I’ll say it, the news is annoying. Even at the best of times, and these are not the best of times. So here’s some news you can’t use. But you can dance to it.

This week, Luzhou hit zero active cases of Covid-19, so we wrote a song to celebrate. But, we realized, as the virus is still making itself known around the world, #danceforzero can mean many different things. Yes, we’re at zero cases, but we’re also cheering for the rest of the world to hit zero.

To that end, we invite everyone to join the #danceforzero. You can download our Bowie-esque tune at Bandcamp (for free) and make your own dance, either celebrating with us, or willing the world strength to make it down to zero. Upload it to YouTube, and hashtag it “danceforzero.”

In the meantime, keep washing your hands!

What do you do when you end up with fish mint in your dinner order? Get back on the phone!

Chill out with this music video that takes you on a ride throughout central Luzhou. It’s always more peaceful when someone else is doing the driving …

We’re all going somewhere, and we need something to listen to on the way! Here’s the sounds of “Yield when we die.”

We tackle Art this week, in about 8 minutes. So, you know … it’s pretty thorough.

The ending animation we did with our new Adonit Pixel stylus and this nifty animation app I found for my iPad. Animation, as you may know, is pretty labor intensive, but it’s also a lot of fun, so we’re excited to start expanding our repertoire in that direction.

Dave’s interview takes place outside of Luzhou, actually, in a suburb called Naxi. He brought us to this great little BBQ place, where you cook your own meats right on the table. I love cooking my own meats right on the table!

A patriotic tune to get you in the mood to vote in the midterms … if you’re American and registered. Or if you live in another country with a political contest coming up and you’re eligible. Go ahead and have your say! From Uncle’s Shorts #35, “I have a ballot: Clerical work for the future”.

Enjoy the soundtrack from “Bearing Fruit: Pomelos and Mortality.” And visit us on SoundCloud to hear more all-original music from the videos of Hello Uncle Foreigner.

You may have noticed some changes around here. A new facelift, and Hello Uncle Foreigner is now responsive and mobile-friendly. We are ready for the future!

And the changes are not just cosmetic. We know that the in past few years posting had slowed to slightly more than nothing. Since mid-2015, we were busy moving across the country — twice! — but more than that, Hello Uncle Foreigner entered into a period of rumination. After four years of regular blogging about our daily life, travel, and hot pots, we had reached the end of what we wanted to say on those fronts. We went dormant. And then Peter got sick.

But that doesn’t mean we had given up. During our two-year time out we still worked and traveled and ate hot pot, and refilled our creative reserves. Now, I’m excited to say that Peter is well on the mend, and … we’re back! We’ve got so many new stories to share, and so many different ways in which we want to share them.

First up, we are extremely proud to present, “Hello Uncle Foreigner: America.” Peter and I spent a month of summer 2016 back in the U.S., and basically eating everything in sight. “What’s it like to be back?” was the main question people had for us, and at the time, we struggled with a good answer. More than a year later, I think we can explain how that felt …

We’re very grateful to all of our friends and family who hosted us, partied with us, and just generally showed us a good time. To those who didn’t make the final cut (there was a 45-minute version, but even we were bored by it), just know that you’re too much fun for Peter to waste his time with you behind a camera. And, uh, to those who did make the cut … you’re just too telegenic to leave out!

Our other big news, you’ll have to go elsewhere to find. This summer I spoke with Chengdu rap group Higher Brothers, and you can find my article in the September issue of NYLON magazine. It was great fun to exercise those muscles again: chasing leads, contacting strangers, asking invasive personal questions, and writing and rewriting on deadline. The guys are really talented artists. I don’t know if they’ll successfully cross over to the American market, but I do know that they deserve some attention.

So, keep an eye on this space! There will be many new movies and other projects coming down the pike in the next few months. It’s our goal to join the greater discussion going on about China and Chinese culture, as well as share the fantastic stories that Luzhou (and beyond) has to offer. But mostly we’re just excited to keep pushing ourselves to the limit of what two people, a blog, and some a/v equipment can do.