11/20/24 - Lol, since when is work tied to your life?
#Yu Donglai [supermarket chain CEO] makes a post: Starting from next year, Pang Dong Lai [his supermarket chain, well known for its high quality stock and excellent pay and benefits for their employees] employees will not be allowed to demand or pay bride price, or lose all their benefits. #What do you think about Pang Dong Lai announcing employees are not allowed to ask for bride price? On the 11th of November, Pang Dong Lai’s founder, Yu Donglai wrote, “From next year! In order to achieve a beautiful life, direct society towards civilised living, rational science, and chill and sincere life, Pang Dong Lai employees about to marry are not allowed to ask for or pay bride price! Weddings cannot be too lavish. Only friends and family are allowed to be invited to the feast, and there can be no more than 5 tables of them. If you can’t do this, then the company will cancel all benefits from its policies! Future Pang Dong Lai workers are not allowed to rely on their parents to buy a house or a car! You are perfectly capable of creating and enjoying a beautiful life on your own!”
On July of 2024, Pang Dong Lai founder Yu Donglai made multiple posts on his personal social media account talking about Pang Dong Lai is working on policies to secure worker’s rights and safety.”
Comments say, “Can I interpret this to mean that he’s actually just banning employees from getting married, just with this as an excuse?”
“My sister works at Pang Dong Lai, and I asked her and her company explained that they just don’t want young people to be under too much pressure, or to put that pressure on their parents. This is just a promotion, not mandatory, so thank God.”
“Lol, since when is work tied to your life?”
A post from a lawyer: “An advice-seeker today really blew me away.
There was this guy. His parents are divorced. His mom and dad have both since went on to remarry.
After remarriage, his dad had another child, his younger stepbrother.
During his second marriage, his dad got a house, and now this house is going to get eminent domain’d.
Then his dad died.
And his mom died.
So this guy quietly got the rights to the house under his name. And at this point, his stepbrother, his stepmom, and him started a war on how to split the estate.
The newly built house isn’t finished being transferred under his name yet, and he also died in an accident. And he didn’t have a wife or kids.
Now his uncle and aunt want to inherit this house.
So basically, this guy’s first successors—his spouse, his parents, his children—are all gone. His second successors—grandparents, siblings—also don’t exist. But he has a stepbrother, which is technically a sibling legally speaking.
No matter how I look at it, the only person with the right to inherit is his stepbrother. This has nothing to do with his uncle and aunt.
Even if he never had a stepbrother, this guy’s estate would go to the government. His uncle and aunt never had a chance to inherit.
In all my years of work, this is the first time I’ve ever encountered someone with an estate that no one can inherit, where it has to go to the government.”
Comments say, “His whole entire family plus himself are all dead lol.”
“If he had a will, it would be possible, right?”
“Huh? I have a question? Doesn’t inheritance just kind of go down the line? Why would it go to the government?”
#Changde is a wonderful place. [There is a poem here that I am not capable of translating, but basically, it describes beautiful autumn scenery.] “Come check out a 6000 year old rice field site at Chengtoushan.” [I have been getting spammed with tourist promos from Changde, maybe to try to revert the negative press it’s been getting since a guy attempted another vehicular massacre at a primary school a couple of days ago?]
Guangzhou Daily comments, “#Businesses need to back off from the private lives of their employees. “Employees are banned from demanding bride price. Employees are banned from relying on their parents for houses and cars.” Objectively speaking, Pang Donglai surely meant well. On the one hand, they are fitting in with the societal trend of promoting frugal and simple weddings, wanting people to have a more pure kind of happiness. On the other hand, they’ve created the dream that you can work hard and earn a happy life for yourself to their employees, increasing confidence and a sense of belonging in their employees.
But the problem is in the two words “banned”. What should’ve been a suggestion or a call to action has become a mandatory regulation that is directly tied to company benefits. In reality, whether it’s bride price or purchasing houses or cars, it’s still an employee’s family matters, private matters. It can be a sign of social responsibility for a business to express an appropriate amount of concern towards their employees and call for the right actions, but when this concern goes too far, and suggestions become demands, becomes “ordering employees around”, and even tying it to company benefits, claiming that, “If you can’t do it, you will lose all benefits”, that’s mixing business and private life. At the same time, there’s plenty of ways to get around these regulations. And asking employees to “confess” to these private matters is a violation of personal privacy too.
Regarding this controversial “management policy”, this business has to figure out its management boundaries and adjust the contents. For example, they can give out rewards to employees who don’t ask for bride price or rely on their parents, using positive motivation to make employees more enthused.”
Comments say, “They’ve been talked up too much, and now they’re full of themselves.”
“They’re employees, not your personal property. It’s none of your fucking business.”
“You can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit you can quit.”
“Eating lunch with a Chinese coworker at the British office today.
Me: What’s your favourite thing about London?
Him: They’ve got lots of brothels here. [妓院, ji yuan]
Me: ??? Whaaaaa???? O_O
Him: I go every week. You should try it out too.
Me: ??? What the fuck? What the fuck???
