🔥 China Trend Watch (week 25 | 2026) Part of Eye on Digital China, this is my premium newsletter where I explain the stories, memes, debates, and viral moments shaping online conversations in China. This edition was sent to paid subscribers — subscribe to receive the next issue in your inbox.

China celebrated the more than 2,000-year-old Dragon Boat Festival (端午节) holiday this Friday, so I wish you health, good luck, and plenty of zongzi (sticky rice dumplings) and dragon boat races – they’re now held in many places around the world and are continuing into the weekend anywhere from Toronto to Dresden.

In this newsletter, you will find the trends and stories that caught my attention this week. This edition includes one longer read alongside a handful of shorter stories.

I always just start working on stories and noteworthy trends for the newsletter during the week, and often only discover an overarching theme later. This time, I realized that from the goose aunt who turned out to be suspiciously “quacky,” to Lululemon presenting Japanese drums as ‘truly Chinese,’ and trusted diaper brands being exposed for toxic chemicals, recent online discussions in China seem to revolve around similar questions: what is real, who can be trusted, and where do we find authenticity in a world where things are increasingly not what they seem? It is perhaps one of the reasons why the Chinese World Cup referee who is painfully straightforward in handing out red cards is now so beloved by the public.

With that in mind, here are the social media stories, debates, and internet moments you should know about this week 👇

🔍 EXPLAINER

Why One Beijing Street Vendor Sparked a Nationwide Debate

If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it might still be a goose – or the other way around. That, at least, is the takeaway from two stories that recently went viral on Chinese social media.

The woman at the center of it all is Beijing street-food vendor Chen Xiufeng (陈秀凤), better known as “Auntie Goose Legs” (鹅腿阿姨). Over the years, she became something of a local celebrity in Beijing’s university district. Originally from Jiangsu, the migrant vendor had been selling her famous roasted goose legs to students since 2011.

She skyrocketed to national fame in 2023 , but became the target of widespread criticism last week after it was revealed that her celebrated goose legs – sold for 16 yuan ($2.20) per piece – were actually duck meat all along.

The controversy came up after the vendor ventured beyond the university area into Beijing’s business district. At the universities, she enjoyed a loyal customer base and dedicated WeChat groups. In her new market, however, customers proved more skeptical. Some noticed that the meat looked suspiciously duck-like; others complained that the color seemed off.

In the university district, Auntie Goose Legs she enjoyed a loyal customer base and dedicated WeChat groups.

After the first complaints surfaced, Auntie Goose Legs admitted the truth on WeChat on June 9.

“The ingredients I originally used were goose legs,” she wrote, “but they have been out of stock for more than fifteen years. The current ingredient is duck legs.”

It turned out that she had only sold goose legs, the product that made her famous, for two months back in 2011 before switching to the much cheaper duck. “Did geese become extinct without us knowing?” some netizens joked.

The revelation quickly exploded online. The hashtag “What Auntie Goose Legs is Selling Turns Out to be Duck Legs” (#鹅腿阿姨卖的是鸭腿#) became the top trending on Weibo for an entire day, with millions of people discussing the topic.

Why did millions of people become so outraged over a single Beijing street vendor selling duck instead of goose?

Piggybacking on the debate, Anhui-based commentators pointed out that a beloved regional specialty has the exact opposite ‘problem.’ Wuwei smoked duck (无为板鸭) is branded as duck, but is usually goose. According to local standards, however, goose products may be sold under this name, prompting discussions about “hanging up a goat’s head, while selling dog meat“ (挂羊头卖狗肉): advertising one thing while selling another.

Because geese are more expensive than ducks in China, and generally considered tastier, the Anhui duck-is-goose story, unlike the Auntie Goose Legs controversy, did not provoke online anger. Instead, many people saw it as an example of sellers prioritizing flavor over cost. Auntie Goose Legs is seen as doing the exact opposite.

