Huizhou architecture, Huizhou way of life

"Huizhou is the dreamland that haunts me all my life." Huizhou is amazing! The trip from Suzhou to Huizhou, in southern Anhui Province, takes a long eight boring hours by bus. Leaving be hind the exquisite images of 'China's Venice', you soon begin to nod off, but then, some hours later, a totally different vista will shock you as you open your eyes. All of a sudden, there is grey and white architecture, forbidding in its starkness. Old stones, ancient building     

ARCHITECTURE INFORMS HISTORY

Clusters of ancient architecture in central China have recently been entered on the world heritage list A group of ancient architecture in Dengfeng,central China's Henan Province,was added to the world heritage list at the 34th session of the World Heritage Committee in Brazil on August 1 this year.The architectural collection is China's 39th property inscribed on the list,and the third world heritage site in the province after the Longmen Grottoes and Yinxu in Anyang,site of the capital of the late Sha...     

Book of Songs：The World＇s Earliest Anthology of Verse

Acollection of 305 songs from the early Western Zhou Dynasty （1100-771B.C）to the mid Spring and Autumn Period（770-476 B.C）.the Book of Songs is acknowledged to be the Book of Songs is acknowledged to be the fountain of Chinese poetry and literature in general,and was high on the reading list of intellectuals in ancient China.     

The Colorful History of Chinese Stamps

IN August 1982, the First Congress of the All-China Philatelic Federation convened in beijing, and the Chinese ministry of Post and Telecommunications issued a stamp sheetlet in commemoration. The stamp motif depicts an ancient courier galloping on horseback, while in the background wild geese fly in graceful formation. Wild geese are migratory birds, and every au- tumn they can be counted on to set off on their thousand-kilometer migration southward to warmer climes.     

Two Kingdoms,One Mission

While the terracotta warriors from ancient China are still on display in London,receiving the admiration of millions of British visitors, the prime minister of the UK touched down in Beijing and then Shanghai to be greeted by leaders,entrepreneurs and citizens in the Middle Kingdom. Gordon Brown's trip to China in mid-January was the first to the country since he took office and the first for a European state leader     

FOOD FOR LUCK

<正>Locals are given free porridge to mark the Laba Festival on January 27 in Qiankou Township,Huangshan in east China’s Anhui Province.The festival falls on the eighth day of the 12th lunar month every year and dates back to over 1,000 years ago.In ancient times,the Chinese would cook porridge on this day as a tribute to the God of Agriculture.The festival is also intended to celebrate the harvest and pray for blessings in the upcoming year.     

The Ancient Olympic Games

The origin of the Olympic Games is linked with many myths referred to in ancient sources, but in the historic years their founder is said to be Oxylos whose descendant Ifitos later rejuvenated the games. According to tradition, the Olympic Games began in 776 B.C. when Ifitos made a treaty with Lycourgos the king and famous legislator of Sparta and Cleisthenes the king of Pissa. The text of the treaty was written on a disc and kept in the Heraion.     

Better Together China cements ties with its Eurasian partners through President Xi Jinping's visits to Kazakhstan,Russia and Belarus

<正>During his state visit to Kazakhstan in September 2013,Chinese President Xi Jinping proposed the building of the Silk Road Economic Belt,which is expected to facilitate trade between countries along the ancient trade route on the Eurasian continent and increase connectivity of infrastructure in these countries.When Xi made his newest Eurasian tour to Kazakhstan,Russia and Belarus on     

The Divine Celebration of Fire

FIRE was as crucial to the development of ancient civilizations as electricity has been to modern times, and the ancient peoples of both Eastern and Western cultures wor-shipped those who brought fire as heroes. In China, many ethnic groups still mark the day on which their god of fire lit up their lives; the Axi is one of them. The Axi ethnic minority group is an offshoot of the Yi people that live mainly in Yunnan's Mile County, 143 kilometers from the provincial capital of Kunming. On a recent trip to Yunnan, I heard an ancient Axi legend about the origin of man-made fire.     

