hemerocallis ๑

sinology 汉学; anti-speciesist; Italian; 21; queer; ☭

[2long2live]

“do u want to hang out tn” oh sorry i can’t bc my chemical romance is playing a show in mexico city. yeah thousands of miles away. oh no i’m not going haha i’m gonna watch it over a grainy livestream. yea it’s non-negotiable. why do you ask

[sleeplessv0id]

what doesn't kill you makes you weird at intimacy

[emerocallide]

私たちの青春は南京の秋のように。

[emerocallide]

[emerocallide]

✨Outbursts of a scholar✨

What if I just want to disappear from certain events and situations? Can I elide myself from university organisations and live a discreet life without being taken for an idiot?

I just want to study but I can't express myself even though I've read a lot and I know what I'm talking about. I'll never be taken seriously and considered an academic because I do everything in the easiest way and I'm quite laconic.

Then the fact that a degree course has a wide range of different subjects does not mean that I want to focus only on the prevalent aspect.

If my major is "Languages, cultures and society of Asia and Mediterranean Africa" I'm not just doing languages, yet everything is reduced to "Languages" when I went to read the texts of the daoist "Lingbao tradition" of the fifth century CE, and I almost know by heart some chinese poems from Shijing and Chuce, how many peasants did the Qin Dynasty send to the borders and I even interpreted what Mao was thinking when he called the Cultural Revolution, and Mao and I are not even friends.

Yes, I'm validating my studies, I deserve it, and scholars need to stop that capitalistic useless competition between each other, let's share interests, books and let's compliment each other without thinking that certain people aren't up to the task.

[rukisnyart]

morphing, shifting

[duncebento]

the bisexual woman is so crucial to the atmosphere

[maidthings]

as long as the united states exists there will be no peace on earth

[emerocallide]

南京灵谷塔附近的黑猫

[biladal-sham]

Bethlehem, Palestine, 1986. Martin Parr

[emerocallide]

Not feeling happy even when you should be — China edition

Memoirs of a Mentally Unstable Exchange Student in Asia

I left for China about three months ago, when one night in August I couldn't stop crying, I couldn't move, I felt completely helpless, and they had to forcefully carry me to my bed.

After that day, I began therapy, but with my imminent departure to China, it was a bit like having to throw yourself into the void as soon as you started climbing. I saw places I never imagined existed, and majestic temples. I smelled a mixture of smells that are hard to even remember, but it's hard to remember everything when you feel completely numb, overstimulated and disassociated in front of a pagoda with the relics of the Buddha.

Some days passed only because they had to, and coming to China, after dedicating a decade of my life to sinology, made me realize how little one can know about such a vast country, the leitmotif of veiled propaganda, what people really think, and Chinese youth. I've never seen such unique people, with dreams that are somewhat the preserve of a dystopian american dream, thinking that America can fulfill yourself and guarantee freedom.

It makes you feel bad having to wake up every morning to fetch water, having to live with someone you get along with and laugh with, but who has made you put on armor to protect yourself. Defending your ideals, retreating into the metaphysical comforts that in the past helped make life easier. You feel numb in the evening, at eight o'clock after eating at six because you have nothing to do, and the funniest and most curious thing of the day is "what shall I eat today." Holding a book is almost difficult, my head spins, and with it all the thoughts inside. I even fell into the trap of thinking that buying things for myself could give me momentary happiness, but more than momentary happiness, it created even more anxiety. I don't even know how to explain it, but it's certainly not the drowsiness that virtual shops in China cause. There are people who spend hours of their day choosing clothes of such poor quality that they could catch fire at any moment.

In China, I cried; in China, Westerners look at me with suspicion, while the Chinese sometimes cheat me, other times they lend me a hand, they teach me to play poker and laugh in cities where everything is a dualism between extreme capitalism, the most unbridled consumption, and country houses, with farmers who then perch in the streets near the subway to sell you a bouquet of flowers or some fruit. A few days ago, I was wondering with a friend how they managed to carry all those bottles of water and fruit to mountain stops; after that question, I realized they are the strongest people in the world.

