1.
Traditional Chinese characters
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Traditional Chinese characters are Chinese characters in any character set that does not contain newly created characters or character substitutions performed after 1946. They are most commonly the characters in the character sets of Taiwan, of Hong Kong. Currently, a number of overseas Chinese online newspapers allow users to switch between both sets. In contrast, simplified Chinese characters are used in mainland China, Singapore, the debate on traditional and simplified Chinese characters has been a long-running issue among Chinese communities. Although simplified characters are taught and endorsed by the government of Mainland China, Traditional characters are used informally in regions in China primarily in handwriting and also used for inscriptions and religious text. They are often retained in logos or graphics to evoke yesteryear, nonetheless, the vast majority of media and communications in China is dominated by simplified characters. Taiwan has never adopted Simplified Chinese characters since it is ruled by the Republic of China, the use of simplified characters in official documents is even prohibited by the government in Taiwan. Simplified characters are not well understood in general, although some stroke simplifications that have incorporated into Simplified Chinese are in common use in handwriting. For example, while the name of Taiwan is written as 臺灣, similarly, in Hong Kong and Macau, Traditional Chinese has been the legal written form since colonial times. In recent years, because of the influx of mainland Chinese tourists, today, even government websites use simplified Chinese, as they answer to the Beijing government. This has led to concerns by residents to protect their local heritage. In Southeast Asia, the Chinese Filipino community continues to be one of the most conservative regarding simplification, while major public universities are teaching simplified characters, many well-established Chinese schools still use traditional characters. Publications like the Chinese Commercial News, World News, and United Daily News still use traditional characters, on the other hand, the Philippine Chinese Daily uses simplified. Aside from local newspapers, magazines from Hong Kong, such as the Yazhou Zhoukan, are found in some bookstores. In case of film or television subtitles on DVD, the Chinese dub that is used in Philippines is the same as the one used in Taiwan and this is because the DVDs belongs to DVD Region Code 3. Hence, most of the subtitles are in Traditional Characters, overseas Chinese in the United States have long used traditional characters. A major influx of Chinese immigrants to the United States occurred during the half of the 19th century. Therefore, the majority of Chinese language signage in the United States, including street signs, Traditional Chinese characters are called several different names within the Chinese-speaking world
2.
Simplified Chinese characters
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Simplified Chinese characters are standardized Chinese characters prescribed in the Table of General Standard Chinese Characters for use in mainland China. Along with traditional Chinese characters, it is one of the two character sets of the contemporary Chinese written language. The government of the Peoples Republic of China in mainland China has promoted them for use in printing since the 1950s and 1960s in an attempt to increase literacy and they are officially used in the Peoples Republic of China and Singapore. Traditional Chinese characters are used in Hong Kong, Macau. Overseas Chinese communities generally tend to use traditional characters, Simplified Chinese characters may be referred to by their official name above or colloquially. Strictly, the latter refers to simplifications of character structure or body, character forms that have existed for thousands of years alongside regular, Simplified character forms were created by decreasing the number of strokes and simplifying the forms of a sizable proportion of traditional Chinese characters. Some simplifications were based on popular cursive forms embodying graphic or phonetic simplifications of the traditional forms, some characters were simplified by applying regular rules, for example, by replacing all occurrences of a certain component with a simplified version of the component. Variant characters with the pronunciation and identical meaning were reduced to a single standardized character. Finally, many characters were left untouched by simplification, and are identical between the traditional and simplified Chinese orthographies. Some simplified characters are very dissimilar to and unpredictably different from traditional characters and this often leads opponents not well-versed in the method of simplification to conclude that the overall process of character simplification is also arbitrary. In reality, the methods and rules of simplification are few, on the other hand, proponents of simplification often flaunt a few choice simplified characters as ingenious inventions, when in fact these have existed for hundreds of years as ancient variants. However, the Chinese government never officially dropped its goal of further simplification in the future, in August 2009, the PRC began collecting public comments for a modified list of simplified characters. The new Table of General Standard Chinese Characters consisting of 8,105 characters was promulgated by the State Council of the Peoples Republic of China on June 5,2013, cursive written text almost always includes character simplification. Simplified forms used in print have always existed, they date back to as early as the Qin dynasty, One of the earliest proponents of character simplification was Lubi Kui, who proposed in 1909 that simplified characters should be used in education. In the years following the May Fourth Movement in 1919, many anti-imperialist Chinese intellectuals sought ways to modernise China, Traditional culture and values such as Confucianism were challenged. Soon, people in the Movement started to cite the traditional Chinese writing system as an obstacle in modernising China and it was suggested that the Chinese writing system should be either simplified or completely abolished. Fu Sinian, a leader of the May Fourth Movement, called Chinese characters the writing of ox-demons, lu Xun, a renowned Chinese author in the 20th century, stated that, If Chinese characters are not destroyed, then China will die. Recent commentators have claimed that Chinese characters were blamed for the problems in China during that time
3.
Pinyin
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Pinyin, or Hànyǔ Pīnyīn, is the official romanization system for Standard Chinese in mainland China, Malaysia, Singapore, and Taiwan. It is often used to teach Standard Chinese, which is written using Chinese characters. The system includes four diacritics denoting tones, Pinyin without tone marks is used to spell Chinese names and words in languages written with the Latin alphabet, and also in certain computer input methods to enter Chinese characters. The pinyin system was developed in the 1950s by many linguists, including Zhou Youguang and it was published by the Chinese government in 1958 and revised several times. The International Organization for Standardization adopted pinyin as a standard in 1982. The system was adopted as the standard in Taiwan in 2009. The word Hànyǔ means the language of the Han people. In 1605, the Jesuit missionary Matteo Ricci published Xizi Qiji in Beijing and this was the first book to use the Roman alphabet to write the Chinese language. Twenty years later, another Jesuit in China, Nicolas Trigault, neither book had much immediate impact on the way in which Chinese thought about their writing system, and the romanizations they described were intended more for Westerners than for the Chinese. One of the earliest Chinese thinkers to relate Western alphabets to Chinese was late Ming to early Qing Dynasty scholar-official, the first late Qing reformer to propose that China adopt a system of spelling was Song Shu. A student of the great scholars Yu Yue and Zhang Taiyan, Song had been to Japan and observed the effect of the kana syllabaries. This galvanized him into activity on a number of fronts, one of the most important being reform of the script, while Song did not himself actually create a system for spelling Sinitic languages, his discussion proved fertile and led to a proliferation of schemes for phonetic scripts. The Wade–Giles system was produced by Thomas Wade in 1859, and it was popular and used in English-language publications outside China until 1979. This Sin Wenz or New Writing was much more sophisticated than earlier alphabets. In 1940, several members attended a Border Region Sin Wenz Society convention. Mao Zedong and Zhu De, head of the army, both contributed their calligraphy for the masthead of the Sin Wenz Societys new journal. Outside the CCP, other prominent supporters included Sun Yat-sens son, Sun Fo, Cai Yuanpei, the countrys most prestigious educator, Tao Xingzhi, an educational reformer. Over thirty journals soon appeared written in Sin Wenz, plus large numbers of translations, biographies, some contemporary Chinese literature, and a spectrum of textbooks
4.