Him: Phantom of the Opera, Les Miserables, Lion King…they’re all great.
Ohhhhhh, he said theatre! [剧院, ju yuan]
Comments say, “The start of this post made my jaw drop hahahahahahaha”
“Hahahahaha what? I wanna go too.”
“And there’s a district famous for this kind of thing, eh? Eh?”
#Changde is a wonderful place “Beneath the ruins of Changde’s Chengtoushan is a history that’s disappeared in the past, and that is alive now.
An ancient city that was erected more than 6300 years ago, went through the difficulty of selecting location and being built, opened up the liveliness of agriculture, and started a new era of prehistoric cities.
This formerly prosperous city slowly died away 4500 years ago, their history frozen in soil, leaving behind shocking relics of manmade structures and signs of production and life.
The world’s oldest rice fields, China’s oldest city, the oldest large-scale altar in the Yangtze River basin…
Sometimes, I remember a line from Wang Xizhi [famous caligrapher], “Those who see this in the future will still be awed by its sophistication.”
I think even generations beyond us will make such remarks when they see the site at Changde, Chengtoushan.”
A discussion on the stereotypical jacket that government officials always seem to be wearing. For context, it looks something like below. They’re called “administrative jackets” in China.
“My dad wanted to show off when he went to meet my boyfriend, so he went to the mall to buy a n administrative jacket, and it was over 5K after discounts. My dad turned around and bought the Bosideng down jacket that he was hesitating over for 2600. He said that down jackets were designed for peasants XD”
“I never even knew about this brand, until a government worker friend of mine told me.” [screenshot of the Zegna jacket I posted above for 32,900 RMB.]
“Water proof, static proof, not corruption proof.”
“Wash resistant, wear resistant, not investigation resistant.”
“I was wondering why leaders are never cold in the winter.”
“When my uncle was young, he’d just started working at the department for a year or so, and one time, he went out to inspect workers and wore a white shirt plus a jacket, and had to write a self-reflection for three days once he got back.” [Sort of like writing an apology letter, reflecting on your mistakes.]
“Yeah, their jackets are made to be wearable directly next to skin, but my menstrual pads are C-category products.” [Clothing is split into A, B, and C categories in China, with safety restrictions being looser the lower you go. C-category items are never supposed to be worn on human skin, and are generally winter jackets and the like, and contain the most amount of toxic materials.]
“Pissed me off so much that I rolled over and got zapped by the static on my polyester sweater.”
“Leaders don’t just wear nice clothes! They also eat the healthiest food!”
“I can’t even imagine.” [another screenshot of a Zegna jacket for 56,900 RMB.]
“My workplace’s budget for buying a shirt every year is 1270RMB per piece. Winter jackets are 14,580RMB per person. You can imagine the quality of the fabrics.”
“Right? I’ve worked at Erdos 1980 before, and the men’s clothing item they make the most of is administrative jackets, pure cashmere wool. The cashmere shirt inside is really low key and comfortable and warm too.”
“Even their shirts aren’t just plain old white shirts~”
“My dad fell in love with an administrative jacket from Prada before for 50K+, and I was like, “You’re not an official. Why would you wear an administrative jacket? Wear something fun!””
“Meanwhile! The! People! Wear! Plastic!”
“Tell me more about global warning.”
“Loro Piana’s clothes are all five figures, six figures. If you custom order, the most expensive I’ve seen is 450K, sewn with gold thread, sprinkled in diamond dust. Aside from a single label on the inside, you can’t tell from the outside at all which brand it came from.”
“No wonder they wear so little in the winter. I honestly thought they just weren’t cold.”
“Isn’t that nice? They get to stay warm in the winter, and we get to wear plastic use C-category menstrual pads.”
“Before, I bought a Northface windbreaker for my FIL and he even asked what brand it was, and my husband was like, “Relax. Your DIL isn’t gonna buy you cheap shit.” Later, I went shopping with my MIL and she wanted to fetch a custom jacket from Saint Angelo for my FIL and buy him two undershirts. I thought Saint Angelo was a normal brand, so I was just going to pay for it, and my MIL stopped me and told me to use the gift card. She put in her phone number, and two undershirts added up to over 3K, and there was another 30K left in the card. I was dumbfounded. It was just the simplest of round-collar undershirts.”
“Don’t wear administrative jackets unless you’re above county level. Not everyone is willing to spend over 7K on a piece of clothing. And to be honest, this jacket is a sign of your status. In daily life, if you wear an administrative jacket to a restaurants, the waiters would know right off the bat that you’re not going to pay the bill. This jacket is too iconic. If you’re not at that level of power, it’s just embarrassing to wear it.
Why I specify above county level? Because at this level, you’re somebody in most towns. People know to be impressed by you when you wear an administrative jacket out. If you wear the wrong clothes, put the wrong labels on yourself, then you’d just turn yourself into a joke. On the little theatre stage of government, every character has his own costume, a sign of their identity. Wear the right clothes, and you’re half way to success. Wear the wrong clothes, you’re just adding obstacles to your life.”