My precarious mental health has led me to discover temples on streets written solely in traditional Chinese in the middle of Nanjing, and to eat mango toast because it was the only option that didn't contain animal flesh. I've seen distant glances on the subway, jovial eldery to whom I've given up my seat, and people who distrust politics and aren't afraid to express their opinions in public while sipping good wine and laughing at memes.

The repetitiveness of my days isn't a healthy monotony, however; it's a way of moving forward despite everything, even if I still don't know what to write in my thesis, but there's time for that, and it's I who can't project myself into the present because I'm a constant flow of ideas and future things. My desire for research will never fade; even though I don't remember anything and can't get emotional or have the strength to connect with the people I love, I can still contemplate the maples and the old men playing cards in the streets. Little by little, the light returns, on one continent or another.

[crittervillage]

heaven's preying gaze by comacheese, posted with artist's permission

[yanwangdijunfensi]

every once in a while LIKE CLOCKWORK you get a viral tweet that goes something like "THE CCP IS ARRESTING PPL FOR WRITING YAOI/YURI/DANMEI/ ETC" with zero sources and a few screenshots of random danmei, and you get tens of thousands of interactions on it with people not even questioning this bullshit

and every single time you look into it, it's always just an author that committed tax fraud, or the content had child p*rn, or it was simply that a bunch of online haters mass reported the work to the government like preschool tattletalers

meanwhile the same ppl who spread this bullshit also see the thousands of photos from travelers IN CHINA AT THIS VERY MOMENT of shelves filled with danmei merch, and don't think about the dissonance at all

this just comes down to like - will you motherfuckers stop believing everything and anything you see on social media??? We already see how many straight up lies ppl say there about literally anything to do with non western countries. Grow some brain cells. Grow some brain cells. Grow some brain cells

[leviathan-supersystem]

sending an apology card to greta thunberg like "sorry I called you liberal controlled opposition like 5 years ago"

[itslegribou]

Margherita Caruso dans L'Évangile selon saint Matthieu de Pier Paolo Pasolini, 1964.

[pure]

being a feminist, a real feminist, means you have to undertake the most difficult, grueling, and embarrassing act of them all. you have to advocate on behalf of heterosexual women as a group. this is worse than being a communist and having to field 100 million dead venezualean iphone accusations any time you speak. this has been the true test of my morality but i refuse to falter. This is the challenge of all time

[frankenstinegirlz]

do you think china is still currently socialist?

Yes (ML)

No (ML)

Yes (Non ML)

No (Non ML)

Voting ended onAug 28, 2025

[jadeharleyinc]

i'm interested in hearing from people who think it no longer is, specifically curious about what they consider the point where it stopped

[emerocallide]

It ended with Deng Xiaoping's reforms and openings, the dismantling of the people's communes, the privatization of healthcare, the paradox of Chinese residency which did not allow workers to access benefits in a workplace other than their place of residence, joint-ventures with foreign companies, and the progressive opening of the free market.

China can be divided into three levels of thought: From an ideological point of view it is Marxism-Leninism, and it is easy to see because the party operates on the Leninist principle of democratic centrism;

On the economic side there is a mixed economy between the private and the state, where the latter prevails but only in words since many sectors are not public.

Then we have the thought of the masses which I like to categorize as the sarcasm that the author Yu Hua uses in his literary works: a paradoxical life where ideology does not match the life led by citizens.

The CCP considers private property to be unsocialist, but party theorists say it does not harm socialism nor increases capitalism. China can be considered socialist because it will be achieved after its era of hyper-consumerism and state capitalism and also because Xiism envelops all the thoughts developed from 1949 onwards. When the Shein giant collapses and workers aren't forced to work unforgivable hours. When no Foxconn worker commits suicide over working conditions and AliExpress, Temu And TikTok (which recently opened a market within the app) will not exploit workers by guaranteeing absolute transparency and collaborating in safeguarding the environment.

Socialism is the welfare of the workers.