This was my escape from the war narrative. Working on it on and off in between chores entirely for entertainment purposes.

1.

I saw the video above which included content from a young woman raised in the US of mixed US-Chinese descent who represented a social media trend called "becoming Chinese." Such posts are sometimes associated with a recording or lyric from A Spray of Plum Blossoms. "Being a cultural intermediary" increasing US-Chinese contact on social media was the theme. The song dates from 1984. Much later, after the song became a trend on social media, the composer Peter Chen passed away. I saw one commentary say he was considered the father of Mandarin pop music in Taiwan. Chen appears to have had a great role in the development of modern Chinese popular songs. He's said to have influenced Teresa Teng and many other Chinese singers in the modern era. Chen was born in Chengdu but moved with family to Taiwan at age 3.

Above is a version of the song performed by the original composer. Chen was raised and came of age in Taiwan and returned to the mainland in 1988. He became interested in song writing and music at a very young age, although his family wanted him to be an engineer. I like Chen's rendition of a Spray of Plum Blossoms, and it has fairly good English subtitles. One or more of Chen's many other songs were subject to censorship in Taiwan because they alluded to love of his homeland. When he obtained the opportunity in 1988 to return to his hometown on the mainland he did so.

I'll note here that the Baidu write up on the song doesn't appear to credit Peter Chen for the composition. Several people with the family name Chen appear to have been involved in the song's production but not Peter Chen born as Chen Hsiao-yin (陳曉因). Peter's acquired name appears to be phoneticized Chinese 陳彼得. Fei Yu-ching was the original singer, and I've seen an old photo of the two of them collaborating in their younger days, but couldn't read the blurred caption. Obituaries commemorating Chen's death in June 2025, credit him for composing the now world famous song. The video above credits him as composer and singer.

This is the computer translation of a write up on the song from Baidu:

"A Spray of Plum Blossoms" was written by Chen Yu-zhen (Wawa), composed by Chen Hsin-yi (陈信义), and arranged by Chen Chih-yuan. [4]The popular song sung by Fei Yu-ching is included in Fei Yu-ching's album "Yangtze River Water - This Love Will Never Stay" released on April 21, 1983. [ 1]The song was the theme song for the 1984 Taiwanese CTV TV series of the same name, " Yi Jian Mei ". It was later used as the theme song for the 2009 TV series " New Yi Jian Mei " and the promotional song for the 2015 movie " Goodbye Mr. Loser ". [43].

The song title “Yi Jian Mei ” is taken from the ancient ci poem title of the same name* , which highlights the theme of this work about eternal true feelings. [19]The lyrics created by Wawa transfer the spirit and character of perseverance to the realm of male-female relationships. As a love song, the snow in "A Spray of Plum Blossoms" is the background, and the plum blossom is the protagonist. [20].

In June 2020, "Yi Jian Mei" (一剪梅) suddenly topped the Spotify music charts in many countries and won several championships (No. 1 in Norway, No. 1 in New Zealand, No. 2 in Sweden, No. 2 in Finland), and the related topics also had more than one million views. A "XUE HUA PIAO PIAO" (from the line beginning "Snow flakes are falling..)** challenge even swept the Internet, with many young men and women overseas singing the lyrics together. Its pinyin spelling also became popular online and even became a meme among young people in Europe and America.

一剪梅
*Li Qingzhao a female poet of the Song Dynasty, wrote the original poem which inspired the song of the same title.
** 雪花飘飘 XUE HUA PIAO PIAO Snowflakes are falling...

2. This is a wuxia (martial arts) piece below. I get the impression that whoever put together the video may have borrowed scenes unrelated to the Heaven Sword and Dragon Sabre tv series. It looks like the Jet Li clips with his romantic counterpart were taken from Soldier II. "The Bold and the Beautiful" is just another interpretation of the title.

