Fili’s world

Unlike the US and western Europe, China doesn’t make it to the Israeli headlines very often, especially not with smaller stories about everyday Chinese life.  There’s actually very little Israelis know about what’s going on in China. But, every once in a while there is a story or two that makes it through the barrier and that’s when suddenly everybody’s asking me about China and what I think about what’s happening over there. I believe this might also be happening with other western countries.

Following are two examples of viral China stories that made it to the Israeli collective awareness in the past months.

I imagine everybody following China knows about this first one. This next photo spread all over Israel about 2.5 months ago :

The story in short from Danwei

China’s latest Internet celebrity is the 40-year-old Ms Wu Ping, owner of the "coolest nail house in history" in Chongqing.

Nail house (钉子户) is a Chinese slang term referring to people and households who refuse to move after receiving eviction notices from real estate developers or government officials. Wu Ping became famous overnight because of the extremity of the situation: her house has become an island in the middle of a construction pit.

How was this reported in Israel? Here’s "Not moving" from the "World Order" news, based on a CNN report : 

Conclusion translation - "what’s left to wonder is whether this isn’t just a stunt by the Chinese government to convince the world that they’re softening up a bit and allowing the citizens some fair protests…".

This second one is more recent, and its about the global concern over fake China food produce and possible health risks. Here’s "Fake products in China" from "World order" :

Once health hazards were found in Chinese products exported to the west, there was a global concern which resulted in a harsh death-penalty crackdown of health violators in China.

Aside from the obvious economic potential reported daily in the financial sections of the bigger newspapers, I think those two stories represent something about what Israelis are interested in when in comes to China - signs of democracy in China and possible implications/threats from China over life in the west.