China Airports

Airport Company Set Up in East China Fujian Province
The Xiamen Aviation Development Company (XADC), a subsidiary of Xiamen Airlines Co. Ltd., has signed an agreement with Wuyishan airport to jointly set up a major airport company to increase economic development which will benefit both parties.

The two will invest a total of 108 million yuan (about 13 million US dollars), 65 percent from XADC, into the new airport company, which will concentrate on advanced business management and improved service.

The scenic Wuyi Mountains close to

Airports Co-operate to Improve Service
Five major airports in South China's Pearl River Delta will join forces in a bid to offer improved and safer service.

The airports in Shenzhen, Hong Kong, Guangzhou, Macao and Zhuhai have vowed to jointly create a unified brand name to help boost the region's economic development.

The airports' top officials gathered in Shenzhen recently, the second of such meetings, agreeing to further co-operation in more fields to upgrade their competitiveness.

The airports will become ea

West China fair for attracting overseas investment opens
The three-day West China Fair for Attracting Overseas Investment opened Saturday in Xi'an, the capital city of northwest China's Shaanxi Province.

The fair has attracted more than 1,000 businessmen from both at home and abroad, and 145 overseas-funded enterprises in China and noted enterprises from other countries and regions, including many multinational corporations such as IBM, Siemens, Kodak and Toshiba.

Some official and semi-official organizations for the promotion of investm

Fujian Province to host bamboo festival
A bamboo festival is due to be held during October 18-20 in Fujian Province, east China.

Organizers from the provincial Forestry Department and governments of Sanming City and Yong'an City, where the festival is hosted, held a joint press conference in Fuzhou recently.

A seminar on the bamboo economy and trade fairs and guided tours to bamboo processing factories would be held during the festival, organizers said.

Endowed with abundant bamboo resources, this province claims

China, Nepal agree to promote border trade
China and Nepal agreed in Beijing recently to promote bilateral cooperation in such areas as border trade, tourism and transportation.

The agreement, which emphasises trade and related issues between the Tibet Autonomous Region and Nepal, was signed by Chinese Vice-Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Secretary of the Nepalese Foreign Ministry Madhu Raman Acharya during the current visit of Nepalese King Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev to China.

Both China and Nepal said they believed the ag

Pacific anticipates rosy cooperation with China
The Pacific Island Forum Trade Office (PIFTO) signed an agreement recently with the Guangxi Branch of the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade (CCPIT Guangxi), in a bid to promote bilateral cooperation in trade, investment and tourism.

It was PIFTO's first deal with China on economic and trade cooperation, said Rohan Ellis, PIFTO representative in China, who expects a bright future for cooperation between the two partners.

He revealed that PIFTO also aims to widen

Saving the Great Wall from itself
The Great Wall, dubbed the symbol of the nation's spirit, is facing a growing threat to its facade from the country's burgeoning tourist industry, experts said recently.

To protect the authenticity of the mammoth structure, which boasts a history of more than two thousand years, the Beijing Administrative Bureau of Culture Relics on July 16 signed a memorandum on conservation with the International Friends of the Great Wall, a Hong Kong-based group aiming to protect the environment along

China resolves technical problems in building Qinghai-Tibet railway
China has succeeded in solving a series of technical problems in building the Qinghai-Tibet railway, the highest railway in the world.

Chinese railway builders and scientists have developed effective ways, based on experimentation and experience in constructing the railway in the past year, to treat major problems like highland cold, water and oxygen shortages, and frozen earth.

The 1,118-km railway will extend from Lhasa, capital of the Tibet Autonomous Region in southwest China,

Tibetan sutra printing house becomes tourist attraction
Li Xiaodong visited a sutra printing house in Sichuan Province, southwest China, and came away with an unexpected and special memento.

Li spent just two yuan on five sets of sutra books at the printing house in Dege County, said to be the largest of its kind in areas inhabited by Tibetans in China.

"I never expected to buy such special souvenirs at this mysterious sutra printing house," said the excited visitor from the southern coastal province of Guangdong.

Dege has been c

EP official calls on Tibet to develop tourism
A senior official with the European Parliament said that tourism should be given priority in boosting the economic development of China's Tibet Autonomous Region.

Plooij-Van Gorsel, head of the European Parliament delegation for ties with the People's Republic of China, said during a recent tour in Tibet that the region should open wider so that more foreigners will come for sight-seeing.

In Tibet, religion and culture hold important status, but economic expansion is very important

Computer Glitch Grinds Flights to Standstill
The computer systems of Beijing Capital International Airport crashed at 11:15 yesterday morning, and more than 6,000 people had to postpone their scheduled travel, airport sources said. The reasons behind the system failure were still under investigation. Airport regulators started back up computer systems at about 12:30 pm and resumed processing of boarding passes for passengers, said Wang Jiadong, vice-president of the airport. He said noon is the peak travelling time for the airport, so the

World's highest wetland well protected
Lhasa, capital of the Tibet Autonomous Region in southwest China, has made some achievements in protecting Lhalu Wetland, considered the world's highest wetland.

Lhalu Wetland, located in the suburbs of Lhasa and covering an area of 6.2 square kilometers, plays an important role in safeguarding ecological balance, preserving biodiversity, improving the climate and environment of Lhasa city.

To protect the wetland, Tibet has turned Lhalu into a regional nature reserve and is prepari

China approves project to preserve endangered reptile
China's national forestry authority has approved a 10-million yuan (1.2 million US dollars) project to breed more than 1,500 Chinese alligators, one of the world's most endangered reptiles.

Under the project, the Chinese alligator breeding center in Changxing County, Zhejiang Province, in east China, will expand from its current three hectares to 10 hectares.

Established in 1979, the center has bred 355 Chinese alligators since 1984.

The project is aimed at boosting the cent

Dalian Reports Booming Tourist Industry
Dalian, the scenic coastal city in northeast China's Liaoning Province, witnessed a boom in tourism in the first half of this year.

According to official statistics, the city received 216,000 overseas visitors in the first six months, up 12.9 percent over the same period last year. Earnings from overseas tourist arrivals reached 145 million US dollars, up 11.5 percent.

Domestic tourist arrivals reached 6.5 million and revenue from this totaled 6 billion yuan (723 million dollars) i

Shanghai aims to become world center by 2010
The main frame of the city of Shanghai will be built into "four international centres" by 2010, thus increasing the gross domestic product (GDP) per capita to US$7,500 by 2007.

Set by the State Council, Shanghai is to construct itself into the centre of international economy, finance, trade and shipping, which is the guideline of Shanghai's development.

Vice-Mayor and Deputy Party Secretary Han Zheng urged the municipal construction & management commission in a meeting held recentl

Egyptian cultural week opens in Beijing
An Egyptian cultural week, "Waves of the Nile", opened on July 21 in the Egyptian section of the World Park in Beijing.

During the event, visitors will be introduced to Egyptian history and culture through words and pictures. The history of China-Egypt cultural exchanges will also feature.

Egyptian Ambassador to China Aly Houssam EL-Din EL-Hefny said at the opening ceremony that the event reflected the great progress Egypt and China had made in cultural exchanges.

Egypt beca

Beijing Builds Imperial Tourism Zone
The Chinese capital has kicked off the first phase of a tourism zone which covers several famous imperial gardens of ancient Chinese dynasties and scenic spots in the northwestern suburbs of Beijing.

Covering 50 square kilometers, the planned imperial tourism zone runs from the Fragrant Hills in the west to the Yuan Ming Yuan or the Garden of Ten Thousand Gardens in the east,and from Qinghe in the north to the northwest section of the Fourth Ring Road in the south.

The whole projec

28 Chinese Cultural Heritages Listed
Between 1987 and 2001, 28 Chinese sites have been put on the World Nature and Culture Heritage List. China now ranks third, behind Italy and Spain, on the list.

The Great Wall, 1987, cultural heritage Mount Taishan, 1987, cultural/natural heritage Imperial Palace of the Ming and Qing Dynasties, 1987, cultural heritage Mogao Grottoes, 1987, cultural heritage Mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor, 1987, cultural heritage Peking Man Site at Zhoukoudian, 1987, cultural heritage Mount Huangshan,

Construction, tourism threaten historical relics
China's burgeoning tourism and construction sectors, which pose a growing threat to the country's World Heritage sites, has compelled preservation authorities to launch a comprehensive inspection on the historical relics.

The two-month-long inspection, which began this week, consists of examining and appraising the present state of 14 sites on the World Heritage List by the World Heritage Committee of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) before 199

Tourism gala opens in NW China's region: CNTA
A 10-day international tourism festival which was opened in northwest China's Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region on July 18 is expected to attract more overseas visitors.

The tourism gala, entitled "2002 China Ningxia Deserts and Yellow River International Tourism Festival", is co-sponsored by the China National Tourism Administration (CNTA) and the regional government.

Shapotou Tourist Zone is the main venue for the festive gathering but there are five secondary venues across the auton

China licenses 528 travel agencies for foreign tours :CNTA
China has licensed 528 travel agencies to provide exclusive services for Chinese citizens traveling overseas.

A spokesman for the China National Tourism Administration (CNTA) said on July 19 that the administration also canceled the special rights of the travel firms it authorized in 1997 to provide services for Chinese citizens on overseas tours.

The moves were designed to implement the central government's policies to regulate Chinese citizens' overseas tourism, and help the coun

More go abroad, but ready to come back
Despite years of study in a Swedish university town, Ji Ming, 24, still believes his hometown,Shanghai, is the ideal place to build a career.

"On the one hand is an oriental metropolis with a population of 16 million, and on the other hand, a little town with 90,000 people," said the recent Lund University graduate, "Naturally I'd choose to come back to Shanghai. It's fast growing and full of potential."

Ji majored in environment science. "That experience has opened up my horizons

Young foreign students thrive in China
A 7-year-old Korean girl can sing Chinese songs even better than Chinese children, her music teacher has said.

Baek Min Jeong who is from the Republic of Korea (ROK) has been studying for eight months in Grade One at Huijia primary school in Beijing.

She is among about 180 foreign students who are in the kindergarten, primary and middle school of Huijia. They come from 12 countries including the ROK, Japan, France, the United States and the Philippines.

Huijia has been allow

Pope in Canada for World Youth Day
With the world watching, a frail but determined Pope John Paul II walked down the steps of his plane Tuesday instead of using a lift after arriving in Canada to join thousands of young Catholic pilgrims for World Youth Day. Clutching a rail and helped by an aide, the 82-year-old pope inched his way down the 27 steps to the tarmac, drawing cheers from onlookers, after a stiff wind blew off his skull cap. "The very fact that Your Holiness has made the trip here bears witness to your tenacity and y

More Chinese Choose Relaxing Travel
This year's vacation for a young woman office worker from southern Guangdong Province is all about sleeping and sipping coffee beside Lake Xihu, rather than rushing around the scenic city of Hangzhou in east China's Zhejiang Province. More Chinese share Huang's idea of relaxing travel. A survey by the Hangzhou tourism committee shows a rise in such tourists in the first half of this year. The city endowed with a big lake has long been a popular resort. Tourists heading for Hangzhou mainly go for

Sea Route to Taiwan Opens in Quanzhou
A direct sea link was launched Tuesday between the port of Quanzhou in East China's Fujian Province and Taiwan's Penghu Island. The move brought to five the number of ports on Fujian's coast that are allowed to operate cargo and passenger shipping routes to Taiwan. The other four Fujian ports are Mawei in Fuzhou, Meizhou in Putian, Xiamen and Zhongyin in Zhangzhou. Zhongyin Port handles cargo only and Meizhou Port transports passengers only. The other three ports deal with both cargo and passeng

Experts gather to discuss Antarctic exploration
Over 400 experts from home and abroad put their heads together to discuss Antarctic exploration in the conference of the 27th Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) and the 14th Council of Managers of National Antarctic Programs (COMNAP) opened in Shanghai on July 14.

President of SCAR Robert Rutford said, hundreds and thousands of scientists and explorers risked their lives in the Antarctic in

order to discover the secret there and make people's living environment bette

Chinese dream of Antarctic travel moves closer
The faraway icy Antarctic region has attracted global tourists for a long time. And for curious Chinese travelers, going to the Antarctic may not be just a dream for much longer.

"Currently Chinese citizens cannot go to the Antarctic as they please. But I believe within three years, our government will seriously think about this issue. China is capable of supporting Antarctic travel," said Zhang Zhanhai, deputy director of the Chinese Antarctic and Arctic Administration (CAA).

