分类： society

Tucked away in a quiet corner of a cultural and creative park in Zhengzhou, the capital of China’s central Henan Province, Daodao Guilai restaurant offers far more than authentic Taiwanese cuisine. For visitors and regulars alike, it is a warm harbor of homely comfort, and a quiet, powerful bond that brings together people from both sides of the Taiwan Strait.

Founded in 2024 by 46-year-old Lan Wen-chuan, a native of Yilan County, Taiwan, the restaurant carries layers of personal and cross-generational meaning. Lan’s maternal roots stretch back to Luohe, Henan, where her grandparents left decades ago to build a new life and run a family restaurant in Taiwan. It was not until more than 20 years ago, when Lan moved to Zhengzhou for a work posting, that she fully grasped the depth of this family connection.

“For my family, this wasn’t leaving home—it was coming home,” Lan explained. After years of building an online business and putting down roots in Henan, Lan decided to open the restaurant when friends, both Taiwanese and local Zhengzhou residents, told her the city was missing a spot serving real, traditional Taiwanese flavors. Drawing on decades of her family’s restaurant expertise, she set out to craft a space that feels like a home away from home for anyone who misses Taiwan.

Every detail of the restaurant’s decor is curated to evoke Taiwanese cultural memory: vintage radios, retro promotional posters, and hand-painted murals line the walls, each small element adding to the warm, familiar atmosphere. “I wanted every detail to tell a story of the shared memories we hold across the Strait,” Lan said.

The menu centers on beloved Taiwanese street food and home-style dishes: Taipei-style braised pork rice, crispy oyster omelette, chewy beef noodles, aromatic three-cup chicken, and crunchy shrimp crackers. To perfect her oyster omelette recipe, Lan traveled back to Taiwan to train with more than a dozen seasoned night market vendors, refining her technique to match the authentic flavors she grew up with. For Lan, one of the greatest joys of running the restaurant is hearing small, satisfying moments: “One of my happiest moments is hearing a parent say their picky child finished a whole bowl of braised pork rice,” she shared.

Beyond serving food, the restaurant has grown into a beloved community hub for young Taiwanese people living and working in Henan. Lan makes a point of supporting new arrivals as they adapt to life on the Chinese mainland, helping with everything from applying for residence permits and enrolling in medical insurance to sharing practical career advice. She actively encourages Taiwanese people to come experience the mainland for themselves, instead of forming opinions based on secondhand reports.

“Don’t understand the world only through what you hear. Come and see it with your own eyes,” she said. Lan notes that many young Taiwanese visitors are caught off guard by how advanced daily life is on the mainland, from the ultra-convenience of mobile delivery apps to the rapid pace of development. “What they see here is completely different from what they heard back home,” she added.

Xu Chu-qiao, a 24-year-old new graduate from Kaohsiung who got a job at the restaurant after finishing her degree at Zhengzhou University, echoes this view. “For me, coming to the Chinese mainland to study and work is also a process of broadening my horizons,” Xu said. “It’s best if you come and see for yourself — that’s the only way to truly experience and understand.”

Displayed prominently on one of the restaurant’s main walls is a plaque that reads: “People on both sides of the Strait are one family.” For Hsi Yun-lung, a diner who grew up in New Taipei, that sentiment feels tangible every time he visits. “The familiar decor and flavors remind me of home,” he said. “It feels like being back in my hometown. Being able to eat these dishes in Zhengzhou is truly special.”

For Lan, food has always been the most natural, approachable bridge between people. “Many dishes from Taiwan originated on the mainland and then developed their own unique local character, much like simplified and traditional Chinese characters,” she explained. “Different in form, but the same at heart.”

Against the backdrop of evolving labor market needs and growing demand for industry-aligned professional skills, China’s expansive vocational education network is undergoing a sweeping transformation, adding unexpected niche majors from outdoor barbecuing and spicy snail noodle making to professional training for delivery riders. This shift is part of a broader overhaul of the world’s largest vocational training system, designed to bridge the gap between worker capabilities and evolving requirements from local industries and regional economies.