But why did millions of people actually become so outraged over a single Beijing street vendor selling duck instead of goose, especially when there were no indications that anyone became ill? The answer has little to do with poultry and everything to do with trust.

Auntie Goose Legs during the prime time in Beijing’s University District in late 2023 (image via Lianhe Zaobao 联合早报).

Food fraud and mislabeling have been longstanding concerns in China. Earlier surveys found that food safety worries even outweighed concerns about public security and environmental issues, and while China’s food safety record has improved in recent years, public trust remains fragile.

Part of these concerns are immediate and practical. Major scandals in the past involving melamine-tainted infant formula or recycled “gutter oil” have posed serious risks to public health. But the issue goes beyond health risks alone.

If a goose can be a duck, then what exactly is the duck?

Whereas food safety concerns in many Western countries often focus on contamination, Chinese consumers are frequently just as concerned with economic deception. It is unfair to pay for a more expensive goose and receive a duck. Even if no one gets sick, Chinese consumer law still treats it as fraud.

More important, however, is what such deception does to confidence in the broader food system. If a goose can be a duck, then what exactly is the duck?

As a major 2023 college canteen scandal demonstrated, the build-up of deceit can reach a breaking point among the public. During that somewhat Kafkaesque “rat head or duck neck” (鼠头or鸭脖”事件) controversy, officials insisted a rat head found in a student’s rice was merely a “duck neck,” even though everyone could clearly see the snout and teeth of a rodent.

This kind of gaslighting shatters social trust and reinforces a generalized sense that, as a consumer, you are entirely on your own. When regulators fail to step in honestly, even a seemingly isolated incident comes to symbolize more dangerous forms of systemic food fraud.

And this is where the Auntie Goose Legs story stings the most.

People did not come to her simply because her food was good. Over the years, she had become part of local student life, and she felt safe and authentic. Her pink scooter helmet, which she continued to wear while working, became an iconic symbol of her no-nonsense and humble image. Her success was built on word of mouth and, above all, on the trust her customers placed in her.

That this particular “auntie” deceived her customers by selling a different product than the one she advertised is no longer really about her. If duck is goose, goose is duck, and your local auntie has deceived you for years, then who can you trust anymore?

👁️ WHAT STOOD OUT

1. China’s Condom Market Shrinks 25% in Four Years

China’s biggest condom brand is being sold off, facing a market where fewer people are buying condoms. The brand is Jissbon (杰士), and the company behind it, Renfu Medical (人福医药), recently announced it would sell its stake in the international parent company that owns Jissbon and exit the condom business entirely.

Founded in 1998, Jissbon was once considered a “profit cash cow,” but this is already the third time it has been sold. As one commenter wrote, “Now even the parent company doesn’t want it anymore.” Jissbon is not the only brand struggling in China’s condom market, which shrank by 25% between 2020 and 2025, with all leading brands seeing sales drop by 15–20% (#避孕套销售缩水25%#).

The decline is linked to multiple factors, such as the rising popularity of oral contraceptives and other birth control methods. But alongside China’s rising single market, sex toys have been booming, reflecting a shift from two-person dating life to “private solo consumption,” as Chinese media outlet Dushi Kuaibao (都市快报) put it.

2. China’s World Cup Pride: Ma Ning, the Card Master

Even though Team China is not participating in the World Cup, Chinese referee Ma Ning (马宁) is, and he has become a viral talking point and a source of national pride. Ma is only the second Chinese central referee in World Cup history, 24 years after the lauded Chinese football referee Lu Jun (陆俊).

On Chinese social media, Ma is also nicknamed the “Grandmaster of Cards” (卡牌大师 kǎpái dàshī) for his strict, no-hesitation approach to handing out cards. During one infamous Shanghai match, he issued a total of nine yellow cards and three red cards.

AI-generated image of Ma Ning on Xiaohongshu, showing him arriving at the World Cup with his suitcases filled with red and yellow cards.