More

China makes remarkable progress in Antarctic research
China has achieved remarkable progress in Antarctic research in the last 20 years and will strive to make a greater contribution in the future, according to Wang Shuguang, director of the State Oceanic Administration.

He made these remarks at the 27th session of the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) and the 14th session of the Council of Managers of National Antarctic Programs, which opened here Monday.

China dispatched its first national Antarctic expedition in lat

U.S. firm wins key prizes in design contest for 2008 Games in Beijing
The first winners of the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing were announced recently with American architects Sasaki Associates scooping two prizes for design competitions, reports the China Daily.

The event was held for the conceptual designs of two major venues for the Games-the Olympic Green and the Wukesong Cultural and Sports Center.

San Fransisco-based Sasaki Associates won the top prize of 250,000 U.S. dollars for the Olympic Green-the nucleus of the Games which holds the Olympic

Macao to issue new set of stamps
The Macao Postal Services will issuea set of new stamps on July 24 to commemorate the 160th anniversary of the birth of Zheng Guanying, a reformist, literal man and philanthropist who received his childhood education in Macao.

The set includes four varieties of stamps which bear the face value ranging from 1 pataca (12.5 US cents) to 3.5 patacas (43.75 cents) and, a total of 500,000 sets will be issued, Carlos Roldao Lopes, director of the postal services, said at a press conferenceMonday

Cultural relics face submersion in central China
China's south-to-north water diversion project will endanger a huge number of cultural relics at its water sources, thus requiring urgent salvation, archeologists said.

The project is to divert water from the mighty Yangtze River through the eastern, central and western lines to solve water shortage in the country's water-deficient northern areas.

The concern was voiced following the planned construction of the central line of the water diversion project in central China's Hubei pr

Ancient Tang silk dresses safely separated
With the help of their German counterparts, scientists in northwest China's Shaanxi Province have successfully separated and restored six 1000-year-old silk dresses which were stuck to each other when found.

The silk costumes were believed to belong to noble women in the Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD), the most prosperous and powerful feudal dynasty in China's history. They were unearthed in 1987 from an underground chamber at the Famen Temple, a royal temple in the Tang era some 118 km west o

Ancient female corpse discovered intact
A well-preserved ancient corpse, believed to date from the Western Han Dynasty (BC 206- AD 24) was recently unearthed from a construction site in Lianyungang, eastern Jiangsu Province.

The female corpse, estimated to be over 2,000 years old, is said to still have elastic muscle tissue from being immersed in special fluid in her coffin, according to Zhou Jinping, curator of Lianyungang Museum which is currently looking after the find.

The coffin was sent to the museum after being di

China invites foreign expertise for Dunhuang protection
China for the first time has invited foreign experts to help with plans to protect the Dunhuang grottos, a world cultural heritage site in northwest China's Gansu Province.

Fan Jinshi, director of the Dunhuang Studies Institute, said the 5-to-10-year plan had utilized ideas from American and Australian experts.

Fan said they had spent five years drawing up the plan and hoped to keep grottos in their original state while attracting more tourists.

He said protection of the gro

Flight along Silk Road now operating
An air route connecting three tourist spots along the ancient Silk Road has begun operating.

A flight set off from Urumqi City in northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region in the morning on July 19, heading for Jiayuguan City at the western end of the Great Wall and Dunhuang City, where the well-known Mogao Grottoes are located.

The ATR72 planes, made jointly by France and Italy, will shuttle between Jiayuguan and Urumqi every Friday and Sunday.

A tourist official i

Southern Airlines opens routes to remote resorts
China's Southern Airlines on July 19 scheduled return flight links from Guangzhou, capital city of south China's Guangdong Province, to Xishuangbanna and Lijiang,remote resorts in southwest China's Yunnan Province.

Boeing 737s and Airbus 320s will fly twice a week from Guangzhou to tropical Xishuangbanna, with a stop in Kunming, capital of Yunnan.

Similar flights from Guangzhou to Lijiang, boasting an ancient water city, will take place three times a week.

Both routes are ex

Air route opened between Chengdu, Osaka
A new air route linking Chengdu, capital of southwest China's Sichuan Province, with Osaka in Japan opened recently.

South Western Airlines' Boeing 757 and 737 passenger aircraft will fly the new route every Monday and Thursday, taking about four hours each flight.

This is the fourth direct air route to Japanese cities operated by the South Western Airlines.

Chengdu is now the destination of eight international air routes from such overseas cities as Singapore, Bangkok, Phuk

Air route opens from Lanzhou to Hong Kong
An Airbus A320 took off from Lanzhou, capital of northwestern Gansu Province, in the afternoon on July 20 for China's financial hub Hong Kong, marking the first air link between the two cities.

Gansu company China's Northwest Airlines launched the route in the hope of boosting economic ties between the remote province and the southern economic powerhouse.

Departing Lanzhou at 4 pm, the 2,226-kilometer flight takes two hours and 50 minutes. A flight returns to Lanzhou the same day.<

Macau Sees Tourist Boom in First Half of This Year
Tourist arrivals in Macau went up a year-on-year 9.3 percent to 5.48 million in the first half of this year,according to the latest figures from the Statistics and Census Services. Hong Kong visitors amounted to 25.5 million,or 46.5 percent of the total,making Hong Kong remain the largest tourist source for Macau,but the figure dropped 2.3 percent compared with the same period of last year. China's inland was catching up with visitors from there increasing to 34.2 percent of the total,while Taiw

Giant Panda Corridor for the Qinling Mountains
A new project is to be introduced to protect the giant panda. This will involve forming a corridor in the Qinling Mountains in a bid to link up their fragmented pockets of habitat and expand their living space. The habitat for giant pandas in this area is expected to come under pressure within the next three years. Li Ning, Chief of the Giant Panda Division of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), describes this cooperative, protective project launched by the World Nature Fund and the Shaaxi Forestry D

Xishan - Earthbound Heaven by Taihu
Two thousand and five hundred years ago during Spring and Autumn Period (770-476 BC), the king of the Wu Kingdom, Fuchai, and his concubine Xishi, one of the four Chinese ancient beauties, spent their summer days in Xishan Town, an island on Taihu Lake. Today, so can you. Taihu Lake, China's third largest fresh water body in East China's Jiangsu Province, is about an hour's drive from Shanghai. Compared to adjacent areas at the same latitude, the island's temperature is a little cooler in summer

More Chinese Choose Relaxing Travel
This year's vacation for a young woman office worker from southern Guangdong Province is all about sleeping and sipping coffee beside Lake Xihu, rather than rushing around the scenic city of Hangzhou in east China's Zhejiang Province. More Chinese share Huang's idea of relaxing travel. A survey bythe Hangzhou tourism committee shows a rise in such tourists in the first half of this year. The city endowed with a big lake has long been a popular resort.Tourists heading for Hangzhou mainly go for t

More Chinese Choose Relaxing Travel
This year's vacation for a young woman office worker from southern Guangdong Province is all about sleeping and sipping coffee beside Lake Xihu, rather than rushing around the scenic city of Hangzhou in east China's Zhejiang Province. More Chinese share Huang's idea of relaxing travel. A survey by the Hangzhou tourism committee shows a rise in such tourists in the first half of this year. The city endowed with a big lake has long been a popular resort. Tourists heading for Hangzhou mainly go for

Hukou Waterfall Elaborates Spirit of Chinese people
Big rivers enjoy good reputations either for long history or for achievements in fostering human civilization. The Yellow River in China is no exception. In the Yellow River basin, there is a tourist resort that visitors should not miss experiencing in person. That is the Hukou Waterfall, the second largest waterfall in China. The Yellow River runs all the way from Qinghai Province to the border of Shanxi and Shaanxi provinces, zigzagging to Jixian in Shanxi Province and Yichuan in Shaanxi Provi

Hukou Waterfall Elaborates Spirit of Chinese People
Big rivers enjoy good reputations either for long history or for achievements in fostering human civilization. The Yellow River in China is no exception. In the Yellow River basin, there is a tourist resort that visitors should not miss experiencing in person. That is the Hukou Waterfall, the second largest waterfall in China. The Yellow River runs all the way from Qinghai Province to the border of Shanxi and Shaanxi provinces, zigzagging to Jixian in Shanxi Province and Yichuan in Shaanxi Provi

Air Macao to add flights between Beijing, Macao
Air Macao plans to increase the number of flights between Macao and Beijing to nine per week as ofAugust 23, an effort to meet growing air traffic demand on the route linking the booming Special Administrative Region (SAR) and Beijing.

The added flights will be returned ones every Friday and Sunday,airline sources said.

Gong Xiaozhuang, public relations manager of Air Macao, told Xinhua Thursday that the number of people travelling by air between Macao and Beijing has been rising a

Wuhan to host international tourist gala
Central China's Hubei Province plans to host an international tourist festival in its capital city, Wuhan, on Sept. 25-27, according to the festival executive committee.

Located on the bank of the Yangtze River, Wuhan is a famous tourist destination and distribution center in central China. It was assessed as one of "China's excellent tourist cities" last year.

The program will include a series of festive events, such as a village tour, Yangtze tour, international tourist fashion s

South China tigers learn to survive
Fu Wenyuan, a research fellow and tiger keeper with the center, says three tigers came from Suzhou Zoo, in east China's Jiangsu Province, in September 1998 and another three from Guilin Tiger and Bear Mountain Farm, in south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, in June 2000.

"These tigers even feared chickens, goats or human beings as a result of captivity when they first came here, but through wilderness adaptation training, the six tigers have shown signs of improving their abiliti

Rare monkey spotted, first time in 20 years
A rare species of monkey, the grayish black assamese macaque, is reportedly living in the Longhu Mountain Nature Reserve in South China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

It's the first time in 20 years this kind of monkey has been found in the region, according to the nature reserve.

The male monkey, as fat as a bear, entered the nature reserve from neighbouring mountains about two weeks ago, reserve workers said.

Assamese macaques are found mostly in India, Viet Nam and C

China makes breakthrough in crested ibis protection
Chinese scientists have succeeded in making a pair of white ibises adopt a newborn crested ibis, in what they believe is the first successful such adoption in the world.

The scientists put a crested ibis egg in the white ibis nest about three months ago in Beijing Zoo, and the baby ibis hatched after 30 days, the Beijing Morning Post reported.

At almost eight weeks old, the little bird is in a sound condition and scientists hope its "parents" will teach it how to adapt to wild life

Insurance Companies Promote Travel Accident Policies
Chinese insurance companies are promoting new transport accident policies to satisfy the demands of growing numbers of tourists. The China Ping An Insurance Company is promoting its travel policy offering "100 yuan (US$12) for all-year accident air insurance". The China Pacific Life Insurance Company is also promoting a transport accident card. Customers can spend 50 yuan annually (US$6six) to get 250,000 yuan (US$31,250) in air accident compensation, 100,000 yuan (US$12,500) for a rail accident

Top Indian Software Firms Move into Shanghai
Shanghai is set for a new boom in the information technology industry with the arrival of top Indian software companies in the first half of the year.
Three of India's four largest software companies -- Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Infosys Technolo

Tibetan Antelopes Still Threatened
Tibetan antelopes on the verge of extinction are still threatened by poaching and habitat damage despite the progress in anti-poaching campaigns in China, according to Chinese wild animal protection authorities. They cited new research as a warning that if illegal hunting persists, the highly-endangered species could disappear from the Earth in a short period. Over the past five years, a group of Chinese and American researching the antelope's birthing and breeding behaviors have discovered that

Violinist Itzhak Perlman Opens Graduate Program in Shanghai
Scores of young gifted instrumentalists gathered in the Shanghai Conservatory of Music to attend the long-awaited graduate program offered by the Israeli classical violinist Itzhak Perlman. The Shanghai program is the first established outside New York, where the 56-year-old virtuoso's music school is based. This year's program attracted 68 students, 28 of whom are from countries other than China, and all of whom were hand-selected by Perlman. Wearing T-shirts with the logo, "beautiful music", t

War Against Forest Fire Rages on
Firefighters are now winning their battle to protect the country's largest virgin forests in the Greater Hinggan Mountains from the fires raging there since the end of July. The fires sweeping the northern part of the Greater Hinggan Mountains have been brought under control, according to the firefighting command centre in Inner Mongolia. Firefighters who have been working around the clock on the fires' frontline are busy mopping up the affected areas to ensure that the wind has no chance to rek

War Against Forest Fire Rages on
Firefighters are now winning their battle to protect the country's largest virgin forests in the Greater Hinggan Mountains from the fires raging there since the end of July. The fires sweeping the northern part of the Greater Hinggan Mountains have been brought under control, according to the firefighting command centre in Inner Mongolia. Firefighters who have been working around the clock on the fires' frontline are busy mopping up the affected areas to ensure that the wind has no chance to rek

Metal Scrap
Our plants in China monthly process 4,000 tons of non-ferrous metal scrap. Items including but not limited to: Cu/Al/Pb cables, Irony stainless/Cu/Brass/Al/Zn/Pb, shredded metals, motors. Our brass mill requires 2,000 tons of brass per month. We are constantly sourcing and buying. If you have some buying/exporting experience in your region, we would like to discuss with you. Our main requirements are: you must be honest, reliable and enthusiastic; willing to learn and travel. Joint venture is al

First Gold Mining Rights Auctioned Off in Jiangxi
The first public bidding for the excavation rights to a gold mine concluded "fairly and successfully" yesterday morning in Nanchang, capital of East China's Jiangxi Province.
Li Hongchang, vice-director of the Department of Land and Resources of Jiangx

China nurtures new generation of Catholic priests
When I became a parish priest at this church three years ago, I started celebrating the liturgy in Chinese instead of Latin, the language traditionally used on such occasions, said Feng Guoxin, a priest at the North Catholic Church in Beijing.

