FEBRUARY 2022
www.thenanjinger.com
THE NANJINGER | VOLUME 12 ISSUE 04 | FEBRUARY 2022
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Contributors
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Nanjing Nomads
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Editorial
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Poem; Awakenings
10 Are We There Yet; Please Tell Me Humans Can Hibernate! 14 The Productive (And not-so Productive) Ways to Hibernate 16 The Tale of Todd (Cruelly Locked in His Cave) 21 The Gavel Enterprises in
Hibernation; An Analysis of Dormant Companies
23 Capital Constructs (3) Porcelain Tower
24 Strainer From Bush to Cup; So White it’s Green
25 Great Nanjingers (19)
Dark, Political Satirist who was Fairy Tale King; Zhang Tianyi
27 Our Space 35 Metro Map
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THE NANJINGER | VOLUME 12 ISSUE 04 | FEBRUARY 2022
Editorial
Golden Slumbers
H
appy tigers! This month, The Nanjinger debuts works of fiction by local members of The Inkwell, a non-profit literary organisation dedicated to hosting educational and literary events, while developing the talents of writers. Workshops and events are hosted in cities across China. Hattie’s debut begins on p.16.
And so to our theme. We’d wager that most of our readers would have rather not get out of bed on more than a few mornings these past couple of months.
Elsewhere, alert readers will have noticed that Nanjing’s metro network expanded considerably at the end of last year. As a result, our handy metro map (the only printed map with first and last train times for every station) has had a complete overhaul. Find it on our inside back cover.
Or… maybe it was just COVID keeping us at home. Nahee Kim finds out what we have been doing there. See p.14.
And there’s a reason for that. As Triona Ryan reveals, humans might just actually be suited to taking to caves for the winter after all. See p.10-12.
Welcome to “Hibernation” from The Nanjinger.
Ed.
S
can the QR Code to visit The Nanjinger on WeChat, from where you can download a free PDF of this issue, find a full list of distribution points for hard copies or arrange a subscription to have The Nanjinger delivered to your home or office! This magazine is part of a family of English publications that together reach a large proportion of the foreign population living in Nanjing, along with a good dash of locals, comprising: The Nanjinger City Guide www.thenanjinger.com Facebook, WeChat, Twitter & Instagram
All of the above are owned and operated by HeFu Media, the Chinese subsidiary of SinoConnexion Ltd; www.sinoconnexion.com
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i. Receding shadows cry out on snowy hillssliding on clay sacks, down snow-stacked slopes, pleading lovingly into urban tree canopies in which hide the disobedient pet hippopotami. These worlds of wonders bleed into dark corners, half-remembered. ii The hollow one’s world was gunmetal grey, his every step tracking the last into virtual gloom where spaces marked places where memories were missing off wire walls of self-control and pragmatic disbelief. iii A wood pigeon's chorus taunts – ‘who are you?’ He breathes in the morning’s chill, the waning moon’s lopsided grin Exciting in him some long-lost stirrings, hid, hibernating from those adult years, awakening now to rephrase the world around him. iv These things now may he once again see: Sun-bleached cloud castles; cumulus dragons; a slender bird stalking a pixie at the water’s edge; streaks of colour where a tower scrapes the grey sky red pale new landscapes on which he has yet to treadnew days’ dawns in which he may pull at more fragments of long-forgotten dreams. v This is the way each day begins This is the way each new day begins This now is the way each new day begins With a plunge in a pool and a spring in his step As he’s reaching to taste, to savour, all of life he can get…
By M ait iu Bralligan ‘2 2
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PLEASE TELL ME HUMANS CAN HIBERNATE!
