Three weeks before Beijing hosts the Olympics, two weeks after Zheng Jie stormed Wimbledon, the same week that Yao Ming returned to action with the Chinese national team and Sports Illustrated China puts on its cover a tennis player who hasn’t played a professional match in four years and never won a Grand Slam. Apparently in the magazine’s Olympics-run-up newsroom, great legs beat greatness. Anna Kournikova is pretty, and so is SI China (体育画报). But......

What do the digits 25, 35 and 82 have in common? They were all part of China news this week, as journalists, businessmen and government officials counted out and ranked up different individuals and groups related to the PRC. In ascending order:Forbes announced China's 25 Most Powerful Celebrities, with the number one spot going to basketball star Yao Ming. To create the ranking, Forbes looked not only at income (Yao brought in 388 million RMB......

Colour us excited! Jackie Chan (成龙) — the man who was the subject of the first post ever to be written on this blog — is going to have a museum named after him! Renovated from old factory buildings located out in the *sshole of nowhere in Shanghai's Putuo District, the museum will house props and costumes from Chan's movies, photos and other memorabilia. This makes him the world's second person to have a museum......

Brit/Aussie pop star Amy Pearson (don't know her? neither do we.) has a video that recently came to our attention not for its cliched lyrics and overwrought vocals, but because it was shot in our city. Feel free to mute, sing along in front of the mirror or just fast forward to 3:12, when the major Bund shots start.......

In this interview with the South China Morning Post, Yao Ming fields questions related to his injury, his chances of playing at the Olympics and the Sichuan earthquake.......

Less than a month after airing this commercial featuring Richard Gere driving the new Fiat Delta from Hollywood to Tibet, Italian automaker Fiat has been forced to withdraw the ad, and issue a statement extending its "apologies to the Government of the People's Republic of China and to the Chinese people". Readers of this blog (a group which no doubt excludes anyone from Fiat or their agency) will be aware that Richard Gere is a......

EastSouthWestNorth has uncovered Zhao Bandi (赵半狄), the man behind the Kung Fu Panda protest, as an unabashed panda lover and a fashion designer who has a line inspired by the national treasure. Check out the images from Zhao's fashion show below. Apparently he got China's internet celeb numero uno Furong Jiejie (芙蓉姐姐) to model for him and that one picture of her is priceless:......

This sounds like a joke, but it's absolutely true. Luxury goods manufacturer Louis Vuitton have produced a series of three audio guides to China. Voiced by some of the top actresses in the business, the guides are produced like high-budget radio plays with sound effects, a plinky-plonky piano soundtrack and a plot. The Beijing and Hong Kong guides are voiced by Gong Li and Shu Qi respectively whilst Shanghai gets Joan Chen ("Lust, Caution", "The......

Beijing Olympics Fan points us to this Olympic song of the moment, We Are Ready. For more Olympic music videos, click here.......

"You can't say whether this is karma or not because nobody wants to see a big disaster happen. When a natural disaster strikes, you cannot avoid it. Perhaps the Heavens are meting out punishment in order to make people protect the natural environment better. 這不可以說是報不報應，因每個人也不想發生嚴重災難，而且天災的事想避也避不到，可能是上天給予的懲罰，要人們更加保護自然環境。" — 19-year-old Hong Kong celebrity model Janice Man (文詠珊)in response to a journalist's question on Sharon Stone's remark —[from EastSouthWestNorth via Apple Daily]......

Looks like mammon does have its way of making people think before they talk. Less than a day after Sharon Stone suggested at the Cannes Film Festival that the Sichuan earthquake was karma for China's treatment of the Tibetans, she has been forced to eat back her words and apologise:"My erroneous words and deeds angered and saddened the Chinese people, and I sincerely apologise for this. I'm willing to participate in any earthquake relief activity......

A group of about a dozen celebrities including Andy Lau (刘德华), Sammi Cheng (郑秀文), Joey Yung (容祖儿), Gilbert Lam (林韋辰), Joey Meng (萬綺雯), Grace Cheung (張家瑩), Bowie Lam (林保怡), Astrid Chan (陳芷菁), Zhang Guoli (张国立), Chen Daoming (陈道明), Feng Xiaogang (冯小刚) and Jiang Wenli (蒋雯丽) are part of a contingent of celebrities taken to visit the earthquake zone in Sichuan Province and to rally the troops that have been serving non-stop in rescue operations. Pop......

Has Sharon Stone been drinking too much lately? You be the judge. Here's what she said on the sidelines of the Cannes Film Festival when asked about the earthquake that has devastated the Sichuan Province:Well you know it was very interesting because at first, you know, I am not happy about the ways the Chinese were treating the Tibetans because I don’t think anyone should be unkind to anyone else. And so I have been......

Film star Jackie Chan has donated RMB10million to help those in need following the earthquake in Sichuan province. Other celebrities have also dipped into their wallets. From CriEnglish: "Jackie Chan also sent his consolation to the quake victims and encouraged them to hold on as "people all over the country are with you," the star said. The One Foundation initiated by kungfu star Jet Li has made a donation of one million yuan and......

Shanghaiist spotted John Cusack at Bar Rouge on Friday. Ensconced in the bathroom-sized VIP room on the club's terrace and guarded by a bevy of beefy bodyguards, Cusack was playing with his phone and appeared both tired and bored (who recommended BR anyway?). Doing the rounds of Shanghai nightspots, he was spotted at MAO the night before until the wee hours. The American actor of High Fidelity fame, is presently in town shooting Shanghai, a......