Feng, 33, was ordained as a Catholic priest in late 1993 after five years of formative study at the Beijing Seminary.

Like Feng, there are now about 1500 Catholic priests in the country, who have been trained by the Catholic Church of China.

Old Catholic diocese buildings to return to church
Feng Guoxin, 33, hopes to play basketball with students from a nearby school when the new semester commences this September.

Feng is a priest at the North Church, the largest Catholic Church in Beijing also known as the Xishiku Church. The Beijing No.39 Middle School has used the church's diocese buildings since the1950s but is now being relocated to an area bordering its present playground. A new school is taking shape beside the playground which separates it and the old church buildings

China to offer foreign language religious services
Children, taxi drivers, even grannies are working hard on English six years ahead the Beijing Olympic Games in 2008, and now China's clergy are taking lessons too.

Some Chinese clergy, nuns and seminary students were learning not only English, but also Spanish, Portuguese and Italian, said Michael Fu Tieshan, the bishop of Beijing Diocese.

In fact, all religious groups in China encouraged the learning of foreign languages in preparation for the Games. A group of returned Catholics,

Scholars, clergy study Christian impact on Chinese culture
Chinese scholars and Roman Catholics are to jointly study relations between Catholicism and Chinese culture.

The Beijing Institute of Christianity and Culture Studies was founded in the Chinese capital on August 5, almost 400 years after the death of Matteo Ricci (1552-1610), an Italian missionary who introduced the world map, Western mathematics and astronomy to China in the 16th century.

"This will be the first time that clergy cultivated by new China over the past half century,

A pair of white ibises are taught to raise new baby
Chinese scientists have succeeded in getting a pair of white ibises to adopt a newborn crested ibis in what they believe is the first successful adoption of this animal in the world.

The scientists put a crested ibis egg in the white ibis nest about three months ago at the Beijing Zoo, and the baby ibis hatched after 30 days, the Beijing Morning Post reported.

At almost eight weeks old, the little bird is in a sound condition and scientists hope its adoptive parents will teach it h

Taklimakan Desert formed 4.5 million years ago: expert
The Taklimakan Desert located in northwestern Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, the second largest desert on the globe, could have been came into being some 4.5 million years ago, according to recent research.

The research was conducted jointly by Prof. Zheng Hongbo from the Shanghai-based Tongji University, and noted scientists Chen Huizhong and Cao Junji from the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). A paper on the research was published in the CAS magazine, the Chinese Science Bulletin.

China's second largest freshwater lake expands
The vast Dongting Lake in central China has expanded by nearly 20 percent over the past five years thanks to grain-for-water projects.

As the enlarged area can store an extra of one billion cubic meters of water, local people's lingering fear of flooding is gradually receding.

Since 1998, approximately 300,000 people formerly living around China's second largest freshwater lake have returned their reclaimed farmland to the lake and moved out to build new residential homes.

J

Cloud walking sensation on Taoist mountain
Those who prefer a thrilling should try walking amid clouds on a Chinese Taoist mountain cliff-side of Sanqing Mountain in east China's Jiangxi province.

The real-life cloud walking experience is made possible by the recent construction of the world's most elevated cliff plank mountain roadway. The ferro-concrete cliff plank, 1,600 meters in average altitude and 4,600 meters long, zigzags across the western part of Sanqing mountain, famed both for its natural charm and its1,600-year-long

Shanghai to host world engineer conference
Shanghai will host the first session of the World Engineer Conference (WEC) in November 2004, Zhou Guangzhao, chairman of the WEC 2004 advisory board, said here recently.

Initiated by the World Federation of Engineering, the conference is supposed to be held every four years. Organizers said the Shanghai session will attract 3,000 to 4,000 elite engineers from around the world.

Jose Medem Sanjuan, president of the World Federation of Engineering, will attend the Shanghai conference

New regulation to scuttle fake and shoddy drugs
The State Drug Administration issued a new civil measure on Wednesday to better protect people against fake and shoddy drugs.

The new regulation is expected to go into effect on September 15 in support of the revised Law on Drug Management, which became effective on December 1 last year.

Zhen Xiaoyu, director of the administration, said the regulation strives to watch closely every link in the production and sale of drugs for the sake of guaranteed quality, while endeavours continu

Famous Qinghai lamasery reopens to public after renovation
The main hall of a reputed ancient lamasery in west China's Qinghai Province reopened to the public on August 6 after a major renovation lasting several months.

The Grand Golden Tile Hall is one of the oldest and most important buildings in the Gumbum Lamasery, known as the "Ta'er Temple" in Chinese.

It is said to be built on the exact birth place of Tzongkhapa, founder of the influential Gelugba Sect or Yellow Sect of Tibetan Buddhism and a tutor of the Panchen and Dalai Lamas. Th

The Nujiang Canyon becomes China's latest tourist hotspot
The Great Nujiang Canyon, in southwest China's Yunnan Province, has become a new tourist hotspot in recent years, thanks to local efforts to improve infrastructure and tourism facilities.

Some local tourism specialists believe that the Nujiang canyon is more attractive
than the United States' Grand Canyon.

The Yunnan section of the canyon is 621 kilometers long and 3,000 meters deep, compared with the Grand Canyon which is 440 kilometers long and 1,830 meters deep.

In the

Shantou city to hold music fair
Shantou, a port city in south China's Guangdong Province, will hold a music fair in September, marking UNESCO's Year of Cultural Heritage and China's Year of Folk Art Tourism Festivals.

The festival is co-sponsored by local cultural affairs authorities, and will include music contests and performances of traditional music popular in the Chaozhou-Shantou area for hundreds of years.

During the event, many local and overseas bands, including those from Hong Kong and Macao, will take p

Air China Resumes Non-Stop Beijing-New York Flight
Air China announced yesterday it would resume its Beijing-New York non-stop flight on September 27, slashing three hours off the journey time for passengers. The company will introduce Boeing 747-400 planes on the long-distance route, which it last used in 1998. Aircraft will not follow the previous Far East air route through Russia, Alaska and Canada but travel via regions closer to the North Pole. It is a landmark move for the company as Air China will be the first Chinese airline operating fo

7% Fail Local Health Exams
Seven percent of overseas citizens applying for residence permits in Shanghai during an 18-month period ending in June were found to carry infectious diseases such as hepatitis, tuberculosis or HIV during their mandatory health inspections, the Shanghai International Travel Healthcare Center reported Monday. The center reported that 1,903 of the 27,045 people tested during the period were carrying some infectious disease. Venereal diseases are becoming more common, according to the center, notin

Air China to Offer Beijing-New York Flight over North Pole
Air China announced yesterday it would resume its Beijing-New York non-stop flight on September 27, slashing three hours off the journey time for passengers. The company will introduce Boeing 747-400 planes on the long-distance route, which it last used in 1998. Aircraft will not follow the previous Far East air route through Russia, Alaska and Canada but travel via regions closer to the North Pole. It is a landmark move for the company as Air China will be the first Chinese airline operating fo

7% Expatriate Applicants Fail Shanghai Health Check
Seven percent of overseas citizens applying for residence permits in Shanghai during an 18-month period ending in June were found to carry infectious diseases such as hepatitis, tuberculosis or HIV during their mandatory health inspections, the Shanghai International Travel Healthcare Center reported yesterday. The center reported that 1,903 of the 27,045 people tested during the period were carrying some infectious disease. Venereal diseases are becoming more common, according to the center, no

Air China to Offer Beijing-New York Flight over North Pole
Air China announced yesterday it would resume its Beijing-New York non-stop flight on September 27, slashing three hours off the journey time for passengers. The company will introduce Boeing 747-400 planes on the long-distance route, which it last used in 1998. Aircraft will not follow the previous Far East air route through Russia, Alaska and Canada but travel via regions closer to the North Pole. It is a landmark move for the company as Air China will be the first Chinese airline operating fo

Violinist Itzhak Perlman Opens Graduate Program in Shanghai
Scores of young gifted instrumentalists gathered in the Shanghai Conservatory of Music to attend the long-awaited graduate program offered by the Israeli classical violinist Itzhak Perlman. The Shanghai program is the first established outside New York,where the 56-year-old virtuoso's music school is based. This year's program attracted 68 students, 28 of whom are from countries other than China, and all of whom were hand-selected by Perlman. Wearing T-shirts with the logo, "beautiful music", th

2002 Forum on Chinese Internet Media Ended
The two-day forum on the Internet media came to an end in Suzhou August 17.
Persons in charge of Information Office of the State Council, All-China Journalists Association and other participants delivered speeches at the closing ceremony.

The fo

Railway construction makes way for rare antelope
Roaring machines were turned off at the construction site of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway the night on August 5 to make way for 500 migrating Tibetan antelope, a rare species on the verge of extinction.

"It will take 10 days for all the 40,000 female and baby Tibetan antelopes to cross the construction site. We'll halt normal building work for three hours each night during the period," said Yu Shaoshui, an official in charge of railway construction on the Golmud section.

Every June, f

More "green road" being built in Northwest China province
Northwest China's Qinghai provincial authorities have urged all road builders to protect the pastures bordering the roads they are to build.

At all road construction sites along the No. 214 national highway, workers are working hard to remove the grass surface before construction begins, and will replant it alongside the completed road.

As Qinghai has built a gorwing number of roads in recent years, great importance is attached to protection of the roadside environment.

Loca

Macao to build new cross-sea bridge
Chon Tit (Macao) Investment and Development Co. Ltd., a subsidiary of the China Railway Construction Company, has won the bidding for the construction of the third cross-sea bridge in Macao, which will lie between the western parts of Macao Peninsular and Taipa Island.

The Office of Development of Infrastructure told Xinhua recently that the new bridge will extend 1,720 meters and be built at a total cost of 560.18 million patacas (about 70 million US dollars) in line with the bidding pap

Overhaul to be done to oldest bridge on Yangtze river
From August 10 to September 20, an overhaul is to be done to the Yangtze River's oldest bridge, the first since the bridge opened in Wuhan in 1957.

Every day an average of nearly 100,000 automobiles pass over the Wuhan Yangtze River Bridge, which is in the capital city of central China's Hubei province.

Water has eroded and rusted the bridge's steel structure and the asphalted floor surface is ageing with ruins, affecting the smooth running of automobiles on the bridge, according t

China to study relics of earliest humans in East Asia
Chinese archeologists recently began a three-month excavation and study of relics in the Nihewan (Muddy River Bay) area which is believed to be the home of the earliest human inhabitants of East Asia.

These ancient people may have lived some 1.9 million years ago in the Nihewan area of Yangyuan and Weixian counties in Hebei Province, over 100 kilometers north of Beijing, according to archeologists from the provincial cultural relics administration.

Last year, local archeologists un

Peace theme park built in former military port
A peace theme park has been built in Lushunkou, once a military port in the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), at Dalian, a coastal city in northeast China's Liaoning Province.

Covering an area of 130,000 square meters, the Dalian World Peace Park was designed by French architects Devillers. Construction of the 230-million-yuan (27.71-million-US dollar) park began in the spring of 2000 and was completed recently.

The design of the park is in the shape of half the earth, on which the main bu

Singapore embarks on arts mission tour to Asian cities
Three Singaporean agencies have embarked on an arts mission tour to five Asian cities of Hong Kong, Shanghai, Beijing, Tokyo and Taipei from Aug. 16-23, aiming to promote Singapore as an international arts hub for unique and exciting arts and entertainment experiences.