By Triona Ryan
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In my miseducated youth, I used to try to power through the winter with an “Are we there yet?” attitude. Overwhelm, exhaustion and meltdowns over the course of several decades finally led to a kinder approach to winter. Since discovering the JOMO (Joy-of-Missing-Out) of hibernating during the winter months, it has made the whole season marginally tolerable. There are those among us who actually enjoy this dim and dreary time of year, who relish the Siberian winds that chill the very soul. Some out there even wish it would snow. I can’t be able. Hunkering down, and Hygge-ing up, I yearn for Spring. The human body can tolerate little in terms of fluctuations of temperature. A few degrees up or down results in fever or hypothermia, both of which kill us pretty quickly if not treated, fast. Indeed, living year-round in Nanjing provides ample opportunity to explore extremes in temperature and their effect on the body, but none so extreme as rising above critical fever level of 42 degrees Celcius or below 35 for hypothermia, in terms of internal body temperature. This year and last has surely allowed us to get a decent idea of our typical body temperature. Mine is 35.6 , which is lower than the average of 37. So, it doesn’t take much to activate “I’m freezing” mode. Once the dark days and sub-zero temps set in, the only way through is by layering up and upping the ante on bedtime. Drastically. If it were possible to up this ante to say, 6 weeks, I would be in. Still, web searches on human hibernation turn up naught but fantastical possibilities for space exploration, and very significant developments in trauma care for victims of cerebral or cardiac arrest. Human hibernation, it would appear, is impossible. We can’t store food or water, so would die of starvation. We can’t suppress metabolism without the resulting organ failure and would die of sepsis. We can’t resist the urge to murder and plunder those settlements which tried to “sleep it off”, and would die of the human condition.
Hibernation, torpor, “deep sleep”; the state of minimal thermal, breathing and metabolic activity by which many animals in less temperate climates survive the winter. Humans do not hibernate. The BBC Science Focus Magazine ascribes this criminal inability to the fact that homo sapiens wandered out of Africa relatively late in the evolutionary process, already equipped with fire, clothes, hunting and agriculture; thus eliminating the need to sink into baseline metabolic rates to survive frigid conditions. hose who did try to snooze through the winter blues were “ousted by the guys with the fur clothes sitting around the campfire in the next cave along”. And yet, for those of us engulfed by invernal torpor, the doubt lingers. Perhaps some of us perishers survived, perhaps we maintain the topical winter torpor gene on the down low. A soon as the December equinox draws close, I feel the need for sleep, for bed, for warmth, for solitude. Retreating to my cave, I wonder. I wonder. Stories of mythical beasts do exist, strange creatures who despite the decisive research to the contrary, have gone ahead and hibernated anyway, like a boss. On 7 October, 2006, 35-year old Mitsutaka Uchikoshi decided to walk down Mount Rokko in Western Japan, rather than join his friends in the post-picnic cable car ride home. Totally relatable, as a sufferer of vertigo, but what happened next beggars belief. With nothing but the dregs of a bottle of water and a pouch of barbeque sauce, Uchikoshi set off on foot. He got lost. What else to do, in the woods? He found a stream, thinking to follow it to a settlement. He slipped, fell, and broke his pelvis. After wandering around for one more day, Uchikoshi stumbled upon a meadow, and in the sunlight, with a feeling of great comfort, he lay down and went to sleep. On October 31st, 24 days later, a hiker stumbled across his body.
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Incredibly, the body was still alive. At 22 degrees, suffering multiple organ failure and blood loss, Uchikoshi made a full recovery and was discharged from hospital by a baffled medical team, with a clean bill of health. Doctors around the globe have hailed the case as “revolutionary”, though some remain skeptical, stating that 24 days without water is physiologically impossible. In Canada, the country where you go for the culture and scenery, and stay because your car won’t start, Erika Norbury wandered into the unforgiving night back in 2001 wearing nothing but a pink t-shirt and a diaper, and in the most literal sense of the word, froze to death. It was minus 24 degrees outside. When her mother found her 2 hours later, she was curled into a ball and “so cold, […] she was afraid to hold her too tightly for fear of breaking off her frozen limbs.” She was considered clinically dead upon arrival to hospital, she had no pulse or vital signs, and her core body temperature was 16 degrees.
