Sometimes, China is just one big spoof of itself. Three stories from the blogosphere had me laughing today, for better or worse:

On the Humanaught’s Blog:

Though long thought to have evolved from the UK-created rounders, new evidence suggests that the sport of baseball’s origins extend back nearly 500 years to China’s Ming Dynasty (c1368-1644).

Li Gang, of the National Council of History and Culture (NCHC), recently announced findings from a year-long study into the origins of various sporting events thought to have Chinese roots.

“We were quite surprised by this discovery,” said Li. “It is common knowledge that table tennis, tai chi, swimming and football all have a long history in China, but we could not have expected baseball too would make the list.”

OK, baseball has to be a joke. No way that’s real. And swimming? I’m pretty sure the guy who invented swimming was the first one thrown into the pond who didn’t sink.

This story had China Law Blog contemplating a new post category: Fiction.

“China’s ethnic groups enjoy equal status and live in harmony. There is no discrimination (directed at any ethnicity),” Dainzhub, who is of Tibetan origin, said at a press conference in response to a Reuters reporter who asked whether racial discrimination existed in Chinese society.

China has 55 ethnic minority groups. The Han people account for more than 90 percent of the country’s total population.

“People from different ethnic groups often help each other and their relations are harmonious,” he said, adding the central government was investing more money to alleviate poverty in some ethnic minority groups.

“The 56 ethnic groups are like brothers and sisters living in one family,” said Dainzhub.

And then there was this site, which looks curiously familiar:

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 1st, 2007 at 10:29 pm and is filed under self-indulgence. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.