China’s history has plenty of strange corners that rarely make it into the usual classroom version. These facts dig into hidden scripts, pirate queens, political traps, bizarre crimes, scandals, and modern stories that feel almost too strange to be real.
Secret Script Gave Women Freedom
1. Nüshu is a script written and used only by Chinese women that allowed them to write letters, poetry, and autobiographies. Because men could not read it, women literate in Nüshu experienced greater intellectual freedom.
2. In 2012 a U.S. programmer subcontracted his duties to a Chinese programmer who was paid one-fifth of his salary. His employer discovered that he spent his workday watching cat videos.
3. After eating raw beef for several years, a man in China developed a 20-foot tapeworm in his small intestine. The tapeworm had been living inside him for at least two years.
4. In 2004 authorities shut down 215 restaurants in Guizhou, China, for adding opium to food to addict patrons. By 2016, 35 restaurants across the country were charged in similar cases.
5. Ching Shih, who had worked as a Chinese prostitute, became one of history’s most successful pirates. She commanded more than 1,800 ships and as many as 200,000 pirates, and astonishingly she retired peacefully.
6. During the 19th century, Hong Xiuquan, a poor Chinese man who failed the civil service examination, became ill. After revisiting a Christian pamphlet he had earlier disregarded, he hallucinated that he was Jesus’ brother. He went on to lead a religious sect and an uprising, seize control of much of southern China, and crown himself king. The civil war caused more than ten million deaths.
7. In 1995, the Chinese government seized a six-year-old Tibetan boy identified as the Panchen Lama and replaced him with a Han Chinese ‘fake Panchen.’ The real Panchen Lama has not been heard from since; he plays an important role in selecting the next Dalai Lama.
8. In ancient China, a man named Nan Guo tricked his way into being hired as a musician for the King of Qi despite not knowing how to play an instrument. He imitated the movements of other musicians and collected a salary until the king died, after which he fled because the new king preferred solo performances.
9. In 2017, Chinese authorities shut down two AI chatbots after the bots began criticizing communism and praising the United States.
10. In 1956 and 1957, the Chinese Communist Party launched the ‘Hundred Flowers Movement,’ encouraging citizens to voice criticisms of the party. When criticisms did appear, Mao Zedong initiated an ideological crackdown against the critics.
Secrets Behind Masked Transformations
11. In Sichuan opera, Bian Lian, or “face changing,” has performers switch theatrical masks with imperceptible speed, and the sleight of hand technique is classified as a level two national secret by China’s State Secrets Bureau.
12. As of 2015, China was the most irreligious country in the world, with 90% of residents reporting no interest in religion.
13. In Imperial China, depictions of dragons were regulated so that commoners used three claws, members of the nobility used four, and only the emperor could employ five-clawed dragons.
14. In 2019, a Chinese businessman hired a hitman for $282,800 to eliminate a competitor; the hitman subcontracted the assignment, creating a chain involving five additional subcontracted hitmen, and the final hitman simply asked the target to fake his death.
15. In China, people generally drink hot water, a custom that contrasts with the preference for cold water in many other cultures.
16. At the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony, a nine-year-old appeared to sing a patriotic song but was lip-syncing. Officials later disclosed that the real singer was a seven-year-old who had been kept backstage because she was not considered attractive enough; she actually sang to protect China’s image.
17. Chinese medical tourists who have plastic surgery in South Korea often encounter difficulty re-entering China because their altered appearance no longer matches their passport photo, creating identification problems.
18. In China, some students obtain loans by submitting nude photographs of themselves holding their student ID as collateral, and those images are released online if they default on the loan.
19. In 2002 in China, a fake Harry Potter sequel titled “Harry Potter and Bao Zuolong” appeared; its text was actually J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Hobbit” with character names changed to those of Harry Potter characters.
20. All of China observes a single time zone, China Standard Time, which aligns with Beijing Time, ignoring international time zone divisions across its territory.
Drivers Avoiding Lifelong Costs
21. Because Chinese law requires drivers who hit pedestrians to pay victims’ lifelong medical expenses, some drivers deliberately run over people multiple times to ensure they die and thus avoid the obligation to cover those lifetime costs.
22. In July 2017, Chinese authorities prohibited Justin Bieber from giving performances in China, saying the measure sought to preserve market order and cleanse the performance scene of poorly behaved entertainers.
23. In 2008, Chinese officials concealed a large scandal in which baby formula was contaminated with melamine to safeguard the Beijing Olympics’ image. The contamination sent more than 54,000 infants to hospital, resulted in six deaths, and prompted worldwide recalls and public outrage.
24. At a 2019 HIV/AIDS prevention event in Harare, Zimbabwe’s health minister criticized condoms made in China as being too small.
25. China’s final imperial eunuch was castrated by his father with a razor so he could serve the last emperor, Pu Yi. Yet only months after the operation, the emperor was deposed and the governmental system changed.
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