Schedium

On Monday Chinese video sharing website Bilibi (哔哩哔哩) will be releasing a cartoon about the life and times of the founder of Communism, Karl Marx . The Publicity Department of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCPPD) and the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences  have partnered to create the cartoon, whose aim is to popularize Marxism. The cartoon, entitled The Leader (领风者), has been realized in a style reminiscent of Japanese anime and consists of 7 episodes of 25 minutes each.  The story focuses on the young Karl Marx' friendship with Friedrich Engels and his relationship with his wife, Jenny von Westphalen. A trailer released in December shows Marx portrayed as a young, handsome and energetic leader.  The cartoon aims at making Karl Marx more accessible the common Chinese people, who may not be familiar with his theories. Marx has experienced a revival in China after Xi Jinping took office in 2012 and began emphasizing the importance of M

2017 Venezuela protests (by Voice of America via Wikimedia Commons) On January 23 United States president Donald Trump recognized Juan Guaidó as Venezuela's legitimate president. The citizens of Venezuela have suffered for too long at the hands of the illegitimate Maduro regime. Today, I have officially recognized the President of the Venezuelan National Assembly, Juan Guaido, as the Interim President of Venezuela. https://t.co/WItWPiG9jK — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 23, 2019 Opposition leader Guaidó had previously declared himself interim president in an attempt to remove from office incumbent president Nicolas Maduro. Other countries, including Canada, Brazil, Argentina, and other South American governments , soon joined the United States in recognizing Guaidó as Venezuela's president. The European Union released a statement calling "for the start of an immediate political process leading to free and credible elections, in conf

Portrait of Mao Zedong on Tiananmen Square (photo by Rabs003 via Wikimedia Commons) Chinese dissident Zhang Jilin (张吉林) has been detained by police in the city of Chongqing after publicly saying that President Xi Jinping should be removed from office. According to Taiwan-based Apple Daily , on January 17 Zhang talked about China's current affairs on a WeChat group. His ideas received praise from the group members, and he later told friends that he wanted to give a public speech based on the thoughts he had expressed online. Other dissidents urged him to be careful, but he insisted that he had "the right to free speech." On January 19 Zhang went to Guanyinqiao Square, in the city of Chongqing, and delivered a speech about China 's political situation, calling on Xi Jinping to be removed from office. "I think it's time for Xi Jinping to be removed from office," Zhang told a crowd according to an audio recording. "The Chinese Comm

Statement by Chengbu Public Securtity Bureau (Weibo)  A Chinese citizen from Chengbu Miao Autonomous County, in China's Hunan Province, was detained for a week after he altered the words of a government propaganda poster.  According to Chinese media reports, on December 17 the government of Chengbu's Xiyan Town put up propaganda posters that read: "Gluttonous and lazy people are shameful, being poor is not glorious" (好吃懒做很可耻、贫穷落后不光荣), as part of a government propaganda campaign to reduce poverty.  After seeing the posters, a 34-year-old man surnamed Tang altered the words to: "Gluttonous and lazy people are glorious, being poor is not shameful." Passers-by photographed the modified poster and shared the pictures online.  On January 5, the Chengbu Public Security Bureau released a statement on its Weibo account, announcing that Mr. Tang had been detained on charges of violating Article 25, Section 1, of the Public Security Administrat

At around 1 p.m. on December 11 the award-winning Taiwanese baker Wu Pao-ch'un (吳寶春) held a press conference in front of his store in Kao-hsiung, in southern Taiwan. Next to him stood Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), mayor-elect of the city. Surrounded by journalists, the two men explained why Wu's statements about Taiwan being part of China are no big deal. Han Kuo-yu praised "Master Wu", calling him an artist and a " glory of Taiwan ". He then argued that it is wrong to politicize business. "Master Wu is like an artist," Han said. "Because he just bakes bread. He doesn't understand politics ... Simple business people don't deal with politics, they develop their business. I hope that the people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait [Taiwan and mainland China] will wish him well. He has faced pressure, but I hope that the Taiwanese people will back him, fully support him. It's not easy to win an international award. Whether he opens a st

A policeman in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen has been accused of misconduct after a video of him choking a woman with his knees surfaced online.  According to media reports , on December 9 a 23-year-old Chinese woman surnamed Cheng published a post on Weibo documenting how a policeman had abused her.   Cheng explained that on December 8 she had an altercation with a security guard inside a building and had called the police. When the police arrived she asked to see the CCTV footage of the incident, but the policeman refused and threatened her with a stun gun. When she refused to leave the room, he allegedly threw her to the ground. "[The policeman] pulled my hair, forcefully threw me on the bench, and trapped my head and throat with his knees," she wrote in the post. "I immediately felt like I was choking."   A video uploaded on Weibo and later on Youtube shows the policeman pinning Cheng down with his knees. Another woman tries to hel

Dougan, a type of dried bean curd (by Bryan [CC BY-SA 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons ) While I was living in Taiwan and Hong Kong , vegetarian food became a fundamental part of my diet. When I returned to Europe after six amazing years in East Asia, I suddenly realized how difficult it was for me to readjust to a diet where most of the protein intake comes from meat and dairy products. In most of Europe it is hard to find suitable and affordable vegetarian alternatives to meat and fish. Of course, one can eat eggs and pulses. However, eggs   contain a lot of cholesterol. Generally speaking, eating one egg a day is considered safe for most people. One large egg has only about 6-7 grams of protein . But the body needs about  1 gram of protein per 1 kg of body weight  (0.75 grams for people who have a sedentary lifestyle). I personally found that eating more than one egg per day negatively affected me. Pulses are healthy and cheap, but, honestly, I find them quite boring on a daily b

A while ago I had a debate with two guys from South America I met in Hong Kong. They argued that Hong Kong had lost its Chinese culture and identity, complained about the fact that the city had the same kind of buildings and shops, like McDonald's and Starbucks, one can find anywhere in the world, that people behave like Westerners. I disagreed, telling them that behind the surface of modernity, Hong Kong remained culturally Chinese. One of those guys obviously didn't like to discuss with people who had a different opinion than himself - he got upset and stormed out of the room. Talking about Chinese culture is not only in itself a very complex subject, but it is also politically sensitive, because some people mistakenly assume that "Chinese" means Communist Party and People's Republic of China (PRC). So, if you tell someone that Taiwan is culturally Chinese, they might get angry and tell you that China is not Taiwan. I don't see Chinese cul

A street in Shenzhen, China (By Daniel Case [CC BY-SA 3.0] via Wikimedia Commons) Over the years I have met many Westerners who - to my surprise - praised dictatorships and engaged in moral equivalence. One American who visited Pyongyang told me that the Western media were not telling the truth about the country, and that North Korea was clean and modern. Westerners who live in China often parrot Communist propaganda and actively spread it, whether they are aware of it or not.  We have seen the decline of our cities and communities while witnessing the rise of illiberal market economies that oftentimes make us envious of their rising living standards, optimism and advances in technology and infrastructure.  The crisis of democracy which we are experiencing today is not a new phenomenon. It began 40 years ago with the rise of neoliberalism and the idea of a "free", unfettered market that would unite the world in one global ideology of money-making. Milton Frie