Why power of honghuang is so popular

The response to Fu Yuanhui shows the quest to find ever-richer puns for awesomeness knows no cultural bounds

What have ancient Taoism and the internet got to do with the final of the women's 100-meter backstroke at the 2016 Rio Olympics? Everything.

"Really, was I that fast?" said Fu Yuanhui about her seemingly effortless performance in the pool. The 20-year-old came in an unexpected third in the 100-meter backstroke semifinals on Aug 9 (She won the bronze medal the next day).

Interviewed by a journalist from China Central Television at edge of the pool, the slightly embarrassed yet evidently overjoyed Fu explained: "It must have been the li of honghuang."

Twenty-four hours later, Fu was a social media sensation.

Li is usually translated as power, and in Chinese philosophy, honghuang is the "primitive universe". Varying from story to myth to TV adaptation (more on that in a minute), it's between 4,000 and 50 million years old and filled with mythical beasts such as Kunpeng the bird, Qilin the giraffe and the kitchen god Chau.

Call li a hidden, superhuman ability if you will, or better still, "the force". George Lucas, the creator of the Star Wars franchise, borrowed many key Taoist elements - qi became "the force" - for his movies.

Acting flabbergasted, and thus memorable and entertaining, Fu put Chinese power into a Greek institution. One proud fan said: "The Greeks invented the Olympics, but the Chinese win at it."

Chinese viewers immediately recognized the li of honghuang from recent TV drama The Journey of Flower. In it, a Taoist immortal wonders whether his love interest, a powerful she-demon, "can be made not to use her awesome strength", or at least "resist her primitive powers".

The show was a sensation in China, reaching hundreds of millions of viewers.

Most people in the West are probably familiar with "the force" through its westernized name. In East Asia, however, Taoism naturally makes sense to moviegoers, gamers and geeks.

Akira Toriyama, the Japanese creator of Dragonball, accidentally caused one of the greatest "Tao power memes" when in one episode a villain inquired about "Goku's power level" and learned that it is "over 9,000". Goku is a Taoist immortal modeled on Sun Wukong, the celestial Monkey King.

It means that the power of Tao is simply over the top and off the scale - even the best illustrators and cartoonists know that.

The humor in this global quest to find ever-richer puns and slang for explosive awesomeness across all disciplines knows no cultural bounds. Laozi, the ancient Chinese philosopher, once said: "The Tao that can be described is not the Eternal Tao." It's perhaps the vaguest, most comical yet exceedingly versatile "motivational philosophy" that's ever been penned. "Tao acts like water, it does not resist ... it conquers all."

He could also have said: "Tao works best in the pool."

With the internet being a fast-paced dispenser of new cultures and traditions, however, it was perhaps symbolic, and certainly satisfying, to learn that the mysterious "power" helped a down-to-earth, world-class backstroke specialist.

The author is a German writer and cultural critic, and author of The Euro-Tao. The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.

(China Daily Africa Weekly 08/19/2016 page12)