Jyutping
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Jyutping is a romanisation system for Cantonese developed by the Linguistic Society of Hong Kong, an academic group, in 1993. Its formal name is The Linguistic Society of Hong Kong Cantonese Romanisation Scheme, the LSHK promotes the use of this romanisation system. The name Jyutping is a contraction consisting of the first Chinese characters of the terms Jyut6jyu5, only the finals m and ng can be used as standalone nasal syllables. ^ ^ ^ Referring to the pronunciation of these words. There are nine tones in six distinct tone contours in Cantonese, however, as three of the nine are entering tones, which only appear in syllables ending with p, t, and k, they do not have separate tone numbers in Jyutping. Jyutping and the Yale Romanisation of Cantonese represent Cantonese pronunciations with the letters in, The initials, b, p, m, f, d, t, n, l, g, k, ng, h, s, gw, kw. The vowel, aa, a, e, i, o, u, the coda, i, u, m, n, ng, p, t, k. But they differ in the following, The vowels eo and oe represent /ɵ/ and /œː/ respectively in Jyutping, the initial j represents /j/ in Jyutping whereas y is used instead in Yale. The initial z represents /ts/ in Jyutping whereas j is used instead in Yale, the initial c represents /tsʰ/ in Jyutping whereas ch is used instead in Yale. In Jyutping, if no consonant precedes the vowel yu, then the initial j is appended before the vowel, in Yale, the corresponding initial y is never appended before yu under any circumstances. Jyutping defines three finals not in Yale, eu /ɛːu/, em /ɛːm/, and ep /ɛːp/ and these three finals are used in colloquial Cantonese words, such as deu6, lem2, and gep6. To represent tones, only tone numbers are used in Jyutping whereas Yale traditionally uses tone marks together with the letter h. Jyutping and Cantonese Pinyin represent Cantonese pronunciations with the letters in, The initials, b, p, m, f, d, t, n, l, g, k, ng, h, s, gw, kw. The vowel, aa, a, e, i, o, u, the coda, i, u, m, n, ng, p, t, k. But they have differences, The vowel oe represents both /ɵ/ and /œː/ in Cantonese Pinyin whereas eo and oe represent /ɵ/ and /œː/ respectively in Jyutping. The vowel y represents /y/ in Cantonese Pinyin whereas both yu and i are used in Jyutping, the initial dz represents /ts/ in Cantonese Pinyin whereas z is used instead in Jyutping. The initial ts represents /tsʰ/ in Cantonese Pinyin whereas c is used instead in Jyutping. To represent tones, the numbers 1 to 9 are usually used in Cantonese Pinyin, however, only the numbers 1 to 6 are used in Jyutping
5.
Chow Yun-fat
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Chow Yun-fat, SBS, previously known as Donald Chow, is a Hong Kong actor. He mainly plays in films and has won three Hong Kong Film Awards for Best Actor and two Golden Horse Awards for Best Actor in Taiwan. In 2014, Chow was the second-highest earning actor in Hong Kong, earning HK$170 million, Chow was born in Lamma Island, Hong Kong, to a mother who was a cleaning lady and vegetable farmer, and a father who worked on a Shell Oil Company tanker. Chow grew up in a community on Lamma Island, in a house with no electricity. He woke up at dawn each morning to help his mother sell herbal jelly and Hakka tea-pudding on the streets and his family moved to Kowloon when he was ten. At seventeen, he left school to support the family by doing odd jobs including bellboy, postman, camera salesman. His life started to change when he responded to an advertisement and his actor-trainee application was accepted by TVB. He signed a contract with the studio and made his acting debut. Chow became a heartthrob and a face in soap operas that were exported internationally. Chow has been married twice, first in 1983, to Candice Yu, an actress from Asia Television, in 1986, Chow married Singaporean Jasmine Tan. The couple have no children, although Chow has a goddaughter, Celine Ng, when Chow appeared in the 1980 TV series The Bund on TVB, it did not take long for him to become a household name in Hong Kong. The series, about the rise and fall of a gangster in 1930s Shanghai, was a hit throughout Asia, although Chow continued his TV success, his goal was to become a big-screen actor. However, his ventures into low-budget films were disastrous. Success finally came when he teamed up with director John Woo in the 1986 gangster action-melodrama A Better Tomorrow, a Better Tomorrow won him his first Best Actor award at the Hong Kong Film Awards. It was the film in Hong Kong history at the time. Taking the opportunity, Chow quit TV entirely and he brought together his disparate personae in the 1989 film God of Gamblers, directed by the prolific Wong Jing, in which he was by turns suave charmer, a broad comedian and an action hero. The often tough demeanor and youthful appearance of Chow Yun-Fats characters has earned him the nickname Babyface Killer, the Los Angeles Times proclaimed Chow Yun-Fat the coolest actor in the world. In the mid 90s, Chow moved to Hollywood in an unsuccessful attempt to duplicate his success in Asia
6.
