With about a fifth of the world’s population living in China, it should come as no surprise that there are a seemingly inexhaustible number of good ideas churning around this vast country. Indeed, the Chinese people were the first to devise four of our most fundamental tools and processes: papermaking, the compass, gunpowder and printing. Happily, this long tradition of innovation continues to this day, and not just in the antiseptic halls of China’s scientific research laboratories. With grade school kids designing human-powered washing machines and small-town farmers taking wood-framed helicopters out for test runs, it’s clear that the spirit of invention is alive and thriving in China, albeit with an output that’s at times, well, strange.

The robot cook
Using a hammer, axe and other simple tools, a retired automation engineer named Liu Changfa spent a little over a year inventing a robotic cook that can follow preset recipes to prepare a number of different dishes. The robot is silver, black and red and, excluding what appears to be an adorable plastic white toque welded on top, it is not humanoid in appearance, looking more like a futuristic outdoor grill or an unusually sleek trash can. It is connected to a laptop computer and a cell phone through which the robot’s inventor can choose from a list of preprogrammed recipes, teach it to cook new dishes and, one hopes, call in an order while away from home. Thanks to special software installed on the laptop, the robot knows to add certain seasonings – stored in its chest – at the proper moment and in the correct amount, and to stir and cook the food for the right length of time. One must simply place a bowl with all the ingredients in the induction cooker located in the robot’s stomach, start it up and wait for the beep signaling a meal expertly prepared. According to Mr. Liu, at least one restaurant has already agreed to try out the robot in its kitchen, but whether its culinary skills can satisfy the tastes of the discriminating Chinese diner has yet to be established.

Satan’s own two-wheeler
Guan Baihua’s recent invention – a bicycle with a pentagonal wheel on the front and a triangular one on the back – almost perversely goes against everything that is appealing about riding a bike, replacing it with what sounds like the feeling of riding over an endless field of boulders. According to Mr. Baihua, his invention was sparked by the idea that riding a regular bike is too easy, and that some would prefer a greater workout. Despite being arguably naïve or blinkered to the extreme, Mr. Baihua is certainly nobody’s fool, math-wise at least. He has designed the wheels so that the edges are curved in such a way that the diameter of the wheel is the same no matter where it is measured, meaning that the seat does not bob up and down as one rides, but rather stays a fixed distance from the ground, much as a normal bike would. Still, it’s hard to believe that many people would choose to ride to work on a bike whose use seems to resemble nothing so much as some kind of infernal torment.

A bra with breathing room
Possibly in response to recent complaints about certain CCTV anchorwomen either going bra-less, feeling a bit too chilly inside the studio or just extremely excited about broadcasting the weather, a 63-year-old man from Chengdu named Wang Shunqiao has recently designed a bra with two small convexities on each cup. According to GoChengdoo, Mr. Wang, who claims to have noticed over ten such women seemingly bra-less on the street, had this to say: “All the bras on the market create a lot of pressure on women’s breasts, especially the nipple, causing deformities and abnormalities of the breast. It’s like the Himalayas without Mt. Everest, there’s something missing of the beauty and robustness of the female form.” Even though his wife and daughter don’t quite get it and his neighbors call him debased, Mr. Wang was encouraged enough by the enthusiastic responses of his nieces to take out a one million RMB patent on the design. Not to tweak the poor man’s bosom dreams, but of fifteen women surveyed on whether they would wear the bra, not one assented, and doctors have denied that a snug-fitting bra could cause medical problems, which are generally caused by internal factors. But Mr. Wang is undeterred. “I have a lot of confidence in my creation,” he said. “Prominent nipples are actually a new step in aesthetic appreciation. Sun Yat-sen liberated women’s feet; now I will liberate women’s chests.”

Saving the world one sock at a time
Peeved at the amount of electricity wasted by conventional washing machines, Zhang Jiayu, a plucky nine year old from Liaoning designed a washing machine with a spin cycle powered by a man running on a treadmill set atop the machine. Basically a washing machine attached to a small set of stairs leading to several conveyer belt rollers hitched together into a kind of track, the bright red and blue washing machine cum planet-saving treadmill wouldn’t look out of place among the primary colored pieces of exercise equipment that dot many parks in China. The machine, which requires the runner to be fleet of foot and bound along the narrow track practically on tip toes, was apparently a hit at the Beijing 2009 Technology Exhibition, where it aroused the attention of spectators and fellow inventors alike.

Wooden helicopters
Wu Zhongyuan, a 20-year-old farmer from Henan province completely unschooled in aeronautics and aviation technology, was able to build a wooden helicopter relying solely on what he remembered of middle school physics. The copter, which Mr. Wu apparently flew to over 800 meters above the ground, was constructed using wood from an elm tree, a 150cc motorcycle engine and steel pipes. Sadly, Mr. Wu has been permanently grounded by the provincial authorities, who claim that his flights could interfere with air traffic.

Delicious enlightenment
Gao Xianzheng, a farmer from Hebei province, has invented a translucent plastic mould that he places around soft and undeveloped pears, causing them to grow into the shape of a plump and quiescent Buddha sitting in lotus with his hands together. The mould took Mr. Gao approximately six years to perfect, and the pears it produces – a pricier variety than their unenhanced counterparts – are either awesome or sacrilege, depending on how you feel about chowing down on the Buddha. But religious qualms be damned, Mr. Gao’s strange fruit have been selling like gongbaojiding at an English teacher’s convention, and he plans to expand to Europe and the UK. “People seem to think they are cute or lucky and will buy them as soon as they are off the tree,” he told UK’s Daily Mail.

Overland and (barely) underwater
An unnamed inventor has been working for the past ten years on an amphibious car that resembles a classic Delorean, including the gull-wing doors, but with a bright yellow paint job and what looks like rocket booster for an exhaust pipe. Everything was designed and built in the inventor’s own private workshop, with the exception of the paint job, which was done for free by some local banana-loving body-shop. The design of the doors enables the car to be completely sealed and self-contained while in the water, where it can reach speeds of 50 km/ph. But one hopes the windows can at least be rolled down while cruising on the highway, where the car has been clocked at around 140 km/ph.

Though details about their (assumedly limited) capabilities are sketchy, two Chinese farmers have separately assembled boats that do somewhat resemble submarines – however one of them looks to be a lot closer to a pond-worthy kayak with a plastic recon tower. The visually superior of the two was made with scrap metal and metal barrels, and its inventor claims the sleek, 20-foot-long craft – similar in appearance to a long, silver-grey cruise missile – can dive as deep as ten meters. However, the submarine is only pictured on dry land, so whether the thing can even float remains a mystery. The second farmer-built submarine is a good deal more rickety and much smaller than the former, however it is pictured afloat by a small dock, so as long as one brings along a paddle and a life preserver, there seems to be no reason why an adventurous fellow couldn’t take this war machine for a spin.

Sources: globaltimes.com, inventorspot.com, dailymail.com and gochengdoo.com 

Warning：The use of any news and articles published on eChinacities.com without written permission from eChinacities.com constitutes copyright infringement, and legal action can be taken.