On November 17, Zhang Quanling (张泉灵), a CCTV news anchor, posted the following tweet using her Sina Weibo account:
@Zhang Quanling: @Xu Shengyi is one of our foreign correspondents. Bin Laden died soon after she arrived in the Pakistan bureau. She was recently dispatched to Libya as part of the rotation, and Gaddafi died soon after her arrival. So we have all been guessing where she will be heading to next: Syria or Iran?
Zhang’s tweet soon generated thousands of comments pleading for the journalist to “immediately come back to China.” The above screenshot of Zhang’s original tweet shows that there are over 26,000 re-tweets; however, all comments were deleted after the amusing plea was spread widely in cyberspace. Clearly, the censors do not like bad fortune — especially when it’s been re-posted everywhere online.
On November 19, Xu Shengyi (徐圣益) responded jokingly on Sina Weibo:
@Xu Shengyi: I just can’t clear my name [“I can jump in the Yellow River but not wash my name clean.”] Bin Laden was killed by Americans; Gaddafi was killed by dozens of youngsters. It (their death) has nothing to do with me. Really.
Xu’s tweet has received over 2,000 comments, and many of them keep pleading for her “return.”
Below is a screenshot of an entire page of comments under Xu’s tweet, all but one pleaded for her “return,” with comments such as:
– “Come back, the motherland needs you the most!”
– “For the Chinese people, quickly come back!”
– “Hurry back! The motherland’s people have missed you.”
– “Return to Beijing. The whole world needs you to.”
– “Come back soon, baby. China needs someone like you.”
One comment with an alternate plan read: “The Motherland dispatches you to America. Let Obama hang.”