Andy Lau
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Andy Lau Tak-wah, BBS, MH, JP is a Hong Kong actor, singer and film producer. He has been one of Hong Kongs most commercially successful film actors since the mid-1980s, in the 1990s, Lau was branded by the media as one of the Four Heavenly Kings of Cantopop. Lau was entered into the Guinness World Records for the Most Awards Won by a Cantopop Male Artist, by April 2000, he had already won a total unprecedented 292 awards. In 2005, Lau was awarded No.1 Box office Actor 1985–2005 of Hong Kong, yielding a total box office of HK$1,733,275,816 for shooting 108 films in the past 20 years. In 2007, Lau was also awarded the Nielsen Box Office Star of Asia by the Nielsen Company, Andy Lau was born in Tai Po, Hong Kong. A son of a fireman, as a young boy Lau had to fetch water for his family up to eight times a day because their house was not equipped with plumbing. He later graduated from a Band One secondary school, Ho Lap College in San Po Kong and he was named as Lau Fook-Wing during his academic years. Lau converted to Buddhism in the 1980s and he was raised in a nominally Buddhist household and is now a follower of the Lingyan Mountain Temple in Taiwan. In 2008, Lau married Malaysian Chinese Carol Chu after 24 years of speculation over their relationship, the couple were married in Las Vegas. On 9 May 2012, Chu gave birth to his first child, in January 2017 Lau was seriously injured after being thrown off a horse during a film shoot in Thailand. In 1981, Lau signed up for the artist training program offered by TVB, the lead role which led to his initial popularity was in the 1982 TVB series The Emissary. In 1983, Laus role as Yang Guo in the TVB wuxia series The Return of the Condor Heroes further increased his popularity, from then on, he would take on many of the lead roles in many of the TVB series. In September 1983, TVB was looking to increase their ratings in competition with Korea, the station then created the show TVB All-star challenge featuring almost the entire line-up of the most popular actors and singers at the time. Lau along with Tony Leung, Michael Miu, Felix Wong, in the late 80s, Lau left TVB due to contract problems. TVB wanted to him to an exclusive five-year contract which Lau refused to sign. He then focused on his film career, in 1981, Lau made a guest appearance in one of Susanna Kwans music video and caught the eye of the manager Teddy Robin. Teddy Robin then gave Lau a chance to play a role in the movie Once Upon a Rainbow. This was the first step in Laus film acting career and he was then given a role in Ann Huis 1982 film, Boat People
7.
Cantonese
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Cantonese, or Standard Cantonese, is a variety of Chinese spoken in the city of Guangzhou in southeastern China. It is the prestige variety of Yue, one of the major subdivisions of Chinese. In mainland China, it is the lingua franca of the province of Guangdong and some neighbouring areas such as Guangxi. In Hong Kong and Macau, Cantonese serves as one of their official languages and it is also spoken amongst overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia and throughout the Western World. When Cantonese and the closely related Yuehai dialects are classified together, Cantonese is viewed as vital part of the cultural identity for its native speakers across large swathes of southeastern China, Hong Kong and Macau. Although Cantonese shares some vocabulary with Mandarin, the two varieties are mutually unintelligible because of differences in pronunciation, grammar and lexicon, sentence structure, in particular the placement of verbs, sometimes differs between the two varieties. This results in the situation in which a Cantonese and a Mandarin text may look similar, in English, the term Cantonese is ambiguous. Cantonese proper is the variety native to the city of Canton and this narrow sense may be specified as Canton language or Guangzhou language in English. However, Cantonese may also refer to the branch of Cantonese that contains Cantonese proper as well as Taishanese and Gaoyang. In this article, Cantonese is used for Cantonese proper, historically, speakers called this variety Canton speech or Guangzhou speech, although this term is now seldom used outside mainland China. In Guangdong province, people call it provincial capital speech or plain speech. In Hong Kong and Macau, as well as among overseas Chinese communities, in mainland China, the term Guangdong speech is also increasingly being used among both native and non-native speakers. Due to its status as a prestige dialect among all the dialects of the Cantonese or Yue branch of Chinese varieties, the official languages of Hong Kong are Chinese and English, as defined in the Hong Kong Basic Law. The Chinese language has different varieties, of which Cantonese is one. Given the traditional predominance of Cantonese within Hong Kong, it is the de facto official spoken form of the Chinese language used in the Hong Kong Government and all courts and it is also used as the medium of instruction in schools, alongside English. A similar situation exists in neighboring Macau, where Chinese is an official language along with Portuguese. As in Hong Kong, Cantonese is the predominant spoken variety of Chinese used in life and is thus the official form of Chinese used in the government. The variant spoken in Hong Kong and Macau is known as Hong Kong Cantonese, Cantonese first developed around the port city of Guangzhou in the Pearl River Delta region of southeastern China
8.
Mahjong
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Mahjong, also spelled majiang and numerous other variants, is a tile-based game that originated in China during the Qing dynasty. It is commonly played by four players, the game and its regional variants are widely played throughout Eastern and South Eastern Asia and have a small following in Western countries. Similar to the Western card game rummy, Mahjong is a game of skill, strategy, the game is played with a set of 144 tiles based on Chinese characters and symbols, although some regional variations may omit some tiles and/or add unique tiles. In most variations, each player begins by receiving 13 tiles, in turn players draw and discard tiles until they complete a legal hand using the 14th drawn tile to form 4 groups and a pair. However, most Mandarin-speaking Chinese now call the game májiàng, in the Taihu dialects of Wu, it is pronounced as 麻將, but in actuality, 麻將 is the diminutive form of 麻雀, written as 麻雀兒, due to an erhua event. It is through the Wu Chinese pronunciation of 麻雀兒 that the form of 麻雀 in Taihu Wu became known as 麻將 in both Wu and Mandarin. Mahjong is based on card games that were popular in 18th and 19th century China. They were played with a deck of money-suited cards. Each deck is divided into three suits of Cash or coins, Strings of cash, and Myriads of strings, there are nine ranks in each suit. In addition, there are three cards, Red flower, White flower, and Old thousand. Depending on the game, there are copies of each card. Games scholar David Parlett has written that the Western card games Conquian, All these games involve players drawing and discarding tiles or cards to make melds. Khanhoo is an example of such a game. The most likely ancestor to Mahjong was pènghú which was played with 120 or 150 cards, during the late 19th century, pènghú was used interchangeably with máquè in both card and tile form. It is not known when the conversion from cards to tiles took place precisely, the earliest surviving tile sets date to around 1870 and were acquired in Fuzhou, Shanghai, and Ningbo. These sets differ from modern ones in several ways, in the Glover sets, there were no flower and fā tiles. In their place were king tiles for heaven, earth, man, in the contemporaneous Himly set, there were no zhōng tiles either. Instead there were the wild cards known as Cash Flower, String Flower, and Myriad Flower plus an additional tile and these early jokers are still found in the Vietnamese and Thai sets
9.