It would seem that the dream of hitting the duvet for the duration of deep winter was not to be. Imagine my surprise, when at last I came across a journal article by Juan-Luis Arsuaga and Antonis Bartsiokas, entitled Hibernation in hominins from Atapuerca, Spain half a million years ago. This paper, published in the journal L’Anthopologie, postulates the very real possibility of hibernation as a means for surviving the frigid Iberian winters for our hominin ancestors. The Atapuerca UNESCO World Heritage site, is an anthropological treasure trove of fossil remains which are over 400,000 years old. That’s 20,000 generations ago. Granted, much has changed since then, but still, possible is possible. Helpfully known as Sima de los Huesos, the pit of bones, Atapuerca, near Burgos in northern Spain, has provided scientists with enough evidence of seasonal disruption of bone growth to propose hibernation as an explanation. The patterns in human bone growth, matched those of the bones of bears found in the same cave system. And bears, as well we know, are a dab hand at hibernating. In 2022, the obsession with hibernation hinges on the desire to explore deep space, lessening the need for space, fuel, and the psychological challenges of long-distance space voyages. Because the 300 million miles, 7 years trip to Mars would rouse an “Are we there yet?” from even the most stoic of wanderlusts.
And yet, despite the “chunk” of ice in her throat that prevented the paramedics from intubating, despite the feet frozen together, despite it all, she survived. It’s believed that due to the rapid cooling (to say the least) of her body, the brain was able to survive with enough oxygen, though all other vital signs were virtually non-existent. Still, these cases involve actually freezing the body in order to keep the central operating system, the brain, alive. And as we have already established, it is the feeling cold part of winter that is up in the top three things I hate most about the damnable season.
Its practical implications have allowed for medical advancement of therapeutic hypothermia. It’s been done, but we don’t know how. As I tap the keys in my mittens, swathed in four layers of wool beneath my leg blankets, Nanjing, China and much of Asia slips into its annual torpor, the city sleeps and the dwellers celebrate Lunar New Year, The Year of The Tiger. In Ireland, February 1st heralds the beginning of Springtime. The dark months are long and weary. The practical implications of figurative hibernation have also lessened the psychological challenges of the winter voyage in my life, given that the fight and flight option is still a no go. But yes, fellow travellers. We are nearly there. Xin Nian Kuai Le, Nanjingers.
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The Productive
(AND-NOT-SO PRODUCTIVE)
Ways to Hibernate By Nahee Kim
O
bserving the world during the past 24 months, it seems that the most apparent hibernating species is not the commonly perceived, good-old garden-variety bear, but instead the Homo Sapien. Ever since the COVID pandemic began, public spaces around the world became less and less crowded, with people staying in their own homes all the time. Schools and work were postponed or switched quickly to online. According to cnbc.com, people looking for online jobs increased 460 percent in 2 years, between June, 2019, and June, 2021. There was also a 15fold increase in the number of new registrations on the online course website, edX, during April 2020. For me, ever since the virus started, I have hardly ever left my neighbourhood, buying any required materials online, chatting with my friends and studying through digital means. We became the bears, hibernating in our caves with our supply of websites, Zoom calls, and online courses, during the long-lasting winter of COVID. However, just as hibernation allows animals to get ready for springtime and prepare for the warmth and birth of the new organisms that it brings, this human hibernation could also allow our global society to prepare for new changes in life in the post-COVID era. So, what have Chinese people been up to while hibernating in their homes? According to statista.com, the most activity during COVID in
China is surfing the internet, with 78.7 percent of female and 73 percent of male survey participants claiming so. Next up comes chatting, gaming and sleeping. While these activities may not seem like the most productive, they have allowed us to look within ourselves and at others in a clearer perspective. Hibernation has given us time to reflect and think deeply about things we think of as significant, such as our goals in life and important relationships, as well as the things we enjoy doing. Unable to go to school in early 2020, I had more time to consider my goals, plans and my true interests, which, in a way, made my room my own special cave. Here, I stored winter supplies, such as bullet journals or my stationary while I waited, using them to bring about better changes in the spring to come. Secondly, consider the smallest things that happen in our daily lives, as compared to the huge pandemic hanging over our heads. Who has not wondered as to their health and how they are still alive on this Earth today? For me personally, I am most thankful for that I still have people who are happy to be with me, such as friends and family. This hibernation period has also allowed me to keep in touch with some of my old friends in a city where I formerly lived. It all amounts to the steps of change that lead to a warmer, happier spring.
