Online car hysterics drive Shanghainese round the bend
SHANGHAI, May 13 — A popular Chinese online video showing a woman going hysterical after her male companion refuses to buy her a car is stirring debate about Shanghai’s females, who are renowned for their demanding ways.

In the video, apparently shot on a mobile phone or handheld camera and carried on the widely read www.youku.com, the woman is seen screaming at the man in a Shanghai car showroom.

It's already attracted over 1.7 million hits since it was posted some four months ago and is still drawing heated comments.

“The car doesn’t suit you,” the man tells the woman, to which she answers screaming: “It does suit me!”

“It’s like this each time we go shopping. I’m not buying this car for you!” he counters.

The woman is then seen jumping into and driving the burgundy sedan up and down the showroom, ignoring her frantically gesturing companion and the salesman.

Finally the man gives in, waving his credit card and shouting: “Stop! Stop! I’ll buy it! I’ll buy it!”

So far, the video has attracted over 1,000 comments, some supporting, others criticising the woman's behaviour.

But not everyone is buying the video, entitled “What Shanghainese women are like”, with some bloggers questioning its veracity and the stereotypical image it portrays of women from mainland China’s richest and most cosmopolitan city.

“I didn’t even hear one word of Shanghainese!” wrote one poster, asking why the whole exchange was in Mandarin rather than the local Shanghai dialect.

“Listening to the accent you know they are not Shanghainese. You people who say Shanghainese are bad — how many do you actually know?” wrote another.

Others wondered whether the whole thing was a stunt by the car brand. “It’s all been whipped up,” one person wrote. “What great publicity.”

Still, not everyone thought the woman was at fault.

“I admire this lady. In the end she won — that’s the moral of this tale!” — Reuters