about the findings. “I don’t think we can rush to conclusions here,” Beijing Normal University professor Shi-mian Maifu told China Daily Show. “There may be some other explanation.  Maybe they were performing a dance, or playing some sort of practical joke. We just don’t know.”

Shi-mian, a noted scholar of Chinese ethics and author of seven university textbooks, urges Westerners to “stand still” and “remain calm” in the face of “sudden excitement.”

“I cannot believe that any reasonable, sane Chinese person would choose to purposefully increase the time he or she spends waiting out of deference to someone else,” said Shi-mian. “I just can’t stand behind that line of logic.”

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By XING CHOUWEN
Entertainment Correspondent

The ending of the ban is good news for both pornographers and fishermen

BEIJING (China Daily Show) – Servers crashed and internet connections slowed to a crawl yesterday, after Japan ended its recent ban on Chinese exports of specialist pornography, in what is being seen as a diplomatic gesture of seasonal goodwill.

But the move, part of a thawing of diplomatic relations after an unsteady few months, left millions still without proper access, as Internet providers buckled under the strain of the sudden pornfall. Some users were this morning being told that “holiday hand-relief” was effectively canceled until after Chinese New Year.

Senior Chinese ministers were last night demanding to know who was responsible for the lack of preparation, which they said embarrassed China and left it looking like a “developing country, like Vietnam or Great Britain or something.”

Lack of access to porn is seen as a major potential cause of social instability in China. In November, Japanese officials blocked all exports of so-called “rare” pornography as part of a tit-for-tat controversy between the two nations over a sovereignty dispute in the Diaoyu – or Senkaku –  Islands.

Japan, fondly known  in China as “Nipporn”, has long specialized in such erotic exports but the November ban left to an upsurge in fake or shanzhai product, which many described as lacking the production skill and high cinematography values of the real thing.

User Yao Ten, 23, downloaded a copy of Calamari Co-eds 5 only to find it was an inferior Chinese knock-off.  “I found myself watching a group of Shandong women awkwardly rubbing each other with dead eels. A total turn-off,” Yao told China Daily Show.

Since the prohibition was lifted, schools and universities across the country have reported widespread truancy, which is expected to last well into late January.

Undergraduate Yu Men, 24, describes himself as an angry, bitter nationalist to the point of almost total ignorance. Yet he was quick to praise its adult cinema industry: “Japan is highly superior in the quality of their adult videos compared to China, mainly because they are perverted, barbarian running dogs,” he said, adding, “I’ll give them their due, though: their porn is top-notch.”

Search engines and forums pledged this morning to put their engineers on full alert to maintain connectivity, while UNAIDS ambassador and TV personality James Chau has promised those unable to download authentic squid porn free access to an infamous full four-hour bootleg sex tape, featuring Chau, that recently surfaced on the web.

In a public ceremony yesterday attended by international media, Japanese Foreign Minister Yamata Hatanzi handed Politburo representative Li Fu a specially commissioned copy of Conger Conga 4, featuring AV star Erika Sato with a cast of thousands of fish and underage schoolgirls.

Accepting the gift on behalf of senior Chinese officials, Li said: “Our countries may disagree on some things but fundamentally see eye-to-eye over the need to maintain a constant balance of trade between cheap, disposable plastic goods and 90-minute DVDs of Japanese women being molested by octopi.”

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By XING CHOUWEN
Entertainment correspondent

Chau is said to often boast of his prowess in private, friends claim

BEIJING (China Daily Show) – No sooner has Edison Chen announced his return to  singing than the Chinese entertainment industry is set to be rocked by another sex scandal, this time involving CCTV milquetoast James Chau.

Chau is best known as the presenter of CCTV News and Worldwide Watch, both shows recently implicated in a scandal involving a Minnesotan family forced to watch CCTV-9 during a purported ten-hour ordeal.

Chau’s woes were set to increase last night though, after a lengthy sex tape, featuring the host with three unidentified females, began doing the rounds on the Internet.

Lovingly deemed “the sixth fuwa” by admiring Chinese mainlanders, Chau’s unimpressive and effeminate physical features have long convinced an adoring public that the star is, at best, an non-threatening beta male. Viewers of the tape — which China Daily Show has seen excerpts of — report an entirely different impression, however.

During the four-and-a-half hour footage, Chau is seen effortlessly maneuvering between stand-up-69 and “downward-facing-dog”, and performs a number of other positions with practiced aplomb, including advanced techniques such as the “Horizontal Mambo” and the “Rifleman.”

“Holy crap, you have got to be kidding!” was the reaction of “Captain Tofu,” one of many netizens commenting on Mop and Sina, two popular Chinese forums. Other comments included “Go, James! I never knew you had it in you” (“zerogame”) and “Cute… his cock looks like a small, fleshy cork” (“Xinhua4ever”).

But not all reactions were supportive. Many fans felt betrayed, having taken Chau’s clean-cut image to heart. “I had taken down my James Chau doll from the firing place [sic]!” stormed “d67shu” while “ren6ren” complained “Too much… I never wanted to see more than his real head. Now brother has seen both heads! Fuck!”

Some also criticized comments Chau allegedly makes during the tape including “Screw condoms” and “You’ve seen one AIDS victim, you’ve seen them all, I’m telling you. Seriously, move on with your life, people. Chau coming through!”

Chau is the first Chinese mainlander to be appointed a National UNAIDS Goodwill Ambassador for China. A UN representative last night said she was unaware of the tape and could not comment further.

According to one former Cambridge classmate, Matilda Wu, Chau had a well-established reputation as a ladies’ man and amateur swordsman while at the university.

“He was known as ‘Hung Kok’. James was a total player,” Wu told China Daily Show, adding that Chau had also gamely agreed to appear as Mr September in the 1996 Cambridge Student Body Calendar. Representatives of Chau were unavailable for comment at the time of going to press.

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