Sichuan Diaries On China's Heartland
I am in the midst of planning a China trip and my tentative itinerary consists of Beijing, Shanghai, Hangzhou, Qingdao, and Dalian. Not exactly roughing it and that's the problem. Most businesspeople and journalists rarely, if ever, get out into China's hinterlands.
But I just saw that two Chicago Tribune reporters (h/t to China Digital) will be blogging about their trip from Chongqing to Kongding along a route less taken by Westerners. The blog is the Sichuan Diaries and it describes itself as a trip "through the heart of China in search of its future." The trip is described as follows:
For centuries, China’s remote interior has churned with war, revolution, growth and collapse. Today, inland China is churning again. With the help of Chinese guide Zhang Xiaoguang, correspondent Evan Osnos and photographer Wes Pope are walking a stretch of inland China to discover what it is today and what lies ahead for China’s Heartland. Along the way, they will answer your questions in English and post some features in Mandarin, thanks to news assistant Lu Jingxian in Beijing.Their journey began Sept. 10, 2007. They don’t yet know what day it will end.
Be sure also to check out a somewhat similar journey over at "Behind the Bamboo Curtain."
Comments (5)
Read through and enter the discussion by using the form at the endAndy Scott - September 17, 2007 7:52 PM
I couldn't agree more, if you haven't been to a disco with a bouncing floor, you haven't seen China.
shah8 - September 17, 2007 10:55 PM
You ready for that big typhoon?
kmm - September 19, 2007 12:44 AM
I dunno man . . .if they're planning on stopping at Kangding I'm not so sure these guys are really roughing it, either. I mean, that's the city most people start with when they want to go roughing it in western Sichuan.
Still a cool idea though. It is interesting how a province as big and important as Sichuan is rarely covered in bigger media outlets. I think you're right: a lot of people (and a lot of media) don't leave the big comfortable east coast cities, and they extrapolate from them conclusions about all of China. It's good to see these guys throwing themselves a little bit deeper in the heartland.
Also, some of the pictures on that site are fantastic.
Dean Stevens - September 22, 2007 9:20 PM
Have a great trip. Maybe you can stop by our office while you're in Beijing...
Ben Ross - September 28, 2007 9:19 PM
Excellent point about too many journalists and business people think Beijing and Shanghai are representative of China as a whole. I think the fact that people most often forget is that the majority of the Chinese population do not live in the major urban centers. This is the complete opposite of most developed North American and European nations (especially the US) where most people live in large cities. Sure, there are the Beijings and the Shanghais with their 10 million plus populations, but there are also hundreds of other towns with 1 or 2 million which most people in the West have never heard of.