During the tour, the artists would conduct informal dialogue sessions to update on the latest developments in the Singapore arts industry as well as to share their insights on the transformation Singapore has undergone in t

Macao lures more Taiwan flights
Air Macau will add another aircraft to its fleet this week in an effort to expand its business while taking advantage of the long-delayed direct flights between the Chinese mainland and Taiwan.

After introducing a 122-seat A319 Airbus this June, the air carrier will have another plane of the same type on August 21, making its total number of aircraft 11, a spokeswoman announced on Thursday.

As of this Friday, 67 flights will run each week between Macao and Beijing, Shanghai, Xiamen

Expanded airport operational in NW China Dunhuang
The expanded Dunhuang Airport in northwest China's Gansu Province opened on August 18.

With its new runway and terminal building, the expanded airport can land big airplanes like the Boeing 737 and can accommodate 300,000 passengers.

The expansion project, which started in July 2000, cost 320 million yuan (3.9 million U.S. dollars).

With the world-famous Mogao Grottoes located in Dunhuang, the upgraded airport will greatly boost the local tourism industry.

Past Glory Shines in Ancient Village
The 2,000-year old ruins of a Han Dynasty city in east China's Fujian Province and a 1,000-year old village nearby bespeak deep traditions and a long past. No busy traffic, no concrete blocks and no noise from bustling crowds of city dwellers -- the surroundings of the remains of an ancient city in east China's Fujian Province are as bleak and deserted as the ruins themselves. But it is the vast stretches of deserted land covered with bushes and wild grass that bring visitors' imagination back m

More Ruins of Great Wall Come to Light
Snaking along the meandering mountains for thousands of kilometers from north China's Hebei Province to northwest China's Gansu Province, the Great Wall has remained a symbol of human ingenuity and Chinese civilization. As highways and roads are built leading deep into the previously inaccessible mountains, people have discovered more ruins of the Great Wall. For instance, the section of the ruined Great Wall in Tangshan in Hebei Province, about 200 kilometers to the northeast of Beijing, recent

China's basic medical insurance covers AIDS patients
With a louder social voice for understanding and sympathy on the occasion of the 15th World AIDS Day on Sunday (Dec.1), more Chinese AIDS patients are turning to the state medical insurance system for protection of their rights and interests.

"We AIDS patients are also human beings and have the right to survival," said an elderly couple from Kunming City, capital of southwest China's Yunnan Province.

They are both HIV-positive as a result of a contaminated post-operative blood tran

What do condoms mean to the Chinese?
What do condoms mean to the Chinese?

A family planning product as they have been for a long time or something for safe sex?

The answer seems to be the latter.

Three-pack condoms are seen more and more often in vending machines on the streets of China's capital, Beijing, where most married people do not need to buy them as they receive them free from the government for birth control.

Durex's well-packed products are placed side by side with chewing gum beside the cashi

China's millions learning AIDS prevention from TV
Zhang Guiyun, an old rural lady in Beijing's northern outskirts, used to think that Ai Zi Bing, as the Chinese call AIDS, was just a problem for foreigners.

But after watching a series of short TV documentaries publicizing HIV/AIDS information on Saturday (Nov.30), 60-year-old Zhang has realized how close the disease has come to her and her neighbors in the countryside.

"China's already got one million people infected with the disease?" Zhang, sitting in a meeting hall packed with

Right of privacy: key factor in AIDS prevention
A hard up retired couple from southwest China's Yunnan province, which has the most HIV cases in the country, tested positive for HIV last year.

But what concerns them most is whether their privacy can be protected. "Our bodies have been seriously harmed, and we cannot stand any more spiritual damage," said the wife.

According to the couple, the virus may have come from a surgical operation 10 year ago during which the wife received a contaminated blood transfusion.

Because

All Chinese citizens to have access to treatment for blindness by 2020
By the year 2020, Chinese citizens will no longer have to suffer from treatable vision-related diseases, the National Office for the Prevention of Blindness announced here recently.

To achieve this goal, the office announced the establishment of a blindness prevention health and hygiene network which would cover 70 percent of China's villages and 80 percent of its provinces and cities.

By 2020, 70 percent of blind people should have received treatment, which means that the number o

China's first lacquer painting show staged in Xiamen
More than 230 lacquer paintings were put on display recently at China's first lacquer painting show staged in this port city in east China.

A seminar on the art of lacquer paintings will also be held during the exhibition, which runs through the day.

The exhibits were selected from 600 lacquer paintings from around the country, including Hong Kong and Macao, according to organizers.

The tradition of lacquer painting can be traced back to 7,000 years ago in the Hemudu Neolith

Compilation of records tracing Zheng Chenggong's family tree initiated
A ceremony was held recently in Nan'an city of east China's Fujian Province to introduce a compilation of records tracing the genealogical history of Zheng Chenggong, a national hero who drove Dutch colonists out of Taiwan in the 17th century.

The 50-volume genealogical history, upon its completion in 2010,will cover a 1,000-year period and will constitute the most accurate and complete record of Zheng's family tree.

In Nan'an, Zheng's birthplace, an inaugural ceremony was also hel

Chinese Mongolian living Buddha engaged in environmental protection
The Chinese Mongolian herdsmen nearby have begun to observe an old man leading several lamas to plant trees since last spring in the Muus Desert, one of the four deserts in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.

The old man turned out to be Arabten Daorji, 68, a living Buddha in Uxinzhao Town of Uxin Banner in Inner Mongolia's Ordos City. He became "Gegen" (the Mongolian word for living Buddha) of the town at the age of 3.

Uxinzhao Town was home to a large Tibetan Buddhist temple du

Artists discuss revival of Chinese wood engraving
Local artists attending a symposium on Chinese wood engraving have called for the revival of the once-popular art form.

The picture printed from engraved plate used to be so common and popular in Chinese homes, especially during the traditional Lunar New Year Festival, that it earned the name "New Year's Picture".

These days, however, wood engraving works can only be found in the homes of researchers or collectors or in remote villages, said the artists at the 1st International Sym

Endangered animal rescue center set up in Chaozhou city
An endangered animal rescue center was established here recently in Chaozhou City of Guangdong Province.

The center will take in wild animals seized in accordance with state protection laws, and provide medical attention, food and protection until further handover instructions are received from the local superior department in charge of wild animal protection.

The center will also serve as a major education center to raise public awareness with regard to the protection of endangere

Archeological breakthrough made in eastern Zhejiang province
A large number of Paleolithic sites have been discovered in east China's Zhejiang province, enabling scientists to trace the existence of humans in Zhejiang area back at least 126,000 years.

The province used to be considered China's only province without Paleolithic sites.

The latest findings are the resultant from one-month efforts of an archeological team formed jointly by the Zhejiang provincial archeology research institute and the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Pale

Expressway under construction in Hubei Province
Construction on the 234-km-long Xiaogan-Xiangfan expressway began recently in central China's Hubei Province.

The project, which is listed in the state plan as a key project, involves a total investment of 7.4 billion yuan (890 million US dollars), including 250 million US dollars in loans provided by the World Bank.

It is part of the expressway to be built between Yinchuan, the capital of northwestern Gansu Province, and Wuhan, the provincial capital of Hubei.

The project w

World Carnival HK to attract over 2 mln visitors
The forthcoming World Carnival Hong Kong, the largest carnival touring around the world, is expected to attract more than 2 million visitors and create around 450 local job opportunities, said the Invest Hong Kong here Thursday (Dec.5).

The world carnival, organized through a joint venture between UK Funfairs Ltd and Hong Kong-based World Carnival Ltd, will take place at the apron of the former Kai Tak Airport in Kowloon City between December 14, 2002 and February 9, 2003.

Invest H

China reveals first clue in riddle of terra-cotta warriors
The world-renowned terra-cotta warriors and horses unearthed from the tomb of Qin Shi Huang, or the first emperor of Qin dynasty (221-206 B.C.), were probably fired nearby, scientists have concluded after three years' hard work.

"This is the first step toward confirming the kiln sites, and before uncovering the secret of how the terra-cotta warriors and horses were made in ancient times," said Prof. Gao Zhengyao at Zhengzhou University in central China's Henan province, who was involved i

Investors to Jump Aboard Rail-ferry
The heralded Yantai-Dalian railway-ferry line project was formally launched this weekend with the establishment of a project management company. The Yantai-Dalian railway-ferry line - connecting Yantai Port to Yangtouwa Port of Dalian - will span 79.4 nautical miles across the Bohai Sea and is expected to involve 3.1 billion yuan (US$373 million), according to the newly-established company. Some 2.2 billion yuan (US$265 million) will be poured into the construction of the line and the purchase o

Urban Mysteries
Bettina Rheims and Serge Bramly left Shanghai with their perception of Shanghainese women embedded in 1,999 reels of film they took to be developed in Paris. The project, lasting four or five months, photographed women of all types and levels - celebrities and stars, models and ordinary people - and left Rheims thinking women in Shanghai were a mystery. The two French artists were inspired to do this project by Mian Mian's novel, "Candies", a bestseller in France. Interestingly enough, the novel

Jurassic Dinosaur Fossils Found on China's Southern Coast
A day at the seaside ended with an archaeological discovery when beach-goers from Fangcheng stumbled upon dinosaur fossils on the Jiangshan peninsula in south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. Archeologists with the Guangxi Natural Museum said this was the first time that dinosaur fossils of the Jurassic period (145 million and 208 million years ago) had been found on the southern coast of China. Before that, many dinosaur fossils dating back to the Cretaceous period (135 million and 60

Benchmark Stocks Go on 19-month Downtrend
China's benchmark stock inched lower yesterday, deepening a 19-month downtrend, but shares in select Shanghai-based firms defied the gloom on hopes they will benefit from the World Expo to be held in the city in 2010. The Shanghai composite index, which groups hard currency B shares and yuan-denominated A shares, closed down 0.33 percent at 1,400.867 points with investor confidence depressed by a lengthy slump, brokers said. Buying in Shanghai-based companies helped Shanghai's B share index end

Chinese Folk Music Gains Big Audience Around World
Hundreds of musicians from over 20 countries have performed, enjoyed and reveled in Chinese folk songs during a rare five-day International Folk Songs Festival, in Nanning, capital of south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. "I don't understand the Chinese, but I very much love the rhythms in the folk songs and the typical ways the singers sang them." said Griffiths Alexandre, a famed folk singer with a French troupe performing at the festival that ended recently. Van Zuylen, a Dutch tour

The Anqing Trilogy
A traveling Anqing businessman always prefaces questions about his hometown with pride stating, "I'm an Anqing native." Such replies often win him the respect and friendship of inquirers. Reflecting the city's recognition and esteem, people have positive thoughts about Anqing's past and present. Prior to 1949, the year the People's Republic of China was founded, Anqing was regarded as a "cultural" city. In its 785 years as capital of east China's Anhui Province, Anqing developed a diverse and br

1,700-year-old Legal Document Found in Gansu
An incomplete document dating back 1,700 years just has been unearthed in northwest China's Gansu Province, providing a valuable clue for archeologists on the long-lost Criminal Law of the imperial Jin Dynasty (265-420). The hand-written Annotation on the Criminal Law of the Jin Dynasty was pasted on a coffin in the Bijiatan site of Yumen city in Gansu. Because the coffin was seriously decayed, only more than 5,000 Chinese characters were still recognizable, said Zhang Junmin, associate research

Shanghai has higher divorce rate
Couples in Shanghai are suffering a rising divorce rate, mainly due to extramarital love affairs, China Daily reported recently.

Quoting statistics of a recent survey conducted by the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, the paper said the divorce rate in Shanghai has risen from 0.027 percent in the late 1970s to 0.486 percent of last year, 2.5 percent times of the country's average.

More than 40 percent of the divorced couples surveyed admitted their spouses had other sexual partn

Leisurely strolling down age-old lane
In the Xijie (West) Street, a time-weathered lane in the ancient, lovely town of Yangshuo in south China, a wrist watch seems to be a gadget you would least need.

Time means nothing for leisure seekers from almost every corner of the world traveling to this enchanting town, approximately 50 kilometers from Guilin, a world-renowned scenic resort in southern Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

It is almost midnight. Noushin Riazi is still nibbling her roasted corn cob beside a snack st

Bamboo industry flourishing in SW China city
Slender bamboo not only beautify the city, but also provide one third of the local revenue in Chishui, southwest China's Guizhou Province.