Chinese social media is now full of creative images celebrating Ma Ning, often depicting him handing out cards. Although strict referees are usually not that popular among football fans, for Ma it is the opposite: he is actually praised by Chinese fans for being honest, unyielding, and having “no soft spot” (没有软肋).

Ma has been assigned to referee Ecuador vs. Curaçao, scheduled for June 20 (this Saturday). Millions of Chinese fans are definitely tuning in.

3. Rolex Accused of Hiring 3,000 Paid Attendees

Rumors that Rolex recruited around 3,000 paid crowd extras to make its 100th-anniversary “Oyster Story” temporary exhibition in Shanghai, which opened on June 10, appear more popular than it actually was have sparked discussions on the Chinese internet.

The rumors surfaced after members of the so-called “crowd-filler” (群演 qúnyǎn) groups were allegedly promised 75 yuan (US$11) to attend, only to see the fee drop to 55 yuan (US$8.15) per person. Some claim they have not been paid at all, while others say they were removed from group chats after complaining.

It is not unusual for brands and companies in China to pay people to hype up an opening or stand in line to create queues that attract actual customers. But the idea that one of the world’s most prestigious watchmakers would need fake social engagement to drive exhibition attendance is being seen as another sign that the foreign luxury-brand boom in China has cooled down significantly. (I also wrote about this last week in the context of Nike’s declining popularity.)

4. Lululemon Beating the Wrong Drum

One of the most talked-about brand-related stories this week has been how Canadian athletic apparel brand Lululemon made a culturally sensitive faux pas. The company staged a yoga-themed event at the Great Wall of China featuring Chinese actor Zhu Yilong (朱一龙) and a giant drum. It was meant to represent a “Chinese grand drum” at one of the country’s most famous cultural landmarks – but it turned out to be Japanese taiko drums (日本太鼓).

A familiar playbook unfolded: netizens were outraged, online discussions exploded, and Lululemon scrambled to apologize. In this case, the mistake was especially sensitive. The Great Wall carries immense historical significance and is seen as a symbol of Chinese national identity, and using Japanese drums there – particularly at a time when Sino-Japanese political relations are tense – is viewed not as a simple prop mistake, but as a complete and “disrespectful” failure to get cultural symbolism right. Ouch.

5. China’s Diaper Safety Scandal

After this week, most parents in China will know what formamide is: a hazardous chemical classified as a reproductive toxin in the EU. The compound started trending after Chinese state media newspaper Economic Information Daily (经济参考报) reported that three popular diaper brands — Huggies (好奇), BIBAbebe (碧芭宝贝), and Babycare — contain the substance, with blood formamide levels reportedly doubling after wearing a diaper overnight (the reporter even wore one to test). The investigation followed online complaints from parents whose infants developed redness or skin irritation after diaper use.

Formamide (甲酰胺, jiǎ’án’àn), the chemical at the center of the controversy, is explicitly banned in China’s cosmetics regulations, but is not included in China’s mandatory national testing standards for infant hygiene products. Long-term exposure may affect the reproductive system while also causing chronic liver and kidney damage.

This story is still developing at the time of writing. The brands involved have all responded that they’re complying with relevant national standards for baby diapers and/or that their in-house testing could not detect formamide. Still, many questions are left unanswered. Although this story can be placed in a broader string of controversies surrounding food & product safety, this one hits especially hard because it concerns the safety and health of China’s most vulnerable: its babies.

📱ON THE FEEDS

Award-Winning Actress Uses Teleprompter on Stage

An award-winning Chinese actress using a teleprompter in her latest stage play at the Aranya Theatre Festival is sparking debate after audience members revealed that, in addition to relying on a teleprompter, she at times allegedly even read directly from a physical script.

The actress in question is Zhou Dongyu (周冬雨), considered one of the best actresses of China’s post-90s generation. With tickets for City of Fiction (文城) — a stage adaptation of the novel by Yu Hua — costing between 480 and 880 yuan (US$70–130), viewers took to Xiaohongshu and Weibo to voice their frustration after seeing the play.

