With 2009 just 55 days away, it's almost time again for GoKunming's annual Best of Kunming reader survey. On the first of December we will open voting for your favorite venues for food, drink, entertainment and the arts. Here are nominees for this year selected by the GoKunming editorial board:

Food: Best Chinese Restaurant
Heavenly Manna
Shiping Huiguan
Gingko Elite
Panlong 17
Yi Dong Yang Lou
Huatongqun
Xiangyun Huiguan

Food: Best International Restaurant
Moonlight Corner (Expo Garden)
Salvador's Coffee House
Indian Kitchen
Meijiya
Totem Village

Food: Best Fine Dining
Moonlight Corner (Expo Garden)
Gingko Elite
España Restaurant
Blue Bird
1910 La Gare du Sud
Panlong 17

Food: Best New Restaurant
Moonlight Corner (Green Lake)
Lazy Bones Pizza

Drink: Best Café
Salvador's Coffee House
Chicago Coffee
The Silver Spoon Café
French Café
Mazagran Café
Prague Café
Vintage Café

Drink: Best Teahouse
Yihuchun Cha Lou

Drink: Best Bar
Chapter One
Halfway House
SoHo
Speakeasy Bar
The Box
The Hump Bar

Drink: Best Wine Selection
Pizza da Rocco
Moonlight Corner (Green Lake)
Gingko Elite

Entertainment/Arts: Best Gallery
TCG Nordica
Yunart Gallery

Entertainment/Arts: Best Live Music Venue
Laowo Bar
TCG Nordica
Speakeasy Bar
Halfway House
SoHo

Entertainment/Arts: Best Dancing Venue
Speakeasy Bar
Uprock

To nominate any places we are leaving out, please send us the names of the places plus the category you are nominating them for via our contact form.

For a look at last year's winners, click here.

Thank you in advance for your nominations.

Tags: arts, Best of Kunming, entertainment, food and drink

Multimedia phenomenon and arguably China's best-known female rock star Wu Hongfei (吴虹飞) will be playing a special unplugged performance tonight at Halfway House.

Wu is lead singer for the Beijing-based band Happy Avenue (幸福大街) and is also a well-known magazine journalist and author of books including The fish who loved Xiao Long and The double life of A Fei.

A member of the Dong ethnic minority originally from Sanjiang, Guangxi, Wu is a graduate of the prestigious Tsinghua University in Beijing, where she majored in environmental engineering and the editing of scientific books.

Wu's lyrics range from the abstract and fantastic to dark and melancholy. Whether with Happy Avenue or playing solo, her music has been called many things: poppy, folk, goth and more. Tonight's performance at Halfway – co-organized by Wheatfields Bookstore – features Sam Debell on drums, Ma Li of Wheatfields on the mouth harp and Zhang Shuang playing violin, with Wu playing acoustic guitar.

Wu has been blogging from Kunming recently, her Sina blog can be found here. She is currently touring to promote her new solo album Rouge (胭脂).

Tonight's show starts at 9:30 pm with opening act Fang Blues Band (坊乐队), tickets cost 15 yuan.

Related article: Ma Li and the Kunming underground

Tags: entertainment, ethnic minorities, Halfway House, Happy Avenue, live music, Ma Li, Sam Debell, Tsinghua University, Wheatfields, Wu Hongfei, Zhang Shuang

Karaoke - aka 'KTV' - is a much-loved form of entertainment for millions of Chinese. Although it is not the activity of choice for most of China's international population, there are some foreigners who can tear it up in the baofang.

Kunming resident Steph Jensen alerted us to the story of Mike Alpert, an American who decided to try his luck in a national karaoke competition:

"In the middle of May, Mike was selected from over 1,000 hopefuls as one of twelve finalists to compete in a provincewide karaoke competition. Mike, known in Chinese as Xiangzi (祥子), registered when he saw an ad for the competition at his gym. He was the only foreigner to enter, and though he did not have the best singing voice, his enthusiasm won the judges over in the preliminary round."

"He advanced to the next round of 50 singers, eventually earning a spot in the finals with 11 other talented local singers. In the finals, Mike chose to sing " 恋爱ing" by Mayday (五月天). This YouTube video, filmed and created by one of Mike's fans, documents the competition and its outcome."

Does Mike win the Yunnan provincial karaoke championships and continue on to the national competition in Shanghai? Watch the video to find out.

GoKunming thanks Steph Jensen for her contribution. If you have a story you'd like to share with GoKunming readers, please contact us via our contact form.

Tags: entertainment, karaoke, Mike Alpert, Steph Jensen, video

Feng Xiaogang on the set of The Banquet

Beijing-born director and writer Feng Xiaogang (冯小刚) will be joining the faculty of Dali University as a guest professor, according to a Dushi Shibao report.

During a three-day stay in Dali's old town last week, Feng was approached by Dali University regarding a guest professorship at the school. Apparently enamored with Dali – he reportedly said he hoped to shoot a film there someday – Feng met with officials at the university and accepted the invitation. No details have been made available regarding the schedule or content of his classes at Dali University.

Feng is director of several major mainland films since 2000, including The Banquet (夜宴) and Cell Phone （手机）. He has also written and directed the films A World Without Thieves （天下无贼） and Big Shot's Funeral （大腕） and has acted in several major productions, most notably in a cameo role as the Crocodile Gang Boss in Stephen Chow's action comedy Kung Fu Hustle.

Feng has directed some of China's biggest screen names including Zhang Ziyi, Zhou Xun, Andy Lau, Li Bingbing, Fan Bingbing and Ge You. He has also directed foreign actors including Donald Sutherland, who starred in Big Shot's Funeral.

Already a popular getaway destination for Chinese directors, actors and writers, Dali is expected to become increasingly competitive in terms of attracting new film and television projects in the next few years as Chinese studios seek alternatives to Beijing and Shanghai.

Feng Xiaogang Image: sina.com

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Malaysian company to invest in Kunming film studio, theme park

US-China joint venture to film in Yunnan

'China's Hollywood' to be built in Kunming

Tags: Dali, Dali University, entertainment, Feng Xiaogang, film