The Chinese vampire versus Western vampire

Vampire is one of the hottest topics in Hollywood and Hong Kong horror movies, even comic books or TV program. They are fearsome but very entertaining characters, thanks to their overwhelming images. The encyclopedic Vampire book in 1994 provides a precise definition: " a vampire is 'a reanimated corpse that rises from the grave to suck the blood of living people and thus retain a returned to life' or ' a peculiar kind of revenant, a dead person who returned to life and continued a form of existence through drinking the blood of the living'.

The differences started from the way they turn to be vampire. As we know from western novels, vampire is originally a person who died because of certain viruses. The viruses, which some people called as VS, cause DNA mutation. The infected human mostly stop breathing, will be paralyzed, pale, and completely seen lifeless. But the next day, usually the day after funeral, they will be alive again as a different creature with a new strength, known as undead. On the other hand, to be a vampire, Chinese corpses do not need to be infected by any kind of viruses whatsoever. Chinese vampire, which is known as Jiang Shi, is caused by an evil spirit. In this case, not all corpses are able to be possessed by an evil spirit; there are two kinds of corpses with certain causes. The first kind is corpse that died in a bad way, such as accident or suicide. The other kind, which is quite absurd, is corpse whose coffin or burial ground is jumped over by an animal. Besides, Chinese corpse mostly needs hundred years to turn to be vampire. That told us why Chinese vampire is rotten while western vampire look fresh.

Another distinction of Jiang Shi and western vampire is in the appearance, which can be seen in a glance. We can easily distinguish between Chinese vampire and the western one, but we’ will get difficulties distinguishing western vampire from human being. Western undead dress up like us, they wear denim, jersey, and other types of clothes except pajamas, because they do not need to sleep. Even some of them are more fashionable than us. They are adroit in mixing and matching outfits, since their pale skin match every color covered their body. Conversely, Jiang Shi is out of date in term of fashion. They always wear the same cloth whenever and wherever they go. Traditional Manchu robes and black hats of the Qing dynasty are never apart from their body. As explained before, Chinese corpses need hundred years to be vampire, in other words, the recent modern vampires in China are people who died in Qing dynasty era hundred years ago. We can imagine how bad their scent are, that they wore those same clothes for centuries.

Chinese Vampire

Western Vampire

A Chinese Vampire movie

A Western Vampire movie