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Q: Provence! Titanic! Basketball!
There are about 1.4 billion souls in China, so why is it when I ask my students where they want to travel, they almost always say Provence or Paris (sometimes Maldives or Australia)? Why are Titanic and Forrest fucking Gump their favourite films? Why do they go apeshit about NBA (and occasionally soccer) but are totally unaware of, say, rugby?
I don't so much mean why are they all so similar but why those particular places/movies/sports? Who sat down and decided that Chinese students would love Titanic and its cliched characters and dreary romantic plot above all others? Was it the Party? Or... someone else?
Disclaimer: I live in Henan, it's the only province I've inhabited, so it might be different in other provinces - if it is, let me know.
That's not a very accurate description. Most Chinese people and students I've met want to go to America or England. They also watch more American films and dramas than me on their streaming websites. Basketball and soccer are international sports, so they should be fans of them. Do you really expect your students to be aware of a sport that can not be seen played in their country? Are you aware that Chinese also play a sport called jianqiu, which is like a hackeysack with a shuttlecock? I didn't know that until I came here.
But you live in Henan which isn't good for much.
I think NBA because it's the only sport where a Chinese national has excelled at the highest level.
Yao's career was cut short by injury, but no denying that he was a force.
Rugby is awesome...my ex-boss was a british guy former semi-pro rugby player so I've watched my share in pubs, but it's more a niche sport popularity-wise. Not taking away from the game itself.
Hockey is like that in most of the US, you can go to a hockey bar and you'd think the game on is life and death for the whole population, but then you ask your average guy on the street to name 2 starters on their city NHL team and draw a blank.
basketball and intl football are the two most accessible participant sports. Hence the most popular worldwide. Not a shocker.
xinyuren:
don't diss Li Na so easily. She was the Yao Ming of tennis.
DrMonkey:
Maybe you mean team sports ? Because at the Olympics Games, Chinese athletes are doing well, for individual sports.
For the Provence thing, I heard that a lot from dozen people. They mention the flowers fields, which are indeed a thing in Provence (to make perfume and soaps, around a town named Grasse, for example). There might have been some famous picture of a flower field with "Provence" on the caption that went around... Or a movie that popularized Provence. A bit like Thailand after Lost in Thailand went out.
It's not very deep, and I'm not sure you should take it too seriously. When asking why Provence was so appealing, I always get ...nothing... apart from "it's nice". No idea about where is Provence, apart from "in France", and no idea about what is specific to Provence, like its culture. Why it's nice, hu, one picture or one scene, and that's it.
I got the impression that the simple concept of liking something is often acquired by imitation and hearsay, rather than actual experience or personal research. When personal research is done anyway ? No during studies, rarely with the parents, definitely not encouraged anywhere, it's a rather new idea... Walk in a Chinese city, and see where the effort to make something beautiful are. Yeah, right. Then, people in China tends to be naturally secretive about themselves and their personal tastes or aspiration. Fairly often, amongst students, someone who appeared completely void of personality turns out to have personal aspirations and tastes, once this person likes me and feel like sharing a bit.
expatlife26:
I agree about imitation.
Those are things that are generally agreed to be popular/good which makes them safe choices. No one is going to say you're an idiot or worse a weirdo if you say you want to visit provence or watch titanic.
On the other hand somebody says they want to visit Verdun or watch House of 1000 Corpses they might get some strange looks for their unapproved interests.
Because Chinese are empty shells filled with whatever the majority tells them to like/want.
Your welcome.
I cried during Titanic. I thought the bloody thing would never end!
Fun Fact: the actual Titanic sunk in about 2 hours.
The movie limped on like a one legged zombie for about 3 hours. That was the real tragedy....three hours stolen from my life that I will never get back. The missus loved it.
Oh, and Rose was a bit of a slut.
Stiggs:
I saw that movie with a girl I really wanted to... well let's not get into that.
The whole movie she was going on and on about how hot Leo Dicaprio is. I loved the scene where he died ! 
I've lived in Shandong and Xinjiang and the only things the people know about are as you have said.
They lead incredibly boring and repetitive lives. The absolute highlight for them is to go shopping and then come home and watch effing basketball. Or some mongoloick soap opera. For a change-up the man can get pissed on baijiu and abuse his wife who's only too happy to cop it so she's got something to whinge to her friends at the market about.
ScotsAlan:
Aye. And the people back in your hometown are probably doing the same ( not the wife beating tho... of course)
In fact, you, and me, we are doing the same. We are having pretty much boring non-descript lifes. We are not the head of a major company. We are not movie stars. We are just getting on with things.
So are the Chinese.
If I went home tomorrow I could slot into my culture. Walk the hills, buy Gortex jackets and thicker boots to walk the higher hills. I could go to the bar in the evening and tell a rivited audience about how shit China is.
They would soon get bored. And so would I.
Your in the wild west dude. You live in a place the BBC and Fox news are not allowed to go to !! You are.... on the edge of the known world.
So yeah, the locals have a boring life. How about you dude ? 
Wow, what a place to be. The last frontier..........
royceH:
Yes. Sigh..... I lead a boring life too.
But I'm not particularly content with that, hence I get bored. And that's because there's nothing to do, especially now that it's too cold to go riding.
My wife's English is good enough for us to converse normally, and that's great.
But she isn't particularly interested in some of the topics that go well with my favourite social pursuit, beer drinking, such as; sport and politics, and nor is anyone else in this town.
So for conversation, I talk to myself and that can tend to get boring.
There are pool halls here and I visit the cleanest one semi regularly. There will soon be snow on the mountains on the edge of town and we'll go and play there.
There's a library and it has an English book. Very occasionally there's a non Hollywood blockbuster English film showing it town and we'll go see that (and pray they haven't dubbed it into Chinese, a la 1968).
There used to be visible signs of Uyghir culture about but not so much now, more's the pity.
Finally there's restaurants where they serve the same old muck and hot beer.
And that's all.
Luckily, though, I have my wife and I enjoy being with her.
If not for her I'd consider Xinjiang done and I'd be somewhere else by now.
But when all's said and done you are quite right. Life's just about getting on with it, and hopefully with someone to share it with.
Most Chinese view the outside world through a very narrow lens, a lens that is controlled. Most modern pop culture is either American or is derivative of American culture. If an alien was coming to Earth and you let them watch 2 weeks of MTV as a primer for their time here on Earth then they'd arrive with some pretty screwed up preconceptions.
When it comes to wanting to go to Paris and Provence, it's for visiting, rather than moving. So far, the answer has almost always been, "It's romantic." Nothing much more specific than that.
As for Titanic... I'm guessing that they go for the simple, but cliched plot. I would suspect there's also some element of the wealth and class critique in the movie (even if that's pretty hamfisted). The hero is poor, and the douchebags are all upper class rich snobs with no character development. Not only that, but the poor hero does get the girl, even though he can't buy her a car or apartment. It's not complicated, and panders to people frustrated by a country in the grip of rigid social class.
We should add IPhone 6 into this thread.
I just saw the funniest thing in a bar. A woman wanted to put on music. In a panic she went around her friends..." IPhone 4S?..... IPhone 4?..... IPhone 3?...... No?"
Answers from friends.... " 6"...."6 plus"...."erm".
"Oh no, I want music but the IPhone dock is too old", exclaimed the frantic asker.
Ha ha ha ha ha ha.
But what really got me was I know this bar has a mini jack to plug into a headphone socket.
Was this just a ploy by the asker to show off her IPhone 6?
