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Q: What's the coolest Chinese history event you know of?
Britain getting Hong Kong and turning it into one of the most prosperous and thriving cities in Asia Pacific whilst the mainland was wrapped in paddy field, famine and disease.
I wouldn't characterize it as being 'cool', but the event that I would call historic and that I can still remember would be the Wenchuan Earthquake. I wasn't in it, didn't even feel it, I was living in Zhejiang at the time, but I can still remember that day, everybody was outside talking and I just knew something big had happened. I have felt two quakes in my life, one in Washington state and the other in Alaska- nothing like that one out there in Sichuan though.
The 2008 Sichuan earthquake[10] or the Great Sichuan earthquake, measured at 8.0 Ms[2][11][12] and 7.9 Mw,[13][14] and occurred at 02:28:01 PM China Standard Time at epicenter (06:28:01 UTC)[15] on May 12 in Sichuan province, killed 69,197 people and left 18,222 missing.[16]
It is also known as the Wenchuan earthquake (Chinese: 汶川大地震; pinyin: Wènchuān dà dìzhèn; literally: "Great Wenchuan earthquake"), after the location of the earthquake's epicenter, Wenchuan County, Sichuan. The epicenter was 80 kilometres (50 mi) west-northwest of Chengdu, the provincial capital, with a focal depth of 19 km (12 mi).[3] The earthquake was also felt in nearby countries and as far away as both Beijing and Shanghai—1,500 km (930 mi) and 1,700 km (1,060 mi) away—where office buildings swayed with the tremor.[17] Strong aftershocks, some exceeding magnitude 6, continued to hit the area even months after the main quake, causing new casualties and damage.
Official figures (as of July 21, 2008 12:00 CST) stated that 69,197 were confirmed dead, including 68,636 in Sichuan province, and 374,176 injured, with 18,222 listed as missing.[9] The earthquake left about 4.8 million people homeless,[18] though the number could be as high as 11 million.[19] Approximately 15 million people lived in the affected area. It was the deadliest earthquake to hit China since the 1976 Tangshan earthquake, which killed at least 240,000 people, and the strongest in the country since the 1950 Chayu earthquake, which registered at 8.5 on the Richter magnitude scale.[20] It is the 21st deadliest earthquake of all time. On November 6, 2008, the central government announced that it would spend 1 trillion RMB (about US $146.5 billion) over the next three years to rebuild areas ravaged by the earthquake,[21] as part of the Chinese economic stimulus program.
mArtiAn:
I nearly got caught up in that, I had a holiday planned to go there and I changed plans at the last minute. A fortuitous change to say the least.
diverdude1:
same here. I had been planning to trip the Sichuan for at least six months, then find my way into the West, or far NW anyway, TaklaMakan, and such. After the quake I just went to Yunnan instead. Yunnan and Kunming were definitely cool, but I still have a hankering to get over to Xinjiang. Well, maybe this summer.....
Britain getting Hong Kong and turning it into one of the most prosperous and thriving cities in Asia Pacific whilst the mainland was wrapped in paddy field, famine and disease.
I would say it's the continuous ability for Chinese to generalize without actually adding anything meaningful or relevant to the topic. Nice Brice, Hal 195 and, of course, Delphine86 itself serve as prime examples.
690 AD when the first and only woman became Chinese empress!
Not many countries at that time (and some even until nowadays!) made it possible.
Despite of her achievements and provable China progress under her reign many Chinese see her very negatively (before due to one historic chronic who was written shortly after her death by one of her opponent and lately due to a bit naive and simplified TV series).
Still great thing in history.
The second - probably China becoming the biggest world economy in the last year! Not bad for China and in my eyes for world either.
Englteachted:
"Not many countries at that time (and some even until nowadays!) made it possible."
Not true,Queens at some time or another ruled all across Africa Egypt long before that.. Even Scandinavian countries were known to have female leaders (around the time of the Roman Empire)
Janosik:
Yes, I would still dare to say it's vast minority.
But I never mentioned China is the only country where it happened.
Nevertheless I still like Wu Ze Tian the most.
China defeating Japan all by themselves during WW2.
My personal favourites are:
China winning WW2
China liberating Tibet
Chinese scientists inventing a cure for Ebola
China defending Korea from the American invasion
China inventing pizza
Or, if you mean things that actually happened:
-
I like the first emperor's tomb, that is pretty cool. Lu Bu was a badass too, it was interesting reading how he was manipulated into killing his master so he could marry a hot woman. During the fighting with Britain they had a hidden chain under the mouth of a river. Once a few ships entered they raised the chain trapping them (just like game of thrones).
Genghis Khan leaving a mountain of skulls in BeiJing, then being regarded as a great Chinese leader generations later.
Hotwater:
Ah yes, amazing how barbarian conquerors can, a few generations later, become Chinese.
Janosik:
Well, I think, with small corrections, that you are basically correct. But:
1. It is not Genghis Khan who seen as a Chinese hero but Kublai Khan; Genghis Khan grandson
2. He did not pile skulls in Beijing but made it China capital
3. Kublai Khan became the 5th Khagan in 1260 but the reason why he is so important for China is that he established Yuan dynasty in 1271 (unifying then the whole China in 1279)
What is actually quite interesting and not that common is that:
A. Mongols generally adopted Chinese system of ruling and really became Chinese dynasty (actually the first foreign nation Chinese dynasty)
B. Chinese see them on one hand as conquerors but on the other clearly as part of Chinese dynasties (same goes for Manchu later on)
I think there is a reason for Chinese to see Kublai Khan as Chinese hero and does not make him less Mongolian hero.
Even though Yuan dynasty lasted less than 100 years so they still bring certain improvements which were later on used by Ming dynasty (btw it looks like that the third Ming emperor, btw very capable, could be Mongolian/Yuan origin as the reason why the first Ming emperor did not make his first son his successor is due to believing his wife [Mongolian princess] was already pregnant when he married her - but he still made it ...).
Englteachted:
That's not true unless you're confusing admiration for his military tactics, leadership and the magnitude of what he accomplished. At the height of his empire, he ruled over lands stretching to Europe. Oh and by the way, he was Mongolian.
Outside of Inner Mongolia, he is regarded as an evil invader. What you're saying makes no sense whatsoever.
Janosik:
Well, I also think that your reply/comment makes no sense whatsoever.
I never commented on Genghis Khan - he was a brilliant guy and apparently real mastermind.
I am not aware of any other absolutist who would voluntarily limit own power (he did it by implementing Jasa).
But he was Mongolian hero and other than Chinese Mongolians I do not think Han Chinese see him as Chinese hero.
But that's different for Kublai Khan. He is already seen as a hero by both - Mongolians and Hans.
not sure about the coolest, but the strangest history bias i see in china is nanking versus shanghai
yes nanking was terrible, civilians killed, rape etc. but this happen in stalingrad,berlin, etc.
they consider nanking to be this terrible atrocity of history.
by western standards shanghai carpet bombing was the worst thing japan did in the war.
the army was gone, no war factories, and japan carpet bomb civilians from the air in shanghai killing almost a million compared to the 40 to 300 thousand numbers for nanking depending on what history version you read.
these people had no weapons could not defend themselves in anyway, the people in nanking could kill or be killed, shanghai could do nothing. tokyo bombing and the a bombs were a direct retaliation for this action.
i dont understand why chinese cant see a problem with carpet bombing, khadafi using fighter planes to mow down unarmed protesters with 6000 rounds a minute. if a civilian population has no fighting chance, its a war crime, while every country can do this with drones now, this was deliberate and ongoing for almost 6 weeks.