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By Hattie
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But these were not Earth bears, and there was one aspect in which they had the typical Brown Bear beat. These bears could talk. They could use words rather than snarls to convey anger, affection without needing to nuzzle soft head to soft head. And they could tell stories to one another. Cubs sprawled in heaps gazing up at the fire lit face of the storyteller. Bears of all ages gathering around in rapt silence. Bears otherwise engaged listening with only a slight tilt to furry ears to show their interest. It is here that our story truly begins, as we weave our way through snow and slurry and sleet to the bright, warm cave where our family of bears lived. There were three cubs, Dora who stood on two paws as she clutched at her mother and complained at the thought of bedtime; Jacky who used his sister’s distraction to try escaping through the door and who was thwarted by his mother’s thick leg; and Mollie, who sat quietly and unhappily on a heap of leaves, muttering that it wasn’t so cold outside yet. They were attended to by their harried mother, who was well looking forward to the time she’d have to herself while her cubs were asleep. She had a lump of meat that she’d been able to keep hidden from them, and as such she was very keen to get them in bed so she could dig it up. It was the little things that kept her going, she thought, pushing her two rowdiest cubs towards their littlest sister and giving that little sister a look that promptly closed her mouth. “If you three go to sleep I’ll tell you a story.” The cubs were soon ready and curled up together on the leaves, for their mother was a notoriously good storyteller and could weave fantastical illusions in the minds of her listeners. Storytime with their mother was an experience they treasured every time she took them on an adventure. This time, with the winter sleep looming and this the last story of the season, they anticipated a new story that would transport their young minds to different worlds and times. Seeing them sweetly waiting for her to begin softened her characteristically stern expression, and she began with warmth flowing from every word.
“Did I ever tell you about why we hibernate and hide away from winter’s bite?” “Long long ago, in a forest not far from this one, there lived a young bear who was so lazy and round that from a distance he resembled a near complete sphere. This bear’s name was Todd, and he loved summer as much as he hated winter. “During summer Todd could be found in the various patches of sunlight formed as the sun moved across the sky, lying on his stomach in a way most unbecoming of bears as the heat from the sun soaked into the thick fur coating him. The other bears that lived in the same small village were used to stepping over him, though they suffered it with gritted teeth. “Todd, they all said, had to be the laziest bear in the world, and they took no effort to say it away from his earshot. “But if they thought Todd was lazy in the summer, winter was when Todd expanded on his laziness, emerging from his cave only to grab food before turning around and ambling straight back to bed. “He wouldn’t help the other bears who worked so hard to collect the food he ate, and nor would he help his neighbours pad their caves with leaves like they did for everyone. The two times Todd actually moved his round body in some type of productive way during the year was when he collected leaves to pad his cave for winter, and when he threw them out in preparation for summer. “Even then it was with minimum effort, discarded leaves left littering the ground around his cave as his neighbours’ unhappiness grew. “One winter these neighbours decided they’d had enough. ‘All we do is work so we can make it through winter! But he does nothing, and grows fat on our labour and our food!’ Todd heard, of course, but he paid these statements little attention, having heard the message many times before. However, this time the sentiment rippled into the wider community in a way it never had before, waves of ill sentiment breaching on different villages’ shores. “This time, they decided, something had to be done.”
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Mother bear paused, looking in turn at each of her cubs’ fuzzy faces, each so precious and known to her she could tell who was who by touch alone. Dora, as her oldest, was always in a hurry to grow up and become independent, but she sat in the same way she had since she was very young as she listened intently. Jacky, the cub who couldn’t sit still, was rolling around on the floor, looking for all intents and purposes as if he paid no attention to his mother’s words. Mother bear knew differently, for he could recite every story she told back to her, familiar bones but with a vastly different body. He was a storyteller, like herself. And little Mollie, small but with an attitude that showed in every roll of her eyes. Those dark eyes were fixed on her mother’s face as she forgot her attitude for the sake of the story, though shades of it appeared back in her gaze as the pause dragged on. Mother bear held onto it for the longest possible moment, peaking right between anticipation and annoyance. And then she continued. “They all agreed it, word passing snout to ear as for once the community took care in who heard their schemes. And once everyone, bar one lazy, round bear, had been told the plan, they waited for the perfect opportunity. “Finally, it came one particularly chilly morning, just after Todd had eaten his fill of other bears’ food and rolled himself back into his cave for his midmorning nap. With not even a glance at one another, the bears moved the debris and detritus, the stones and sticks, dirt and dung alike that they’d been hiding round corners Todd wouldn’t ever waddle around, pushing it up to the entrance of his cave in such a great mound that it covered the entirety of the cave’s jagged opening, blocking out the patch of weak sunlight Todd had been lying in.