Out of a population of 230,000 in the rural area, 120,000 peasants earn half of their income through bamboo planting.

The 1,800-sq km city covers an area between the Sichuan basin and the Guizhou tableland. The area's subtropical climate and rich rain, together with complex landform and wide-ranging altitudes, make it highly suitable for bamboo

Bus journey might be happier experience in China
Commuting to work in a crowded bus can be an unpleasant experience, but commuters in Harbin, the capital of northeast China's Heilongjiang province, can enjoy the hottest hip hop, listen to the latest celebrity gossip, and even get employment information thanks to the VCD-supported TVs installed by the municipal government.

An official with the bus company in Harbin said that, since March of this year, the company has installed nearly 1,000 VCD-supported television sets on 500 buses.
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China building highway network to connect ethnic minority areas
Construction on a 4,397-km highway network linking areas inhabited by ethnic minorities is going smoothly and already bringing benefit to Sichuan Province, southwest China.

Costing 3.76 billion yuan (450 million US dollars) and covering mountainous areas more than 3,000 meters above sea level, the highway network is expected to connect the Tibetan Autonomous Prefectures of Aba and Garze and the Yi Autonomous Prefecture of Liangshan by the end of next year, the highway builders said.

Dinosaur site to become theme park
A site known for its dinosaur relics will soon be home to a theme park for the prehistoric creatures in the Tongguling area of Maoming city, south China's Guangdong Province.

The area is made up of several hills and has yielded many dinosaur egg and bone fragment fossils.

Tongguling is also covered with unusual red sandstone stratums belonging to the late Cretaceous period when dinosaurs thrived. Some scientists believe the stratums may still contain complete dinosaur skeletons.

Macao makes initial plan for light rail
The Macao Special Administrative Region (SAR) government has mapped out an initial plan to build its first light rail line connecting the city's major ports and tourism spots, according to an exclusive report of the Macao Daily News.

The line will run through Macao's third cross-sea bridge scheduled to open in early 2005 between the western parts of Macao Peninsular and Taipa Island.

And it will start at the Hong Kong-Macao Terminal and end at the Macao International Airport, passi

Guangzhou, Zhuhai to be linked by express railway
South China's Guangdong Province is set to build a high speed railway to link Guangzhou, the provincial capital, and the Zhuhai Special Economic Zone that borders Macao.

The 139.8-kilometre track will cost 20.8 billion yuan (US$2.51 billion) and be completed for traffic in 2008.

A feasibility study of the project will be completed by the end of the year and if given the green light, construction is expected to start before the end of 2003, according to an unnamed official from the

China to set up database of intangible cultural heritage
The Chinese Academy of Arts (CAA) will invite domestic and overseas experts in the following five years to investigate Chinese oral and intangible heritage and set up a comprehensive database for evaluating it.

CAA Vice-president Wang Wenzhang made the remarks here Sunday at the opening of an international symposium on "Safeguarding and Preservation of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity".

Wang said the CAA, as a national artistic research institute responsible for saving,

Big reservoir planned to increase flow of China's largest waterfall in Guizhou
China is planning to build a large reservoir on the upper reaches of the Huangguoshu Falls, in southwest China's Guizhou province, hoping to enhance its flow in dry seasons.

According to the provincial water resources and hydropower department, Guizhou will invest 300 million yuan (36.3 million US dollars) to build an upstream reservoir 14 kilometers from Huangguoshu, which could irrigate over 3,000 hectares of farmland.

The reservoir with a capacity of more than 10,000 cubic meter

Cultural heritage preservation a success in China
But as to why the Chinese mainland has succeeded in achieving brilliant archeological findings in the past decade, it's because the past 13 years have been the years of stable development in a comprehensive way.

Director of the Shaanxi Provincial Cultural Heritage Bureau Zhang Tinghao made such remarks in an exclusive interview with Xinhua recently when asked how China managed to achieve the impressive archeological findings that are the very essence of the exhibition titled: "War and Pea

HK museum to showcase Qin and Han dynasty relics
An exhibition featuring unexhibited cultural relics from the Qin and Han dynasties (221 B.C. to 200 A.D.) is opened to general public for viewing at the Hong Kong Museum of History on Nov.27,2002.

The exhibition, titled "War and Peace - Treasures of the Qin and Han Dynasties exhibition" will showcase cultural relics from the era of rule of Emperor Qinshihuang to that of Emperor Hanwudi.

Paul Leung, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) director of leisure and cultural ser

Law Passed to Protect Dunhuang Treasures
Local legislature in Gansu Province, northwest China, has passed a special law to better protect the Mogao Grottoes in Dunhuang City, one of the country's three major Buddhist art treasures. Underground relics, sites of historical interest and the natural environment around the prestigious Mogao Grottoes are the three protected categories under the new Regulation for Protection of the Gansu Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes passed by the Standing Committee of the Gansu Provincial People's Congress on Dec.

Bankruptcy Filing Won?Harm United Airlines?China Business
United Airlines operations in China continued normally following the company's filing for bankruptcy on Monday. "The company's reorganization in the United States will not affect its ability to continue its operations in China," said Sidney Kwok, United Airlines general manager for China. According to Kwok, United Airlines is working hard to resolve the challenges currently facing the company. In the meantime, business will go on as usual. United Airlines filed for bankruptcy protection under Ch

Collector Displays Wartime Evidence
These are the sabers and bayonets used by the Japanese soldiers to kill Chinese people. These are the cotton-padded clothes they wore, a man explained to students at the Nanjing University students' center, where a free exhibition is displaying evidence of the Japanese invasion of China. Ren Dianjue, a 53-year-old farmer, has been collecting such items for almost 10 years. Hundreds of black and white pictures are displayed in the exhibition hall. Sabers, grenades and other military objects are l

First Anniversary of Entry to WTO: Foreign Investors Eye Tourism Sector
China's tourism sector has made progress in lowering the market threshold for foreign investors to set up joint ventures or run travel services. China currently has about 10 joint-venture tourist agencies with major foreign companies, including German-based TUI (Touristik Union International), United States-based Rosenbluth and American Express. In line with China's agreement with the WTO, foreign investors will be permitted to hold shares in tourist agencies operating in China by the end of 200

New Abnormal Chromosome Discovered
Recently, staff at the Zhangzhou Institute of Medical Science in east China's Fujian Province examined the chromosomes of a woman who has lost four babies due to spontaneous abortions in the second month of pregnancy. The staff detected abnormalities in her chromosomes. Identified by Xia Jiahui, a member of the National Key Laboratory of Medical Genetics of China, and other experts as abnormalities in the chromosomal nucleus, the results were revealed to the world for the first time. The institu

Shichahai -- A Magnet for the Seekers of Old Beijing
From May to September, visitors to Beijing are recommended to visit the city's hutongs, or lanes, along the banks of Shichahai, where scenes of the old Beijing are still preserved. When the sun is setting in the west, the lake is a pleasant place for visitors to enjoy the cool while savoring tea on an ancient-style wood boat. The heat of summer hesitates to leave Beijing even in September. During the long period of summer, Shichahai is a good place in urban Beijing to seek the cool, especially i

UA Flights Stay in Air in China
United Airlines operations in China continued normally following the company's filing for bankruptcy on Monday. "The company's reorganization in the United States will not affect its ability to continue its operations in China," said Sidney Kwok, United Airlines general manager for China. According to Kwok, United Airlines is working hard to resolve the challenges currently facing the company. In the meantime, business will go on as usual. United Airlines filed for bankruptcy protection under Ch

More Chinese enhancing their future with international qualifications
Yang Jingsong, a 27-year-old white-collar worker in Beijing, recently gave up a well-paid job in order to prepare for tests of the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI).

"My long-term goal is to become an international business professional, and the LCCI's qualification is an internationally accepted credential that leads to better jobs," she said.

In fact, a growing number of white-collar workers in Beijing have come to believe that an international qualification will lea

China invites over 440,000 overseas experts annually
China has sent out more than 440,000 invitations to overseas experts per year, according to the State Bureau of Foreign Experts Affairs (SBFEA).

State Councilor Wang Zhongyu said in his written message to the national meeting of SBFEA staff in Beijing recently, inviting overseas experts was a prime factor in "strengthening China with high-quality personnel", and also vital to its opening-up drive.

In recent years, China has seen greater efforts and wider cooperation in the sphere o

Chinese students back from overseas seek fortune in government
Liu Yuelun holds a British doctoral degree and serves as deputy director on the Development Zone Management Committee of prosperous Guangzhou City in south China's Guangdong Province.

After returning from Britain in 1993, Liu chose to launch his career in government rather than the commercial world or starting his own business.

Liu is not alone among "haiguipai" - those Chinese who get degrees overseas then return to the homeland - in seeking fortune in political circles. Li Yuguan

Commemorative Stamp HK Disneyland to be issued
Hong Kong's Postmaster General Luk Ping-chuen announced that a set of special stamps to commemorate the groundbreaking of the Hong Kong Disneyland was issued on Dec.22.

Scheduled to open in late 2005/06 fiscal year at Penny's Bay on the Lantau Island, Hong Kong Disneyland will feature classic Disney attractions, unique shops and restaurants, dazzling live entertainment and all the magic and imagination people have come to expect from Disney parks around the world.

The stamps are pr

China invests huge funds to end droughts and floods
The central government has invested178.6 billion yuan (22 billion US dollars) over the previous five years in water conservation projects said Minister of Water Resources Wang Shucheng at a national water resources conference over the last weekend according to the China Daily.

These projects are used to fight against drought and flooding, strengthen reservoirs and tackle shortages in drinking water for human beings and animals and they have passed careful examination by the State Council.

Tianjin invests 180 billion yuan in river project
Tianjin, a northern Chinese port city southeast of Beijing, recently invited bidding on designs for its massive 180 billion yuan (21.7 billion US dollars) project to develop the areas along the Haihe River that flows through the city.

Prestigious domestic and foreign design institutions, including those from the United States, France and Australia, showed strong interest in the project at the press conference sponsored by the municipal government.

The initial phase includes the bui

Late Chinese thinker's residence to open to public in Fuzhou
The late Chinese thinker Yan Fu's residence in Fuzhou has been renovated and opens to the public recently.

Born in 1854, Yan was a scholar known for advocating western learning in the late 19th century in China. He was the first to translate British naturalist Charles R. Darwin's "On the Origin of Species" into the Chinese language.

Yan translated Thomas H. Huxley's Evolution and Ethics, which yielded much influence on the thinking of contemporary scholars at that time.

Yan

Exhaustive data bank on Dunhuang grottoes being built
Researchers or common enthusiasts of Dunhuang may have access in two years to any information on the Buddhist cultural site's manuscript scrolls, grotto archeology and history and geography, thanks to a special data bank under construction.

Upon completion, the data bank being built at the Dunhuang Research Institute is expected to be the most complete and authentic information service center in the world on the Dunhuang grottoes in northwest China's Gansu Province.

Sorting and com

Three Gorges on Yangtze River to retain its splendor: expert
The Three Gorges on the Yangtze River will remain one of the most spectacular gorge scenes in the world despite the damming of the river, according to a Chinese specialist.

Although the water level of the Three Gorges section will rise around 100 meters once the Three Gorges Reservoir is filled with water, the gorges will retain a magnificent height of nearly 1,000 meters above the water, said Professor Li Jiangfeng, who heads the Institute of Land and Resources Management of the China Un

China to host world heritage conference in June
The 27th World Heritage Conference will be held in Suzhou City of east China's Jiangsu Province in June 2003.

This will be the first time for China to host an annual meeting of the World Heritage Committee, the Popular Science and Technology News reported on Jan.15.

Participants from 175 countries and regions are expected to discuss and approve sites to be added to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization's world heritage list.

The upcoming confer

Customs clearance efficiency enhanced in Beijing Capital Airport
The time for cargo to clear customs at Beijing Capital Airport has been shortened from over 23 hours to an average 12 hours.

The Beijing Foreign Trade and Economic Commission released the figure recently, saying that with such a customs clearance speed, the capital airport has become the most efficient airport nationwide.

For some urgent cargoes, the time for customs clearance was even shortened to 4-8 hours.

The airport has achieved this more efficient clearance by all-out

Fujian targets improved Taiwan ties
A senior provincial Taiwan affairs official in East China's Fujian Province has pledged to take full advantage of all opportunities to strengthen economic and trade co-operation with Taiwan.

