China A-Z

All Chinese look the same, some say and the same goes for Americans. How much do we really know about China? Did you know that they don't eat soup they drink it? And not before, but after a meal? That their surname comes before their first name? That their good sense is to be found not in their heads, but their hearts? Or that white is the color of mourning? Kai Strittmatter has lived in China for almost ten years and in this fascinating book he lets us in on a few secrets. Introducing us to some telling Chinese symbols-but not all 57,000 of them! -he explains in a wealth of charming, amusing anecdotes what they reveal of China and its people. On the way we meet pensioners who practice the art of street calligraphy, read the Beijing police's hilarious English phrasebook and have the dubious pleasure of sampling trendy 'Western' food, as well as a hundred other surprises.