“He actually noticed the change in his environment, though when he sleepily blinked at the cave entrance and saw only blackness he took it instead for the dark of night, rolling over and returning to sleep. So it was much much later that Todd realised his predicament, pushing against a surprisingly solid barrier of night that on contact reminded him of the gritty soil the village lived from, hardened into a wall he couldn’t hope to breach. “He tried to anyway. He pushed against it with his paws pressed flat on the wall, he threw his mass at what he thought were the weaker spots, he tried to chip at the surface with his claws. “But all his efforts were in vain, and eventually he grew tired, walking back to his bed of leaves with his head hanging. ‘I’ll try again tomorrow’, he told himself, tucking himself into the pile and trying not to think about the reception he might encounter upon escaping his cave. He felt pain nip at his stomach, and he tried not to think about that either. It took a long time for him to fall asleep, and he dreamt of his neighbours releasing him and showing mercy. “The neighbours had no such intention as they enjoyed life without Todd. They left him there, trapped in his cave, under no illusions that he was still alive in there. “However, summer was on the horizon and the bears didn’t want any smells, if you know what I mean. It was time to take Todd out of his cave, dispose of his body, and wait for a new family to inhabit his home. They broke the wall down together, but just as they were about to enter, swirls of dust darkened as a figure, narrow and swaying, moved out of the cave and into the spring sunshine. “All Todd asked, as he gazed around at the only thing he’d dreamed of through his days and nights of sleep, was, ‘Am I asleep? Am I asleep?’ “The end.”
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Mother bear closed her mouth and the pictures in her young cubs’ mind faded away as the story finished. “Was he a ghost?”, Dora asked as she pulled her mother closer to her, nuzzling her face into her mother’s soft neck. “Or was he still alive?”. “He was still alive, my child.” Dora groaned in horror at the neighbour’s failure. “As unfortunate as that was”, mother bear continued. “He taught us two very important
pieces of information that day as he staggered back into the world. First, that with enough fat built up we can sleep all through winter without needing food. “Second, and the moral of the story; kill your enemies fast, kill your problems fast. Do you understand, children?” The cubs nodded, and cuddled together as she nudged leaves over them. “Night night, my babies. I shall see you in spring.”
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Legal notes from The Nanjinger in association with:
A
D’Andrea & Partners Legal Counsel
Enterprises in Hibernation; An Analysis of Dormant Companies
ffected by COVID, the world economy has been impacted for the past 2 years. Countless enterprises have faced or are facing the dilemma of stagnant operation and are unable to make ends meet. For these enterprises, if they want to maintain themselves, they urgently need to seek a low-cost survival model. Therefore, the concept of dormant company has been raised more and more frequently of late. A dormant company, similar to what we often call "zombie company", refers to a company that exists in the legal sense, but actually has no business activities and any form of income at this stage. Dormant companies do not need to bear any risks brought by normal business operations, nor do they need to pay expenses, such as site leasing, employee wages, shareholder dividends, or even tax returns. It is more like a company in hibernation, maintaining its life at the least cost, waiting for the day when it is awakened. Without the concept of dormancy, the forced closure of businesses is not only a loss for enterprise operators themselves, but also an obstruction to economic development and a waste of social resources. The dormant company system provides a buffer for enterprises to help them pass a special period smoothly, which is also of great significance to the development of the whole market. In 2020, in the face of huge losses caused by COVID, the State Council of the People's Republic of China proposed to try an “enterprise dormancy system”, in order to save small and medium-sized enterprises, and appointed Shenzhen as the first experimental area to take the lead in practicing the system. As a result, Shenzhen has successively issued the “Several Measures of Shenzhen Market Supervision and Administration Bureau on Further Optimising the Business Environment and Better Serving Market Players” and the “Sev-
eral Provisions of Shenzhen Special Economic Zone on Commercial Registration”, which stipulate that if a commercial subject needs to suspend its business temporarily but does not want to cancel the company, it can take the initiative to apply to relevant departments for closure, and the commercial subject will survive during the closure. In addition to not engaging in business activities, it still has other legitimate rights and interests in commercial subjects. After the closure period, the commercial subject needs to go to the relevant departments to register the termination of closure, and then the business can be resumed. On 24 August, 2021, Article 30 of the State Council of the People's Republic of China promulgated the “Regulations of the People's Republic of China on the Administration of the Registration of Market Entities”, which clearly states that, “In case of business difficulties caused by natural disasters, accident disasters, public health events, social security events and other reasons, the market entities can decide to close down within a certain period of time”. Before dormancy, the company shall negotiate with its employees on labour relations and other related matters according to law, and publicise its dormancy period and legal document service address to the society through the registration authority. Also, in order to prevent dormant companies from becoming "zombie enterprises" that do not actively promote the market economy, the regulation stipulates that the upper limit of the closure period is 3 years, and once they carry out business activities during the closure period, they are deemed to resume business. The regulation is to be officially implemented in March, 2022, which is an important step forward for China's market economy as it provides more possibilities for China's small and medium-sized enterprises to survive. In short, the dormant company system in the world still has a long way to go, but as a system conducive to market development, it is destined to be valued by more countries, such as China, in the future.