"The mainland's wider opening-up following its entry into the World Trade Organization is set to appeal to more investors from the island in the new year," said Zhang Guangmin, deputy director of the Fujian Provincial Taiwan Affairs Office.

He predicted that Taiwanese investment in the coastal

HKSAR to catapult into tourism hub in a few years
We've never been more confident in Hong Kong or the potential success of Hong Kong Disneyland. Hong Kong is an even stronger tourism market than it was back in 1999 when we first announced this project, remarked Robert Iger, president of the Walt Disney company, recently.

Iger's bullish view of Hong Kong and the Chinese mainland's economic development is only a sample of the vote of confidence be speaking the international business community's commitment to investing in the Hong Kong Spec

China's historical, cultural cities voted the most popular: Internet poll
A monthly survey conducted via the Internet asking people to name their favorite Chinese cities revealed that those with great historical and cultural value won the day.

The Internet poll released in Beijing on Jan.8, indicated that cities such as Guilin, Hangzhou, Xi'an, Shanghai, Beijing, Chengdu, Luoyang and Quanzhou won the most votes. All are listed among China's state-level historical and cultural cities.

The poll, which was initiated by China's unique nation-wide website, ww

Statue of Ming General to Be Erected
A statue of Zheng Chenggong, a general of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), is being built in Quanzhou City, in east China's Fujian Province, and is expected go on display by the middle of the year. The statue of the national hero riding a horse, which is 38 meters high, 42 meters long and weighs nearly 500 tons, would be the largest of its kind in the world, said Professor Li Weisi, of the arts college of Xiamen University, who designed the monument. Zheng, who was known as Koxinga, was born in Fuj

Chinese Single Women Enjoy Colorful Lives
A 37-year-old single woman surnamed Wei, from north China's coastal city Dalian, is satisfied with her unattached life. As the boss of a company, Wei spends most of her time working with her employees. "I don't worry about anything except my work," said Wei. "I enjoy spending my time with my employees." Every weekend, Wei buys a bunch of flowers to decorate her big house of 120 square meters. By the end of a year, she spends over 10,000 RMB yuan (US$1,209) on new clothes. Most of her spare time

Operators Eye Maglev's Tourism Potential
Shanghai city tour operators are considering whether to include the new magnetic levitation train in their packages to attract more out-of-town tourists, the Shanghai Morning Post said today. Some travel agencies plan to promote the train line as one of Shanghai's signature spots at the upcoming international tourism fair to be held in Berlin, Germany. Some plan to include the high-speed train line in their spring promotions in other Chinese provinces. The Sino-German developed line, the first c

Cracking Down on Web Pirates
A massive nationwide crackdown against Internet game piracy is expected to be carried out next month to clean up the mushrooming market and extend protection of online intellectual property. The move comes against the backdrop of the nation's fight against piracy of recreational products, a key condition of the country's World Trade Organization membership. Ministry of Culture officials said yesterday they will cooperate with local government bodies and Internet game operators to keep the boomin

China lays out family-planning schemes to boost development
China mapped out a three-step family-planning scheme here recently to ensure its economic development has a much more favorable climate.

Zhang Weiqing, Minister in Charge of the State Family Planning Commission, said at the National Work Conference on Family Planning that by 2005 the population of the Chinese mainland would be kept lower than 1.33 billion with an annual growth rate less than 0.9 percent.

By 2010, the total would be limited to 1.4 billion with an annual birth rate l

China's forestation efforts in 2002 reach record high
In 2002 China's forestation efforts resulted in 7.47 million hectares of land planted with trees, 1.6 times as much land as in 2001, the People's Daily reported recently.

Zhou Shengxian, director of the State Administration of Forestry, said the accelerated pace of the country's forestation work over the past year generated substantial ecological and economic benefits.

Of the 4.13 million hectares of farmland which was converted into forest over the past year, about 2.16 million he

China to hold another high-level international marathon in Xiamen
China has decided to hold another high-level international marathon race annually in Xiamen, a beautiful coastal city in south China, and the first of its kind will start on March 30, 2003.

A reliable source from the State Sports General Administration said recently that the level of the upcoming Xiamen marathon race is the same as that of the Beijing international marathon race held annually in autumn.

Furthermore, the organizers have set the competition route on the amazing ring

Ethnic minority cookbook published in SW China
A book describing the diverse cuisine of 26 ethnic groups has been published in southwest China's Yunnan Province.

The "Collection of Dian Cuisine", in which Dian is the abbreviated name of Yunnan, includes 1,000 distinctive dishes from the province.

The book provides cooking instructions, historical background and pictures of each dish and cultural and geographic information about the places of origin. The dishes from the Wa, Lisu, Nu and Dulong minorities are the first recorded i

Dunhuang murals reproduce history of ancient Chinese music
The murals in the Dunhuang Grottoes in northwest China's Gansu Province, depicting musical instruments used over a period of about 1,000 years, trace the evolution of ancient Chinese music, according to experts.

Depicting musical instruments from ten dynasties beginning with the Northern Wei (386-534) and ending with the Yuan (1271-1386), the Dunhuang murals reflect the changes in the Chinese musical instruments.

The musical instrument in the Northern Liang period of the Northern a

Third Changchun Int'l Auto Fair to be held in July
The third Changchun International Automobile Fair is to be staged in China's "auto city", Changchun,from July 15 to 22, the organizing committee said.

This fair is expected to be larger and more international than the previous one, said Gu Xiaoguang, deputy director of the organizing committee.

According to Gu, more world-famous auto-makers have promised to attend, such as Volkswagen, which funded the first Chinese-foreign joint car company in Changchun, capital of northeast China'

KFC moves operations out of imperial park
The Kentucky Fried Chicken outlet in Beijing's famed imperial-era Beihai Park moved out on Jan.8, according to the KFC manager's assistant.

Song Ying, assistant manager of the KFC Beihai outlet, said the restaurant stopped service today following more than a decade of operations. The restaurant opened for business in 1993, and its ten-year contract with the park expired in 2002.

According to a local regulation on the management of Beijing's parks that takes effect this year, ancien

East China Shandong province sees booming tourism in 2002
Shandong Province, one of China's east coast economic powerhouses, received 96.71 million tourists last year, a figure that exceeds its total population, said a local tourism official.

Zhu Limin, deputy head of the Shandong provincial tourism administration, said domestic tourists accounted for 95.73 million, up 18 percent from 2001, and foreign tourists totaled 976,800, up 17.88 percent.

The tourism industry generated revenue of 61.08 billion yuan (7.36 billion US dollars) in 2002

Xiamen received 10 million tourists in 2002
Xiamen in east China's Fujian province received a record high 10 million overseas and domestic tourists in 2002, according to local tourism officials.

Xiamen, dubbed as "the garden in the sea", has seen a growing number of tourist arrivals in the past decade.

The city received about 5.15 million tourists in 1996, and the figure jumped to 9.08 million in 2001.

Guo Hengming, chief of the Tourism Bureau of the Xiamen city government, said the city hopes to become an environment

Renovated luxury yacht begins sightseeing trips on Yangtze River
The renovated luxury yacht "Yangtze Princess" commenced operations on the Yangtze River on Saturday, carrying 132 passengers from Malaysia, Europe, and the United States to witness the natural beauty of the Three Gorges.

New services and facilities have been incorporated on the yacht, including Chinese massage parlors, more satellite TV programs and a British-made fire alarm system.

The yacht left Wuhan, capital of central China's Hubei province, at 4 p.m. and would reach its desti

Air ticket prices likely to drop
Air ticket prices are set to drop on the back of a policy change expected after this year's Spring Festival peak season, sources close to the aviation administrator revealed. China Daily reported on Jan.22.

Discounts offered to consumers are likely to double, with the former 20 per cent limit being raised to 40 per cent.

These price reductions will be determined by seasonal factors and the dates when the tickets were booked.

For example, an air ticket from Shanghai to Shenzh

Shanghai developing airport to welcome World Expo in 2010
Shanghai is making plans to develop its Pudong Airport in anticipation of increased traffic arising from the World Expo to be held in 2010.

According to the top leaders of the Shanghai airport group, experts will be commissioned to update the general plan of the Pudong Airport building.

Pudong is Shanghai's newest international airport built in 1999 to take the burden off the existing Hongqiao Airport, and will shoulder the majority of air transport by 2010.

The building pro

Support from mainland, global outlook crucial to economic success: Tung Chee Hwa
Staunch support from the Chinese mainland and global outlook have been crucial to Hong Kong's economic success, Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Tung Chee Hwa said recently.

Tung made the remarks while delivering his first policy address in his second term at the Legislative Council recently.

Over the past year, the positive effects of China's accession to the WTO have begun to emerge. "We must seize these opportunities to elevate Hong Kong from its tr

HK to consolidate role as Asia's world city: Tung Chee Hwa
Hong Kong will strengthen its identity as Asia's world city which embodies the spirit and characteristics of Hong Kong and reflects its competitive edge.

Tung Chee Hwa, chief executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR), made the remarks when he delivered his policy address at the Legislative Council recently.

"We have a fair and independent judicial system and both the SAR government and the community uphold and cherish the rule of law," said Tung.

Tung sa

Seminar Pledges Continuation of Policy on Taiwan
Beijing on Friday stepped up its efforts to push ahead with the establishment of the three direct links across the Taiwan Straits while urging for the resumption of political dialogue to facilitate rapprochement between the mainland and the island province. Vice-Premier Qian Qichen described an early implementation of cross-Straits trade, transport and postal services as "the trend of the times, the desire of the people and the most pressing matter of the moment." "The establishment of cross-Str

Shanghai: Medical Agents for Seeing Doctors Abroad
China's first medical agent service appeared in Shanghai. When this kind of service become popular across the country, it will become a commonplace for common Chinese people to see doctors abroad. Anxing, a health consultation company in Taiwan, has recently landed in Shanghai with its 17 medical agents. Patients in Shanghai who suffer serious diseases can be diagnosed at one of the best hospitals at home and then transferred to a hospital abroad if necessary, with the help of medical agents. Al

Seminar Pledges Continuation of Policy on Taiwan
Beijing on Friday stepped up its efforts to push ahead with the establishment of the three direct links across the Taiwan Straits while urging for the resumption of political dialogue to facilitate rapprochement between the mainland and the island province. Vice-Premier Qian Qichen described an early implementation of cross-Straits trade, transport and postal services as "the trend of the times, the desire of the people and the most pressing matter of the moment.'' "The establishment of cross-St

Camera Films Tiger Eating Prey
A Siberian tiger devouring a dead horse was photographed in Northeast China on Friday night using long-range infrared photographic technology. Since the beginning of this year, the tracks of rare Siberian tigers have appeared frequently in the Huichun Nature Reserve in Jilin Province. On January 22, farmer Yang Jianjun found his pregnant horse dead in a cornfield one kilometer from the village where he lives. There were distinct tiger footprints around the dead horse. Yang, who did not dare touc

Shenzhen Opens 24-hour Border Crossing
Twenty-four hour border crossing is like a brand new start to me. It seems as if an entirely new economic relationship has emerged between the Hong Kong SAR and the mainland, Zhou Qi, a Shenzhen Special Economic Zone resident said Monday. Zhou, moving unhurriedly with his fishing net and sports bag, was one of the first few of the approximately 2,200 people crossing the Lok Ma Chau/Huanggang border checkpoint into Shenzhen within the first two hours after the implementation of the 24-hour passen

Snap Shots Focus on India
It seems Buddha, movies and dancing are all Chinese people really know about India. Few have had an opportunity to visit the neighboring country that has so many similarities and differences with China. But three Chinese photographers are now showing a new face of India, an ancient civilization that is experiencing the dynamics and challenges of modern culture -- just like China. Organized by the Embassy of India in Beijing, the exhibition at the Jintai Art Museum in eastern Beijing's Chaoyang P

Holiday Gift-giving Going Modern
Expensive tonics, leisure and entertainment products, innovative electronic gadgets and gym member-ship cards have become the top choices for Chinese New Year gifts in Shanghai. "Hams," "candies" and "cakes" - the three "musts" of recent history - are seldom seen now on New Year gift shopping lists. More individualized and more fashionable presents are the "in" stuff. The Chinese New Year or Spring Festival falls on Saturday this year, celebrating the Year of the Sheep. Local economists attribut

Guzheng Musician Rocks On
Wang Yong laughingly describes himself as "a hybrid." He is definitely not, but his music might be. He has been trained in traditional ways, yet he produces his music on a computer. He teaches electronic music in the China Conservatory of Music, yet his colleagues and students consider him a rock musician, while most of his friends in the rock field say he is a master of guzheng, a zither-like instrument mostly with 21 strings. No other word than "cross-over" better describes Wang's music and no

