The first landmark visitors will encounter in Xi'an is the ancient city wall, which stretches round the old city. The northern side runs parallel to the railway. Xi'an was originally a walled city, and even today the wall is considered a landmark dividing the city into the inner part and the outer part. The city wall is massive - tall, long and thick. The South Gate and North Gate are the two main entrances to the inner city. The city itself is neatly arranged along the city wall. 

The Source of Three Rivers (sān jiāng yuán 三江源) is situated in Qinghai Province (qīng hǎi shěng 青海省) which is located in the northeast of Qinghai-Tibet Plateau (qīng zàng gāo yuán 青藏高原), with an average altitude of 4,000 meters. It covers the headstreams of China's three most known rivers: Yangtse River (cháng jiāng 长江), Yellow River (huáng hé 黄河) and Lancang River (lán cāng jiāng 澜沧江), hence the name. There are 16 countries and one town in this area, with a gross area of 36.3 square kilometers, which account for 50.4% of the whole province area. Sanjiangyuan Nature Reserve (sān jiāng yuán zì rán bǎo hù qū 三江源自然保护区) was established in May, 2000. The State Council of China formally approved it as a national nature reserve in January of 2003.

         
Fan (shàn zǐ 扇子) is a must in summer. It can drive away summer heat and help bring cooling breeze. Since old ages, the Chinese fan has been carrying artistic and unique national style. China has always been regarded as “the kingdom of fans”. The fan first appeared in China about 3000 years ago, in the Shang (shāng 商) and Zhou (zhōu 周) dynasties. However, the fan in the early period was not used to help bring cooling breeze, but used as the symbol of etiquette. And it was called “the fan of honor”. After the Qin (qín 秦) and Han (hàn 汉) dynasties, the main shapes of fan are square, round and hexagon. The material that used to make fan are mainly silk. Because the silk fans were often used in royal court, people called them “court fan” (gōng shàn 宫扇). During the Tang (táng 唐) and Sui (suí 隋) dynasties, the prevailing fans are the round fan, feather fan, and some paper fans. The folding fan gradually became popular after Song (sòng 宋) Dynasty. In Ming (míng 明) and Qing (qīng 清) dynasties, the home of folding fans are Zhejiang (zhè jiāng 浙江), Suzhou (sū zhōu 苏州) and Sichuan (sì chuān 四川), etc. Then writing poems and the vogue of drawing pictures on the cover of a fan is rising. Then this exquisite skill has been introduced to Europe, and became popular all over the world.

Learning Chinese isn’t easy, or is it?

No matter how long you’ve studied Chinese, there are efficient and not so efficient ways of tackling the language. Since you are already on such a tough journey, why not take the path with the biggest pot of gold at the end?

Some things are much more important to focus on than others when learning Chinese for use in the real world. Why? Because they are help make learning Chinese faster and more efficient, at least in the long run. Let’s take a look:

3 Things you must focus on to get better in Chinese

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Individual Characters
Sentence Order

East China University of Science and Technology (ECUST), founded in 1952 in Shanghai, is one of the national key research universities under the direct administration of the China Education Ministry. It is constituted with 16 academic schools specialized in science, technology, pharmacy, philosophy, administration, economy, law, literature, history and education. With its graceful environment and advanced facilities ECUST has begun to receive international students since 1950s’. So far over two thousands international students coming from as many as eighty countries and areas have studied in ECUST.