n° 1 giugno 2012 - Ifuw Italia – Fildis sez. di Pavia

percentuale del PIL per dire che la Cina è già in
crisi, occorre recarsi laggiù e verificare sul campo,
con mente aperta, l'immenso numero di opportunità
di carriera pronte per essere colte.
18
Una cosa è certa: non sarà sicuramente la mia unica
esperienza in Cina, perché il primo pensiero che
ti pervade la mente appena sali sull'aereo del ritorno
è: “devo ritornare il prima possibile”.
summary
Eight days around China: short diary of a business trip to the East
In May 2012 I finally had the chance to visit China for the first time since 2010, that is, the year I started
to study Mandarin Chinese at the University of Pavia. Most importantly, I wasn't going to take a
tour as a tourist. On the contrary, my chance was a good combination of sense of timing and luck: as
language tutor for Marco Polo Project, I was asked by the coordinator of the project to go to China in
order to take a seven-day promotional tour in several high schools around the country and recruit new
students for the class of 2013.
I arrived in Beijing with my interpreter on Monday 7 th and I was immediately astonished by the greatness
of the Capital City Airport, a real masterpiece of architecture. Unfortunately I didn't have the
chance to visit Beijing because of my busy schedule which forced me to leave again the morning after.
However, I had the chance to have a quick glance at the financial district through the windows of my
taxi, as my hotel was near Tian An Men square, just behind the Forbidden City.
I think Beijing is probably the perfect mix between ancient traditions and modern, almost space age
style. The skyline is pretty much American. I was amazed by the view of the CCTV skyscraper, a giant
building recalling the shape of the well-known “impossible figure”, the Penrose Triangle, and I stared at
the incredibly large boulevards as I was approaching the city centre.
The first stop of my business trip was Hohhot, main city of the autonomous region of Inner Mongolia.
Hohhot is a new, booming city with five million inhabitants, characterised by huge contradictions: on
the one hand, the new middle and upper-middle class enriched by the proceeds of iron and coal mines.
On the other, peasants, craftsmen, bricklayers who work in extreme conditions – safety standards in
building sites do not seem to matter - and struggle to earn enough money to feed their sons. During
my stay in Inner Mongolia I was also taken to the biggest high school in Asia, the First High School in
Jining, an industrial district 200 km far from the centre of Hohhot. This huge boarding school hosts
more than 18000 students and represents the benchmark for all northern China, being directed by one
of the most influencing members of the Inner Mongolian local Communist Party.
After two days in Inner Mongolia I left Hohhot and I flew to Zhengzhou, in order to visit Kaifeng, capital
of Henan Province in middle China. There I finally found the Chinese landscape I was looking for at the
very beginning of my trip. Kaifeng is “real” China, as it is surrounded by ricefields and the skyline is
characterised by the ancient pagodas of the Song dynasty, when the city was the capital of the Chinese
empire. Kaifeng is also widely known in Asia for being the true capital of Chinese gastronomy: tourism
is most assuredly the main resource as the new upper class chooses to come here and spend the
Spring Holiday staying in five-star hotels and spa resorts.
The final stage of my business trip was the huge metropolis of Chongqing. This enormous city is built in
a mountain region in south-west China, and it was formerly known as the capital city of the Sichuan
region, before the central government declared it an autonomous municipality in 1997. With its 32
million inhabitants, Chongqing is nowadays China's biggest city, even though very few Europeans know
it because of its position and its relative recent boom. Its lively city centre and its majestic financial district
make Chongqing very similar to an American city. Moreover, the locals love to say that Chongqing
is a “larger San Francisco”, due to the several ups and downs and the long bridge over the river Yangtze,
which really seems a small copy of the Golden Gate.
What I learned for sure from this first business trip to China is that the Dragon is “alive and breathing”,
and Chinese economy is destined to improve again in the next few years, which is exactly the contrary
of what European and American analysts blindly state every day. China is the new land of opportunity,
and appealing careers are up for grabs for those foreigners who are open-minded enough to take the
chance and chance their arm in the far East.
Alberto Zannetti