Xu Shuai, a 25-year-old restaurant marketing professional based in Changsha, Hunan Province, represents the growing cohort of workers turning to these specialized programs to advance their careers. After two years of working in customer acquisition and restaurant marketing, Xu hit a professional ceiling: without direct expertise in core product development and operations, sustained career growth felt out of reach. To address this skills gap, he plans to enroll in Yueyang Barbecue College later this year. What attracts him is not just learning how to perfect grilled dishes, but the program’s comprehensive training covering every layer of the barbecue business, from supply chain management and cost control to brand building and customer experience optimization.

Qiao Binbin, secretary-general of the Yueyang Barbecue Association, one of the college’s founding operators, emphasized that the institution’s mission goes far beyond basic cooking instruction. “This is more than teaching students how to grill,” Qiao explained. “We aim to train students to understand the entire business ecosystem of the local barbecue industry.”

For Yueyang, the decision to launch a specialized barbecue college is anything but random. Industry data from the association shows that barbecue is a cornerstone of the city’s local economy, supporting more than 2,000 operating outlets and generating annual output exceeding 2 billion yuan ($293.4 million). The college was jointly established in July 2025 by Yueyang Open University, the local barbecue association, and private industry partners, said Jiang Zongfu, vice-president of Yueyang Open University. It was designed to anchor two key local growth drivers — nighttime consumption and urban tourism — while addressing a pressing industry need for greater professional standardization.

“Many local barbecue practitioners want to expand their businesses beyond Hunan, even overseas,” Jiang noted. “But to do that, they need to transform informal hands-on experience into systematic, standardized knowledge, to move from ordinary informal workers to certified industry professionals.”

Prospective students at the college span a diverse range of backgrounds: from first-time job seekers and freelance food vendors to employees sponsored by barbecue chains from across China, with most being new entrants to the industry. The program blends academic coursework with hands-on practical training, offering both degree-credited academic programs and short-term skill certification courses. Its curriculum extends far beyond grilling technique to cover all aspects of small business operations, including food safety regulation, cost control, digital marketing, and customer service, with a core focus on preparing graduates for either wage employment or independent entrepreneurship.

Yueyang Barbecue College is far from an isolated case. Across China, a wave of specialized niche vocational institutions has emerged in recent months, responding to both local industry demand and national policy guidance pushing for more market-aligned vocational education. Examples include a crayfish industry vocational college in Qianjiang, Hubei Province, a Yibin spicy noodle college in Sichuan Province, and a luosifen (spicy snail noodle) college in Liuzhou, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. Even more specialized programs focused on sectors like bathhouse services and gig work food delivery have also launched in recent months.

In December 2025, Guangzhou Polytechnic University in Guangdong Province launched China’s first formal “Rider Academy”, officially named the Modern Grassroots Workers Academy. The institution was created to support the growing professionalization of gig delivery workers, offering foundational training in food safety, road safety, and service standards, while also providing pathways for career advancement into logistics management and roles tied to emerging supply chain technologies.

This growing trend of niche vocational programs reflects a broader shift in China’s vocational education strategy, moving away from one-size-fits-all training to customized programs that directly support local economic strengths and address unmet skill needs in fast-growing emerging sectors.

A devastating explosion at an illegal makeshift firecracker assembly site in India’s southern Kerala state has left at least 13 people dead and multiple others critically injured, marking the second fatal industrial disaster in the country’s fireworks sector within seven days.

The blast struck shortly after 3 p.m. local time on Tuesday in the city of Thrissur, where roughly 40 workers were gathering to assemble fireworks ahead of the upcoming Thrissur Pooram, one of India’s most prominent annual Hindu temple festivals. Local authorities confirmed that five of the injured are in life-threatening condition, and damage from the explosion extended to nearby residential structures, with the shockwave felt as far as several kilometers away — so powerful that many local residents initially misidentified it as an earthquake.

Witnesses reported chaotic scenes in the immediate aftermath of the blast, with local residents rushing to the site to pull survivors and deceased victims out of the rubble before official emergency teams arrived. The response effort was significantly hampered by the location of the temporary assembly sheds: the structures were built alongside rural paddy fields with narrow, unpaved access roads that slowed the arrival of fire trucks and ambulances. The initial blast also triggered a series of secondary smaller explosions from stored firework materials, forcing rescuers to pause operations while hazards were neutralized.

