When I was a little girl, my impression of China was that of millions of people on bikes, martial artists practicing kung fu and sword play in town squares and the populace dressed in army green, blue and brown Mao-inspired jackets. I have Wham’s Freedom music video to thank for that.
For the longest time, it remained that way. Course, I’m a huge fan of Gong Li, Zhang Ziyi, Jet Li and have watched Zhang Zhimou movies over the years, but they were mostly historical pictures, so I never got a sense of what present day China was like.
Even as I was wowed by the opening of the Beijing Olympics and saw how far the country advanced (technologically), I still didn’t know quite what to expect on my trip.
China had always been a mystery to me. I saw it as “wild”, thanks to BBC’s 6 part nature documentary. (if you haven’t seen it, you MUST! So gorgeous!) For some reason, with the exception of Beijing and Shanghai, I had pictured the rest of the country as one of rural living and village mentality. I even thought that of Xi’an and Chengdu.
Boy, was I wrong.
China has been modernizing at lightning speed the past couple of decades. Skyscrapers and cranes are dotting the landscape everywhere. Gone are the antiquated uniforms. Young people are trendy and fashionable. There are luxury and international brands everywhere. Everyone’s out to make money and trying to get a piece of the pie. And those millions of bikes? Have now been replaced by millions of scooters.
After visiting China for 15 days, 5 of which were on my own, I can confidently say that I’m less intimidated, as well as, wowed. And that I could confidently go back on my own to visit. Course, learning a little Mandarin will help too.
So China, thank you for a great first visit. I’m so happy to have connected with my roots and look forward to returning soon. Until then, I’ll always have pictures.
View more photos of my China trip on my Flickr album.
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