Local stories for the mass public

Every morning I make sure to read the ‘China Scene’ short stories that the China Daily takes from local newspapers and publishes in its newspaper daily. It makes me feel like China is not the third largest country in the world with over 1.3 bln inhabitants, but a tiny village somewhere in a forgotten corner of France, where the local journal is forced to use filler articles for 90% of its content. It’s a great read during my commute as, aside from being bizarre/funny/plain shocking, the stories breathe Chinese culture in between the lines. Below a selection of stories for you from the past few weeks:

Attempt to steal tree puts 80,000 homes in darkness
A man who tried to steal a tree from a street instead plunged 80,000 homes into darkness in Wuhan, capital of Hubei province, on Thursday.
The blackout started at 2am and lasted for six hours when the thief illegally tried to chop down the tree but instead destroyed an electrical wire.
A special task force of nine workers rushed to the scene to repair the wire.

Painter advertises for college girl on 1,000 posters
A 32-year-old painter has handed out more than 1,000 posters at 10 university campuses in Zhengzhou, capital of Henan province, all in an effort to find a suitable wife.
Fu Bing wants to find his true love from among the student population because he believes most of the students there are pure. He said woman in general society are too materialistic.
Fu has received 10 phone calls from female students in recent days.

Boy frantic after call from dead man’s phone
A 14-year-old boy was so frightened to get a call from a number that belonged to a deceased neighbor that he began sharpening his martial arts moves at home to protect himself.
Alone at home last Wednesday night in Nanjing, Jiangsu province, the boy saw the called ID on his parent’s phone and went berserk. The neighbor died two weeks earlier.
He turned up the television volume as loud as it could go, switched on all the lights and called his parents using another phone.
After his parents rushed back home, they saw him doing kungfu. He learned that the dead man gave the phone to his housemaid who was calling to say goodbye before she returned to her hometown.

Man spends two months walking wrong way home
A man who tried to walk from Zhejiang province to his hometown in Guizhou, realized after two months that he was going the wrong way.
Wang Zhaoqing, 28, of Guiyang, Guizhou province went to Jinhua, Zhejiang province, for a job but soon got fired.
He had no money for a train ticket so he walked home and begged for food. Last Thursday, police in Huzhou found him sleeping on the side of the road and gave him a ticket.

Mahjong fan in coma after playing 32 hours straight
A man in Guiyang, capital of Guizhou province, fell into a coma on Sunday and doctors said it’s because he played mahjong non-stop for 32 hours.
The man, surname Zhang, 30, began playing on Friday night and fell off his mahjong chair on Sunday morning. His partners went home and were replaced by new partners on Saturday afternoon.

No money for mahjong, man burns house
After his wife refused to give him money to play mahjong, a man tried to burn down their house, and was arrested.
His wife was returning to home in Meihekou, Jilin province, on Sunday when she noticed the fire and call authorities.
Her husband confessed he set the fire in a rage.
“I asked my wife to give me money to play mahjong with friends that day but she refused,” he said.

Woman sells grandson to spite cheap son-in-law
An elderly woman sold her grandson because she said she opposed her daughter’s marriage.
Wu, of Minhou, Fujian province, realized his son disappeared days after the boy’s mother sent him to stay with the grandmother in Xiapu county.
After an investigation, police got the grandma to confess that she sold the boy to a couple because the son-in-law failed to give her a bride price.
Police found the boy in another county.

Mom posts daughter’s ad for marriage in colleges
A woman surname Liu posted personal ads for her daughter to find her a suitable husband on the bulletin boards of Tianjin University and Nankai University.
The woman even wanted to personally interview all the candidates before introducing them to her daughter, who was completely oblivious of the ads.
Liu said she posted the ads during the summer break as mostly post graduates, professors, and student councilors visited the campus. She claimed only they were fit for her daughter, who holds a Masters degree.

Man’s cleanliness obsession raises alarm
A man in Wuhan, capital of Hubei province, doesn’t like to leave the house without wearing a cap, mask and gloves.
The 23-year-old university graduate began his strange habit after he browsed a pornography website earlier this month. He started believing that everything and everyone is dirty.
He always washes his hands and body each time he returns home because he’s worried about catching a sexually transmitted disease from saliva and dust.
Many suggested he make an appointment with a psychotherapist.

5 years later, elderly man removes leech from nose
A 73-year-old man who suffered nasal congestion a nosebleeds for more than five years is recovering after doctors removed a 10 cm long leech from his nose in Gaozhou, Guangdong province.
The man surnamed Fu, a barefoot doctor from a rural village, visited the hospital last week after he experienced nosebleeds 10 days in a row.
Fu believed the leech lived in his nose for five years because he suffered the same symptoms for five years.
The leech possibly went into his nose five years ago after he drank water from a mountain stream while collecting herbs.

Poor garbage collector has collected 20 kids
An old woman who relies on picking up waste for a living has adopted 20 abandoned babies in Puning, Guangdong province.
Zhang Fei has now even become a foster granny.
Zhang is now living with 16 of her adopted children. The other four have grown up and have left the county for employment opportunities.Despite severe financial issues, Zhang, an adopted child herself, said she never regretted her decision to pick up abandoned babies and give them a decent life.