Liu Yiqian now stands accused of being no more and no less than a snobbish millionaire

Jul 22, 2014 11:49 GMT  ·  By
Chinese millionaire accused of being a snob after drinking tea from Ming-dynasty cup
   Chinese millionaire accused of being a snob after drinking tea from Ming-dynasty cup

Word has it one can't have their cake and eat it too. As it turns out, one can't buy a porcelain cup and then expect to use it to enjoy a sip or two of tea either. More so if the cup in question sports a price tag of several million dollars.

Not to beat about the bush, news from China says that a millionaire by the name Liu Yiqian fell victim to heavy criticism after spending as much as $36.3 million (about €26.83 million) on a Ming-dynasty cup and then having the Audacity to use it to drink tea.

According to Huffington Post, Liu Yiqian has about $921 million (€681 million) neatly tucked away under his many (and probably golden) mattresses. What's more, it is said that this man, identified as a businessman from Shanghai, is China's 200th richest resident.

The man reportedly got the porcelain cup at an auction organized by Sotheby's. Having won the auction, Liu Yiqian paid a visit to the auction house. In a nutshell, he went to Sotheby's looking to pay for the Ming-dynasty cup and have the bowl-shaped container handed to him.

Shortly after getting his hands on the porcelain cup, the millionaire did something nobody would have ever expected him to do. Simply put, he not only poured tea in it, but also drank from it. And then a bone-chilling silence engulfed the Earth.

By the looks of it, the exact moment when this Shanghai millionaire poured tea in the cup and then proceeded to drink from it was caught on camera. Some of the photos hit the online community just hours later and are now making rounds in China.

What quite a lot of people keep complaining about is the fact that, since the porcelain cup dates back to the Ming dynasty, the millionaire should have known better than to disrespect it by using it to drink tea, regardless of how thirsty or eager to show off his wealth he might have been when he visited Sotheby's.

“You think you can drink [out of the cup] and become immortal?” reads a message posted on Chinese microblogging website Weibo. “No people who are civilized would treat a cultural treasure like this. No wonder Chinese people are looked down on by other countries’ citizens,” another one says.

Talking to the press, Liu Yiqian attempted to defend himself and stressed that he never meant any harm. “Emperor Qianlong has used [the cup]. Now I've used it. I just wanted to see how it felt. Such a simple thing – what’s so crazy about that?” the Chinese millionaire reportedly said.

The cup, pictured above, measures 3.1 inches (approximately 7.9 centimeters) in diameter. Historians say that just 17 porcelain cups of this kind are now left in the world, and that Chinese people keep them so close to their heart that some are ready and willing to part with millions of dollars just to acquire one.