Sharon King Hoge

Despite its reputation as “strictly business,” Guangzhou provides some rare opportunities for sightseeing. Two modern monuments face each other across the Pearl River: the iconic “twist” of the Canton Tower and the renowned “double pebble” Opera House designed by Zaha Hadid. Steps from the Opera House, find the graphic façade of the provincial Guangdong Museum which houses engrossing exhibits of porcelain, calligraphy and woodcarving. The extraordinary Museum of the Mausoleum of the Nanyue King exhibits 2,000-year-old treasures in a meandering structure constructed right on the downtown site where the Han Dynasty tomb was discovered in 1983. Read More

Guangzhou has focused on “strictly business” since the city’s early years as the major port of the southern Silk Route and in the 17th to 19th centuries as a major harbor of European trade. The foreign outpost on Shamian Island still exists today but principally as a historic district of graceful parks and colonial buildings. Business activity in China’s third-largest city transferred to three principal areas of town: the gigantic sprawling exposition area which is the site of the two giant annual Canton Fair trade shows; the traditional midtown Tianhe business district; and, most recently, the extensive ultramodern riverside Zhujiang New Town, being created to accommodate high-rise office towers housing Fortune 500 companies from around the world.

While the business of Guangzhou is business, foreigners who come to work in town are advised to soften the Western approach of forthrightly “getting down to business.” Cultural competence calls for observing Chinese guanxi, a more graceful approach with a dynamic based on personalized networks. Developing relationships is an essential prelude to commerce, and facilities around town are designed to accommodate that practice with elegant venues for fraternizing, impressing clients at private meals and receptions. Read more

The capital island of China’s smallest, southernmost province, Hainan has set its sights on becoming a “worldwide first-class island resort.” Dozens of major global resorts are located on its white-sand beaches. One big attraction for more than a decade is the annual Boao Forum for Asia, a sort of Far Eastern Davos World Economic Forum where leaders come to share their views on pressing issues of the region. Delegates from Armenia and Austria, the Netherlands and Nepal, Uganda and Zambia were among those gathered this year to discuss economic, social and environmental concerns — and to enjoy the locale. Whether or not there are meetings to attend, Boao is a charming destination with white-sand beaches, sunny sidewalk cafés and a main street lined with picturesque colonial buildings.

China’s crowded, traffic-congested, chaotic cities call for a place to escape the stress and wear and tear, and the solution is Hainan Island, the country’s designated vacation spot — a mountainous, tropical forest ringed with white, sandy beaches.

In 2009, the State Planning Council launched ambitious plans to develop the main island of its southernmost province into a major tourist destination, “the Hawai’i of the East.” The 39,000-page “2010–2020 Hainan International Tourism Island Development Planning Outline” furthers the government’s provisions to cultivate additional areas of tourism, add international air routes, develop infrastructure, expand green options and improve living standards in order to achieve a “worldwide first-class island resort” by the year 2020. read more