"Enduring marriage" — staying married in middle age while living as roommates under one roof — is being sold in Chinese essays as wisdom and self-care. One writer pushes back, calling it a graceful name for giving up.
A popular essay reframes the old folk notion of 'heavy yin' from ghostly possession into a description of chronically low, draining people — and offers five signs for spotting them. It is a window into how Chinese self-help blends folklore with emotional advice.
A Chinese essayist describes how Alzheimer's disease takes a parent long before death, leaving families to mourn someone who still sits at the table. The piece, published on a mass-market reading platform, gives a name to a loss Chinese families rarely discuss openly.
A Zhihu explainer traces the disappearance of the intramuscular penicillin injection that once greeted nearly every sick child in Chinese county clinics, arguing that better drug formulations and modern medical infrastructure, not nostalgia, retired it.
A roundup of user answers on Zhihu, China's Quora-like platform, turns everyday mishaps and odd coincidences into a shared comic ritual. The format thrives on brevity, self-mockery and the unexpected connections readers make between unrelated things.
A viral set of etiquette rules for cash gifts at weddings and banquets is spreading online in China, reflecting growing fatigue with the financial and social burden of reciprocal giving. The guidelines cap ordinary colleagues at 200 yuan and encourage careful accounting of family gifts.
Documentary filmmaker Lu Qingyi went back to his home county to care for his dying father and stayed to care for his mother. His new book turns that year of caregiving into a meditation on family, memory and ordinary lives.
China's insurance giant Ping An has launched a cultural IP, 'Ping An in Intangible Heritage,' partnering with a heritage-themed television program and opening the first of a planned series of events on October 30.
A Chinese essayist argues that heroes should be defined by excellence in a field, naming scientists like Qian Xuesen and Ma Weiming, rather than by fame or rescue drama. The piece reflects a broader Chinese appetite for essays that rethink admiration and everyday values.
West Lake vinegar fish is one of Hangzhou's signature dishes, yet Chinese diners now treat it as a punchline. A Zhihu essay argues the recipe was built for conditions that no longer exist, so the fame outlived the fish.
A Zhihu discussion argues that today's Chinese buses, despite better specs and smoother roads, often feel harsher than the models of the 1980s and 1990s. The reason lies in technology that stopped changing decades ago and in how buses are now bought and specified.
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