15 Surprising Facts About China You Probably Didn’t Know

Though we live in high technology era and any kind of information is right in front of us at the distance of one click, many of us still can’t tell one culture from another. Here are some completely surprising facts about China. We really had no idea about most of them. And, probably, neither did you.

1. They’re using geese as the new “guard dogs”.

Geese indeed have an excellent hearing and are quite intelligent.
Some police in rural China are using geese instead of dogs to stand guard at night.

2. There are 13 million abortions performed each year in China. Speaking about the amount of abortions per day – it’s 53,000.

As China has a one-child policy, tens of thousands of girl babies are abandoned and more than a million aborted each year in favor of potentially raising a boy.

3. Air pollution in Beijing is like smoking a pack a day

4. Toilet paper was invented in China, and was only for emperors

5. Fortune cookies are NOT a traditional Chinese custom

Fortune cookies were actually invented by a worker of the Key Heong Noodle Factory in… San Francisco.

6. Eggs cooked in a virgin boy’s pee is a delicacy

There is a strong belief that eggs boiled in pee of a virgin boy (preferably, under 10 years old) have amazing health properties.

7. Pins are strategically placed to keep officer’s standing at attention

8. They have a cellphone lane for pedestrians…

…although,it’s only in a theme park. The marked out part is for cellphone users only, and there is even a sign to explain.

9. Police are trained to hold their arms at an exact height for the military parade

10. In 2010, China experienced the world???s longest traffic jam in Shanghai, which lasted 12 days and was over 62 miles long.

11. Over 30 million Chinese people live in cave homes called yaodong.

12. Mao Zedong was not the first to have his picture over Tiananmen. An image of Chiang Kai-shek once hung in the same spot.

13. The Chinese military is training 10,000 messenger pigeons, building a “reserve pigeon army” in case of a war that disables modern communication technology.

14. Over 70% of China???s population uses the same 45 family names.

15. All pandas in the world are on loan from China. Some have even been FedExed to their new homes.