“It’s simply not worth paying so much money to basically watch a rehearsal,” one commenter wrote.

Recently, there have been many discussions within China’s arts and entertainment world on what’s real and what’s not. In an age of AI-generated dramas and actors, audiences are increasingly looking for authenticity and genuine productions. The surprising success of the underdog local-dialect film Dear You (给阿嬷的情书, Love Letters to Grandma) is perhaps the best example of this trend. As for a stage performance starring one of China’s most celebrated actresses, audiences expect a higher standard and are disappointed when it feels “fake.”

DeepSeek Can’t Recognize Its Own Founder

China’s major AI startup DeepSeek (深度求索) made headlines this week after confirming its first-ever external funding round on June 16. The company reportedly raised over 50 billion RMB (approximately US$7.4 billion), making it the largest single funding round in Chinese AI history.

Alongside this serious news, however, a much more amusing story also started trending. On June 18, DeepSeek launched an image recognition feature on its web version, only for users to discover that it could not even recognize Liang Wenfeng (梁文锋) — the company’s own founder. In some cases, DeepSeek identified Liang as Moonshot AI founder Yang Zhilin (杨植麟) or even as a younger version of Tencent CEO Pony Ma (马化腾). Liang still has some work to do 😂.

🀄 ONLINE PHRASE OF THE WEEK

‘Shenzhen Airport Says Sorry’ Returns: “sorry全场” (sorry quánchǎng):

It’s that time for “Shenzhen Airport Says Sorry” (hashtag: #深圳机场sorry#): an ongoing joke on Chinese social media about Shenzhen Bao’an International Airport and its chronic flight delays during the rainy season, when one gate announcement after another says, “Sorry to inform you…” [that your flight has been delayed], and departure boards turn orange with delays and red with cancellations.

Because of the endless announcements and the airport’s PA system repeatedly saying “sorry” to passengers during mass flight delays, netizens have jokingly started referring to these airport-wide apologies as “sorry全场” (sorry quánchǎng), “sorry, everyone” or “apologies for everyone.”

It’s partly the force majeure nature of the delays and partly Shenzhen Airport’s proactive and overly apologetic response style that people have come to view with a sense of humor.

On June 18 alone, more than 400 flights were delayed due to thunderstorms and heavy rain. On June 19, netizens once again wrote: “It’s another ‘sorry全场’ day at Shenzhen Airport.”

By now, the phrase has become a meme. When Hong Kong Airport recently did not apologize for its delays, some netizens commented that the least it could do was to issue a “sorry全场.” The expression has also started appearing in unrelated contexts: if you want to jokingly apologize to an entire room in a routine and matter-of-fact way, it’s now perfectly acceptable to say “sorry全场.”

 
Also, perhaps it’s interesting to note what wasn’t necessarily trending this week. I found that the G7 summit hasn’t been a particularly big topic on Chinese social media. Meanwhile, the 618 shopping festival, now in its 16th year, still matters but no longer dominates online conversations as it once did.

Hope you all enjoy this weekend’s games, if you’re watching, and the remainder of the Dragon Boat Festival.

If you enjoyed this newsletter, please share it with your colleagues and China-focused friends, and encourage them to subscribe, too. Every new subscriber helps support my work. Thanks!

Best,

Manya

Eye on Digital China, by Manya Koetse, is co-published on Substack and What’s on Weibo. Both feature the same new content — so you can read and subscribe wherever you prefer. Substack offers community features, while What’s on Weibo provides full archive access. If you’re already subscribed and want to switch platforms, just get in touch for help. If you no longer wish to receive these newsletters, or are receiving duplicate editions, you can unsubscribe at any time.

