On a sunny morning in late June, 50-year-old Liu Yidan prayed to Buddha as usual at Dabei Temple in Tianjin, a coastal municipality near Beijing. But this time she was pleased to see that there were no bird sellers crowding the alley surrounding the temple. “Other Buddhists and I spent over a million yuan ($150,000) buying and releasing birds from these sellers from 2008 to … Continue reading Letting Go of ‘Fangsheng’
Riding home on his electric scooter after work one day, Fan Xifa was stopped dead in his tracks by the sound of an infant crying. The cries, cutting through the noise of the heavy rain, led him to a cardboard box that lay beside the road. It was November 2012, and Fan, a migrant worker in Sanya, in China’s southern province of Hainan, had just … Continue reading Abandoned Intersex Baby Rescued and Raised by Migrant Worker
For over 15 years, Tan Zhiliang’s parents refused to let his family spend the country’s most important holiday — Spring Festival, or the Chinese New Year — with them. Old and conservative, Tan’s parents wouldn’t accept their son’s family. Since 2001, Tan, now 46, has been living with his partner, Chen Dezhou, 42, and Chen’s 18-year-old biological son, Jack. But this year, Tan’s parents finally … Continue reading Three Men Under One Roof
On a Tuesday afternoon in March, one of the young, soon-to-be-married couples at Shanghai’s Putuo District marriage registry was less than excited. Wei Jun, a premarital counselor, was asking the spouses-to-be to rate each other on a 10-point scale. “Seven,” said the woman of her fiance. This, according to counsellor Wei, was a little on the low side. In her experience most couples who come … Continue reading Think Twice About Marriage, Shanghai Counsels Couples
As of January 1st, the Chinese government has canceled the ‘late wedding leave’ that allowed China’s twenty-five-somethings to take a 30-day paid leave when getting married. With the policy’s cancelation, newlyweds can now take no more than a 3-day wedding leave. Chinese netizens are angry about the sudden reversal: “Who wants to get married if we don’t even have time for a honeymoon?” At a … Continue reading The Honeymoon Is Over: China’s Late Marriage Leave Cancelled
When East Meets West 