Dice
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Dice are small throwable objects with multiple resting positions, used for generating random numbers. Dice are suitable as gambling devices for games like craps and are used in non-gambling tabletop games. A traditional die is a cube, with each of its six faces showing a different number of dots from 1 to 6. When thrown or rolled, the die comes to rest showing on its surface a random integer from one to six. A variety of devices are also described as dice, such specialized dice may have polyhedral or irregular shapes. They may be used to produce other than one through six. Loaded and crooked dice are designed to favor some results over others for purposes of cheating or amusement. A dice tray, a used to contain thrown dice, is sometimes used for gambling or board games. Dice have been used since before recorded history, and it is uncertain where they originated, the oldest known dice were excavated as part of a backgammon-like game set at the Burnt City, an archeological site in south-eastern Iran, estimated to be from between 2800–2500 BCE. Other excavations from ancient tombs in the Indus Valley civilization indicate a South Asian origin, the Egyptian game of Senet was played with dice. Senet was played before 3000 BC and up to the 2nd century AD and it was likely a racing game, but there is no scholarly consensus on the rules of Senet. Dicing is mentioned as an Indian game in the Rigveda, Atharvaveda, there are several biblical references to casting lots, as in Psalm 22, indicating that dicing was commonplace when the psalm was composed. Knucklebones was a game of skill played by women and children, although gambling was illegal, many Romans were passionate gamblers who enjoyed dicing, which was known as aleam ludere. Dicing was even a popular pastime of emperors, letters by Augustus to Tacitus and his daughter recount his hobby of dicing. There were two sizes of Roman dice, tali were large dice inscribed with one, three, four, and six on four sides. Tesserae were smaller dice with sides numbered one to six. Twenty-sided dice date back to the 2nd century AD and from Ptolemaic Egypt as early as the 2nd century BC, dominoes and playing cards originated in China as developments from dice. The transition from dice to playing cards occurred in China around the Tang dynasty, in Japan, dice were used to play a popular game called sugoroku
10.
Eyeglasses
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Glasses are typically used for vision correction, such as with reading glasses and glasses used for nearsightedness. Safety glasses provide eye protection against flying debris for construction workers or lab technicians, some types of safety glasses are used to protect against visible and near-visible light or radiation. Glasses are worn for eye protection in some sports, such as squash, Glasses wearers may use a strap to prevent the glasses from falling off during movement or sports. Wearers of glasses that are used only part of the time may have the attached to a cord that goes around their neck. Sunglasses allow better vision in daylight, and may protect ones eyes against damage from high levels of ultraviolet light. Typical sunglasses are darkened for protection against bright light or glare, some specialized glasses are clear in dark or indoor conditions, most sunglasses do not have corrective power in the lenses, however, special prescription sunglasses can be ordered. Specialized glasses may be used for viewing specific visual information or 3D glasses for viewing three-dimensional movies, sometimes glasses with no corrective power in the lenses are worn simply for aesthetic or fashion purposes. Even with glasses used for correction, a wide range of designs are available for fashion purposes, using plastic, wire. The number of Americans who are nearsighted has doubled since the 1970s, people are more likely to need glasses the older they get with 93% of people between the age of 65-75 wearing corrective lenses. They can be classified by their function, but also appear in combinations such as prescription sunglasses or safety glasses with enhanced magnification. Corrective lenses are used to correct refractive errors by bending the light entering the eye in order to alleviate the effects of such as nearsightedness, farsightedness or astigmatism. The ability of eyes to accommodate their focus to near. Also, few people have eyes that show exactly equal refractive characteristics, one may need a stronger, a common condition in people over forty years old is presbyopia, which is caused by the eyes crystalline lens losing elasticity, progressively reducing the ability of the lens to accommodate. Corrective lenses, to bring the back into focus on the retina, are made to conform to the prescription of an ophthalmologist or optometrist. A lensmeter can be used to verify the specifications of a pair of glasses. Corrective eyeglasses can significantly improve the quality of the wearer. Not only do they enhance the visual experience, but can also reduce problems that result from eye strain. Pinhole glasses are a type of glasses that do not use a lens
11.
Contact lens
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A contact lens, or simply contact, is a thin lens placed directly on the surface of the eye. Contact lenses are considered medical devices and can be worn to correct vision, in 2004, it was estimated that 125 million people use contact lenses worldwide, including 28 to 38 million in the United States. In 2010, worldwide market for contact lenses was estimated at $6.1 billion, multiple analysts estimated that the global market for contact lenses would reach $11.7 billion by 2015. As of 2010, the age of contact lens wearers globally was 31 years old. People choose to wear contact lenses for many reasons, aesthetics and cosmetics are the main motivating factors for people who want to avoid wearing glasses or to change the appearance of their eyes. Others wear contact lenses for functional or optical reasons, when compared with spectacles, contact lenses typically provide better peripheral vision, and do not collect moisture or perspiration, this makes them ideal for sports and other outdoor activities. Contact lens wearers can also wear sunglasses, goggles, or other eyewear of their choice without having to fit them with prescription lenses or worry about compatibility with glasses. Additionally, there are such as keratoconus and aniseikonia that are typically corrected better with contact lenses than with glasses. The size of the contact lens market is likely to due to the increasing occurrence of eye related conditions such as astigmatism. The other drivers are increasing population and the desire to make fashion statements, by the end of 2020, the value of the contact lens market is predicted to reach $13.5 billion. Neither idea was practically implementable in da Vincis time and he did not suggest his idea be used for correcting vision, as he was more interested in learning about the mechanisms of accommodation of the eye. Descartes proposed another idea in 1636, a tube filled with liquid placed in direct contact with the cornea. The protruding end was to be composed of glass, shaped to correct vision, however. In 1801, Thomas Young made a pair of contact lenses based on Descartes model. He used wax to affix water-filled lenses to his eyes, which neutralized its refractive power and he then corrected for it with another pair of lenses. However, like da Vincis, Youngs device was not intended to correct refraction errors and this enabled the manufacture of lenses that, for the first time, conformed to the actual shape of the eye. It was not until 1887 that German glassblower F. E. Muller produced the first eye covering to be seen through, in 1888, German ophthalmologist Adolf Gaston Eugen Fick constructed and fitted the first successful contact lens. These lenses were made from heavy blown glass and were 18–21 mm in diameter, Fick filled the empty space between cornea/callosity and glass with a dextrose solution
12.
