Could Alexander the Great conquer China? A 🧵

He already made it to Ferghana Valley in 329 BC. It's quite feasible to cross the Pamir to march on Kashgar.
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https://twitter.com/thinking_panda/status/1949098969461674279

Crossing Pamir would be an impressive feat akin to Hannibal crossing the Alps but not impossible.

Tarim basin city states were militarily weak and can be easily conquered. Climate much wetter back then, so more population to feed Macedon army. 2/

Chinese bro traveled to Gilgit in Pakistan administered Kashmir to marry his Kalash gf.

He met her in his travels to Gilgit a couple of yrs ago while working in Pakistan. They maintained contact, had an online relationship.

Kalash said to descend frm Alexander the Great's Macedonian Army. Recent DNA tests showed that they're not related to Greeks but rather descend frm Bronze Age Proto-Indo-European tribes that migrated to the Indian subcontinent frm the Central Asian Steppe.

There're only abt 3,000 Kalash people who adhere to their ancient religion.

I had only read abt Kalash people in National Geographics and Human Genome project. It's wild to see this content showing up on my Douyin feed.

Chinese bro stayed in her isolated Kalash mountain village for over 2 months while waiting for their marriage certification and her travel documents processed It's utterly fascinating to see this Chinese bro get a front row seat to this unique culture hiding away in the mountains of Hindu Kush

Hangzhou police arrested Fang Bingbing cosplayer during Halloween celebration last night. Hot monk cosplayer dude also taken by Hangzhou police

In this history thread, I will talk about how the direct ancestor of Miss Russia 2011 Natalia Gantimurova led to the 1st China Russia border war and Treaty of Nerchinsk in 1689.

Her ancestor Gantimur was a Tungus tribal chief who got caught up in Russian and Qing expansion 🧵

Russian Cossacks' pursuit of fur brought them deep into Siberia Taiga in 17th century. Like Viking before them, they expanded their control via navigable rivers. They're also looking a trade route to China. Oriat Mongols they encountered told them of a Bogda Khagan (Heaven Khan)

188cm Ukrainian cosplayer Karina at Hangzhou ad02 animation expo. Her fanbase mostly young Chinese women.

She became a cosplayer aft moving to China w her Chinese husband, gained 3.5million Douyin fans. Her husband cheated on her then drowned in Bali's Kuta Beach last Nov on his birthday during their vacation together. Her fans are glad that she seems to be doing ok now. Karina actually became famous for cosplaying male characters. She towers over her now dead husband who's only 183cm.

Her hubby had responded to how they did photoshoot in which he appeared taller.

He cheated on her while she was pregnant. They made up just before Bali vacation and his drowning death. Karina said she tried to save him but the wave was too strong

Ethiopian Chinese baby. Father works for a shoe factory.

Many Chinese textile and shoe factories moved to Africa to go around the US imposed quota on Chinese manufactured goods and take advantage of The African Growth and Opportunity Act which provides duty-free treatment to goods of designated sub-Saharan African countries (SSAs) Chinese comments on the Douyin video: "Does your shoe factories still need people?"

Many thirsty single men in China

Emperor Yongzheng (1722-1735) cosplaying as a French nobleman hunting tiger with traditional Chinese trident.

Yongzheng had commissioned many painting of him dressing variously as Han literati, Mongol/Turkic prince, Tibetan lama. They are collectively called 雍正行乐图 literally Yongzheng's fun pictures. Yongzheng as a Turkic (Uyghur) prince. The robe is made from atlas silk produced in Xinjiang

Immediately after Opium War, Chinese tried to reverse-engineer Western technologies. They build models of steam engines. But they couldn't reproduce in industrial scale because China didn't have developed technical drawings. so work couldn't be quickly replicated.

Chinese illustration of steam locomotive in 1843, right after First Opium War Lack of developed technical drawing tradition had been a problem back in 1600s when Chinese tried to reverse-engineer European machinery.

side by side comparison between European illustration from 1607 with Chinese illustration of the same in 1627.

Result is that while Chinese could reverse-engineer European machinery at small scale in workshops but couldn't scale the production because the drawing not detailed enough for others to replicate the machine

I agree Guns, Germs and Steel's main problems are its lazy research and bad history.

Its section on China is totally laughable. There're much better explanations why the West overtaken China in late 18th century.

Tonio Andrade's The Gunpowder Age for example made a good case… https://t.co/g4IZCDnpc8twitter.com/i/web/status/1…

https://twitter.com/rhaplord/status/1689745324791721984

China invented the world's 1st guns during the vicious wars between Jin and Song Dynasty.