DISCLAIMER This article is intended solely for informational purposes and does not constitute legal advice. Although the information in this article was obtained from reliable official sources, no guarantee is made with regard to its accuracy and completeness. For more information please visit dandreapartners.com or WeChat: dandreapartners 21
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By Matthew Stedman
From Bush to Cup
So White it’s Green Well, I just don’t think it happened like that. It relies on too many coincidences. It can’t be the true origin of tea-drinking, surely. For the emperor, Shen Nong (神農), to have received a stray, falling leaf of camellia sinensis in his cup of boiling water relies on that tea plant being very tall, or the weather very windy. It’s the height thing. And why do these apocryphal breakthroughs always happen to bigwigs like emperors, not to ordinary folk and earnest experimenters? Doesn’t wash with me. But if the Emperor’s cup was the first example of people drinking tea, then this, surely, is what it tasted like. I’m digging into another bag of white tea from Fujian. I love these, as I’ve written here in Strainer. And this is different. The white bag is a clue. There’s a white certificate, too. I am grateful to the friend who gave it to me. His big new box of Nescafé is not a worthy counterpart. Oops. This white tea is simply much closer to a raw, tealeaf experience than any processed tea I’ve had. Never mind broken fragments of tea cake; not one of these leaves has been deliberately rolled. If a dried tea leaf, scorched off the bush by unseasonal sunshine perhaps, did fall into your cup, this would be it. I am reminded of my own hand-picked leaves last Spring. Still on holiday, I had no place to process them, nor refrigerate them. Tragically, I just let them wither in a paper cup. They sweated there, softening each day. But I kept on infusing them in the hotel
room, monitoring the changes in taste even as the leaves started to redden and smell interesting. The white tea I am drinking now was withered, too, but only very briefly, I guess. And then the tissuepaper-thin leaves were baked in the open sun, somehow prevented from blowing away in the breeze. Unlike the brown-coloured, white teas I usually drink, at least half of these leaves are pale green-coloured, much like my hand-picked tea. And that raw, raw, vegetal taste is there, too, like unripe peas. Of course this pleases me; much that we enjoy is because of familiarity and recognition. I do like raw tea (and raw peas) though I can’t promise that you do too. Drinking this before breakfast makes me queasy. Caffeine jitters perhaps. But there’s lots of flavour here; picking it up after a stabilising breakfast is rewarding again. Calling this “raw” unfairly suggests simplicity. Actually, it reminds me of so many other great tea experiences. That green-pea flavour is what Maofeng (毛峰) is all about. Then there are the pale, pale Pouchong (包种) oolongs of Taiwan, one of which I used to sell through my website. And I’m reminded of the Darjeeling my parents kindly brought me from a Himalayan trip 10 years ago. That was truly a memorable adventure, for me! This drink can conjur all that. A fine, surprising, way to start the year. So how was tea really discovered? Ah. I’m glad you asked. Actually, it all started with the Sakyamuni Buddha peeling off both of his eyelids… 24
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Great Nanjingers (19)
Dark, Political Satirist who was Fairy Tale King; Zhang Tianyi By Frank Hossack
