Why Chinese Twine?

In 1998 and part of 1999 I studied in Beijing, China for my undergraduate study abroad. I was there a total of 6 months and spent my final month on a wandering travel through parts of southern and southwestern China.
While I was studying at the Beijing Language & Culture University I did everything I could to keep the language surrounding me. Part of that was to label EVERYTHING in my dorm room with tiny, homemade stickers with the character & the pin yin. I also wanted to string up some things clothes-line style for decoration or part of the labeling thing - this I don't really remember. What I do remember is searching for weeks on end for some kind of string. Every possible store I could think of didn't carry anything like string. No ribbons, no shoelaces, no yarn, nothing.
Fast forward to one of my random days of wandering about the city when I happened upon a shop tucked into a Hu-Tong that just happened to be nothing but all kinds of string! Floor to ceiling string and yarn and rope of all kinds!! I could hardly contain myself with excitement - yet felt so completely overwhelmed by this sudden treasure of choice. I picked one little ball of twine to take home - twine I actually still have today. Since then, ChineseTwine has been the little name I used whenever I'd make homemade cards & those sorts of things and has since spilled over into the internets. I am neither Chinese nor twine, but I kinda like being ChineseTwine.