Haibao, Shanghai’s Expo Mascot
China’s next big event, which is receiving enough attention here to possibly be the second coming in disguise, is the Shanghai 2010 World Expo. Last year, statues of a cartoony blue guy started cropping up in different cities, Changzhou included, but I didn’t realize he was the official mascot for the expo until I went to Shanghai and saw the craze firsthand.
His name is Haibao, which means “treasure of the sea,” and, like the Fuwa from the Beijing Olympics, his likeness is being exploited throughout several official mascot merchandise stores. Seriously, they can fill up an entire store with just this guy. He comes in all sizes, from a small keychain to an enormous blow-up doll. Don’t get any ideas, now.
On Nanjing Road in Shanghai, many people have started selling knock-off Haibao dolls at a fourth of the price. All of these vendors come across as very nervous and fidgety, though, and will flee at the slightest hint of police presence. I guess the Shanghai government wants to crack down on the knock-off market. But wait a minute. At the same time on the same street, there are hundreds of nonchalant vendors pushing DVDs, watches, purses, bags, marijuana, and even prostitutes. Haibao dolls, though? That’s going too far.
Harry Potter Now Playing… on DVD
Yeah, Harry Potter is big here, too. No, I haven’t gone to the theater yet. What’s the point? It’ll be dubbed in Chinese with Chinese subtitles, and several scenes will be missing. Since there is no rating system in China, movies (particularly foreign movies) get “edited” down to suit the general public. This would explain why, when I saw Quantum of Solace and Night at the Museum 2 in the theater, there were so many abrupt transitions and odd cuts. I’m not sure what’s getting cut, though, because the Chinese blockbuster, Red Cliff, still had quite a bit of violence.
To avoid the trouble, you could always go buy the DVD instead. Those bootleggers are pretty good about getting a copy of a new release on store shelves within a few days of a movie’s premier, regardless which country it played in first. It used to be that movies took a while to come to China, but now I’m seeing the bigger names show up nearly the same time as they do in the US. We even got Dragonball: Evolution a few weeks earlier. Sorry, guys, I should have warned you.
I suspect distributors have started taking the Chinese market more seriously, because they realized if they waited too long to bring a movie over, everyone will have already seen it on DVD. Of course, airing a movie in China just makes piracy easier, but when the DVD and the movie experience come out at the same time (and the movie experience is only a few yuan more), some people are bound to choose the latter. Plus, initial DVD prints suck.
Legend of Zelda: Games for Windows Edition
Leave it to the Chinese bootleg market to package an emulator and ROM together and sell them as a standalone game on a different platform for only ten yuan:
Those crazy Chinese.
Prostitutes and DVDs
As I was walking back to the bus stop after visiting a local park, I couldn’t help but notice several doorways along the side of the street emanating a dark pink glow. Sitting directly behind every glass door was a mostly-naked woman watching TV. Something like that is pretty hard to ignore. Something like that is also pretty easy to figure out. Brothel. On previous bus rides, I’ve seen plenty of shady shops that couldn’t possibly be anything else, but this was the first time I saw the pink light that screams, “Hey! We’re open for business!”
(Interesting cultural side note: in Chinese, they refer to hookers as “chickens.” This has caused some unnecessary embarrassment and confusion with Chinese friends and students since, in America culture, we use the word “chicken” when we want to call someone a coward. It doesn’t have quite the some effect, and they, completely shocked, exclaim, “Why would you say that to me?!”)
It was my understanding that prostitution was illegal in China. But then… it was my understanding that DVD piracy was also illegal in China. A few months ago, there was a police check, and all of the DVD stores hid their English DVDs so their merchandise would look nice and legitimate. But without the English DVDs, the shelves were hilariously barren. Five Chinese DVDs spread across a huge bookshelf? Come on! The police aren’t stupid! They know these stores sell bootlegs. They could bust them any time they wanted, and not just on a police check that was somehow tipped off to the store owners. I’m guessing the brothels get a similar treatment.
“Oh, no, police officer, I’m not doing anything wrong, just watching TV in my own house with no clothes on like all my neighbors do.”
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