Animated Chinese idioms could be key to cultural education

TAIPEI - "The people from the Kingdom of Zhao were music savvy. They walked like this, very elegantly," says Chou Kung-shin, as she demonstrates how people walked during the Warring States Period (475-221 BC).

"That's why a young man from the neighboring Kingdom of Yan tried to imitate the way they walked," Chou says, explaining the Chinese idiom, handan xuebu (meaning to copy the way they walk in Handan). It is used to describe someone who slavishly imitates others and loses their own originality.

Chou, former director of Taiwan's Palace Museum, is leading a team of young people to find a new way to learn about Chinese culture - studying ancient idioms with the help of new media.