愛江山更愛美人(The Bold And The Beautiful)|李麗芬，金庸武俠金曲， 高清(HD)，中英文字幕, English Lyrics，2020

"I love the country more than the beauty" is a song sung by Li Lifen , with lyrics and music by Xiao Chong, and arrangement by Liang Bojun and Xiao Chong. It was included in the album " Let's Make a Promise " released on January 22, 1994. [1][10]The song was selected as the ending theme for the 1994 TV series "The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber" starring Ma Jingtao , Cecilia Yip , and Kathy Chow.

I love the country more than the beauty

I chose this version for the English subtitles with this reservation: "I love the country more than the beauty," is a computer translation of the song lyrics as far as I can tell, and I believe it's in error after briefly looking for some grammar guidelines on 更 which is used to express the meaning still, moreover or further. I'm saying this after reviewing the summary of the "The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber" storyline. (I could be mistaken; I try to avoid grammar). There are two or three other lines that could have been more artfully expressed in English but I'll leave it at that.

3.

The "little Chinese woman" as I have nicknamed Yan on the Little Chinese Everywhere youtube channel, is an intrepid traveler throughout the Asian mainland, with or without her German partner "bao bao." Youtuber or 遊說者 (envoy/lobbyist)? I found this recent episode (part 2) of her recent trip through Iran interesting:

I think the video is from January. If I remember correctly, she did go to Tehran but was advised by her friend there not to linger because of social unrest. What interested me was the impact of economic conditions on ordinary lives.

4..Important reminder from Sun Tzu on planning to go to war:

孫子 兵法 始計 translation: Laying Plans, The Art of War, by Sun Zi

fwiw. I don't really think Americans are "becoming Chinese." Caveat- I'm not in touch with youngest generation of adults in the US, tik tok, nor "the little red book." This is just some tangential ruminating by an old man. The incipient "Cwave" does show signs of broadening its appeal. I was immersed more or less in the so called Kwave from South Korea for so many years. So I'm merely acknowledging some similar cross cultural signposts. The process is romanticized. They don't call it the Romance of the Three Kingdoms for nothing. There are the Robinhood like equity aspirations of itinerant knights and scholars in folklore. There is a special role for the educated envoy in times of trouble. The spiritual and martial arts traditions always had their appeal in the west. SCMP puts their foot in the water (since 2016?). Wikipedia below on SCMP.

Critics including The New York Times, Der Spiegel, and The Atlantic have alleged that the paper is on a mission to promote China's soft power abroad.[10][11] Academic studies have found that the newspaper has since shifted its editorial stance closer to a position of the Chinese government and portrays the country in a positive light.

I found this further elaboration of 梅花 symbolism in a couple of "skritter" youtube channel videos by the two sisters teaching mandarin. I cued this one to the discussion of plum blossoms:

So the theme is a part of a much broader cultural current than that of just one classical poem.

Also, this much longer video (about an hour) by Dr. Gao on the significance of the knight errant class in times of social turmoil in China history. The popular appeal of itinerant scholars, warriors and heroes went beyond mere fascination with martial arts skills and arose from the associated values they represented. I think this is one of the most substantive youtube videos Dr. Gao has done on Chinese culture if one has tolerance for her method of presentation, bears with her English accent and the lack of pinyin. The google translate function won't romanize Chinese names. She said she spent months preparing this video and I believe it. The American Asian Studies scholar Dr. Peterson said once he could spend six months or more interpreting a classical Korean text, which were also written in classical Chinese characters. If you watch Dr. Gao's video and want to save time, skip her reading the classical Chinese and her step by step interpretation and skip ahead to her finished printed English interpretations.

I found this interesting article in the Japan Times a couple of days ago-

Lost in AI translation: What’s at stake? Our humanity.

I use AI translations quite a bit. TK over at The Blue House, a professional US court translator in Korean and political writer on Korean events, said at one point don't ask me to translate anything. I use dictionaries quite a bit more, because I like to translate, not literature (too difficult for a novice), but songs, sometimes poetry, the news etc. It's a learning process.