How Beijing Changed My Views of China

Growing up in a Cantonese household, I have always had an interest in Chinese culture and history.  I have always thought of China as being such a vast, enormous country and I knew that a quick trip to China wouldn’t even begin to answer the many questions I had about this mysterious place I had heard so much about. 

My preconceptions about China prior to traveling there, was that it was a large communist country, and due to the large amount of poverty that exists there, people have become selfish in order to survive.  In my mind, it was a scary place as I’d often heard stories during my childhood about how crossing the border between Hong Kong and Shenzhen meant crossing into a place where kids were often kidnapped to have their limbs chopped off so that people would take pity on them when they go to beg for money.  I had heard countless stories like such when I was growing up and never understood how a country could treat its’ citizens so poorly. 

In 2009, I was living in South Korea and had the opportunity to visit China for the very first time.  I had been to Hong Kong numerous times before, but in my mind, these are two separate countries and I was very excited to finally visit China for the first time to really see whether there was any justification for the preconceptions that I had formed.  Little did I know that this simple 4 day 3 night trip would change my views of this country to such a great extent. 

I was visiting Beijing after the 2008 Olympics, so the city had been “cleaned up” quite a bit.  I remember speaking to some friends who had visited both pre and post Olympics and they agreed that the city was much less polluted and cleaner than before.  I even asked a Beijing taxi driver if he felt that Beijing had changed much after the Olympics and he provided a very astute answer of “just on the surface”.  His answer was very truthful – you can certainly beautify a city and even change the skyline, but how do you change some of the negative habits, behaviours and aspects that have been around for years and years?

I ended up on a 3 person tour of Beijing that took us to many of the city’s famous sights including the Forbidden Palace, the Summer Palace, the Ming Tombs, and the Great Wall.  We were also taken to visit some specialty shops where we learned about the production of silk, jade, and pearl.  In between all this, we also found time to visit a Chinese medicine shop and my personal favourite, a tea shop.

The 4 days I spent in Beijing really opened my eyes to how different this China was, compared to what I had always thought it would be like.  The people were much friendlier than I had expected, the food was excellent, and the places I visited were enriched with amazing culture.  After returning to South Korea after this wonderful trip, I began looking at teaching opportunities in China for the following year.  In a span of 2 months, I had gone from never having visited China, to being interviewed and preparing for a new job in Shenzhen.  Little did I know at the time, that this would be the beginning of 3 great years I’d end up spending in China, with a lifetime of lasting memories.