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Not only that, we'll send you a bottle of PIMS absolutely free.

Only while stocks last, so go to www.combecktator.com.combe, forward slash PIMS to claim this offer now. Hello and welcome to Chinese Whispers with me, Cindy Yu. Every episode I'll be talking to

journalists, experts and long-time China watchers about the latest in Chinese politics, society and more.

There'll be a smattering of history to

catch you off on the background knowledge and some contexts as well. How do the Chinese see these

issues? A country's drinking culture says a lot about its people, its history and its culture.

Britain has a pretty distinct drinking culture, as does America, and so does China.

On this episode, we'll be taking a look at the role of drinking in Chinese history,

literature and society, and asking why wine never quite took off.

That is, until recently, as my guest Janet Z. Wang tells me, she is the author of the book,

The Chinese Wine Renaissance. And in it, she talks about all the ways in which China's economic

growth of the last few decades have reignited this love of grape wine. So Janet, welcome to the

podcast. Before we start, I think we should just do some vocab, because let's be clear about

what we're talking when we say wine in this context. In Chinese, there is a word called jiu, which is an umbrella

term for all sorts of alcohol, not just grape wine. So what are we really talking about when we say

wine? Yes, so when we talk about wine in English or European language, I think people would automatically

associate that with grape, right?

Wine is made from grapes.

But in Chinese, exactly like you said, jiu, really is an umbrella term.

So we talk about rice wine, we talk about beer, even, p'i-jou, you know, mi-gio,

huang-giu, etc. So when I talk about Chinese wine, in my book I am talking about grape

...