Zhang Tianyi (张天翼) was a 20th-century Chinese satirist who went on to become editor of a prolific national literary journal. But, as a left winger and member of the Communist Party, the public needed to enjoy Zhang’s wit through underground journals. Born in Nanjing on 26 September, 1906, Zhang’s ancestors hailed from Xiangxiang County of southerly Hunan Province. Zhang finished primary and junior high school in Hangzhou and arrived in Beijing in the autumn of 1925 to be enrolled in Peking University the following year. But it was not until 1929 that he officially started his professional writing career. And as it would turn out, that would be writing with political leanings. Expressing dissatisfaction with his uni courses and his family’s limited financial means, a new-found ideology in Zhang led him to join the Communist Party in 1927. Subsequently, he joined the Chinese Left Wing Writers' League (中国左翼作家联盟), the literary organisation led and established by the Communist Party of China in Shanghai, with the purpose to fight a propaganda position against the Kuomintang (KMT) and attract the general public’s support for its ideas. That which would become a turning point for Zhang’s career was heralded by the founding of China’s first first literary journal, People's Literature (人民文学) on 25 October, 1949, with calligraphy for its masthead done by Chairman Mao Zedong himself. But before becoming that publication’s editor in chief, after liberation, Zhang successively served as Deputy Director of the Central Literature Institute (中央文学讲习所), member of the China Federation of Literary and Art Circles (中国文联委) and
Secretary to the Secretariat of the China Writers' Association (中国作协书). But as a writer, given his political leanings and the ever-present KMT of the day, much of Zhang’s personal cannon was published under pseudonyms, such as Zhang Tianjing and Tie Chihan, through underground channels. That particular avenue also only served to enhance Zhang’s popularity with his readers, especially given the style and focus of his writing. Through his prose, Zhang liked to expose the vulgar and ridiculous life of ordinary citizens and intellectuals alike, so as to reveal the hypocrisy and ugliness of reality, attacking the disadvantages of that he saw as an abnormal society. Given this darker preference, the paradox in Zhang’s life story was the fact that he found his greatest success as a writer of children’s fiction, to the extent his fairy tales now occupy an important position in the history of Chinese children's literature. In particular, Zhang’s “The Story of Luo Wenying” (�� ����), a collection of short stories, won first prize in the National Children's Literary and Artistic Creation Award (������������) in 1954. That same institution also later conferred Zhang as an honorary recipient of the award in recognition of his contribution to children's literature. Meanwhile, his other works, “The Bald King” (��� �) and “Dalin and Kobayashi” (�����), went on to be known as milestones in the history of Chinese fairy tales. Sickened by hemiplegia and aphasia but largely cured, he still insisted on working for most of the following decade. Zhang died on 28 April, 1985. 25
THE NANJINGER | VOLUME 12 ISSUE 04 | FEBRUARY 2022
THE NANJINGER | 2022.02
Boxing Cat stopped brewing in Shanghai a while ago; their beers are now brewed in Wuhan by Budweiser, which is owned by the global giant Anheuser-Bush InBev, the world’s largest brewing company. In my opinion, the beers have never been as good since then. In particular, they are now served with too much gas in all of their venues. Presumably AB InBev insists on this, in a similar fashion to their rather insipid mass-produced lagers. The fizziest craft beers never seem to me to taste as good as the rest. My semi-scientific explanation is that with bubbles of gas forming all over your tongue, many tastebuds are not in contact with the liquid for long. This all said, the beers are still worth drinking and this venue is a very welcome addition to our city. On myvisit. I tried the Ringside Red (5.0 percent), Contender Extra Pale Ale (4.9 percent), TKO IPA (6.3 Additional info, online version or Chinese contact via percent) and a stout, but I cannot remember which one! The stout the QR code that follows each review. and the IPA were best, and the least fizzy.