🔥 China Trend Watch (week 23-24 | 2026) Part of Eye on Digital China by Manya Koetse. Here I track and explain the stories, memes, debates, and viral moments shaping online conversations in China, so you don’t have to. This edition was sent to paid subscribers — subscribe to receive the next issue in your inbox.

 
What’s in this newsletter?

• How Adidas turned a translation mistake into one of China’s most successful marketing campaigns.
• Nike is trending for all the wrong reasons.
• 10 quick scrolls: summer snow, a hidden-camera scandal, and the goose leg lady who sold duck legs all along.
• Why Chinese readers are looking to Japan’s “Lost Decades” for answers.
• Meet China’s newest workplace spirit animal.
• Why Henan’s farmers are begging thieves to steal their crops.

Just five years ago, Adidas was one of the most criticized foreign brands in China. Now, it seems to have become one of the most celebrated. Ironically, the brand’s biggest China success yet started out with a mistake it made last month.

In 2021, Adidas – along with Nike and other foreign brands – faced severe backlash and boycotts in China for participating in the Better Cotton Initiative (BCI) move to stop sourcing cotton from the Xinjiang region, which Chinese consumers viewed as a hostile anti-Chinese political stance (and was framed that way by state media and official channels).

Chinese livestreamers for the brands were scolded online, Adidas employees were brought to tears, and stores across the country saw their sales drop. People began posting videos of themselves burning their Nike Air Jordans on Weibo. For the brands involved, it became a marketing nightmare.

Screenshot of SCMP report about the Nike sneakers being burnt, Adidas employees facing backlash back in 2021.

But now, Adidas has managed to completely turn its image around in mainland China, where it is being praised for its top-of-game PR skills.

Adidas: Heading to Town to Take Care of Business

Over the past few years, Adidas has increasingly embraced “New Chinese Style” (新中式), a design direction that blends Chinese aesthetics with contemporary fashion. The October 2025 launch of its “Chinese New Year Jacket”—combining tang suit-inspired elements with classic Adidas sportswear—became a huge hit, not just in China but globally.

The Adidas Chinese New Year that became a huge hit in 2025. On the left: American influencer Hasan Piker wearing the jacket while visiting Tiananmen Square in Beijing.

But that was only the beginning of Adidas’s social media success in China.

In late May, some netizens spotted a machine-translated text on the Adidas website that immediately went viral for its unintentional humor.

A jacket promoted in English with the unremarkable phrase “pair it with jeans for errands around town“ appeared on the Chinese website as the clunky “pair it with jeans to handle business in the city“ (搭配牛仔裤，在城里办事 zài chénglǐ bàn shì).

The original English text and the clunky machine translation on the right.

More than a simple mistake, it was a cultural mistranslation. Running some errands is not the same as 办事 bàn shì in Chinese, which is more formal, bureaucratic language for handling affairs, such as going to the bank, notary, or police station—not a quick run to buy some eggs and milk.

For many Chinese netizens, the phrase evoked an image of an old villager cycling into the county town for official business, all while wearing an Adidas jacket.

Although the website was quickly adjusted, the meme was already snowballing and evolved into the more playful “off to town to take care of business” (进城办事 jìn chéng bàn shì).

One popular comment played on the rural-to-city associations of the phrase:

💬 “While you’re back in the village talking trash about me, I’m already wearing Adidas and heading into town to take care of business.”

Adidas responded with surprising speed and wit.

Instead of apologizing for the mistake, they posted a video showing their own “off to town to do business” T-shirt, which quickly became available for sale online and at flagship stores in Beijing, Shanghai, and Chengdu.

Chinese actor and Adidas ambassador Li Xian (李现) was later spotted wearing a “handling business” T-shirt, and the comment sections exploded.

Adidas read the room and went on to launch a marketing campaign featuring China’s popular possum meme wearing one of its jackets alongside slogans such as “Wear Adidas, Handle Serious Affairs” and “Wear Adi, Handle Big Things“—a nod to the original mistranslation and a series of viral wordplays built around the brand’s Chinese name (including “穿Adi办大事” and “穿Adi, 办das”, with das meaning dàshì 大事, “important business” here).

