Category: China
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Weekly Wanderings: January 4, 2026
So … 2026. What a year, huh? 🤨 One good thing: I had the pleasure of serving as moderator for my friend Joseph Torigian at a discussion of his book, The Party’s Interests Come First: The Life of Xi Zhongxun, Father of Xi Jinping, at Three Cats in Clawson, MI this afternoon. Three Cats is…
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Weekly Wanderings: December 21, 2025
Here we are—the shortest day of the year, and the final regular Weekly Wanderings post of 2025, although I’ll pop into your inboxes next Sunday with a year in review sort of thing. Thank you to everyone who has read, clicked, liked, subscribed, etc. I already have some writing lined up for 2026, both here…
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Weekly Wanderings: December 14, 2025
Two housekeeping notes to start: (1) If you’re in Clawson, Michigan, on Sunday, January 4, I’ll be the discussant for a talk by Joseph Torigian on his book, The Party’s Interests Come First: The Life of Xi Zhongxun, Father of Xi Jinping (read my write-up of the book from earlier this year). Tickets are free,…
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Weekly Wanderings: December 7, 2025
Thanks for joining me this week. Recommendations China Stories Keith Bradsher, “The New York Times Marks the Centennial of Its Shanghai Bureau” Violet Du Feng, “How to Find a Date in a Country With Over 30 Million Extra Men” (video) Oliver Holmes, “‘Don’t say we didn’t warn you’: Beijing summons journalists in Hong Kong after…
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Weekly Wanderings: November 30, 2025
Black Friday Sale! Small-Business Saturday Savings! Maura’s Cyber Monday Mania! Wait, no, that’s not right. I’ve read those words so many times in the past few days, I forgot that I’m not here to sell anything. Nor do I have a holiday gift guide to share. There’s nothing to buy here, just a handful of…
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Weekly Wanderings: November 23, 2025
Thanks for joining me this week. Recommendations China Stories The results of an invasion would be catastrophic not just for Taiwan but the entire globe, with as much as $10 trillion in annual losses to the world economy, according to a recent analysis by Bloomberg Economics. It could wipe out over ten percent of global…
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Weekly Wanderings: November 9, 2025
Greetings from the first snow of the season in Ann Arbor. Although I saw one forecast yesterday that predicted 4-6 inches of snow for us today, it has now settled down to 1-3 inches—enough to make for a picturesque Sunday at home, not enough to make life overly difficult for anyone on the roads. My…
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Weekly Wanderings: November 3, 2025
November. The penultimate month of a year that has often felt endless and yet flown by. November always seems like a month that people want to rush through, eager to get to the December holidays and end-of-year celebrations. Christmas commercials are playing regularly on TV now; one of the radio stations I usually listen to…
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Bookshelf: Silk Roads
As much as I love to cook, I’m hopeless at reverse-engineering recipes. I’ve eaten plenty of dishes that I wish I could replicate at home, only to be defeated by my lack of skills. (Also, probably, my unwillingness to use as much butter and salt as the original chef likely did.) I have little sense…
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Weekly Wanderings: October 26, 2025
Thanks for joining me this week. Recommendations China Stories Chris Buckley, “In China, a Forbidden Question Looms: Who Leads After Xi?” Control over history has been exercised to an even greater degree in the Hong Kong case than others. As in other territories, colonial officials maintained the administration based partly on the extensive information they…
Maura Elizabeth Cunningham 