HOSTELRY By Matt Ford
Cat Boxes its Way into Nanjing with All Day Food & Drink
Boxing Cat in Nanjing will also feature some of the collaborative brews they have done with Great Leap, Jing-A and, even more impressively, the likes of Nøgne and Mikkeller, both of which are legendary. Perhaps their brewing collaborators could have a gentle word about the fizz? The drinks menu also boasts a wide range of classic cocktails, illustrating that the venue clearly aims to appeal to the widest market. Given its size, I can see why. An extensive food menu caters for all western-bar-food tastes; pasta, pizza, burgers, chicken, pork knuckle, chops, salads and snack platters. Although the kitchens were not yet serving the full menu upon our visit, my companion and I enjoyed deep fried chicken, hot chicken wings and sliders. We were also presented with a free trial dish, which was a bizarre cross between hot chili and spaghetti bolognaise, decorated with edible flowers. It wasn’t to my taste, but the chili (masquerading as bolognaise sauce) was actually very good. If that was served in its original form with a baked potato, it would be a perfect winter dish. We saw not many customers, but that was not surprising as it is new. Located immediately south of Sam’s Club on the same block, Boxing Cat is accessible via Tianglongsi station on Metro Line 1. Nearby are some inviting restaurants, a smart coffee bar and an upmarket Tsingtao bar with their full range of beer and a couple of special brews on tap. TsingTao IPA is very good, as is their original strong stout if you can find it (bottled at 6.9 percent), but I digress… 27
I heartily recommend a visit and hope Boxing Cat in Nanjing thrives because it is the only craft beer bar of its type in the city with such generous opening hours. As an aside to that, I have just returned from a little bar tour of Wuhan. The Hankou side has some tremendous bars which open all day and were full of local people enjoying good beer with their lunch. Will some of the rather more traditional Nanjingers begin to embrace craft beer as part of their mainstream eating and drinking experience? This expat certainly hopes so. Boxing Cat is located at #105, Building 1, 109 Software Avenue, Yuhuatai District 软件大道109号1 幢105室 Tel: 18052015958
Nanjing International School Secondary students researched, planned and debated the issue of climate change, with delegate peers representing countries, companies and NGOs. In a unique Conference of Parties, students presented options ranging from shared responsibility, to prioritising economic growth and development, with an aim of creating a new international agreement on climate change that promotes justice.
26 January, 2022
To see photos from your event on these pages, contact The Nanjinger via info@thenanjinger.com. Conditions apply.
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THE NANJINGER | VOLUME 12 ISSUE 04 | FEBRUARY 2022
Representatives of Nanjing’s international community took to an indoor piste in Ma’anshan in Anhui Province to welcome the Winter Olympics to Beijing, by getting up and close and personal with snow, skis and snowboards. In an activity organised by the Nanjing Association for Culture Communication and the British Association of Snowsport Instructors (BASI), four professionals from BASI trained up those who were perhaps taking to sliding on snow for the first time.
Ma’anshan Skis & Boards 15-16 January, 2022
To see photos from your event on these pages, contact The Nanjinger via info@thenanjinger.com. Conditions apply.
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THE NANJINGER | 2022.02
HT Nanjing Impact Academy chose to use a wonderful theatrical performance to allow students to start their Chinese New Year holiday in a grand and artistic ceremony. The children adapted books they had read in the Chinese Integrated Curriculum into a play and bravely displayed themselves on stage, highlighting innovative educational models that create experiential and inquiry-based, integrated bilingual courses, to let each student’s personality shine through.
HT Nanjing Impact Academy 14 January, 2022
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THE NANJINGER | VOLUME 12 ISSUE 04 | FEBRUARY 2022
Students, staff, visitors and even a few select parents, put on a show to remember to welcome the Year of the Tiger at The British School of Nanjing. Opening with a dynamic team of drummers the excitement never stopped, as singers, dancers and some dramatic, and hilariously funny, duos, took to the stage to perform. MC’d by students from the Primary School, who delivered their lines in flawless Mandarin and perfect English, the show had the audience captivated for an hour!
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THE NANJINGER | 2022.02
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Download this map to your smartphone via The Nanjinger website
The Nanjinger’s Metro Map is the only printed map of the city’s metro system to include first and last times for every station, perfect for planning a late night out or an adventure to somewhere new with an early start. In the case of last trains, passengers are advised to enter the station of departure at least 10 minutes before the train time.
THE NANJINGER | VOLUME 12 ISSUE 04 | FEBRUARY 2022