Holiday Gift-giving Going Modern
Expensive tonics, leisure and entertainment products, innovative electronic gadgets and gym membership cards have become the top choices for Chinese New Year gifts in Shanghai. "Hams," "candies" and "cakes" - the three "musts" of recent history - are seldom seen now on New Year gift shopping lists. More individualized and more fashionable presents are the "in" stuff. The Chinese New Year or Spring Festival falls on Saturday this year, celebrating the Year of the Sheep. Local economists attribute

Spring Festival Goes International
The temple fair is as always a first choice for merrymakers to celebrate China's biggest holiday, the Lunar New Year. And this year, a whirl of foreign entertainment is spicing up the traditional event. The louder, the luckier. The gong ushers in a parade, performing a scene from China's famous ancient novel "A Dream of Red Mansions." It depicts an imperial concubine visiting her parents. But the actress is not Chinese but German. Desiree Soehendir, a German student, said, "I am excited, it is s

Pipeline Project Uncovers 18 Archeological Sites
In a spin-off from the West-to-East Gas Transmission Project, the world of archeology has already gained no fewer than 18 previously unknown ancient cultural relic sites. The recent discoveries came to light in the Gansu section of the pipeline. Sites already authenticated include by far the earliest remains of the Neolithic Culture ever to be found in the Hexi Corridor (an area to the west of the Yellow River). In addition there are two sites of the ancient Horse Culture. In a bid to make this

Pipeline Project Uncovers 18 Archeological Sites
In a spin-off from the West-to-East Gas Transmission Project, the world of archeology has already gained no fewer than 18 previously unknown ancient cultural relic sites. The recent discoveries came to light in the Gansu section of the pipeline. Sites already authenticated include by far the earliest remains of the Neolithic Culture ever to be found in the Hexi Corridor (an area to the west of the Yellow River). In addition there are two sites of the ancient Horse Culture. In a bid to make this

More Chinese Heading Abroad
A booming economy and simplified procedures combined last year to boost the number of Chinese traveling overseas past 16.5 million people, up almost 37 percent compared with 2001. According to additional statistics from the Ministry of Public Security, people from the mainland traveled to Hong Kong and Macao most last year. Japan, Russia, Thailand and the Republic of Korea topped about 230 foreign destinations. Among the many elements encouraging those from the mainland to go overseas, being hir

Spring Festival Goes International
The temple fair is as always a first choice for merrymakers to celebrate China's biggest holiday, the Lunar New Year. And this year, a whirl of foreign entertainment is spicing up the traditional event. The louder, the luckier. The gong ushers in a parade, performing a scene from China's famous ancient novel "A Dream of Red Mansions." It depicts an imperial concubine visiting her parents. But the actress is not Chinese but German. Desiree Soehendir, a German student, said, "I am excited, it is s

Liaoning Province Sees Remarkable Rise in Tourism Income
Northeast China's Liaoning Province reported a big rise in tourism income in 2002, according to the provincial statistics bureau. The province hosted 930,000 overseas visitors last year and earned US$550 million from tourism, up 25.6 and 18.9 percent respectively on a yearly basis. More than 63.05 million domestic tourists visited the province in 2002, bringing in 39.7 billion yuan (US$4.8 billion), up 26.5 percent and 44.9 percent respectively from the previous year, the bureau said. To attract

Spring Festival Goes International
The temple fair is as always a first choice for merrymakers to celebrate China's biggest holiday, the Lunar New Year. And this year, a whirl of foreign entertainment is spicing up the traditional event. The louder, the luckier. The gong ushers in a parade, performing a scene from China's famous ancient novel "A Dream of Red Mansions." It depicts an imperial concubine visiting her parents. But the actress is not Chinese but German. Desiree Soehendir, a German student, said, "I am excited, it is s

Mainland Tourists Enjoy Shopping in HK
Tourists from the Chinese mainland have brought a new round of shopping wave in Hong Kong during China's lunar New Year period starting as of Feb. 1. According to the Hong Kong tourism administration, a total of 2,500 mainland touring parties paid visits to Hong Kong in the past five days and over 300,000 mainland tourists are expected to visit Hong Kong during the lunar New Year period. The Travel Industry Council of Hong Kong estimated that Chinese mainland tourists' consuming in Hong Kong may

Mainland Tourists Enjoy Shopping in HK
Tourists from the Chinese mainland have brought a new round of shopping wave in Hong Kong during China's lunar New Year period starting as of Feb. 1. According to the Hong Kong tourism administration, a total of 2,500 mainland touring parties paid visits to Hong Kong in the past five days and over 300,000 mainland tourists are expected to visit Hong Kong during the lunar New Year period. The Travel Industry Council of Hong Kong estimated that Chinese mainland tourists' consuming in Hong Kong may

Chongqing to Resettle 100,000 People from Three Gorges This Year
Southwest China's Chongqing City will resettle about 100,000 people from the Three Gorges Reservoir area this year, says Liu Fuyin, director of the city's resettlement department. The municipality was scheduled to move more than 470,000 residents from the reservoir area from now to the end of 2009 when the gigantic damming project would be completed, Liu said. It would also have to shift 556 industrial and mining enterprises and rebuild more than 10 million square meters of buildings over the ne

China's Cloned Goats to Give Birth Soon
The world's first goat cloned from an adult goat body cell, Yang Yang, is expected to give birth again at the Yangling high-tech experimental zone in Xi'an, northwest China's Shaanxi Province, in the first month of the Year of the Goat. Yang Yang, a cloned goat born in 2000, became pregnant after a natural mating with an Angola goat. Medical examinations show the pregnancy is normal. Qing Qing, a twin daughter of Yang Yang and born in August, 2001, has also been found pregnant and would give bir

Big Money Earmarked for Reindeer Protection
The Chinese government is to earmark 11.2 million yuan (US$1.3 million) in the next two years to protect its endangered reindeer, the forestry administration of north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region has announced. The rare species is listed as China's main protection priority with around 700 surviving in an Ewenki ethnic tribe village deep in the Greater Khingan Mountain Range. China has included the Ewenki breeding area in the state forestry wildlife protection and natural reserve list

Progress Made in Sino-UK E-science Cooperation
China and the United Kingdom have made remarkable progress in mutual cooperation in the Internet sharing of science resources known as "e-science", a recent conference in Kunming, capital of southern China's Yunnan Province, has heard. Scientists were now able to participate in the platform sharing of biological science resources, data exploration and knowledge analysis, said Li Yixue, professor with the Shanghai Institute for Biological Sciences of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, in the China-

China Final of Miss Universe to Be Held in Jinan
The final contest to choose who will be the image of China at the 2003 Miss Universe beauty pageant will be held in Jinan, the capital of eastern China's Shandong Province and the hometown of Confucius on April 18-19. Li Deming, director of the organizing committee of the China final, told a conference that this is the first time for the country to officially host such a nationwide contest for the pageant. Miss Universe is one of the three world-class beauty contests along with Miss World and Mi

Chongqing to Resettle 100,000 People from Three Gorges
Southwest China's Chongqing Municipality will resettle about 100,000 people from the Three Gorges Reservoir area this year, says Liu Fuyin, director of the city's resettlement department. The municipality was scheduled to move more than 470,000 residents from the reservoir area from now to the end of 2009 when the gigantic damming project would be completed, Liu said. It would also have to shift 556 industrial and mining enterprises and rebuild more than 10 million square meters of buildings ove

From Farmers to Townspeople
After spending 300,000 yuan (US$36,188) on an apartment in the city, Chen Jianyun, a farmer in Zhejiang Province, realized a long-cherished dream -- to turn from farmers into townspeople. Chen and his family are beneficiaries of a reform carried out by the provincial government, which allows the registered residence of people, formerly permanent, to change based on where they own a house. Today in Zhejiang, some 2,400 farmers follow Chen's footsteps each day to become city residents. During the

480,000 Local Residents Make Way for Dam
Nearly 480,000 local residents living in the Three Gorges Reservoir areas will be relocated in the coming six years. During the period, a total of 556 businesses and factories will also be shifted to make way for the world's biggest hydropower project on the Yangtze River. The announcement was made by an official from the Three Gorges Project Construction Committee under the State Council, Agency reported Friday. The successful relocation of residents during the construction of the reservoir on

Traffic Peak Starts as Festival Ends
As the weeklong Spring Festival holidays drew to a close on Friday, millions of people across the country were once again on the move. With Friday's transportation peak, trains, planes, buses and cars were once again groaning under the strain. Four million people traveled by train on Friday and 360,000 took to the air, according to official estimates by the Ministry of Railways and the General Administration of Civil Aviation of China, making a new high in the nation's travel history. "The seats

Shandong Equipped with Intelligent Traffic System
China's largest-scale intelligent traffic system began operation earlier this week in east China's Shandong Province, providing a 24-hour information service for drivers and travelers on the province's expressways. Real-time pictures and information can be available on a projection screen at the control center, showing cars and trucks on the expressways, providing their locations and driving speed, and even the movements of toll collectors. The Shandong Expressway Information and Management Syst

Chinese Nets Presidency of UN Court
Chinese judge Shi Jiuyong has been elected by colleagues at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on Thursday to assume the presidency of the tribunal. It is the first time a Chinese national has presided over the ICJ since it was founded in 1946. Shi, 76, will replace outgoing president Gilbert Guillaume of France. Sixty-year-old Raymond Ranjeva of Madagascar was elected vice-president. Both men will serve a three-year term. The ICJ, composed of 15 judges, is the highest United Nations court

Taiwan, Mainland to Co-host Lantern Show
A local cultural exchange center in Fuzhou City, the capital of Fujian Province, and Mawei Island, in Taiwan Province, will join hands for the second time to host a traditional lantern show in Fuzhou. The show, to be held during February's Lantern Festival, is one of a series of new developments in the relations between the mainland cultural center and the island. On Jan. 28, 2001, the two sides signed an agreement on people-to-people economic and cultural exchanges, and since then, 3,766 people

Terror Alert Raised to 'High Risk' Orange in US
The US government raised its terror threat level to "high risk" orange on Friday, warning of a growing possibility that the al-Qaida network would launch an attack against the United States to coincide with Muslim holy days. Changing the terror alert color from "yellow" triggered tighter security at borders, airports and hotels. Officials also urged greater vigilance by all Americans. Attorney General John Ashcroft said the government had received intelligence information, corroborated by multip

Master Remembered by Adoring Fans
For Ran Liuling, the celebrations held at the 1,243-year-old Du Fu Thatched Cottage yesterday were truly poetry in motion. The 71-year-old farmer had made a pilgrimage to the cottage, in the western suburbs of Chengdu, capital of southwest China's Sichuan Province, to mark a day in honor of Du Fu -- one of the nation's greatest poets. "I have come specially to take part in the celebration of 'Day of Human Beings'," Ran said. The celebrations attracted around 13,200 people to the Du Fu Thatched C

Traffic Peak Starts as Festival Ends
As the week-long Spring Festival holidays drew to a close on Friday, millions of people across the country were once again on the move. With Friday's transportation peak, trains, planes, buses and cars were once again groaning under the strain. Four million people travelled by train on Friday and 360,000 took to the air, according to official estimates by the Ministry of Railways and the General Administration of Civil Aviation of China, making a new high in the nation's travel history. "The sea

480,000 Local Residents Make Way for Dam
Nearly 480,000 local residents living in the Three Gorges Reservoir areas will be relocated in the coming six years. During the period, a total of 556 businesses and factories will also be shifted to make way for the world's biggest hydropower project on the Yangtze River. The announcement was made by an official from the Three Gorges Project Construction Committee under the State Council, Agency reported Friday. The successful relocation of residents during the construction of the reservoir on

Guangzhou Steps Up Protection of IPR
Guangzhou, capital of south China's Guangdong Province, has stepped up protection of intellectual property rights, latest customs statistics show. The local customs bureau received 20 patent-related appeals and dealt with 24 cases on intellectual property rights last year, 3.43 times more than the previous year. Most of the counterfeits were ferreted out in exports, involving products like socks, watches, batteries and cosmetics labeled with some internationally well-known brands. Guangzhou cust

Shanghai, Leading Recipient of Capital
Shanghai has become a leading recipient of capital, not only from abroad, but also from other parts of the country. Last year the city accumulated 50.65 billion yuan (US$6.102 billion) in investment from other parts of China, representing a year-on-year increase of 84.6 percent, with a daily average at 130 million yuan (US$15.66 million). According to the latest statistics from the local bureau for industry and commerce, 6,427 wholly-owned or controlling enterprises were set up last year by Chin