Las Vegas Valley
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The Las Vegas Valley is a major metropolitan area located in the southern part of the U. S. state of Nevada. The largest urban agglomeration in the state, it is the heart of the Las Vegas–Paradise-Henderson, the Valley is largely defined by the Las Vegas Valley landform, a 600 sq mi basin area surrounded by mountains to the north, south, east and west of the metropolitan area. The Valley is home to the three largest incorporated cities in Nevada, Las Vegas, Henderson and North Las Vegas, six unincorporated towns governed by the Clark County government are part of the Las Vegas Township and constitute the largest community in the state of Nevada. Since the 1990s the Las Vegas Valley has seen exponential growth, in 2014, a record breaking 41 million visited the Las Vegas area, producing a gross metropolitan product of more than $100 billion. The first reported non-Native American visitor to the Las Vegas Valley was the Mexican scout Rafael Rivera in 1829. Las Vegas was named by Mexicans in the Antonio Armijo party, including Rivera, in the 19th century, areas of the valley contained artesian wells that supported extensive green areas, or meadows, hence the name Las Vegas. The area was settled by Mormon farmers in 1854 and later became the site of a United States Army fort in 1864. Since the 1930s, Las Vegas has generally been identified as a center as well as a resort destination. Nellis Air Force Base is located in the northeast corner of the valley, the ranges that the Nellis pilots use and various other land areas used by various federal agencies, limit growth of the valley in terms of geographic area. Businessman Howard Hughes arrived in the late 1960s and purchased many casino hotels, as well as television, legitimate corporations began to purchase casino hotels as well, and the mob was run out by the federal government over the next several years. The constant stream of tourist dollars from the hotels and casinos was augmented by a new source of money from the establishment of what is now Nellis Air Force Base. The influx of personnel and casino job-hunters helped start a land building boom which is now leveling off. The Las Vegas area remains one of the top entertainment destinations. The valley is contained in the Las Vegas Valley landform and this includes the cities of Las Vegas, North Las Vegas, and Henderson, and the unincorporated towns of Paradise, Spring Valley, Sunrise Manor, Enterprise, Winchester, and Whitney. The valley is located within the larger metropolitan area, as the metropolitan area covers all of Clark County -including parts that do not fall within the valley. The government of Clark County has an Urban Planning Area of Las Vegas and this definition is a roughly rectangular area, about 20 mi from east to west and 30 miles from north to south. Notable exclusions from the Urban Planning Area include Red Rock, Blue Diamond, the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department is the largest police department in the valley and the state and exercises jurisdiction in the entire county. The department does not exercise jurisdiction in areas with separate police forces such as North Las Vegas, Henderson, Boulder City, Nellis Air Force Base
13.
Yakuza
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Yakuza, also known as gokudō, are members of transnational organized crime syndicates originating in Japan. The Japanese police, and media by request of the police, call them bōryokudan, the yakuza are notorious for their strict codes of conduct and organized fiefdom-nature. They have a presence in the Japanese media and operate internationally with an estimated 102,000 members. Tekiya were considered one of the lowest social groups in Edo, as they began to form organizations of their own, they took over some administrative duties relating to commerce, such as stall allocation and protection of their commercial activities. During Shinto festivals, these peddlers opened stalls and some members were hired to act as security, each peddler paid rent in exchange for a stall assignment and protection during the fair. The Edo government eventually formally recognized such tekiya organizations and granted the oyabun of tekiya a surname as well as permission to carry a sword—the wakizashi and this was a major step forward for the traders, as formerly only samurai and noblemen were allowed to carry swords. Bakuto had a lower social standing even than traders, as gambling was illegal. Many small gambling houses cropped up in abandoned temples or shrines at the edge of towns, most of these gambling houses ran loan sharking businesses for clients, and they usually maintained their own security personnel. The roots of the yakuza can still be today in initiation ceremonies. During the formation of the yakuza, they adopted the traditional Japanese hierarchical structure of oyabun-kobun where kobun owe their allegiance to the oyabun, in a much later period, the code of jingi was developed where loyalty and respect are a way of life. The oyabun-kobun relationship is formalized by ceremonial sharing of sake from a single cup and this ritual is not exclusive to the yakuza—it is also commonly performed in traditional Japanese Shinto weddings, and may have been a part of sworn brotherhood relationships. However, after the war, the yakuza adapted again, prospective yakuza come from all walks of life. The most romantic tales tell how yakuza accept sons who have been abandoned or exiled by their parents, many yakuza start out in junior high school or high school as common street thugs or members of bōsōzoku gangs. Perhaps because of its lower status, numerous yakuza members come from Burakumin. Yakuza groups are headed by an oyabun or kumichō who gives orders to his subordinates, in this respect, the organization is a variation of the traditional Japanese senpai-kōhai model. Members of yakuza gangs cut their ties and transfer their loyalty to the gang boss. They refer to other as family members - fathers and elder and younger brothers. The yakuza is populated almost entirely by men, and there are few women involved who are called ane-san
14.
All for the Winner
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All for the Winner is a 1990 Hong Kong comedy film directed by Jeffrey Lau and Corey Yuen. Two films, GOD of Gamblers II and GOD of Gamblers III, Back to Shanghai, Sing is a mainland China country boy who arrives in Hong Kong to visit his Uncle Blackie Tat. He takes advantage of this and turns Sing into the Dou Seng or the Saint of Gamblers, after getting into a fight with several alleyway gamblers he meets the lovely Yee-mung, a henchman for the King of Gamblers, and becomes infatuated with her. Sing quickly becomes a rival to the King and must win his way through a competition to prove his skill
15.