They also put up signs labeling some of their stores as “Adidas Errands Office” (阿迪办事处).

Rather than distancing itself from the joke, Adidas amplified it, becoming even funnier than the netizens themselves. Other brands even jumped in on the hype and referenced Adidas in their campaigns.

Because the response felt effortless, authentic, and on-brand, it greatly boosted Adidas’s popularity and appeal among young Chinese consumers.

Nike’s Grass is No Longer Greener

Sportswear giant Nike also became a major trending topic in China over the past week, but for entirely different reasons. Nike hasn’t been doing all that well recently, and the brand’s decline went viral in the same week that Adidas’s success was evident.

Nike became a top trending topic under the hashtag “Chinese consumers are abandoning Nike faster than anyone expected” (中国消费者抛弃耐克比想象中更快) after reports that a pair of sneakers originally sold for 899 yuan (US$132) are now selling for 429 yuan ($63) and still failing to attract buyers.

Nike’s decline is noteworthy because the brand was once booming in China. As with many other Western brands, it symbolized quality, prestige, and a cosmopolitan future for much of the 1990s and 2000s.

In a 2011 study of Chinese consumer aspirations, one respondent imagined a future in which she would drive a Mercedes-Benz, wear Nike, and eat KFC—a vision of modernity built around foreign brands. Another person dreamt of wearing “Nike clothes and Nike shoes (…) on the green grass, swinging golf clubs under the golden sunshine.”[1]

But Nike’s grass is no longer greener. Chinese commenters largely agree that much of the trust and desire surrounding the brand has eroded.

Many former Nike consumers now prefer Chinese brands such as Anta, Li-Ning or ERKE. Multiple posts on Chinese social media cite the Xinjiang cotton controversy as a turning point from which Nike never fully recovered.

The Localization Dilemma: A Strategic Catch-22?

The contrasting fortunes of Nike and Adidas reveal something important about the position of foreign brands in China today.

As domestic brands improved and narratives of national rejuvenation and the “Chinese Dream” gained prominence under Xi Jinping, consumer sentiment toward Western brands shifted dramatically, especially amid a growing number of controversies involving them.

From a Dolce & Gabbana campaign deemed racist to a witch hunt for Western brands listing Hong Kong and Taiwan as separate countries, international brands increasingly started struggling to find their place between politics, patriotism, and consumers who are choosing “Made in China” over global consumer culture.

As Zhihong Gao[2] observed as early as 2012, the rise of cultural confidence and renewed appreciation for Chinese traditions created a dilemma for foreign brands.

They find themselves caught in a strategic catch-22: if they localize too much, they risk losing the distinctiveness that made their brands attractive in the first place, while also reinforcing consumer preference for local cultural elements; yet if they remain too foreign, they risk appearing culturally tone-deaf and disconnected from Chinese consumers.

This is where Adidas appears to have found a sweet spot.

Unlike Nike, which seems to be living off its past success while showing little urgency in adapting to the Chinese market, Adidas has fully embraced Chinese digital culture, local humor, wordplay, and youth trends without abandoning its own identity.

Rather than pretending to be Chinese, Adidas is participating in Chinese culture as a distinctly foreign brand. By celebrating the unique elements of Chinese culture, both in tradition and modernity, it is boosting both its own image and the cultural pride it is tapping into. That is Chinamaxxing in a nutshell.

[1] Kelly Tian and Lily Dong, Consumer-Citizens of China: The Role of Foreign Brands in the Imagined Future China (London: Routledge, 2011), 70–71.

[2] Zhihong Gao, “Chinese Grassroots Nationalism and Its Impact on Foreign Brands,” Journal of Macromarketing 32, no. 2 (2012): 184–185.

