• Who would eat an egg covered in human urine?
Who would marry a corpse in the afterlife?
We count 10 shocking facts about China.
10 – Virgin Boy Eggs • China.
A place of mystery and wonder.
And a place of some really messed up shit.
• In a little Chinese town called Dongyang, the local food delicacy happens to be one
of the most disgusting things in the history of everything.
‘Virgin Boy Eggs’ are even worse than they sound.
At the end of a long school day, food vendors go to primary schools and collect the urine
of little boys, boil the piss and then cook eggs in it.
The eggs are peeled and continuously cooked for hours at a time.
• Locals swear by the pee pee eggs, and some people even eat them with every meal.
9 – Geese Police • Since guard dogs have become easy targets
in robberies and crime, Chinese security officers have opted for a less conventional guardian
animal.
• Apparently in Xinjiang province, criminals have been throwing sedative-riddled bread
rolls to guard dogs, knocking them out cold.
So instead, officers have began protecting themselves with less-suspecting animals.
Geese.
Fierce and protective, it’s alleged these geese police help to ward off intruders, thieves
and criminals with their loud squawks and intimidating wingspans.
They have poor night vision, making them less susceptible to distracting treats.
• They apparently act like home alarm systems, making a massive ruckus if they feel threatened.
8 – Empty Mall • China’s economy is booming.
On paper anyway.
• In 2005, the world’s biggest shopping centre was built in the town of Dongguan.
It holds the capacity for 2350 stores, has an indoor rollercoaster and takes up 5 million
square meters of space.
The only thing is, it’s pretty much abandoned.
The developers boasted that the mall would attract up to 100,000 visitors per day, but
that was way off.
The locals mostly work for nearby factories and can barely pay their bills, let alone
throw money at an abandoned shopping centre.
• Most of the mall looks like a scene from a post-apocalyptic science fiction.
7 – Lapel Pin • You can’t fault the Chinese on their
techniques of self-discipline.
Or maybe you can, depending on how you see it.
• During some public drills, Chinese Parliamentary police were seen demonstrating their highest
level of discipline.
One of the techniques the officers implemented was sticking sharp pins into their jacket
collars, aimed directly at their necks.
This trained the officers to hold their posture super straight, or they would get pricked
severely.
It’s one of the many tactics they train with to maintain uniformity and professionalism.
• I sure as hell wouldn’t want to sneeze with one of those pointed directly at my jugular.
6 - Execution • Whether you agree with capital punishment
or not, it happens almost every day around the world.
Especially in China.
• In 2014 alone, the number of people executed by the state was a whopping 1000 people.
China is the highest executing country in the world, killing more than four times the
amount of people as Iran, the second highest.
Sure, China also has the highest population of any country in the world with 1.3 billion
people.
But 1000 executions means almost three people are murdered every single day.
• Chinese executions are generally carried out by lethal injection or by shooting.
5 – Weird Names • Chinese names are often difficult for
non-Asian speaking people to wrap their heads around.
• Aside from tricky pronunciation, a lot of western people don’t realise that there
are only 100 surnames used commonly in China, and the surname always comes first.
A unique name is hard to achieve.
In the year 2000, when China put in a bid to host the Olympic games, 3500 babies across
the country were named, ‘Aoyun’ which literally translates to ‘Olympics’.
• When China eventually hosted the games in 2008, a further 4000 children were named
after the five fictional mascots of the Beijing Olympic Games.
4 – Cave People • With the largest population in the world,
many Chinese people prefer to get as far away from other people as they possibly can.
• It is reported that over 30 million people in China live in man-made caves underground.
The caves, called ‘Yaodong’, are sometimes simple spaces with no plumbing or electricity
and sometimes they can have three bedrooms and sell for $46,000.
• While it might not be a choice for all, cave life is desirable for a lot of Chinese
people who prefer the quiet humility of nature opposed to the hectic scenes of the city.
3 – Crab Vendors • Animal rights are literally a foreign
concept in many parts of China, and so things like this vending machine exist.
• What do you do when all the restaurants have closed and the street vendors have packed
up and gone home, but you still really badly want to eat a crab?
You go to a live crab vending machine of course.
Each crab, which is generally still alive, costs roughly $3 each and comes in a dissolvable
container, so you can fling it straight into a boiling pot of water without even killing
it first.
• Nice one, China.
2 – Little People Kingdom • In 2009, a real estate developer built
a theme park in Yunnan province with a very controversial theme.
• The Kingdom of Little People is a tourist destination in China that hosts 100 dwarves
and short-statured people.
All of the “little people” that are employed at the park live on site and put on theatrical
performances twice each day.
Each employee is shorter than 130 centimetres and share dorm rooms together in the facility.
• The cost of entry to the theme park where human beings are literally on display like
a zoo is $15.
Fun for the whole family.
1 – Ghost Weddings • The tradition of burning items to send
to your dead relatives is an ancient Chinese ritual.
But it has a very dark side.
• Many people believe that by burning or burying items, their dead relatives will be
able to use them in the afterlife.
So if you die without a wife in China, don’t worry, your family can still pay for a random
woman’s corpse to be buried alongside you, that way you’ll have a wife in heaven.
They are called Ghost Marriages.
• There have even been reports of living men marrying dead corpses, just in case.