Confucius School, a National Strategy for Chinese Language Teaching

Confucius Great educator, thinker, and founder of Confucianism, Confucius (551-479 B.C.) is regarded as having had the greatest influence on the development of Chinese culture. He is believed to have had 3,000 students and 72 disciples, with whom he traveled the vassal states in ancient China for 14 years. He collated and compiled many ancient books, including the Book of Songs, the Book of History, the Book of Rites, and the Book of Music. He also wrote     

FESTIVAL BANQUET

A folk artisan serves food on a traditional long plate at a large open-air banquet in the ancient town of Zhongshan in Chongqing Municipality,southwest China,on January 18.The banquet called 1,000-Meter-Long Banquet,has more than 800 tables lined along the street.It is a tradition in the ancient town linked to the Spring Festival.The event is held to wish prosperity and good luck.More than 20,000 visitors joined the banquet this year.     

Supernatural Fengdu

FENGDU is famous for its ghost folklore,but its lure to visitors rests on more than that.Deep in the hills,an ancient lake surrounded by beautiful scenery and a cave full of strange shapes and shimmering walls are waiting to be explored. Mingshan Mountain:The Ghost Culture The Ghost City of Mingshan Mountain is located on the north bank of the     

Unspoiled Land in Western Yunnan

I TS awesome landscape, ancient civilization and exotic culture of diverse ethnic groups make south- western China's Yunnan Province one of the country's most alluring tourist destinations. In the past decade, Shidian County in the Nushan Mountain Valley on the east bank of the Nujiang River has drawn large numbers of an- thropologists as well as tourists.Qidan Descendents Found in Shidian The Qidan ancient ethnic group of northern China was once bold and strong enough to establish its …     

Jiangyin:A Magnet for Investors——An Interview with Wang Weicheng,secretary of CPC Jiangyin Municipal Committee

Jiangyin, in southeastJiangsu Province, facing the Yangtze River to the north andTaihu Lake to the south, has been prosperous since ancient times. Today, the people ofJiangyin are active participants in the clay's absorption of foreign investment, introduction of technology and skilled human resources, and acceleration of Constructing Jiangyin into a modem clayPrior to the opening of the Jiangyin, Fair on Foreign TradeAnd Economic Cooperation thatran from 18 to 28 October2001. our report…     

Guiyang and Anshun Mysterious middle part of the Southern Silk Road

Yanlou-A place of mystery by the ancient post road'Look, this lake is named Lake Aha, and the dirt road on the other side is the earliest post road, which leads directly to Anshun,' said Yi Liangjun, a gentle-man in his seventies, sitting next to me as we were driving on a narrow strip out of Guiyang capital of Guizhou Province. Nowadays, most of the remaining ancient post roads along the Southern Silk Road are reduced to weed- covered country tracks. Among the tussocks, we managed to loc…     

Tale of an Ancient Town

THE clock had just struck 5pm when I arrived in Jin'an, the center of Songpan, an ancient county town under the jurisdiction of Sichuan's Aba Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture. I quickly checked into a hotel before setting off on my quest to unlock Songpan's ancient mysteries.     

Just a Memory

While Beijing accelerates its modernization drive,it needs to retain its city culture before the ancient parts of the capital are only seen in photographs and live on only in the memories of residents     

The Rongjiang Miao： Deep in the Mountains

<正>Located at the southern foot of the Miaoling Mountains on the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau,Rongjiang County is home to some 80,000 Miao people.Locked in bv towering mountains,they and their colorful folk customs have remained little known to the outside world.I spent one and a half months in Rongjiang discovering all I could about the ancient villages,costumes, festivals,and weddings of this branch of the Miao.The story represents the first comprehensive coverage of the residents there.     

Beijing International Sculpture Park

Inauguration of the 2002 Beijing International Urban Sculptural Art Exhibition also saw the opening of the Beijing International Sculpture Park on Yuquan Road, Beijing. The park houses 140 statues.This exhibition is aimed at promoting exchanges and cooperation among sculptors across the world, integrating urban sculpture into everyday life, and encouraging innovation in this sector. It is expected to bring inspiration to Beijing as regards new concepts in urban construction, through exchanges with other nations. This exhibition constitutes interaction between the public and art, and dialogue between China and the world.The works on display are Beijing's latest attraction, and add a touch of modernity to this ancient city. Some are to be placed in sports stadiums during the 2008 Olympics.     

THIS WEEK

正LABOR OF LOVE Volunteers carrying paint wait in a long queue to repaint the outer wall of the Potala Palace in Lhasa,Tibet Autonomous Region in southwest China,on November 2.Every fall,workers and hundreds of local volunteers gather at the Potala Palace to give the ancient architecture a facelift The 1,300-year-old palace was included in the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1994.