10 Quick Scrolls

🎓 Gaokao. From June 7-9, the Chinese 2026 Gaokao (高考, national college entrance exams), took place and dominated every major Chinese platform. One viral joke reflected a growing fear among young Chinese that a university degree no longer guarantees meaningful employment: “If you fail the exams, you could be a delivery driver in four days. If you pass the exams, you could be a delivery driver in four years.”

❄️ Snow. One day it’s air conditioning; the next it’s snow. Beijing saw a rare case of “summer snow” on June 6, when a cold front and rain sent temperatures tumbling, leading to unexpected snowfall in the Yanqing Olympic Park area.

📸 Voyeurism. A hidden camera was discovered by students in a women’s restroom at the Shanghai University of Political Science and Law. The camera, pointed at a toilet stall, was linked to an account livestreaming footage to illegal voyeuristic groups. Police have detained a suspect: a 33-year-old male student at the university.

🐯 Corruption. Wei Xiaodong (魏小东), a veteran official whose career spanned more than four decades and included top positions in Beijing’s political establishment, is now under investigation for suspected serious violations of Party discipline and law. He is the seventh full ministerial-rank official placed under investigation so far in 2026.

🏢 Real Estate. A man in Xi’an who bought a presale apartment on the 34th floor was shocked to discover, when it came time to take possession, that the building had only been constructed up to the 32nd floor. Despite winning in court, he still has not recovered all of his money because the developer reportedly has no assets left.

🍔 Fast Food. Is there room for another player in China’s crowded fast-food market? The US chain Wendy’s is planning a major expansion into China, with a reported target of 1,000 stores over the next ten years.

📱 Extravagance. A Chinese man who paid 297,000 yuan ($43,900) for a luxury Vertu phone back in 2015 has gone viral after revealing it no longer works in mainland China because it only supports 2G. The alligator leather-and-diamond phone has effectively become a very pricey paperweight. “If I’d bought gold instead, it’d be worth five times as much today,” he lamented.

💙 Awkward. Blued (蓝色), China’s largest gay dating app, was temporarily down on June 9. As the app’s name appeared on Weibo’s trending charts, people were cracking up over the comments from women innocently asking what kind of app it is, since their husbands seem to be on it all the time.

🚀 Space Diplomacy. During Xi Jinping’s welcome banquet in Pyeongyang, images of Chinese astronauts were displayed on a giant screen. With every single moment orchestrated, the prominent display of China’s space achievements got some Chinese commentators talking about the possibility of a North Korean astronaut one day joining a mission to China’s Tiangong space station.

🦆 Duck legs. “Goose Leg Auntie” (鹅腿阿姨), the Beijing street vendor who went viral in 2023 for her mouthwatering roasted goose legs, has run into trouble with local regulators. Turns out she was selling duck legs all along.

What China’s Reading

Japan’s “Lost Decades” as China’s Mirror

As slower economic growth becomes the new normal in China, and anxieties about the future, employment, and AI disruption increasingly shape everyday conversations, many Chinese are looking back at the period following Japan’s economic bubble burst and asking what lessons China can learn from it.

This is why Japan as a Mirror: A Survival Guide for the Economic Downturn (以日为镜：经济下行期穿越指南) by author Wang Xiwei (王熙威) has become so popular. The non-fiction work, first published on WeRead on May 21, quickly climbed into the platform’s top rankings.

Wang, a China-born graduate of Peking University and the University of Tokyo who has lived in Japan for more than twenty years, uses a series of narrative case studies to explore how ordinary Japanese people navigated the country’s post-bubble stagnation, from the early 1990s onward.

The book zooms in on personal stories: elite university graduates working in convenience stores, a salaryman who becomes an internet café drifter, families trapped by decades-long mortgages, housewives embracing minimalism, and professionals forced to reinvent themselves after career setbacks.

