Sima Guiying

Sima Guiying (Chinese: 司馬桂英; born September 3, 1961) is a Tsengian television host, singer, film actress and businesswoman. Known as the "Empress of Children's Television", Sima built the largest children's television empire in Asia. In the early 1990s, she presented television programs in Tseng,, and  simultaneously, reaching around 100 million viewers daily.

Early life
Sima Guiying was born on September 3, 1961 in Erwan, Touzhou into a lower-middle class family. She was the youngest daughter of Stephen Sima Gui-qing, an automobile mechanic, and Lei Guiying, a veterinarian.

At 15 years old, she was discovered by George Teng-fei's talent agency while performing in a talent show at a church fête. Teng-fei gave her family money to move to Tseng City so she could take up a career in musical theater.

Early years
Sima's early years on TV were spent in musical productions, such as Tseng Broadcasting System's televised productions of Godspell and Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.

Sima's Garden
On July 11, 1983, Sima's Garden aired its first episode on TBS-1. It aired in the mornings from Monday to Saturday until its final episode on December 17, 1993. Sima usually entered with her marching band through the garden gate, with children in the audience joining her for the song "Hello, My Dear Friends". Her show consisted of plays focused on a different social message (e.g. "Believe in Imagination", "Don't Be Mean to Others" and "Practice Helps You Along"), musical numbers, circus performances and games; interspersed with airings of cartoons, anime and Tsengdonghua. The album Sima's Garden from Zenghe had sold over two million copies in Asia by 1988.

International career
After becoming hugely successful in Tseng, Sima released her first Cantopop album, Sima, in 1986, which was hugely successful in and. This was followed by the debut of a Cantonese-language version of Sima's Garden on in 1987.

Sima also wanted to find an audience in Japan, and started to learn Japanese. In 1988, Sima released her debut Japanese-language album, Sima 1. Sima widened her appeal with Japanese audiences with the 1990 debut of Sima no Niwa (シマの庭), airing on, which proved to be incredibly popular.