Results tagged “interviews”

Jeremy Goldkorn of Danwei sits down for a chat with Yang Yang and celebrated gay film director Cui Zi'en (催子恩), masterminds of the Beijing Queer Film Festival (北京酷儿影展) which took place in June this year.

On Wednesday we told you about how the recent comments of Singapore's elder statesman Lee Kuan Yew made during his latest trip to the US have caused an uproar among Chinese netizens. Aside from his more controversial statements that Asia needs the United States to counterbalance a rising China and that the US needs to be "an important part" of any new East Asian architecture, Lee also gave a wide-ranging interview to the Charlie Rose Show of the PBS network. China featured heavily in the 60 minute interview which kicked off with Lee's proclamation that the United States may have half a century left as the world's dominant power. In the new world order, said Lee, the US would have to make space for China and India at the top table of the world. For the next hour or so, sit back with us and gaze into Lee Kuan Yew's crystal ball as he looks back into the past and divines the future. As always, if you're in China and still not able to watch Youtube videos, now is the time to get your VPN. Meanwhile, a full transcript of this interview is available here.

We recently caught up with Shanghai-based independent filmmaker Luis Tapia of Daedalum Films, who is currently busy preparing for the May 9 premiere screening of his new documentary short about Shanghai band Hard Queen and the life of indie rock musicians in China. Seats are still available for the screening. Advance tickets can be purchased here.

Go here to listen to Terry Gross' interview with Beijing-based (and formerly Shanghai-based) writer James Fallows, The Atlantic's "man in China." Fallows discusses a variety of topics, including China's extensive investment in the United States (see his Atlantic story on the topic here), his new book of China essays (excerpt on Danwei), internet censorship and his recently deceased father. Around the 24-minute mark, Fallows makes some interesting statements about how he thinks Chinese people would have voted in the recent U.S. election — we're curious how his observations compare to what Shanghaiist readers saw and heard leading up to November 4.

Shanghaiist recently enjoyed a few nonfat egg nogs with DJ El Nomo, who promises to make the Shanghaiist/Cotton's holiday party "the wildest holiday blowout ever held at Cotton's on Xinhua Lu." A tall task indeed. You may recognize El Nomo from such weblogs as Shanghai Bananas. And, of course, he is ranked No. 1 worldwide in the controversial Gothamist DJ Rankings. The following is a transcript of our unfiltered discussion with Asia's very own wizard of wax.

Xu Xi, author of Evanescent Isles talks to Zhang Lijia, journalist and author of the book Socialism is Great. In her book, Zhang tells her fascinating story of how she worked as a teenager in a Nanjing factory which produced missiles designed to reach North America, participated in the Tiananmen Square protests and eventually became a journalist.

Shanghaiist heartily recommends you read this ESPN interview with Melinda Liu of Newsweek's Beijing bureau, Raymond Zhou of China Daily, Anna Sophie Loewenberg of Sexy Beijing and our very own Maggie Rauch, who's also the founding editor of China Sports Today. This quote by Raymond Zhou caught our attention:

"Personally, I only care about Liu Xiang because I feel Liu Xiang winning the gold medal is tantamount to Barack Obama winning the presidency in the United States. Because it's about more than sports. It's about shattering stereotypes that Asians are intrinsically not good at track and field."

Modern Internet connectivity meets old-school snail mail charm in Shanghai resident Paulo Magalhães’s popular website Postcrossing.com, which allows users to send and receive postcards from friendly strangers all around the globe. Founded in July 2005, the site grew wildly popular as fans passed the news by word-of-mouth and now boasts 50,000 users in 182 countries. On the occasion of its third anniversary, Shanghaiist caught up with the Portuguese innovator just as Postcrossing hit its biggest milestone to date — one million postcards exchanged!

Bill Gates has quit from his day-to-day role at Microsoft Corp, but he's not exactly "retiring" — the 52 year old is dedicating himself to full-time philanthropy through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the world's largest charitable foundation with a war chest of US$37.5 billion, four times the size of the next largest foundation. The amount is set to rise to US$100 billion by the end of Gates' lifetime (Note: The US philanthropy sector is now at US$300 billion).

Standing a foot taller and six inches broader than anyone else on HuaiHai Lu, the young man who calls himself Red Laowai (George to his Mother) is easy to spot. Although this is his first trip to mainland China, George has already gathered a large following by recording video clips singing (mostly Communist) Chinese songs and releasing them on the internet.

Via Danwei: Media mogul, celebrity blogger and ICS host, Hong Huang (洪晃 or Huang Hung as she is known in the US) speaks to MSNBC on the recent outburst of Chinese nationalism. Her mother was Mao Zedong's English teacher. For a previous Danwei interview with Hong Huang, click here.

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 few years ago that gave some of the background. The video above covers some of the same ground, but was made more recently, as it mentions the thorny issue of why Jackie doesn't want to get in touch with his half-brothers Fang Shisheng and Fang Shide, especially when their father died and there was a funeral to attend. The interviews also broach the question of whether or not they are revealing their identities so openly now in hoping of getting some of Jackie's (and his father's) money. To this question they reply that it would be a lie to say that they aren't hoping for some help (university tuition, jobs for the young uns) but are NOT coveting Jackie's wealth. The video is in Chinese.

Are you starved for techno? Real, honest-to-gosh techno? Well, Shanghai's Void crew has you covered. Several times a month they fill up LOgO and The Shelter to bring you the foot-tappinest, head-noddinest, neck-snappinest techno you ever could lay ears on. They've showcased both DJ Nomadico and Jason Hodges in Shanghai, and this Saturday March 1st they bring a little bit of Detroit and Berlin to The Shelter.

William Feng is the host of ICS Shanghai's travel show Getaway. New shows go out on Thursdays and are repeated across the week.

Yes, in the old days it was a national centre. The Jing Wu school was fully running before 1920 in Zhabei. Huo Yuan Jia was the most famous, although many people think he’s fictional these days. You can’t compare now to then but you can still find a lot of Bau Gua Zhang, Taiji and Xinyi, for example.

Chinese director Chen Kaige’s recent movie Wu Ji (The Promise) (website in Chinese) has already surprised Chinese film fans with its US$35 million budget. Now, the premiere of the movie on Dec. 14 at Paradise Warner Cinema City offers a surprise to all of us.