Play a card game, loot a tomb?

While I was in Oxford this weekend I spent some time relaxing in the wonderful Thirsty Meeples board game cafe. While browsing through their shelves I came across an archaeology-related card game. 'Excellent!' I thought. Then I read the back of the box and my heart sank. 

Digging up pyramids to hunt for stashes of treasure? Trading your finds at the marketplace? Picking the right moment to sell your finds to the museum for maximum profit? In fact, after this description the 'cunning thieves' lurking around the dig site would actually appear to be better called 'other archaeologists!'

Is this really the way archaeology is still seen by some people? I certainly hope not.  Needless to say the game went back on the shelf unplayed...

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Bike helmet - you're doing it wrong...

One of the things about travelling in any country, especially China it seems, are the unusual things you see.  Of course, I have no desire to be cruel here and stupid things can be seen on the streets of Britain on a daily basis too, but just for fun, here are some of the things I saw on my recent trip back to China that made me chuckle.

The first is definitely my favourite, and the best version of a meme that I've ever happened across in my own life.  Taken out of the window of a moving car on my phone, which explains the slightly bad photo, but I'll let you spot the glaring gaff yourselves...

Of course, motorbikes are a constant source of wonder for foreigners in China, with babies crammed in between multiple adults and amazing loads balanced on the back of small and knackered machines.  Whilst up on the Tibetan plateau I did come across this little party out for an afternoon ride.

The use of the English language is a constant source of amusement for travellers in Asia (check out the very funny www.engrish.com if you don't know it already), though equally Chinese characters are abused horribly in the west, so we can't exactly claim any moral superiority here.  Still, it's always funny to come across some mangled language, though in the case below it was less a case of garbled grammar and more one of simply not caring how to put a graphic on a car!

Shops in China are funny beasts.  Chinese cities contain a huge variety of establishments, from grubby backstreet family run places to gleaming luxury emporia.  Its actually the latter group that seem to promote the most weirdness, as many seem to compete to be the most 'western', albeit in ways that westerners find rather odd.  Shops names are a particularly great source of fun. My favourite ever was a fashion store in Beijing called 'Valued Squirrel.'

A recent fashion seems to be to take English words and combine them to create brands.  Two that really caught my eye in Chengdu are 'Prich' (combining 'Pride' and 'Rich') and 'Plory' ('Pride' and 'Glory') - who could fail to be impressed with such values!

Another one I found rather odd, if not even a little disturbing was a women's underwear brand (I swear I didn't spend my time looking at women's underwear), called 'Diana', with the tagline, and I quote directly, spelling mistake and all, 'Diana the Romance of Bbritish'.  *shudder*

Staying with the English language, while picking up some last minute food and drink to bring home with me I was rather startled by the jumper a staff member was wearing.  It proved rather difficult to get a good photo on my phone without the wearer thinking I was some weirdo stalker, but hopefully I got a good enough one.  Despite being nonsensical and containing seemingly random words, look out for the words that are rather inappropriate for a family supermarket!

Finally, while browsing in a very small shop in a little town we stopped off at in the Sichuan mountains, I saw this particularly good example of garbled English.  I realise I'm running the risk here of you all thinking that I'm obsessed with women's clothing so I promise that my next post about my Chinese travels will be more high-brow and cultural than this one!

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Mrs Li Dongni's stroke of luck

A bizarre stroke of good luck befell my wife tonight, and it's a tale I feel the urge to tell.


She has been in Paris for a few days for work, and had flown back into Manchester airport this evening. Being a foreign national, it of course took her forever to get through passport control despite having one of those silly ID cards (Daily Mail readers take note that foreigners do not just casually stroll into the country, even when they have permission to be here).


The delays at the border always mean that her luggage has been rattling around on the conveyer for an age by the time she gets there. On this occassion, she arrived to find her luggage had gone, but someone else's identical suitcase was still there...


Guessing that someone had accidentally taken her case by mistake (despite this other case having a large purple lock on the front that my wife's case definitely doesn't have), she went to the luggage desk. Thankfully there was a name on the case - by strange coincidence it also belonged to a Chinese woman. A tannoy announcement led nowhere, and it seemed that the other woman had already left the airport.


My wife filled in the required paperwork and left the airport in a state of dejection, hoping that the woman would soon realise her blunder and would have the common sense to contact the airport.


