China's cigar smokers deserve better
As China strides boldly into the 21st century, taking its rightful place as history's next great superpower, it still lacks one ubiquitous symbol of progress and prosperity: a decent cigar for the masses.
To be brutally honest, a typical made-in-China cigar burns like a chicken bone and tastes ... well ... like a burnt chicken bone. For a country that prides itself on a centuries-old tradition of exquisite craftsmanship in everything from architecture to paper-cutting, this is a perplexing shortcoming.
Even though Beijing has understandably taken a hard line against public puffing, that doesn't explain why a nation that has sent men into outer space and is responsible for engineering the greatest economic miracle of modern times still can't manage to produce a palatable 50-yuan ($7.60) smoke.
