Back in 2010, I wrote China’s Got Talent Too and mentioned Liu Wei, an armless pianist who plays piano with his toes.
He won that national talent contest and sang, “You Are Beautiful” in English.
Lui Wei’s motto is, “I have two options: I can die as fast as possible, or I can live a brilliant life, and I chose the latter.”
Another one of Liu Wei’s quotes is, “To me, there are three things that cannot be missed in life: air, water and music.”
If you watch his winning performance in the embedded video and don’t speak Chinese, be patient. Eventually you will get to hear Liu Wei perform.
Liu Wei was 10 years old when he lost his arms after touching a high-voltage wire during a game of hide-and seek.
In America, the standard current is 110 V. In China, the standard electric current is 220 V. If you travel the globe, you might want visit the World Electric Guide and this link at Electric Shock to discover a few tips to help you avoid that voltage shock.
I also read a piece in the People’s Daily Online that asked Do Chinese people lack compassion?
After reading the piece in the People’s Daily, I’m sure most animal lovers in the United States would think the Chinese lack compassion, but I’d disagree. Most Chinese have a lot of compassion but it isn’t the same as showing compassion in the West, which might mean donating money or time to an animal shelter.
In China, compassion helped Liu Wei win China’s Got Talent, and he became a national celebrity and an example to every child in China showing what it means to never give up regardless of the odds.
Liu Wei earned that compassion by not allowing his handicap to get in his way—not because he lost his arms in an accident.
After winning the talent contest, he landed in the Guinness World Record for typing the most letters alphabetically in 1 minute using his feet: 251 letters.
Liu Wei performing on Italian TV
Watch him set a Guinness World Record in the last half of the video
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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of My Splendid Concubine [3rd edition]. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. This is the love story Sir Robert Hart did not want the world to discover.
His latest novel is the multiple-award winning Running with the Enemy.
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China’s Holistic Historical Timeline
