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Bite of China 2 provokes unappetizing response

The season premiere of A Bite of China 2 was too much to stomach for some viewers after it aired last Friday, who accused the Chinese culinary series of plagiarizing a BBC documentary, shot for shot.

The opening sequence of the first episode, which sees a young man in Nyingchi county, Tibet Autonomous Region climbing a tree to harvest honey for his family, was found to be surprisingly similar to a scene featured in the award-winning BBC documentary Human Planet.

A number of Chinese viewers angrily pointed out that the sequence, angles and pans are almost exactly the same.

Chen Xiaoqing, director of the episode, flat out denied the accusations of plagiarism and claimed the similarity in the sequence was an intended homage to the British documentary.

The controversy triggered flame wars and other spicy debate among Net users.

"If you compare the two scenes with screen shots, you will find them exactly the same except for the characters in it," said dingding1999. "If that is not copying, then we can call academic plagiarism paying homage to scholars."

"There is an old Chinese saying that says 'all learning starts from imitation," posted Zhongkuangyujie in her blog. "But one should express their own stuff in the process instead of completely copying."

In addition, some viewers suspected the process of collecting honey was staged.

Others, however, expressed their love and support for the documentary, an acclaimed series in its own right.

"What's wrong with learning from others?" asked BZCH. "This is how we learn and make progress."