We didn't make it to James Blunt's concert in Shanghai last Saturday at the Yun Feng Theatre, but from what we heard from a friend who went and these videos that we found on Youtube, it was a show worth watching. What did you guys think who went?......

Celine Dion, who sang Power of the Dream for the Atlanta Olympics in 1996, airs her thoughts on the sh*t surrounding the Olympics in an interview right after her concert:I'm not a politician, but I don't think it's about politics either. We're talking about Olympics. We're talking about hardworking people. We're talking about young kids who have dreams, and I think we should give them a chance to go on with their dreams. Let's reunite......

Sam Flemming, founder of the Internet word-of-mouth research firm CIC Data observes in his latest blog entry that while some of the brands that had used the stars involved in the Edison Chen sex photo scandal as spokespeople were scrambling for help (by calling up his company of course) when the scandal broke out, some netizens were “more interested in the brands in the background of the photos than the people themselves". He points us......

Houston Rockets centre Yao Ming is back in China to consult with traditional Chinese medicine practitioners over his foot injury, AP says, and the prospect of his absence is "sparking a panic" in China. Even without him, Yao says China will finish in twelfth position in the worst case scenario. Also, he is expected to be one of the torch-bearers when the Games finally open this August, but for now Yao can't get anywhere without......

So you might have heard that Jackie Chan (成龙) recently went to Australia to bury his father, who died of cancer at the age of 93.Well, what you might not have known is that Jackie Chan's father Charlie, aka Fang Daolong, had a whole other family (Jackie's mother was his second wife) that he lost touch with and then had to leave behind in 1949. There was an article called "Enter the Parents" written a......

It looks like the news embargo on Bjork's "Tibet" incident has finally been lifted and the fallout has begun. We have not found many traces of it, however, in the Chinese mainstream media. Two of the more notable reports we have found among the limited coverage is one by the China News Agency, the lesser known of China's two news agencies, entitled "比约克上海演出引不满 文化部：核实后依法处理" (Bjork's Shanghai performance stirs unhappines, Ministry of Culture to act in......

Ex-Playboy covergirl, epileptic dancer, and Shanghai Baby Bai Ling, was, as we told you earlier, arrested for shoplifting, but apparently, her shoplifting charges have been dropped and she was fined a grand total of US$200 for disturbing the peace. Here is her account of the incident:"I went across the [hall] with the toy in my hand, and asked which battery would fit. They told me [they knew which would fit], but they had really long......

Photo by Brad Westphal Shanghai East Asia Hong Kong United 0 – 3 LA Galaxy Two late goals from Ecuadorian striker Carlos Ruiz gave a final scoreline that not only overstated the quality and excitement of this game, but also flattered a lack-lustre LA Galaxy side at the largely empty 80,000 Shanghai Stadium. East Asia had reduced Major League Soccer's Galaxy to few chances on goal and had even looked the more threatening side......

Tonight will see the massive Shanghai Stadium host a sporting event for seemingly the first time in ages. More akin in recent times to holding pop concerts and ceremonies, the 80,000 all-seater arena will be the venue for an exhibition match between American MLS Soccerball team LA Galaxy and China Division One side East Asia (kick-off 7:30pm). The match is part of the Galaxy’s pre-season tour of East Asia and will also serve as a......

We've been looking around all day for a video of Björk's final song Declare Independence at her Shanghai concert and here it is! [Click here for another alternative video] Björk chanted "Tibet, Tibet" not once, but thrice, before yelling out "Raise your flag" again and again in a crescendo that made the crowd completely ecstatic (presumably because half of them didn't understand what she was saying?). A scan of Baidu News reports on the concert......

... and if the problem is not sorted out in time, Chinese fans may not get to see David Beckham this Wednesday, says Ruud Gullit, head coach of the LA Galaxy. Our city may be home to some of the world's tallest and most beautiful (okay, that one's subjective) skyscrapers, but as it turns out, we have problems keeping soccer pitches clean. Here's Gullit's complaint, quoted verbatim from an AFP report: "The pitch is in......

As Jake Newby told you in our previous post:With backing from a live Icelandic brass section (the ingeniously named Wonderbrass), songs such as the horn heavy ‘Wanderlust’ demonstrated Björk’s gift for spectacle and her incredible delivery, before she closed out the set with the anthemic ‘Declare Independence’, chanting the name of a huge piece of real estate west of Sichuan and Yunnan amongst a hail of streamers. The Deutsche Presse Agentur confirms:[Bjork] shouted "Tibet, Tibet!"......

All this month (that would be March), the photography of Hong Kong artist Norm Yip will be on display not on the walls of a fancy-schmancy gallery on Moganshan Road, but on the meandering walls of Shanghai Studio. The photography, in mostly black and white, features fit, mostly East Asian men in various stages of undress, in front of simple backgrounds or stark black backdrops. The pictures do not feature any naughty bits, so Mr.......

David Beckham was swarmed by fans and journalists when he arrived yesterday at the Pudong airport with the LA Galaxy on the second stop of their three-part Asian tour. The team has just arrived from Seoul, where they were defeated by FC Seoul despite Beckham's stellar performance. The team faces off China All-Star Union at the Shanghai Stadium this Wednesday, March 5 at 7:30 pm. For those of you hoping to catch some Beckham-mania, rumours......

...and we don't mean playing the role of a teacher in a film, we mean an actual teacher. No, really. Most of us know Jay Chou (周杰伦) – the mumbling Taiwanese R’n’B superstar – as that guy who stares blankly at us from Meters Bonwe adverts on the metro, but if you thought he was just another vacant celebrity then a reappraisal may be due, as Jay will soon take up the post of lecturer......