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Wee Kek Koon
Having lived his whole life in the modern cities of Singapore and Hong Kong, Wee Kek Koon has an inexplicable fascination with the past. He is constantly amazed by how much he can mine from China's history for his weekly column in Post Magazine, which he has written since 2005.
Having lived his whole life in the modern cities of Singapore and Hong Kong, Wee Kek Koon has an inexplicable fascination with the past. He is constantly amazed by how much he can mine from China's history for his weekly column in Post Magazine, which he has written since 2005.
As China has shown at various periods in its history, the greater a civilisation, the more open and magnanimous it is to foreigners.
Yang Zhi’s insistence that his convoy hurry in the height of summer comes back to bite him in the Ming-dynasty novel Outlaws of the Marsh.
A complex series of ceremonies, the Three Letters and Six Rites aimed to ensure social recognition, family consent and spiritual blessing.
Muslims celebrate Eid al-Adha this weekend, which involves ritual animal sacrifice, something Chinese started performing in the Zhou dynasty.
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Whether or not customs of Duanwu or Tuen Ng Festival can truly be ascribed to Qu Yuan’s drowning in 278BC, his life is worthy of celebration.
Donald Trump’s lies are so ludicrous only idiots or lapdogs could believe them. In Qin dynasty China, aides parroted a counsellor’s lie too.
How Chinese emperors’ titles, like papal ones, reflected their legacies and why their birth names were considered taboo during their reigns.
Despite being deeply flawed, China’s initial experiments with representative politics starting in 1907 left a lasting legacy.
Is blood thicker than water? While family networks remain an important part of everyday life today, they used to play a much larger role.
China’s first emperor ended 800 years of feudalism, then the imperial system was replaced in 1912. Political shifts are a constant of history.
Worshipped by many Chinese, Lord Guan so personified the virtues of courage and loyalty that he was deified after his death.
Besides the Qin dynasty’s standardisations pertaining to Chinese writing and currency, equally significant was that of carriages’ axle width.
In ancient China, tremors were seen as cosmic warnings of misrule. China was also more advanced than the rest of the world at detecting them.
Asians in particular are conditioned to show older people deference, but I beg to differ. They should show themselves worthy of our respect.
When vegetable fats, especially sesame oil, replaced tallow and lard 1,500 years ago in China, people were able to ‘fry everything’, and did.
China did not have an official language in the modern sense before the 20th century, while Singapore’s is different to its national language.
When Chinese emperor Qin Shi Huang banned, then burned books it caused a loss of knowledge for all of humanity. Now book bans are back.
The legacy of a psychotic Chinese king who flew into murderous rages when drunk led his successor to decree death for anyone caught drinking.
Pandan chiffon cake is associated with Singapore, but pandan is popular all over Southeast Asia and seen in various foods and drinks.
Some historical gestures should never be revived. The yi greeting, once common in ancient China, is thankfully not one of them.
A social media post about sweaty commuters sparked intense debate in Singapore, yet in the old days people would go months without a bath.
Malaysia and Singapore are tiny compared to other Southeast Asian countries, let alone China, whose foods are ubiquitous around the world.
A pastor has called the Chinese New Year ritual of shouting good wishes while tossing salad ingredients high in the air ‘superstitious’.
Chinese brides used to wear black, then red, before the Western white gown became ubiquitous. Some push back now and don hanfu bridal wear.
Various forms of lottery have existed in China for centuries, as have attempts to ban them for reasons like the social problems they induce.
Chinese philosopher Kongzi, also known as Confucius, put no faith in deities, preferring to focus on the here and now.
An alleged attempt to bewitch a president is a reminder of a plotter’s bogus claim about witchcraft being used against a Chinese emperor.
Events during one period in Chinese history indicate that for many, dying for honour was far more desirable than living a disgraced life.
The idea that no one is above the law was mere aspiration in imperial China. Biden pardoning his son shows it to be so in United States too.
