The Star: December 28, 2023

The Star Thursday December 28 2023
12
TRAVEL
Latest Canterbury news at starnews.co.nz
From electric cars to cat cafes,
China a delightful destination
Susan Sandys travelled
to China travelled with
China Southern Airlines
as it re-introduced, for
the first time since the
Covid pandemic, its
direct Christhchurch-
Guangzhou flight
Flying economy
with China Southern
Airlines Christchurch
– Guangzhou return
costs about $1900.
The airline offers the
service November
10 to February 25.
PHOTOS: SUSAN SANDYS
GUANGZHOU is the perfect
place to fly into for those
wanting to travel around China.
The flight from Australia is
relatively short – about 11 hours
– while Guangzhou is in the
province of Guangdong, known
as China’s southern gateway.
Guangzhou is just a bullet-train
journey away from the highprofile
destinations of Shanghai
(7 hours) and Beijing (8-10
hours).
Guangdong also has its own
attractions, as we found out by
staying in its biggest city, Shenzhen.
Just across the water from
Hong Kong, Shenzhen is dubbed
‘the miracle city’ due to the speed
with which it rose from a fishing
town 40 years ago to a metropolis
of 17 million people today.
It offers the visual spectacle of
towering skyscrapers contrasting
with parks, surrounding coastal
wetlands and greenery.
Shenzhen is a young city
with an average age of 32, as it
draws in talent from across the
country. It is known both as the
Silicon Valley of China, due to
being the home for high-tech
companies such as Huawei and
TenCent, and a city of parks, due
to its large networks of the green
spaces.
We viewed the Shenzhen Light
Show, a spectacular night display
across the modern skyline.
Lights on the buildings flash
and sparkle in synchronisation,
with various colours, shapes and
patterns.
We also went to Shenzhen
Civic Center, a building with
a 486m-long winged roof that
provides a striking backdrop to
a nearby square and adjoining
park, where thousands go to
enjoy the outdoors. There were
dozens of families flying kites,
enjoying a 25-degree warm day.
There were youths involved in
their own hip hop dance classes,
breakdancing with a ghetto
blaster, and making videos (there
is a huge TikTok culture in
China).
And we visited what must be
two of Shenzhen’s most stunning
parks – the Dasha Ecological
Corridor and Shenzhen Talent
Park.
The ecological corridor winds
along the Dasha River from the
mountains to the sea. It was only
eight years ago the city began
to transform the riverside from
a degraded environment to the
STUNNING: The backdrop to Shenzhen Talent Park, featuring the spring-bamboo shaped
China Resources Headquarters Tower. Inset – the Shenzhen Light Show.
flourishing green space it is
today. It has thousands of mature
trees, which have been re-located
there.
From a southern viewpoint
we could see white herons congregating
along the corridor’s
swampy shoreline. We could also
see the Hong Kong skyline on
the horizon, as well as the long
bridge that connects this Chinese
city to the mainland.
ALL ELECTRIC: This concept
car at BYD was designed
by Audi’s former head of
design.
Shenzhen Talent Park was just
as beautiful as the corridor – an
expansive park around a lake
with another stunning skyline,
this one featuring the 400m
China Resources Headquarters
Tower. It is the city’s third tallest
building, built to resemble
a spring bamboo. The park has
dozens of sculptures paying
tribute to the talented people
who have contributed to the
city’s development, as well as
global historical figures such as
Eddison, Einstein, Beethoven
and Confucius.
In Shenzhen, we were hosted
by the Foreign Affairs Office.
This meant we were fortunate
enough to be taken behind the
scenes to some of the companies
which had helped Shenzhen
become the city it is today. The
most exciting of these was electric
and hybrid car, bus and rail
manufacturer BYD.
Electric cars are big in China.
There are at least 40 different
manufacturers in the country.
BYD is taking on Tesla in the
global market, having developed
safety and longevity features in
its electric car batteries. This year
it was on track to sell 3 million
new vehicles internationally. We
saw some of its latest vehicles,
including a red Ferrari-looking
sports electric car designed by
Audi’s former head of design
Wolfgang Egger, who now works
for BYD.
Next we flew to Shanghai,
China’s most populous and
wealthiest city, 1200km north.
Our trip was in autumn,
and here we found the weather
cooler, similar to a New Zealand
autumn.
We were met at the airport
by our guide Minji, a journalist
at English-language newspaper
Shanghai Daily.
By its name alone, Shanghai
felt like a glamorous place to be.
A bit like New York, London
and Paris. We walked along
The Bund, a waterfront area
and historical district in the
central city, beneath the city’s
signature skyline. The skyline
features China’s tallest building,
Shanghai Tower, as well as the
landmark Oriental Pearl TV
Tower and the “bottle opener’’
Shanghai World Financial
Center. We took a $2 cruise
across to the other side of The
Bund’s Huangpu River, snapping
photos along the way.
Shanghai was a nice city to
walk around, with its old original
streets, the contemporary
‘‘M50’’ art district, and glitzy
shopping areas. We got to sample
cafes and tea-drinking shops
along the way, not to mention
amazing restaurants featuring
not only the best of authentic
Chinese cuisine, but also food
from around the world.
While eating out costs about
half what it would in New
Zealand, clothes and other items
in mainstream shopping areas
were either similarly priced or
more expensive. Although we
did visit a market area which
offered cheap buys, as well as
fake-branded items such as Louis
Vuitton.
The highlight of Shanghai was
visiting Yu Garden and its neighbouring
outdoor boulevard,
which sold items from souvenirs
to luxury 24K gold jewellery.
There was a cat cafe there, which
we found we could not walk past!
We just had to go inside and
spend some time with the 10 or
so cats of many different breeds.
The garden was once a private
walled garden of the Pan family
in the Ming Dynasty. It blends
pools, bridges, pagodas, archways,
rockeries and carvings
around the original home. We
also viewed the nearby City God
Temple, one of many such structures
in China which stand as a
testimony to the country’s Taoist
and Buddhist heritage.
Once again in this city, we got
taken to places perhaps many
a tourist would not go. Across
the Yantze River on Chongming
Island, we visited a conservation
centre for the endangered
Chinese sturgeon, a fish that
was once abundant in the river.
We also visited a cotton textile
weaving showroom, and a farm
operated by about 245 villagers
who live on-site.
All in all, our whirlwind trip
offered an amazing experience
in a country I never thought I
would get the opportunity to
visit.
Shanghai and Shenzhen
were clean and felt very safe. I
thought they might have been
smoggy, with overcrowded
roads. But they weren’t at all,
having fresh air, perhaps aided
by their coastal locations, as
well as free-flowing roads. And
while busy with people, the
streets themselves were not
overcrowded. China feels like
a safe place to travel, perhaps
helped by its ubiquitous CCTV
cameras. The people are friendly,
abiding, polite, and enjoy a
laugh.
I highly recommend visiting
China. I have already decided I
will return there one day, most
likely once again flying China
Southern Airlines into Guangzhou.
The airline’s Dreamliner
aircraft had a modern and clean
feel, the service was good, and
the food generally fresh and delicious.
I have already started planning
my itinerary – spend some time
again in Southern China before
taking the bullet train up north,
including to the capital of Beijing
to climb the Great Wall of China
and see the country’s iconic
panda bears.
OLD AND NEW: The tree-lined streets of downtown Shanghai.