Spring Festival Seeing 59 Million Tourists
China hosted 59.47 million tourists during the Spring Festival holiday from Feb. 1 to 7, up 15.3 percent from the corresponding period of last year, an official said Saturday. Total tourism income in the seven-day holiday reached 25.76 billion yuan (US$3.13 billion), an increase of 13 percent. Family travel during the Spring Festival was a new trend. More Chinese people preferred to travel abroad, with Vietnam, Thailand, the Republic of Korea and Australia their favorite choices, said Wang Jun,

Underground Reservoir Found in Taklimakan Desert
Chinese geologists have detected a large-scale underground reservoir in the country's largest desert. The underground reservoir has a storage capacity of 36 billion cubic meters, almost the amount of the Three Gorges Reservoir under construction, said experts at the China Geological Survey Bureau (CGSV). The amazing find in the Taklimakan Desert, or "Sea of Death," in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region is big step in China's water-finding efforts in its most arid northwest. The CGSV's preliminary

Revision of Japanese Textbook Blurs History
The revision of a Japanese history textbook has met strong protests from the Chinese. The Japanese military forces mass murdered more than 300,000 Chinese people in Nanjing City, east China's Jiangsu Province, during World War II. But the incident, known as the Nanjing Massacre, is being brushed over in the new editions of the history books. Recent reports say the Japanese Education Ministry has approved the omission of a sentence in a Japanese history textbook for senior high school students. I

Spring Festival Seeing 59 Million Tourists
China hosted 59.47 million tourists during the Spring Festival holiday from Feb. 1 to 7, up 15.3 percent from the corresponding period of last year, an official said Saturday. Total tourism income in the seven-day holiday reached 25.76 billion yuan (US$3.13 billion), an increase of 13 percent. Family travel during the Spring Festival was a new trend. More Chinese people preferred to travel abroad, with Vietnam, Thailand, the Republic of Korea and Australia their favorite choices, said Wang Jun,

New Research Lengthens Bamboo Painting History
New research on bamboo paintings found in the Dunhuang grottoes in northwest China's Gansu Province shows the art form may be dated back to the fifth century. In the past, bamboo painting was thought to have appeared no earlier than the Tang Dynasty (618 AD - 907 AD), when some renowned painters, poets and emperors painted bamboo images with black inks, said Professor Yang Xiong, of the Dunhuang Research Academy. However, research on the Dunhuang paintings showed that many of the bamboo painting

China Hosts 59.47 Million Tourists During Spring Festival
China hosted 59.47 million tourists during the Spring Festival holiday from Feb. 1 to 7, up 15.3 percent from the corresponding period of last year, an official said Saturday. Total tourism income in the seven-day holiday reached 25.76 billion yuan (US$3.13 billion), an increase of 13 percent. Family travel during the Spring Festival was a new trend. More Chinese people preferred to travel abroad, with Vietnam, Thailand, the Republic of Korea and Australia their favorite choices, said Wang Jun,

Sandstorm Control Program to Be Enhanced
As spring draws closer and closer, people in the Chinese capital have started to wonder how many sandstorms they will experience in the coming season. To deal with the destructive weather, the Chinese government has spared no efforts over the last few years, the most noteworthy of which is the Beijing and Tianjin sandstorm source control program sponsored by the State Administration of Forestry. The administration recently decided to work out a series of policies to boost the program and reduce

Experiences of a Foreign Teaching Couple
by John & Wendy Preston The Chinese government has made serious efforts in recent years to upgrade the standard of English language learning (a core subject) in its high schools. One measure has been to invite native speakers to China to teach oral English. Here is the story -- along with a few thoughts and reflections of a married teaching couple partway through a 12-month teaching contract in western Hunan Province. Let's begin by saying that we both love to travel, and are agreed that we like

Bank Robbery Suspects Detained in Liaoning
Four suspects involved in the explosion and robbery of a bank cash vehicle in the capital city of northeastern Liaoning Province mid last month have been caught by local police, public security authorities announced Sunday. The armored vehicle carrying cash was exploded in front of a branch of the Shenyang City Commercial Bank late in the afternoon on Jan. 18, killing three people and injuring five others, including bank clerks and the vehicle's guards. The criminals snatched 1.97 million yuan (

Chinese Nets Presidency of UN Court
Chinese judge Shi Jiuyong has been elected by colleagues at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on Thursday to assume the presidency of the tribunal. It is the first time a Chinese national has presided over the ICJ since it was founded in 1946. Shi, 76, will replace outgoing president Gilbert Guillaume of France. Sixty-year-old Raymond Ranjeva of Madagascar was elected vice-president. Both men will serve a three-year term. The ICJ, composed of 15 judges, is the highest United Nations court

Rare Birds Reappear in South China
The black-faced spoonbill, a kind of migratory bird on the brink of extinction worldwide, has reappeared in Hainan Province in southern China after an absence of more than two decades. Zhang Guogang, a postdoctoral student at the Chinese Academy of Forestry Science, said he and his colleagues had spotted black-faced spoonbills twice during an investigation of the bird's habitat on the island. "We had traveled almost everywhere in Hainan for a joint research conducted by the World Wildlife Fund a

Backgrounder: space shuttle "Columbia"
The US space shuttle Columbia, NASA's oldest and heaviest spaceship, broke up over Texas earlier Saturday (Feb.1) with seven astronauts aboard perished as it returned to Earth from a 16-day mission.

Here is a look at the doomed space shuttle Columbia:

Columbia, built in 1981 at a cost of about one billion US dollars, made its maiden flight on April 12, 1981. It had been refurbished three times since its first flight.

Its last flight, which started on Jan. 16, 2003, was the 1

Chinese expert deeply regrets tragic incident of Columbia
Chen Maozhang, member of Chinese Academy of Engineering, on Feb.2 deeply regretted the tragic incident of US space shuttle Columbia, saying such incident would not shake the mankind's space exploration program.

Chen, who also serves as professor of Beihang University (the original University of Aeronautic and Astronautic Science and Technology in China), told Xinhua that the mankind's space exploration is a great cause that would suffer various setbacks.

"But the mankind will not g

Chinese students shocked by breakup of shuttle Columbia
Chinese students who designed an experiment for US space shuttle Columbia expressed shock on Feb.2 over the breakup of the spacecraft.

Li Taotao, leader of the program from Beijing Jingshan School, simply couldn't believe her ears when she was waken up by her parents and told the news on the early hours of Sunday ( Feb.2).

"This is utterly out of my imagination. I'm saddened," she told Xinhua.

However, she said the tragedy would not shake her confidence in space experiments.

Space disasters in mankind's history of space exploration
US space shuttle Columbia broke apart in flames before landing on Saturday (Feb.1) with seven astronauts on board. It was the latest in a series of accidents since space exploration began.

The following is a chronology of astronauts and cosmonauts killed in the history of space exploration:

-- Jan. 27, 1967: Astronauts Gus Grissom, Edward H. White and Roger B. Chaffee die when a fire sweeps their command module during a ground test at Kennedy Space Center.

-- April 24, 1967:

Chinese scientists: Columbia tragedy won't thwart space exploration
When expressing deep condolences at the loss of the US space shuttle Columbia on Saturday (Feb.1), Chinese scientists said Monday (Feb.3) the tragedy would not thwart mankind's progress in space exploration although the road was full of danger and difficulties.

Tu Shou'e, an astronautics scientist with the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), said China would launch its first manned space flight this year, and Chinese space experts and technicians should learn from the tragedy and work hard

Spring festival vs.Christmas in the eyes of Chinese youth
Song, a teacher in a Shanghai high school, is still immersed, along with her 1.3 billion compatriots, in China's greatest national legacy, the traditional Lunar New Year, or Spring Festival, which fell on Feb. 1 this year.

"Spring festival signifies the gathering of family members, while Christmas is celebrated with friends", said Song, stressing that both are very important holidays to her.

Just over one month ago, the Chinese media carried ads promoting various Christmas celebrat

Beijing to Be Faced With Tourist Flood
Having just said goodbye to the Moon Festival, Beijing's tourist sector is bracing even more nervously for an extremely busy National Day holiday. As the nation's capital, the city is always the prime target in early October for people from all over the country to spend their days off. According to the Beijing Morning Post, a city-wide preparation campaign is in full swing, following a mobilization meeting Wednesday among all related tourist departments. Officials admit Beijing's hotels, transpo

Roundup: Heritage Preservation in Hong Kong Well Rewarded
The heritage preservation efforts of Hong Kong, although in its relative infancy of systematic archeological research, has won a number of international awards in the past five years and has added new glamour to its tourism attraction to visitors from around the world.

Since the Hong Kong's return to China, there has been a greater interest and desire on the part of both the government and the public to preserve and convert Hong Kong's archeological heritage into "living relics" so that t

New Int'l Highway in SW China to Open This Year
An east-west thoroughfare connecting the southwest part of China with Southeast Asia is expected to open to traffic this year, an official with the Yunnan Provincial Communications Department revealed recently.

This is a section on the No. 320 national trunk highway, which leads to Shanghai, China's leading industrial center. It starts from Qujing City, on the border of Guizhou and Yunnan provinces, runs through this capital of Yunnan, Dali and Ruili, and links up with a highway in Myanma

New rest area to grace West Lake's south shore
West Lake, the most famous symbol of picturesque Hangzhou in East China's Zhejiang Province, is to be decked out with a new pretty outfit this year.

In an effort to further beautify the city, the Hangzhou municipal government is initiating a huge project to rebuild part of this 5.8-square-kilometre natural lake in the heart of the city.

The project, which is estimated to require a total investment of about 2 billion yuan (US$240 million), will focus on the southern part of the lake

China Makes Largest Ming Dynasty Archeological Find after Ming Tombs
The excavation of a tomb in central China occupied by a prince and his princess of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) is said to be the country's most significant archeological find of the period after that of the Ming Tombs in the outskirts of Beijing.

The excavation just concluded in Zhongxiang, which is located some 200 kilometers from Wuhan, capital of Hubei Province, revealed some 5,100 precious funerary objects with over 10 kilograms of gold articles and 3,400 pieces of jewelry.

Th

China To Change its Latrine Image
Despite many tasks ahead for social and economic development, China has decided to pay attention to the management and construction of public toilets.

Members of the Chongqing Municipal Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference have proposed to build adequate, convenient and clean public toilets in urban districts over the next five to 10 years.

A recent inspection of Chongqing's public toilets showed almost all failed to reach the standard required by the

Shanghai Aims to Profit from 2010 World Expo
Shanghai is confident that it will make a profit of more than 9 billion yuan (110 million U.S. dollars) if it hosts the 2010 World Expo.

According to Wednesday's China Youth Daily experts estimate that admission fees will bring in 7.3 billion and the sale of food and drink 1.3 million, without counting any other source of income.

It is expected that 43 million people will visit the expo.

The paper quoted a Shanghai tourism official Yao Mingbao as saying that each yuan spent

U.S. Company to Build Golf Course in Southern China City
A U.S. company signed an agreement with the local government here recently to build a golf course and supporting facilities in this coastal city in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

Under the agreement, the 36-hole course will cover an area of about 200 hectares and will be completed in three years.

James Pope, vice-president of Orlando Leisure Development Group,said that the main reason for choosing Beihai as the location for the golf course was that golf is becoming more and

China to Build Park on Qinshihuang Mausoleum
China is to build a park to house the mausoleum of an emperor who unified China. The emperor Qinshihuang and thousands of terra cotta warriors and horses were buried 2,000 years ago in northwest China's Shaanxi Province.

The park covers 2.13 square kilometers, and will be divided into two parts, the inner and outer sections. The 24 enterprises and 6,000 residents living in the area are expected to move out to enable the project, at a cost of 500 million yuan, to be completed.

The Q

Grand Ceremony Held to Welcome Enshrinement of Sakyamuni's Fingerbone in Taiwan
A grand Buddhist ceremony was held here Sunday morning in the gymnasium of Taiwan University to welcome the enshrinement of Sakyamuni's Fingerbone in Taiwan.

The fingerbone, also known as sheli, has been enshrined in the Famen Temple in northwest China's Shaanxi Province before it was flown in Saturday.

As many as 5,000 Buddhists from across the straits attended this grand event.

After the ceremony, the sacred Buddhist relic started to be open to Buddhists and will be enshri