Officials confirmed the workers were contracted to produce fireworks for the Thiruvambady Temple, one of the two main temple groups that host the iconic competitive fireworks display that is the centerpiece of the 7-day Thrissur Pooram festival. Kerala’s Revenue Minister K Rajan told reporters that the organizing committee held official permission to produce and store fireworks in designated, regulated areas, but it remains unclear why assembly was taking place at the unauthorized rural makeshift site. Food preparations for roughly 40 workers were found at the site, confirming that a large workforce was present when the explosion occurred, though an exact headcount remained incomplete in the hours after the disaster.

While the exact cause of the blast has not been confirmed, Thrissur’s municipal chairman PN Surendran told reporters that high mid-afternoon temperatures may have been a contributing factor. “There is still no clarity on how many workers were in the shed or the full extent of injuries,” Surendran said. “It is suspected that extreme heat may have triggered this tragedy.”

This explosion comes just three days after a separate blast at a firecracker factory in neighboring Tamil Nadu state killed 25 people, bringing the total death toll from fireworks sector accidents in south India this week to 38. Deadly explosions are an endemic, recurring crisis in India’s $1 billion fireworks industry, which supplies pyrotechnics for religious festivals, weddings, and cultural celebrations across the country. The sector is dominated by informal, unregulated small-scale operations that handle highly explosive raw chemicals in cramped, low-cost facilities, where even a tiny stray spark can trigger a catastrophic blast.

India’s largest fireworks production hub is Sivakasi in Tamil Nadu, which produces more than 90% of the country’s domestic firecracker supply. A 2010 study documented nearly 10,000 fireworks-related accidents in Sivakasi between 2003 and 2010 alone, including almost 400 fatal incidents. Weak regulatory enforcement and surging consumer demand ahead of major festivals like Diwali routinely push safety protocols to the background, with factory owners often cutting corners to meet deadlines and keep costs low.

Kerala has already seen one of the deadliest fireworks disasters in Indian history: a 2016 explosion at an unauthorized fireworks display at the Puttingal Temple in Kollam killed more than 100 people and injured 400 others. Investigations later found that basic safety rules were completely ignored, with explosives stored in unregulated makeshift sheds, and community competitive pressure overriding existing safety regulations.

In response to Tuesday’s disaster, Kerala authorities have ordered a full magisterial inquiry to determine the cause of the blast and assign responsibility for any safety violations. Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has announced that the state government will bring in specialized burn care experts from other regions of India if needed to treat injured victims. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi also released a statement offering condolences and announcing official financial assistance: 200,000 Indian rupees (roughly $2,140) for each victim’s family, and 50,000 rupees for each injured survivor.

After more than two decades of stalled negotiations and persistent grassroots advocacy, Indonesia’s parliament has finally enacted a groundbreaking law that formally recognizes and protects the rights of the nation’s 4.2 million domestic workers, a workforce overwhelmingly made up of women.

For years, this critical segment of the Indonesian labor force existed in a legal gray area: prior to this new legislation, domestic workers were not officially classified as workers under national labor regulations, leaving them vulnerable to exploitation, abuse, and poverty with no formal recourse. An estimated 90% of all domestic workers in Indonesia are women, many of whom have long faced systemic marginalization in informal work arrangements that lack basic social protections.

The Domestic Workers Protection Law, which was first introduced to legislative chambers back in 2004, delivers sweeping new guarantees for domestic workers across the country. Under the new framework, workers will be legally entitled to paid rest days, public health insurance coverage, and formal pension benefits. The legislation also bars recruitment and placement agencies from withholding any portion of workers’ wages as placement fees, and imposes an outright ban on child domestic labor, making it illegal to hire any person under the age of 18 for full-time domestic work.

Emotional reactions greeted the final passage of the bill, with many long-time advocates and domestic workers describing the moment as the fruition of a decades-long fight for dignity. “It feels like a dream,” Ajeng Astuti, a domestic worker, told BBC Indonesian. “This is our 22-year struggle as marginalized women to gain protection.” Jumiyem, a domestic worker based in Yogyakarta, echoed that sentiment, saying “We’ve been longing for this [law], and now we can feel it.”

