From "Chicken Chop Bro" to China's Donkey Crisis
From viral street food vendors to China’s donkey crisis and new eldercare services, here's what's been trending on Weibo.
What’s inside:
1. Jingdezhen’s “Chicken Chop Bro” Becomes Nationwide Meme
2. China’s 2025 Golden Week Travel Trends
3. China Faces Donkey Shortage Crisis
4. Word of the Week: “Ride-hailing for Relatives” 亲属打车 Qīnshǔ Dǎchē
5. What’s Inside at a Glance
TOP TREND
1. Jingdezhen’s “Chicken Chop Bro” Becomes Nationwide Meme
[#鸡排哥1分钟视频报价仅10元#] [#鸡排哥#] [#鸡排哥回应走红#]
From Beijing to Zibo, every now and then, food stall vendors go viral — for their charm, their uniqueness, and most of all, their tasty food. The star of this moment is 48-year-old Li Junyong (李俊永), who runs a small fried chicken stall in Jingdezhen, Jiangxi Province, with tight rules on who he serves, when, and how.
Li has suddenly become one of the most trending people on Chinese social media under the nickname “Chicken Chop Brother” (鸡排哥 jīpáigē).
Li initially gained popularity among customers for his frantic, multitasking energy — he doesn’t mess around when it comes to his chicken chop business, with superspeed and a clear order of serving customers (”I’ll first do you, then finish yours, then I’ll serve you 做完你的做你的”) and rules such as: no individual customers after 4:30 PM; students pay 1 yuan (about $0.15) less than regular passersby (after 12:00 PM, however, it costs 1 yuan more as punishment for being indecisive); and customers must open the plastic bag themselves before he puts the hot chicken cutlet inside.
The serious way he goes about dealing with his chicken chops almost makes you think he was making big business deals instead of selling to middle school students. In the end, it’s that attitude that gained him social media fame, as students started referring to him as “Head of Chicken Cutlet Operations” (free translation for 鸡排主理人 Jīpái gē Zhǔlǐrén).
In light of Li’s explosive popularity, his chicken chop stall now sees extremely long queues, and local authorities and city management have had to intervene in order to control the crowds and keep the location safe.
There are definite downsides to such sudden fame, and Li is not the first street vendor this has happened to.
