Beijing Opera appeared in the Qing Dynasty (朝代). In 1790, many opera troupes (戏班) went to Beijing for performances to celebrate the birthday of Qianlong. This kind of unusual performance touched the hearts of the people deeply. While in Beijing, the troupes created a new kind of opera called Beijing Opera. It was on the basis (基础) of Anhui Opera by taking in the advantages of other operas.

Beijing Opera is quite unique (唯一的) in role shaping because it divides the roles into different kinds. They are sheng, dan, jing and chou which are quite different in many ways.

A popular song goes like this, “Foreigners call Jingxi Beijing Opera.” In fact, Beijing Opera is different from opera. Opera tells the story and expresses the thoughts by singing instead of speaking. But Beijing Opera stresses (强调) chang, nian, zuo and da. Chang means singing, nian means musical spoken parts, zuo means dance movements and da means martial (武打) skills.

Mei Lanfang is an excellent performing artist of Beijing Opera in China. In 1930, he led an opera troupe to America and presented Beijing Opera before western people. Today, Beijing Opera has become the sign of Chinese culture. It is changing with the development of different musical styles.

Most people around the world love sports. In fact, there were also many kinds of sports in ancient China. Let’s go back to ancient times to watch the ancient sports!

Ice frolicking (冰嬉)

Ice frolicking was a term for many ice activities. It started in the Song Dynasty and reached its peak in the Qing Dynasty. It took place mostly in the north of China during winter. If one was good at it, he would be chosen to perform in the palace for the emperor and his family.

Fangzou (方走)

In the Yuan Dynasty, a long distance race called fangzou was held once a year. It was 600 years before the first modern Olympic Games. Like today’s popular city marathon (马拉松) in the world,   fangzou was also held between the two capital cities of the Yuan Dynasty at that time. It was almost as far as two marathons.

Cuju (蹴鞠)

Nowadays, football is popular all over the world. In 2004, FIFA (国际足联) announced that cuju was the world’s earliest form of football. In Chinese “cu” means kicking, and “ju” means a leather ball. In the Qing Dynasty, cuju was one of the most popular activities during festivals. It was later introduced to Europe. In the 19th century, the British set up a set of rules and the modern football game was born.

With the passing of time, the rules and names of sports events have been very different, but people’s love for sports has remained the same.