Believing they had discovered a ‘group nuclear base’, the US sent in spies who trekked south and inland to photograph the evidence, only to swiftly leave again, embarrassed.

No doubt on entering each ‘reactor’ they were offered noodles and cabbage. The only offensive weapons they discovered were knives used to dispatch chickens and pigs; ducklings scratched on the clay floors of the four-storey earthen fortresses, and tea and persimmons lay drying in the sunshine outside.

The peaceful inhabitants had already lived here for hundreds of years. They had come from the north seeking safety, and war was the furthest thing from their minds.

To visit a ‘tulou’, one of 1500 added to the UNESCO World Heritage list last year, is to step through a portal into another culture, another time zone. Big enough for up to a thousand people, these ‘houses’ are complete villages, compact and efficient.

Sally & Gordon Hammond visited here late 2008.

©Sally Hammond 2009
Pictures: Gordon Hammond

Discover the spectacular stone Buddha sculptures of the Longmen Grottoes and the Yungang Caves. Practice Kung Fu steps with the Shaolin monks. Climb the rickety steps of Sakyamuni Pagoda, the world's tallest wooden structure.

These are just a few of the delights that await on a cultural journey through central China.

Farmers have always struggled here, but merchants prospered for centuries by trading tea, salt, silk and grain between Mongolia to the north and the ancient cities to the south.   Buddhist sanctuaries surviving on mountain slopes, clinging to canyon walls or nestled in caves reward the traveller,  as do walled cities and thousand-year-old pagodas.  More images

Looking around our table, my companions’ reaction ranged from revulsion to anticipation as they considered this local delicacy. Taking hold of a delicately crisp scorpion’s tail I placed it between my lips, closed my eyes and crunched firmly into it mid belly, feeling its tiny little body shatter between my teeth.

The tangy little critter, the size of a large shrimp, tasted a lot like a salted peanut, albeit a peanut with legs. Drawing a line in the sand for future banquets, I declared myself to be a scorpion vegetarian, vowing to eat only vegetables for the rest of our gourmand’s tour through northwest China.

Contact Fiona Harper to commission this article. Images are available.

The isolated but still accessable province doesn’t make it onto many tourist itineraries because it doesn’t boast of a great wall that snakes its way through the Chinese countryside or a massive square in front of a once forbidden city.  

The appeals of Guizhou, therefore, are somewhat more subtle though this inland mountain province located on the elevated Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau has a pleasant subtropical climate, unique natural settings and, perhaps most interesting of all, a diverse and vibrant ethnic minority population that live in small remote communities. 

An illustrated feature on Guizhou Province can be written on assignment from 1000 to 2000 words, depending upon editorial requirements.  A short sidebar or a dedicated feature can also be written on the cultural attractions of neighbouring Yunnan Province. 

When the Shanghai stockmarket shakes, world economies wobble. As China prepares to host the Olympic Games in 2008, Karen Halabi goes to Shanghai to investigate the changes that have taken place in a country that remains as inscrutable as ever, as it emerges as the world’s foremost economic superpower.

When the rest of the world peers into China from its lounge rooms next year ………

©Karen Halabi 2007 words and images.

Story runs to 2,400 words as an in-depth feature and socio-economic analysis of China today as it prepares for the Games. Pics available.

The Hidden Macau is a 1370 word story. There is a 360 word Macau Grand Prix sidebar also available. Accompanying images by Bob King can be supplied.

I wonder if he finds it arduous, this inevitable disruption to traffic. It reminds me so much of Sydney in the time leading up to our Games. He lacks the language skills to answer me properly, but I can see from his smile that he is excited.

And why not? This is the biggest, most prestigious world-class event the country has been involved with since its gradual emergence in the 1970s from self-imposed isolation.

This article continues with details of the lead-up to the games, where to stay in the city and other things to see and do before and after the Games.

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(finishes…)

Not far from the city on a hillside beside the most famous wall in the world, sure to be the second most-visited tourist spot in 2008, a massive sign has been erected across the hillside.

There’s a red symbol of a running stick-figure and the Olympic rings, then: ‘Beijing 2008 One World One Dream’, in Chinese and English’.

Which, really, is the essence of it all.

©Sally Hammond 2007

Picture Credits: ©Gordon Hammond 2007 www.gordonhammond.com.au

(Sally and Gordon Hammond travelled as guests of Helen Wong’s Tours)

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Please contact Sally Hammond for a pricing schedule or to discuss purchase of this article.

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