The ways that Chinese companies use the English language are, well, unpredictable, but many years of living in Beijing and deciphering Chinglish signs did not prepare me for this. The products of a Chinese maker of electric cycles, Xinri Group, use the English brand Sun Ra. This is a surprisingly creative and appropriate rendering of the Chinese, which literally means “New Sun” (it’s pronounced sheen-ruh in the original, which doesn’t really roll off the tongue for English speakers). It also of course is the name adopted by one of the twentieth century’s greatest jazz musicians, a personal favorite of mine for many years now.

Sun Ra himself had a sense of humor and a sense of the absurd, so who knows, he probably would enjoy the whole thing.