Jin Xing is a famous Chinese transgender celebrity.

Along with being director of the Shanghai contemporary dance company, she is also a well known actress, ballerina, modern dancer and choreographer. 

She was born in 1987.  She was also a member of a military dance troop and rose to the rank of colonel. 

Jin Xing

From the Thomson Rueters Foundation News:

"China's best known transgender celebrity says she never aspired to be an LGBT+ activist but now Jin Xing has an eye on politics, saying she has the power and presence to help society.

Jin admits her journey from teenaged soldier to ballerina to one of China's top TV hosts has been extraordinary, as has her widespread acceptance as a trans woman in conservative China.

Next stop: the political stage in one-party communist China.

"If you have the power and the guts and will and thinking to do something for society, why not? My talk show already had a political impact," she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in an interview on Wednesday at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, a ski resort hosting some 3,000 of the global elite."

Follow the link above for more.

Around the World with Cyrsti

It is fascinating enough for me to wrap my noggin around the fact the cyber world is so small. How great is it that we all can learn from other cultures and individuals of their transgender worlds-pro and con.
Today is no different as I ran across this post about Jin Xing (seen right) from China.
She is a transsexual woman who has led a very public life for years and transitioned from a Chinese Army Officer to the person she is today.


Her life story has the mythic outlines of a movie ("Pedro Almódovar is a good friend of mine. One day he will make a movie out of my life.") She's a judge on the Chinese equivalent of Strictly Come Dancing, but is scathing: "In the UK they really work at it. Over here it's second- or third-class movie stars who just want the exposure and work for a maximum of one week. It's really low-quality dancing." Now she has her own debate show, which airs on a Hong Kong station rather than the heavily censored mainland channels. But she picks her topics carefully: "I'm not against the party [and] I know the laws – but I can talk about social issues." Officials trust her because "they know I know the borderlines", she says. Besides, what better way to demonstrate the changing face of China than via an outspoken transsexual former colonel?

Jump here for more! (But do it gracefully if Xing is watching.)