Stephen Chow
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Stephen Chow Sing-chi is a film director, actor, writer, film producer, and political adviser of the Chinese Peoples Political Consultative Conference. Chow began his career as an actor on television after high school. He graduated from TVBs acting classes in 1982, Chow began to find some success with the childrens programme 430 Space Shuttle. In 1987, Chow entered into the industry through the film Final Justice. Chow shot to stardom in The Final Combat and All for the Winner, fight Back to School became Hong Kongs top-grossing film of all time. In 1994, he began directing films, starting with From Beijing with Love, in the later half of the 1990s, China began to warm to Stephen Chow movies. He became pop-culture phenomenon in China, in 2001 his film Shaolin Soccer grossed over US$50 million worldwide. In 2004, his film Kung Fu Hustle grossed over US$106 million all over the world, Chow won Best Director at the Taiwan Golden Horse Awards and Best Picture of Imagine Film Festival and 20 international awards. Chows film CJ7 began filming in July 2006 in the eastern Chinese port of Ningbo, in August 2007 the film was given the title CJ7, a play on Chinas successful Shenzhou manned space missions—Shenzhou 5 and Shenzhou 6. CJ7 became the film of all time in Malaysia. In 2013, Chows film Journey to the West, Conquering the Demons became the highest-grossing China film of all time, in 2016, he released a new film titled The Mermaid. It was released in China on 8 February 2016, on 19 February, it became the highest-grossing film of all time in China. The Mermaid released in Vietnam on 10 February 2016, on 14 March, it became the 3rd highest-grossing film of all time in Vietnam. On 31 March it became the 45th All Time Highest Grossing Movies International, now it is the All Time Highest Grossing Movie Asia. Stephen Chow became the ninth top-grossing Hollywood Director of 2016, Chow often casts relatively new young actresses to play opposite him, especially as romantic leads, and many of these actresses have gone on to have successful film or music careers of their own. Stephen Chow at the Internet Movie Database Stephen Chow at AllMovie
16.
God of Gamblers II
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God of Gamblers II is a 1990 Hong Kong action comedy film written and directed by Wong Jing. It stars Andy Lau as Little Knife, Stephen Chow as the Saint of Gamblers and this movie is a sequel to both God of Gamblers, which included Laus character, and to All for the Winner, which starred Chow and Ng. This film should not be confused with God of Gamblers Returns, also released as God of Gamblers 2, in this movie, down on his luck, Sing, seeks out the God of Gamblers, in hopes of becoming his disciple. Unfortunately, the God of Gamblers is unreachable and out of the country, last heard to be in Brazil, and Michael Chan, the Knight of Gamblers replaces the God of Gamblers. When a phony attempts to impersonate the Knight of Gamblers in a scam, its up to the real Knight and Saint of Gamblers to team up. The film combines intricate action sequences with sharp comedic timing and this films title literally translates to The Knight of Gamblers, the name of Andy Laus character. Wong Jing was so impressed with All for the Winner that he contacted Stephen Chow to star in two sequels made during 1991. This combo went on to several money making films turning Stephen Chow into an Asian Comedy star. This movie is followed by God of Gamblers III, Back to Shanghai, which not have Andy Lau
17.
God of Gamblers III: Back to Shanghai
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God of Gamblers III, Back to Shanghai is a 1991 Hong Kong comedy film, a sequel to the 1990 film, God of Gamblers II. The film is directed by Wong Jing, and stars Stephen Chow, the film does not feature the Knight of Gamblers nor the God of Gamblers. God of Gamblers III continues the story of the Saint of Gamblers, after the events in God of Gamblers II, Tai-kun, who lost his ESP powers, has regained the abilities again and seeks revenge against Sing, the Saint of Gamblers. Barry Wong plays a role as a Police Chief in 1991 Hong Kong. Ray Lui plays Ding Lik, a role he played in the Hong Kong dramatic TV series. Lung Fong has a role as a Chinese backer of the Japanese in 1937 Shanghai. The two titles, Chinese and English, has discrepancies with each other, the English title, however being God of Gamblers III, Back to Shanghai, does not feature the God of Gamblers, played by Chow Yun-fat. The Chinese title is translated to Knight of Gamblers II, Shanghai Beachs Saint of Gamblers, to clarify that, Shanghai Beach does not literally refers to the shores of Shanghai. It refers to a TVB drama called The Bund in the 1980s, God of Gamblers All for the Winner God of Gamblers II God of Gamblers Returns God of Gamblers III, Back to Shanghai at the Internet Movie Database
18.
