The speed of change in China is sometimes hard to fathom even if you live here. Three years ago, the April Fool’s joke on this blog was that a Chinese winery planned to acquire Australia’s Penfold’s, with faux spokesman A.P. Fu describing the two as a great fit.

Fu said longer-term plans include exporting Australian grapes to China for blending with Chinese juice. “We plan to have labels that show the close cooperation between our two peace-loving nations,” said Fu, who added that one idea is a label showing a panda and a koala hugging.

(See the full post here.)

This week a Bloomberg report reported the possibility of a Chinese buyer — Bright Foods — taking over Treasury Wine Estates, which includes Penfold’s, Lindemans, and other labels. In 2011, such a move is all-too-believable. It might sound cliche to say “how times change” but it seems appropriate here.

Maybe last year’s April Fool’s joke isn’t so far-fetched…

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