By focusing on individual experiences during Japan’s so-called “Lost Decades,” Wang seeks to offer Chinese readers perspectives on coping with uncertainty and adapting to economic change. The book presents Japan as a mirror for contemporary China, which is also facing economic slowdown, demographic pressures, and reduced social mobility, and widespread online discussions about neijuan (”involution”), tangping (”lying flat”), and consumption downgrading.

One 5-star review on Weibo said:

💬 “Many feel that, as individuals, we can’t change the broader environment. But what we can do is look at how different industries in Japan changed during periods of economic decline—and the new opportunities that emerged from those changes—and use those experiences as a reference when making our own plans. In doing so, we may be able to prevent our own lives from slipping into a “downturn period” of their own (下行期).”

On the Feed

Possum Staring Out Window: China’s New Meme Spirit Animal

Chinese social media has been taken over by a little opossum staring out of a window with its hands behind its back. Standing there, the little creature seems to be contemplating life. The image is often accompanied by self-deprecating one-liners such as:

– “I may not have made any money, but at least I exhausted myself.”

– “When I handle something, you definitely shouldn’t feel reassured.”

The “hands-behind-back opossum” (背手负鼠) has become an unexpected social media star and emotional spokesperson for young people in China. They appreciate the ugly-cute animal because, although it looks calm and collected on the outside, they imagine it is actually exhausted and anxious on the inside (appropriately enough, the opossum’s most famous defense mechanism is pretending to be dead). They relate because it’s how many of them feel in their daily lives and at work.

It’s unclear where the original photograph came from, but since it was first adapted as a meme, it has exploded from WeChat to Xiaohongshu and beyond.

By now, its use has become highly versatile, and the opossum itself has become a mood—especially when it comes to frustrating workplace dynamics:

– “Received. Cannot be done.”

– “This matter is not urgent, but it definitely needs to be done fast.”

– “As for tomorrow’s matters, you’ll know the day after tomorrow.”

The Online Phrase to Know

“Want Some Garlic Scapes?”

· 你要蒜苔吗？Nǐ yào suàntái ma?

· or: 要蒜苔不? Yào suàntái bù?

Henan’s meme of the year started because farmers have so many garlic scapes, they’re practically begging people to take them away.

Since May, “Want some garlic scapes?” has become a local joke and alternative greeting in China’s Henan province — and a sign of the sympathy many people feel for struggling farmers.

Garlic scapes, the curly green shoots of the garlic plant that are eaten as a vegetable, have seen such an oversupply that prices fell below the cost of harvesting them. Yet farmers couldn’t simply leave them in the fields, because that would reduce the yield of the garlic bulbs themselves.

In other words: farmers didn’t want the garlic scapes, but they couldn’t afford not to harvest them either.

The situation quickly became meme material. One Henan farmer went viral on Douyin after saying: “I hope 50 thieves come today and steal all my garlic scapes. If you don’t know how to steal, I’ll teach you…”

Image: A meme showing two sad-looking dogs standing in farm fields, each trying to attract garlic-scape thieves. One dog shouts, “Come steal from my field first!”

Another running joke is that people have started secretly hanging bundles of garlic scapes on their neighbors’ door handles before running away. Home security cameras, one article joked, are no longer being used to catch thieves. Instead, they’re being used to identify anonymous garlic-scape givers so the vegetables can be returned.

The memes keep coming, with AI-generated images imagining garlic-scape fashion, garlic-scape artwork, and even questionable inventions such as garlic-scape-flavored lattes or beer.

Behind the humor lies a harsher reality. According to Lanjing News, many farmers can no longer afford to hire workers to harvest the crop. Some families that previously earned around 30,000 yuan (US$4,200) a year from garlic scapes alone may make only a third of that this year.

Part of the problem is that strong garlic prices encouraged farmers to increase production. But bumper harvests across multiple regions all reached the market during the same April–May period, worsening the oversupply and pushing prices down even further.

The situation is an economic nightmare for many farmers. On the bright side, besides having plenty of garlic scapes, Henan now also has plenty of online jokes.

 
That’s a wrap!