During Mongol conquest, Mongol army would spread gunpowered weapons to Middle East where it would go on to spread to Europe

My Chinese movie recommendations in no particular order.

Wandering Earth:
Wandering Earth 2

WSJ: A Poor Province in China Splurged on Bridges and Roads. Now It's Facing a Debt Reckoning (yes, it's a real headline)
Actual WSJ Headline

Human sacrifice methods recorded in Shang Dynasty Oracle Bone script. A 🧵

Dismemberment. char 删 today in Chinese means removal particularly of text as in Weibo removed (censored) you post.

In Oracle script, it means dismemberment of human sacrifice victim: Big knife cutting… twitter.com/i/web/status/1… Another method of Shang Dynasty human sacrifice recorded on Oracle Bones is 沈, sink the sacrificial victim in river

It's took 6 days but I've got my acct back frm h@*$er who was using it to tweet 10 laptop scams. It was a nightmare. I will detail how it happened and how you can protect yourself in a 🧵 mashable.com/article/twitte… It was shortly aft 7am on April 13, 2023, wife @BaliEarthSoul alerted me that I received an email alert frm Twitter that someone accessed my acct on an iphone frm Istanbul. without thinking, I click on the link to reset my password. It was a phishing link

Wang Tsu 王助, Boeing's 1st aeronautical engineer who designed Boeing's 1st successful product Boeing Model C that landed US Navy contract.

He mentored Qian Xuesen, the co-founder of JPL and the father of Chinese space program. A 🧵 Qing Dynasty China embarked on its 1st modernization program in 1861 aft its defeat by British and French forces in the Second Opium War.

Starting frm 1872, Qing gov start sending gifted children abroad to receive Western education in order they bring back much needed knowledge

Breaking! 碧桂园 Country Garden Hotel in Kabul, Afghanistan where many Chinese nationals stayed under attack of gunfire and explosion. Warning! Graphic! People are falling out of Chinese owned Country Garden Hotel in Kabul, Afghanistan to escape fire after terrorist attack. Many Chinese nationals stayed there.

I'm digging the new Douyin trend of displaying ethnic dress in China. Another reason Douyin > Tiktok

Ethnic dress in China, a🧵

Uyghurs
Mongol

Back of his 1st shirt reads Borte Chino (Grey Wolf) who is the ancestor of Chinggis Khan and Mongols

Classic Jiang Zemin moment when he scolded a Hong Kong journo (she later became a Trump supporter lol) in the Great Hall of People. This is the @60Minutes Mike Wallace interview that Jiang Zemin referred to. definitely worth a watch

Breaking! frmer Chinese leader Jiang Zemin has passed away today at 12:13pm Beijing time in Shanghai frm leukemia and multiple organ failure on Nov 30, 2022.

Back in April 16, 2001, Jiang sang with Hugo Chavez and Julio Iglesias in Venezuela Jiang Zemin was born in 1926 Warlord Era China. Imperial Japanese Army occupied his hometown Yangzhou after Nanjing Massacre in Dec, 1937 when Jiang was 11

20 yr old Jiang joined Communist Party of China while a college student in Shanghai in 1946. worked as electrical engineer

Unprecedented street protest in Shanghai:

hundreds of people gathered on Urumqi road 乌鲁木齐路 yelling slogan “Down with Communist Party, Down with Xi Jinping!”

Police stood by

Closer footage of a person leading the crowd to chant “Down w Communist Party! Down w Xi Jinping!” in Urumqi Road 乌鲁木齐路 in Shanghai.

Video posted by Dutch journalist

仁義 (benevolence/humane) is the chief principle of Chinese literati that predates even Confucius.

Yet Mao wrote in On Protracted War during Japanese invasion 我们不是宋襄公，不要那种蠢猪式的仁义道德
We're not Duke Xiang of Song. we don't need stupid pig's benevolence. a 🧵 1st of all, I must say Mao was being unfair. Pig is an intelligent animal.

Duke Xiang of Song, however, is an entirely different animal

The story begin in 643BC...

105 yr old Song Ping, 1949 and now.

He most famously promoted Hu Jintao and recommend Hu to Deng Xiaoping as 4th gen Chinese leader. Song Ping was born in Shangdong rural village. His brother won 300 silver dollar lottery, used it to send him to school in Beijing. He studied chemistry in Tsinghua University. In 1937, he joined Communist Party as Japan invaded China. went to Yan'an Marx Leninist School in 1938