God of Gamblers Returns
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God of Gamblers Returns, also known as God of Gamblers Return and The Return of the God of Gamblers, is a 1994 Hong Kong action-drama-comedy film written and directed by Wong Jing. It starred Chow Yun-fat, Tony Leung Ka-fai, Sharla Cheung, Charles Heung, Jacklyn Wu, not to be confused with the 1991 God of Gamblers II, also directed by Wong Jing. Five years have passed since the events of the first God of Gamblers film, Ko Chun is now living a peaceful retirement on his French estate with his pregnant wife Wan Yau, while his disciples Knife and Sing have become world-renowned in their own right. Chun declines repeated challenges from other top-ranked gamblers, having given up gambling in favor of the quiet life, chuns friend and former bodyguard, Dragon, the God Of Guns, comes to pay him a visit. After a shootout with Chau Siu-Chees henchmen, Ko Chun arrives to discover his wife dying. With her last breath, she asks Chun to promise that he will not gamble or admit his identity for one year. Chun agrees as she dies in his arms, nevertheless, he proclaims that he will avenge her after his promise is fulfilled. Chun travels the world for eleven months anonymously, Hoi Tong also has a score to settle with Chau Siu-Chee after he sent assassins to murder her father. Chun also becomes close with Little Trumpets sister Yiu Yiu, who idolizes the God of Gamblers, with three days before his promise ends, Ko Chun and his group arrive in Taiwan to confront Chau Siu-Chee. The group retires to Hoi Tongs family compound to plan for the upcoming match, later, Chau Siu-Chee meets with Cheung Po-Sing, reputed to be the only person to have ever beaten Ko Chun in a poker match. Chau is initially skeptical but after a demonstration of Cheungs powers Chau is convinced, Chau Siu-Chees men then storm the compound to kill Ko Chun and the group, but Dragon arrives to save them. In the ensuing firefight, Chan and Yiu Yiu are killed, with his promise fulfilled, Ko Chun, Dragon, and the rest of the group head to Chau Siu-Chees casino for the final showdown. As the five card stud game proceeds, Ko Chun gains an early advantage, in desperation, he puts up his entire wealth and holdings and his eyes for one final deciding round. Chau agrees to match the bet and shows his straight flush, gloating that he has Ko Chun beaten, Ko Chun then demands that Chau make payment in full, including his eyes. Enraged, Chau removes a concealed pistol and attempts to kill Ko Chun, but is in turn killed by Chun, finally avenging his wife, Yiu Yiu, as the crowd cheers and applauds, Ko Chun and Dragon prepare to depart. Ko Chun notices Dragon is crying and remarks that he didnt think Dragon was capable of shedding tears, Dragon quips, I was really afraid that you were going to lose all of my money. In Hong Kong the film grossed HK$52,529,768, God of Gamblers Returns at the Internet Movie Database God of Gamblers Return at Rotten Tomatoes
19.
Leon Lai
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Leon Lai-ming, BBS, MH is a Hong Kong actor and Cantopop singer. He is one of the Four Heavenly Kings of Hong Kong and he uses the stage name Li Ming or Lai Ming which literally means dawn. Lai was born in Beijing, China as Lai Chit, initially and his family was originally from Meixian. His parents divorced when he was four and he migrated with his Indonesian Chinese father, Lai Xinsheng to Hong Kong during the Cultural Revolution in China. At the age of 15, he attended Kingsway Princeton College in the United Kingdom, Lai initially worked as a salesperson for a mobile phone company. After being awarded second-runner-up in the 1986 New Talent Singing Awards, in the same year he also obtained an artist contract from Capital Artists. He did not release any albums for four years, as a result, his teacher, Dai, arranged to have him signed a contract with Polygram, later known as Universal Music. In Polygram, he released his first album Leon and subsequent album Meet in the Rain, after several years at Polygram, he signed a new contract with Sony Music on 23 March 1998. Together with Jacky Cheung, Andy Lau and Aaron Kwok, Lai was among the four most popular male singers during the 1990s, in 1990 he won his first 1990 Jade Solid Gold Top 10 Awards and 1990 RTHK Top 10 Gold Songs Awards. He followed up to win the Most Popular Male Singer award in 1993 and 1995 for TVB Jade Solid Gold, in 1996, he collaborated with composer-producer Steve Barakatt on his album Feel. Two years later in 1998, he became the first HK singer to reach the Top 10 K-pop chart with the song After loving you, in 1999 he announced that he would no longer accept any more awards in Hong Kong. In 2002 he was selected to sing Charged up, the 2002 FIFA World Cup theme song for the Greater China region, in 2004, he became the first Hong Kong singer to represent the territory at the first Asia Song Festival held in South Korea. Lai was selected to be the ambassador of the 6th Winter Asian Games to be held Changchun in 2007 and he sang the Games theme song and took part in the torch relay. He then joined Michael Wong and Janice Vidal held a three-day Magic Live charity concert at Star Hall, apart from being a solo artist, Lai has co-operated with other artists. In 2004, Lai formed a new production company, A Music, East Asia Record Production Company Limited. The first album produced by the company, Dawn was released in September of that year, the album, Dawn, was released with minimum promotion as Lai went to Mainland China for a movie shoot on the day of the albums release. To bring in new excitements for his music, Lai invited a music producer Jonathan Lee from Taiwan in 2005 to produce his new mandarin album A Story. However, by doing so he had to give up the opportunity for a role in a big budget Taiwan movie Gui Si due to conflicts in his schedules
20.
From Vegas to Macau
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From Vegas to Macau, also known as The Man From Macau, is a Hong Kong-Chinese crime comedy film directed by Wong Jing. The film stars Chow Yun-fat, Nicholas Tse, Chapman To, the film is the fourth installment of the God of Gamblers film series where Chow reprises his role as the titular protagonist once again since 1994s God of Gamblers Returns. The film was released during 2014 Chinese New Year, a sequel titled From Vegas to Macau II was released on February 19,2015. Benz, his son Cool and nephew Ngau-Ngau are part of a team of vigilantes who rob gangsters at night, however, his wife is suffering from cancer and knows nothing of their activities. Unbeknownst to all of them, Benzs stepson Lionel, an officer, is on a deep undercover assignment as an employee of a multinational company called DOA. It is later revealed that DOA is merely the front of a large criminal syndicate and is run by the ruthless Mr. Ko. Lionel, who had a surgically implanted onto a contact lens which he wore so the police could track the syndicates activities. Meanwhile, Benz reunites with his old friend Ken, known as the Magic Hand, Lionel realizes his cover has been blown and hides the contact lens in a stuffed teddy bear at home without his familys knowledge. Ngau-Ngau gives the bear to Rainbow when he and Cool visit Kens house, Mr. Ko sends an assassin to Lionels flat, only to find Benz, who has just returned home. Benz is beaten and tortured and ends up in a coma while Lionels body is found later, Police detectives from China, Hong Kong and Macau decide to enlist the help of Ken to take down the wily and cunning Mr. Ko. Ken challenges Mr. Ko to a match in hopes of provoking him into making a mistake. During the match he discovers that DOAs assassins have attacked his house and Rainbow, Cool, Rainbow is put inside a glass tank, which has gas in it. During the match, Ken reveals that he had undergone through a surgery to implant a card sensor into his fingernail which allows the details of a card into the persons brain. The people following Mr. Ko start a revolution against him after watching Lionel Messi of Barcelona score against Real Madrid, after killing them all, Mr. Ko tries finding Ken. Ken starts shooting cards in retaliation, Cool, is revealed to be wearing the mask of one of Mr. Kos crew, whom had secretly diverted the ship back towards the waters, which police are now making their way to. While making their way towards the top, Cool and Rainbow meets the Assassin, Cool and the Assassin fight, which Cool ends him off with a few punches to his face, making him look like a duck. Mr. Ko starts to escape, only to be met by Ken, Ken now mercilessly shoots cards at Mr. Ko, striking him multiple times. Mr. Ko is later subdued by him, and arrested by the Police, Ken questions Cool who is more qualified to impart his skills to him
21.