..............................


Half an hour later my wife was stood at the railway station, waiting for her train home, when she caught sight of a familiar looking suitcase being pulled out of the waiting room by a young Chinese woman. With faint hope, she scurried over to her and asked 'have you just come back from Paris?'. The woman, obviously thinking that a psycho had started to harass her said, 'no, Madrid' and began to hurry away. My wife, tenacious as ever, was determined to find out if this was her case and again scuttled after her, going straight for the luggage label and with delight seeing her name written there. Oddly, upon pointing out to the other woman that she had collected the wrong case from the carousel, she simply turned and ran away, not saying a word.


Despite the strange reaction of the other woman, I think it's fair to say my wife has well and truly used up her supply of luck for the near future!

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The Ugly Little Panda...

Everyone loves pandas.  Those cute, fluffy creatures that sit there peacefully, casually munching their way through a few tonnes of bamboo with their little black ears and big placid eyes.


There's surely no such thing as an ugly panda, right?  Wrong.


Whilst wandering through the museum part of the Chengdu Panda Research base, I came across a former resident, now spending his days behind glass.  But is the glass to protect the panda, or the visitors?

Just in case that was too shocking for you, here are some of the cuter modern residents to cheer you up

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Grandpa Wen and the Royal medals

You may have seen that Chinese Premier ‘grandpa’ Wen Jiabao has recently been on a visit to the UK.  While he was here, the Royal Society presented him with the Charles II medal for his contribution to science and technology (read about it here).  This was because he ‘has overseen one of the most ambitious programmes of national research investment the world has ever seen.’

This got me thinking.  If the Charles II medal is given for contributions to science, what other medals based on past Royals could we be awarding?

The Charles I medal for the most egotistical leader?

The George III medal for the looniest leader?

The Edward VIII medal for leaders who don’t stay in power very long?

The Oliver Cromwell medal for leaders who don’t really want to be leaders but feel they have no choice?

The Aethelred II medal for leaders who just weren’t prepared enough?*

The Harold Harefoot medal for the leader named after the best animal?

Feel free to add your own to the list!

*before anyone tells me, I know that Aethelred’s unfortunate nickname ‘the Unready' actually means ‘ill-councilled’.  It just seemed funnier this way.

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If IKEA made Stonehenge...

Apologies if you've seen this already (it seems to have being doing the rounds for a month or so), but someone brought it to my attention today and I think it's great, so here it is.

Just in case I get into trouble for reposting the images, I got them from www.designboom.com, so make sure you go to their website too and restore universal karma.

 

 Now why haven't the archaeologists considered the use of giants yet?

 

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Footballer slaps himself – silly?

I came across this great video yesterday.  Watch in wonder as Chilean Under 20 player Bryan Carrasco takes a whack in the face from his opponent’s arm.  Oh, hang on…

Did he really just slap himself in the face?  I think the best bit for me though is that the Ecuadorean player whose arm has just been ‘borrowed’ doesn’t actually seem to even notice…

If the embedded version doesn't work, see it on Youtube here

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Chinese lady takes off pants, beats up police officer

Of all the stories to circulate on the Chinese internet recently, this one reported on Chinasmack is definitely the funniest.

Basically a 55 year old woman called Chu, who works in Nanjing as an illegal pedicab driver (her personal story is not a happy one up to this point be fair), was carrying three passengers when she ran a red light.  She bumped into a guy, who duly demanded compensation.  When she only offered him 2RMB (about 20p), he called the police.

The police showed up quickly and it seems that Chu panicked, fearing that her pedicab would be taken away and her income lost.  So she did what any sane person would do in this situation – she took off her jeans and started hitting the policeman around the head.  This scene would have been funny enough to witness on its own, but two extra elements now appear.  Firstly, have a look at the picture and notice that she not only took of her pants, she did it on a day she was going commando.  Secondly, the poor policeman took such a thud to the head that he was knocked out (though perhaps he took a dive out of embarrassment or sheer horror at the sight in front of him?)

Once she had been arrested she calmed down and expressed regret for her actions.  Her ‘husband’ (a 70 year old guy she’s living with), gave the great quote ‘She’s a stubborn person, rather surly, and quite fierce! Over the years, she’s rarely returned home.’  She was sentenced to 8 months in jail.

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