Tea Leaf Nation

To love is to care, and to care is to want to change. But as the image below suggests, perfection is in the eye of the beholder. With over 22,300 reposts, it is Sina Weibo’s most viral image of May 9, 2012 according to Hong Kong University’s Weiboscope. Weiboscope displays the most widely reposted images among prominent users. [...]

As Chinese President-in-waiting Xi Jinping visits Washington, D.C., China’s netizens have leaders, as well as love, on their mind. This quote by an anonymous user has been quickly making the rounds on Weibo, Sina’s Twitter: @西门不暗: Chinese people’s attitude towards their leaders is a lot like the way a man and a woman get a [...]

Valentine’s Day has come to an end in China. By all accounts, it’s not an easy place to find love. In the last two months, Tea Leaf Nation has told the story of a woman who almost killed herself after her husband cheated on her, detailed the romantic travails of Chinese men who make (gasp!) [...]

Mothers, lock up your daughters! Or maybe that’s a job best left to a police force that netizens have described as “handsome” and “dreamy.” On February 6, with Valentine’s Day around the corner, Chengdu’s Wuhou district police station released a series of posters on Weibo, China’s Twitter, profiling the single men on their rescue squad, [...]

Is romance dead? It may be for some Chinese men, unless they happen to make twice China’s national average income. In a survey released by the Civil Affairs Ministry of China on January 4, more than 80% of single women interviewed believed that a man “does not deserve” to be in a romantic relationship if [...]

Is it a New Years’ miracle? An elaborate media charade? A Greek tragedy? Microbloggers on Weibo, China’s Twitter, diverge sharply on the story of Xiao Yanqin, the betrayed young wife who reportedly commited suicide on Christmas day, only to appear, very much alive, for a January 1 interview on Beijing television after her “resurrection” was [...]