From Vegas to Macau II
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From Vegas to Macau II is a 2015 3D Hong Kong-Chinese action comedy film directed and written by Wong Jing and starring Chow Yun-fat, Nick Cheung, Carina Lau, Shawn Yue, Angela Wang and Michelle Hu. The film is the sequel to From Vegas to Macau, the third installment of the series, From Vegas to Macau III was released on February 8,2016. As of March 2015 the film has grossed US$157 million in China, the film opened at No.2 at the Chinese box office behind Dragon Blade earning US$29 million in its opening weekend which is higher than its predecessors opening weekend gross. It topped the box office in its second weekend with US$69.8 million, in its third weekend, the film fell to No.2 earning US$27.4 million while Hollywoods animated film, Big Hero 6 took the top spot. From Vegas to Macau II at the Internet Movie Database From Vegas to Macau II at Rotten Tomatoes From Vegas to Macau 2 at the Hong Kong Movie DataBase
22.
Anita Mui
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Anita Mui Yim-fong was a Hong Kong singer and actress making major contributions to the Cantopop music scene and receiving numerous awards and honours. She remained an idol throughout most of her career, and was regarded as a Cantopop diva. Mui once held a concert in Hammersmith, London, England, where she was dubbed the Madonna of Asia. That title stayed with her throughout her career, and has used as a comparison for both Eastern and Western media. In the 1980s, the style of music was revolutionised by Muis wild dancing. She was famed for her outrageous costumes and high-power performances in combination with contralto vocals and her fan base reached far beyond Hong Kong into many parts of Asia, including Taiwan, mainland China, Singapore and Malaysia, and other countries as well. In the Hong Kong entertainment industry, where stars often rise and fall quickly and her career came to a halt abruptly in 2003 when she announced that she had cervical cancer. She died later that year at the age of 40 and her continuing commemoration by the Hong Kong entertainment industry was due not only to her music and film legacies, but also her involvement in charity and humanitarian work. Mui experienced much hardship in her childhood and she was the youngest daughter in a family of four children. Her elder sister, Ann Mui, was also a singer, the children were raised in a single parent family. In some of her interviews, Mui mentioned that she had never met her father and this meant that she had to help provide for her siblings at an early age, dropping out of school at the age of 13 or 14. More hardship followed the family when the bar that her mother ran was destroyed by a fire, to make a living, Mui entered the show business at around the age of four with her sister Ann. She performed Chinese operas and pop songs in theatres and on the streets, both Mui and her elder sister Ann performed in practically any nightclub that offered them a chance to make a living. At the age of 15, due to the frequency of performances at different venues that she had, following the advice of the doctor, she took a year off and to keep herself occupied, she attended art lessons with her cousin. After a year, she started performing again despite the change in her vocal range and her newly found distinctive voice became an important trademark in her entire career. In 1982, as encouraged by her sister, Mui competed in the first New Talent Singing Awards and it was there that Mui got a big break by emerging champion with the song The Windy Season, originally sung by Paula Tsui, beating over 3,000 contestants. Despite her title as new talent at that time, she had already been a singer for more than 10 years from street, as an award to winning the New Talent contest at the time, Muis first album was released with the local record company Capital Artists. Her debut album Debt Heart drew a response from the audience
23.
Fist of Fury 1991
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Fist of Fury 1991 is a 1991 Hong Kong comedy film directed by Cho Chung-sing, and starring Stephen Chow in the lead role. Aside from a few parodied scenes, the film bears no similarities to the Bruce Lee film, Fist of Fury. A sequel, Fist of Fury 1991 II, was released the following year, Chow stars as Lau Ching, a mainland country boy hoping to earn a living in Hong Kong. Upon reaching Hong Kong, he finds his luggage stolen, but soon becomes fast friends with the thief, the two soon learn that they need to be registered with a school in order to compete. Some scenes do bear some resemblance to Bruce Lees Fist of Fury including the fight where the Japanese man is forced to eat the sign
24.
Fight Back to School II
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Fight Back to School 2 is a 1992 Hong Kong comedy film directed by Gordon Chan and starring Stephen Chow, Ng Man-Tat and Cheung Man. It is a sequel to the 1991 film Fight Back to School, as per the original Fight Back to School, this movie is set in 2 schools in Hong Kong, Shatin College and Chinese International School. Star Chow is an officer in the Royal Hong Kong Polices elite Special Duties Unit, during a meeting with his senior officer, Inspector Yip, Star jokingly suggests he wish to be reassigned to the traffic unit. Star immediately finds himself demoted to Constable engaging in traffic duty on the streets of Hong Kong, after being made the scapegoat for a failed high school terrorist investigation, Star hastily resigns from the police. He decides to enroll at the school to launch his own private investigation. But Star realises the investigation wont be easy when he discovers that the bumbling,1. An 11-minute flashback of the first film in Mandarin without any English subtitles. 3. Extended scene of Stephen Chow and the principal of the sit down on a chair. 4. The sequence where Stephen is on a cross of Jesus Christ had been removed from the Taiwanese version for the sake of pacing,5. Extended extra scene of Chow coming towards Sandy in the sports area then her sister drags her to play tennis. 6. Chow and Sharla Cheung look for a new apartment,7. An Extended scene of Sandy and her sister talk about chow in the cafeteria scene. 8. The scene of Stephen forced to go home by his mother who is a cop. There is an Alternate shorter scene when Stephen gets expelled by Ng Man Tat,9. The battle sequence at the school is shorter in the Taiwanese version. 10. The Montage at the end of the film is more than five minutes long and has a different music soundtrack, Fight Back to School II at the Internet Movie Database
