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A Chinese man who was dating 17 women at once has been found out after his girlfriends turned up to visit him in hospital following a car crash. The man, surnamed Yuan, from the city of Changsha in Hunan province, had been dating all the women at the same time, and even had a child with one, state media reports. His luck ran out when hospital staff began contacting his loved ones in the wake of his accident.

China's Global Times - that reliable purveyor of the sublimely ridiculous, the terrifyingly nationalistic, and the just generally offensive -- struck again on Wednesday, with a quick nine-paragrapher that may just manage to combine all three offerings in one: "American Indians descend from Hunan, says expert." The tabloid reports on the findings of Du Gangjian, dean of Hunan University Law School, who, on a recent trip to study Native American tribes in the United States (the article doesn't specify which ones), made the discovery that "American Indians have many rituals, habits and working tools that are very similar to the...

If you've seen "Avatar", you know about the floating mountains. If you haven't seen it, there are floating mountains in the movie. While the physics and geology of these are, well, science-fictional, they are nonetheless impressive and picturesque in the movie. Turns out that (minus the fact that they don't float) the mountains in Hunan province in China look a lot like the floating mountains in "Avatar" -- to the point that the Chinese have renamed one of them "Avatar Hallelujah Mountain". There are lots of pictures of that one (Google it), so I Panoramio-ed all over the region and...

Several vehicles were burned out in the riot Security is tight in a town in central China following riots that involved as many as 20,000 people.A BBC correspondent in the town, in Hunan province, has seen riot police and soldiers protecting government buildings and patrolling the streets. He says it appears the protests began after a local firm took over the town's bus routes and doubled the fares. Vehicles were burned and several people were injured in clashes with police as the protests climaxed on Monday. Reports said one person had been killed, although this was denied on Wednesday...

Something as simple as opening of the local bus lines to open competition could have prevented this riot. But this is China, where the government grants of lucrative monopolies (in exchange for kickbacks and bribes) are a several-thousand year tradition.

A protest staged by thousands of rural workers in central China ended in violent clashes last week, media reports and an official said.Several people were injured as up to 20,000 people clashed with 1,000 police in Hunan province on Friday, a local official told Reuters news agency. A report on the Boxun Chinese news website said the clash was sparked by rising public transport costs. Rural regions of China have mounting unrest in recent years. Thousands of protests were held last year amid growing discontent over the widening gap between rich and poor and corruption among officials at local...

Monday August 7, 6:55 PM 100 killed after Chinese police open fire on protesters: reports (Kyodo) _ About 100 people were killed when police opened fire on protesters in central China last week, media reports said Monday. The clash between 1,000 police officers and hundreds of protesters who had been staged protests since late July occurred in Hunan Province last Wednesday. According to media in Hong Kong and mainland China, the protests over the past weeks were caused by disputes between two villages in the province's Xiangyin County. Hong Kong's Commercial Radio quoted the provincial government's news department as saying...

The Japanese news agency Kyodo reports that at least 100 people were killed last week when Chinese police opened fire on a demonstration in the province of Hunan. A police force of around 1,000 officers had reportedly been deployed to end a demonstration against the local authorities in the town of Yueyang. Violent demonstrations are increasingly common in the Chinese countryside, most of them in protest at government expropriations for industrial projects. Much of the social unrest is believed to go unreported due to strict government censorship.

7000 year-old sacrificial altar found in Hunan www.chinaview.cn 2006-01-29 11:23:54 BEIJING, Jan. 29 (Xinhuanet) -- A sacrificial altar, dating back about 7,000 years, has been discovered in central China's Hunan Province, according to Chinese archaeologists. The altar is the earliest sacrificial site so far found in China, said He Gang, a researcher with the Hunan Institute of Archaeology. "Ancients prayed to the gods of nature, such as the gods of the earth, river and heaven," said He at a archaeological forum held by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences recently in Beijing. Archaeologists have found China's oldest white pottery specimens...

Thursday November 10, 1:54 PM Influenza affects pigs, birds in China, kills man in Vietnam (Kyodo) _ Bird flu virus was found in pigs bred in China's Hunan Province, which means the virus could be a step closer to infecting human in a large scale, according to reports in Hong Kong on Thursday, while Vietnam reported the first human death from the A H3 strain of bird flu. Ming Pao Daily News quoted an interview on China's Phoenix Satellite TV in which a deputy agricultural minister in Hunan admitted the bird flu virus had been found in pigs for the...

CHANGSHA, July 5 (Xinhuanet) -- Shaoshan, the hometown of late Chinese leader Mao Zedong, has become an attractive tourist destination in recent years. The famous Chinese village hosted more than 1 million visitors in the first four months this year, up 68 percent over last year's same period, The daily number of visitors exceeds 15,000, according to village officials. The name of Mao Zedong, one of the founders of New China, also means fortune to locals. Years ago, Tan Ruiren, a woman villager in Shaoshan, launched Mao's restaurant, which sells foods said to be the favorites of Mao Zedong. Now,...

BEIJING, May 20 (Xinhuanet) -- Residents in Changsha, Capital of central China's Hunan Province have enjoyed the golden opportunity to see an atmospheric wonder: a solar halo. Yesterday, the sun was wrapped by a grey and black band and the sight looked more beautiful as colorful rings appeared outside the ring. The spectacular sight lasted three and half hours in the city. Meteorological experts make it clear the solar halo can not foretell good or ill luck since it is only an atmospheric phenomenon. Solar halos indicate the increase of steam and the coming of low pressure. (CRIENGLISH.com)

Multiplication table from 1,800 years ago found in Hunan Archeologists claimed that they had found a multiplication table at the Gurendi cultural relics ofthe Eastern Han Dynasty (25-220) in Zhangjiajie, central China's Hunan Province. Archeologists claimed that they had found a multiplication table at the Gurendi cultural relics ofthe Eastern Han Dynasty (25-220) in Zhangjiajie, central China's Hunan Province. The table was discovered on a 22cm-long wooden strip which was broken when it was discovered and the handwriting on it is quite illegible. "We can see that the multiplication table begins at nine times nine equals 81, in a sequence...

Situation in 'SARS-free' city anything but calmBy Asia Times Online Staff HONG KONG - Pingtang is a small suburb on the outskirts of Changsha, capital of south-central China's Hunan province. All vehicles heading toward Changsha from Xiangtan now must pass through Pingtang. During the climax of local anti-SARS efforts, authorities established a temporary traffic checkpoint where everyone who was coming or going received a compulsory body-temperature check and each vehicle passing through was inspected. Last week, however, this checkpoint was converted into a station for fighting the flooding of the Xiang River, a main waterway in the province. After the...

More than 600,000 people have been evacuated from around rain-swollen Dongting Lake in central China, which is threatening to burst its banks and engulf millions, official media said. At least 16 people have died and 27,000 homes have collapsed, the China Daily said Friday, giving the first official statistics on how badly the current flood crisis has already hit the region. More than 8.4 million people have been affected in the region, which has seen water levels in Dongting and the rivers which feed it surge above danger levels, the Ministry of Civil Affairs told the newspaper. Additionally, 415,000...

A state of emergency has been declared across China's central province of Hunan, where more than 10 million people are under threat from surging water levels in a huge lake, Red Cross officials said. "I have just been talking to our Chinese Red Cross colleagues in Hunan, and they say the provincial governor has declared a state of emergency for all Hunan," said France Hurtubise, an International Red Cross spokeswoman in Beijing, on Wednesday. Thousands of workers have been mobilised to shore up flood defences around Dongting Lake, which acts as a flood buffer for the Yangtze River. Around...