The legislation faced repeated setbacks over its 22-year journey to passage: after its initial introduction in 2004, the bill hit one legislative roadblock after another, with parliamentary discussions put on hold for more than a decade before being revived for debate in 2020. Now that the bill has been signed into law, national regulators have one year to develop detailed implementing regulations that will lay out how the new protections will be enforced across the country.

Before the new law, even as domestic workers played an unseen but foundational role in Indonesian households and the broader national economy, millions remained completely outside the protection of existing labor laws. Most worked in informal arrangements with no written employment contract, many logging 12-hour or longer workdays for substandard wages, and reports have documented children as young as 12 being pushed into full-time domestic work.

While human and labor rights organizations have widely praised the law as a historic step forward for worker protections, they caution that the work to secure dignity for domestic workers is far from finished. Lita Anggraini, a representative of Jala PRT, one of Indonesia’s leading domestic worker advocacy groups, told AFP that widespread public education campaigns will be critical to inform employers of their new legal obligations under the law.

Advocacy groups point to ongoing systemic abuse that the new law must address: between 2021 and 2024, Jala PRT documented more than 3,300 reported cases of violence against domestic workers, including instances of severe physical assault and ongoing psychological abuse. The new legal framework marks the first major national effort to curb these abuses and bring millions of marginalized workers under the protection of the law.

In a proactive step to strengthen child protection and build understanding of China’s legal system among young foreign residents, Beijing’s procuratorial organs have launched a targeted, interactive legal education program for international minor students. The pilot event, held Monday at the New Start Center operated by the Xicheng District People’s Procuratorate, brought together 18 international students from the International Department of Beijing Yu Cai School, who traveled from diverse home countries including Egypt, Thailand, Mongolia, Indonesia and Kazakhstan to experience legal education first-hand.

Designed specifically to educate youth on China’s laws and protections for minors, the New Start Center crafted a tailored agenda for this first-of-its-kind visit for international students. During the day’s activities, the participating students got a clear breakdown of the core responsibilities of Chinese public prosecutors, alongside practical guidance on personal safety for young people living and studying in China. In an open interactive session with Zhao Ying, a veteran prosecutor specializing in juvenile justice cases, students explored key provisions of Chinese law, ranging from the legal age of criminal responsibility to the country’s frameworks for addressing pervasive youth issues such as school bullying, child abuse and domestic violence.

Beyond classroom-style discussion, the event included hands-on experience with the center’s innovative welfare resources. Students had the opportunity to test the center’s psychological testing system, which uses biometric sensor technology attached to the ear to analyze breathing patterns and real-time physiological data, generating a visual readout of the user’s current emotional state, from relaxation to acute stress.

For many participants, the visit marked a transformative first insight into China’s legal system. Marwan Mazen, a 17-year-old Egyptian student who has studied in Beijing for several years, shared his enthusiasm after the event. “This activity was really meaningful for me. I learned about how China addresses bullying and got to understand the basics of Chinese law, and I realized just how closely legal education ties to our daily lives,” he said. “It protects us as students, helping us understand both our rights and our responsibilities. This is my first time having an experience like this at such an incredible facility, and it makes me feel really safe studying here knowing there is a strong legal system that protects everyone.”

Shou Yan, a teacher at Beijing Yu Cai School and a deputy to the Beijing People’s Congress, Beijing’s top legislative body, emphasized that inclusive legal education is a non-negotiable resource for all students studying in China, regardless of nationality. “Both Chinese and international students need to understand and abide by the laws of the country they live in,” she noted. She added that the program demonstrates the openness of China’s legal system and plays a critical role in supporting the safety and well-being of international students residing in Beijing, calling for similar initiatives to become a regular, integrated part of international school curricula.

Zhao Ying, the juvenile prosecutor leading the event, framed the visit as a meaningful innovation in public legal education for prosecutors. “By inviting international minor students to our youth center, we can give them a clear, tangible understanding of Chinese law, which helps them avoid accidental violations of the law and empowers them to leverage legal protections for their own safety,” she explained. “This initiative also highlights the strong collaborative partnership between educational institutions and legal authorities, and it gives foreign students a first-hand look at the fairness and compassion that are core to China’s juvenile justice system.”