Seventeen-year-old actress, Huang Yang Tiantian (黄杨钿甜), has ignited a controversy after sharing a selfie on social media wearing a pair of expensive earrings by British luxury brand, Graff.
In her post which was shared on May 11, Huang said she was preparing for her early 18th birthday "coming-of-age ceremony" (成人礼), and showed off the earrings, which she said were borrowed from her mother.
This was not just any piece of jewellery: from Graff’s “Passion” range and studded with emeralds, this one set of earrings would cost 2.3 million yuan (around $320,000 USD) according to comments online.
It was this eye-watering price tag, and her flaunting of such wealth, that caused the image to go viral and catapult the relatively unknown teenage actress to the top of social media trending lists.
The public reaction escalated further when online sleuths revealed that Huang’s father, Yang Wei (杨伟), is a retired low-ranking civil servant—someone who definitely shouldn't be able to afford to buy Passion earrings for his wife or daughter.
The revelation sparked discussions over privilege, corruption, and how families of some low ranking officials (known as “flies” 蝇 in anti-corruption lingo) abuse their positions for financial gain:
Because the public cannot take it any more — today it's a "Young Master Zhou", tomorrow a "Miss Dong", and the day after that an "Arctic Catfish" — there have been countless examples in the past that are eroding the public's trust in state authority bit by bit.
因为公众的神经真的已经足够脆弱了，今天一个周公子，明天一个董小姐，后天一个北极鲶鱼，无数的先例在一点一点透支着公众对于公权的信任。
We met Miss Dong in last week’s newsletter; and the awful Arctic Catfish in April 2023.
According to information which surfaced online, her dad, Yang Wei, served in the government of Ya’an (雅安), a small city in Sichuan Province, from 2011 to 2017. Between 2015 and 2017, he was involved in overseeing distribution of reconstruction funds which flowed into the city after a devastating earthquake in 2013—a magnitude 7.0 disaster that resulted in 196 deaths and over 11,000 injuries.
In the years after the earthquake, public concern grew over potential corruption and misuse of relief funds, with reports suggesting billions of yuan were misappropriated.
Given this context, speculation swirled online that Yang and his family may have taken advantage of his position for personal gain, and bought these extravagant earrings with stolen disaster relief money.
The key point is that her father used to be a government official in Ya’an, Sichuan — which sparked a wave of online sleuthing over “where did the family get so much money?”
重点是，她爸爸曾经是四川雅安的公职人员，于是引发了“她家哪来这么多钱”的网络破案。[3]
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Further details about Yang Wei's background continued to surface over the following days.
Like how after leaving government in 2017, he and his family moved from the relatively modest surroundings of Ya’an to a luxury villa in Shenzhen, valued at 180 million yuan (around $25 million USD).
And how, during the COVID-19 boom, he founded a biotech and medical device firm, leading to speculation that Yang “profited from disasters and the suffering of others” (发国难财).
As online scrutiny continued to mount, Yang issued a statement denying any wrongdoing.
He claimed the earrings were fake, asserted that netizens had mistaken him for someone else with the same name (Yang Wei, conveniently for him, is a common name in China), and he insisted there had been no misuse of public funds.
It also became clear that during these few days of intense scrutiny, Yang transferred 100% ownership of his biotech company to a third party. He changed its business scope from biotech to cosmetics, and renamed the company, which only further fuelled public suspicion, one commenter notes with a telling Chinese idiom:
Why did he change the company's name, legal representative, and business scope immediately following the public uproar?
Why choose to do it at this exact moment — isn’t this just “there are no 300 taels of silver buried here” [making his wrongdoings more obvious]?
为何在舆论起来之后忙着把公司的名称、法人以及经营范围都变更了？为什么偏偏在这个时候选择变更，这不是“此地无银三百两”吗？
So the more Yang pushed back, or covered his tracks, the more suspicious things looked.
Even minor details were scrutinised. Like his use of a cheap Xiaomi phone to post his statement on social media—possibly as an attempt to divert attention from his opulent lifestyle
So, what is the truth?
And why do second generation officials (官二代), like Huang Yang Tiantian, keep inadvertently revealing how wealthy and privileged their lives are on social media?
Most importantly, how do you discuss these issues in amazing Mandarin?
That’s what we’re diving into this week!
🎧RTM Podcast Preview
This week on the RTM Advanced podcast, we're unpacking the language of “showing off wealth” (炫富), “corrupt officials” (贪官), and unsavoury ways to get rich, like “profiteering from national disasters” (发国难财) and “getting rich when promoted in government” (升官发财).
Tune in at 8 minutes where we break down what they mean, how native speakers use them to call out corruption, and how you can use them in real conversations.
Favourite Five
1. 坑爹 kēng diē
expose your dad, annoy someone
17岁的黄杨钿甜最近可算火了，不过不是因为拍戏，而是因为"坑爹" - The 17-year-old actress, Huang Yang Tiantian, finally became popular in recent days, but not for acting — rather, she has inadvertently exposed her dad. [5]
2. 发国难财 fā guó nàn cái
profit from national misfortune
到底有多少人因此发了国难财 - Just how many people have profited from national disasters? [1]
3. 升官发财 shēng guān fā cái
get promoted and make a fortune
那些原本只是小官的小人物，靠着灾后拆迁招标、对口援建，轻轻松松升官发财 - Those who were once minor officials easily got promoted and rich through post-disaster demolition bids and targeted aid efforts. [2]
4. 此地无银三百两 cǐ dì wú yín sān bǎi liǎng
no 300 taels of silver buried here, a blatant cover-up
为什么偏偏在这个时候选择变更，这不是此地无银三百两吗？ - Why choose to do it at this exact moment — isn’t this the same as "there is no 300 taels of silver buried here"? [4]
More: we discuss the background of this phrase in tomorrow’s Sinica Phrase of the Week.
5. 人人心里都有一杆秤 rén rén xīn lǐ dōu yǒu yì gǎn chèng
everyone has their own sense of right and wrong
网友是有几十年丰富经验的老百姓了，心里自有一杆秤 - With decades of life experience, netizens know perfectly well what is right and what is wrong. [3]
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