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Episode Synopsis "SC 1: The Golden Week"
Jian: Hello! Everyone, I am Jian from Hangzhou, China. Thank you for listening to our first episode of podcast “Stuff you should know about China”. I am so excited right now, because it is our first time to make a podcast and it has been my dream to make a personal podcast in English. I am so glad I could have my best friend Pan as my co-host here! Pan: Hello to all the friends who are listening. I am Pan, Jian is my best friend, i met him since 2004 in university, we have lots of same hobbies, and to start this podcast is one of them. So Jian, what’s our main idea about the podcast? Jian: Pan and I are going to talk about China’s stuff, such as culture, food, history. Pan: Yes, especially the unique and interesting things in China. we also welcome all of you who are interested in China and Chinese culture to give us suggestions and tips on what topic we should prepare for you in the future. Jian: Yes, sure. And since we are Chinese and our English levels are not very good. But we try to improve both our knowledge and English level during doing such a podcast. We really appreciate your patience to listening to us. Any comment from you would be huge driving power and encourage for us to keep going. Pan: Right, Output-Push-Input, that is why i think we should start even when we think ourselves are not ready, and i believe time by time, more and more people will understand what we are talking about. (laugh) Jian: first of all, I think we should introduce our goal for doing this podcast. My goal is simple that I just want to have fun with my friends. And there are two friends I am basically doing for, my Chinese friend, Pan, who I knew for about 15 years, and my American friend, who loves Chinese stuff and taught me English before. Pan: Sure, and for me, i am trying to improve my speaking English, and hope to know more interesting friends. Jian: So for the first episode, what are we going to talk about? Pan: ????? Chinese National Day the Golden week Jian: Yeah, that is really the hot topic recently in China, but I am sure people from other countries probablely don‘t know what and how golden week is, so could you help explain it firstly? Pan: Sure. Chinese National Day is celebrated on October 1st every year to commemorate the founding of People’s Republic of China. During the holiday, lots of large-scaled activities are held nationwide. Besides, the 7-days’ holiday from Oct. 1st to 7th is called “Golden Week”, during which more and more Chinese people go traveling around not only in the country but also worldwide. Jian: Yes. Exactly. And I want to give more information about this holiday. Actually the Chinese independence day was September 21st 1949. The grand ceremony held at Tiananmen Square on October 1st 1949 was to celebrate the forming of the Central People’s Government of the brand new country. Later on, the new government passed and declared October 1 to be the Chinese National Day. Ever since 1950, every October 1st has been grandly celebrated by Chinese people. Pan: Really? This is also my first time to hear that., though it is a little bit boring. However this year is special, because we have another very important holiday, Zhongqiu jie, which is the middle autumn festival overlaped with national day, and make the length of holiday to 8 days. Last time these two holidays come together was 2009, and next time it will be 2020. Chinese people’s happiness will be doubled when it happens, National holiday is more about our nation, and mid-autumn day is more about our family. Jian: Yes. That is ture. I love Mid-Autumn Festival. The festival takes places on August 15th of the Chinese calendar. In 2017 it’s on October 4th. It is the second most important festival in China after Chinese New Year. To the Chinese, the festival means family reunion and peace. It is also called “the moon festival” as it is celebrated when the moon is believed to be the biggest and fullest. Pan: When we mention the mid-autumn day, our first reaction is moon cakes, it’s our traditional cake especially made for the mid-autumn day. In my family, after dinner together with whole family, we will go out to find a good place to enjoying the full moon in the sky, and eat moon cakes. Also there are many other traditional and meaningful activities, such as hanging lanterns, guessing lantern riddles, and worshipping the moon. Jian: Because we have such two big holidays today, we of cours will enjoy more shopping, travelling and rest with friends and family members. However it is obvious that it will be incrediblly crowded during such a big holiday. Pan, Have you heard of the news about how crowded tourists are in all the hot places? Pan: Yes, actually top news everywhere are about the crowded people in the big holiday. One example is that the highway had become a huge parking because of the traffic jams. the wonderful landscape you could see is the long line of brake lights on the road in night. and if in day time, you could see people get off their cars and play with their phones, smoke, some happy people even play badminton, and dance. (laugh) Jian: That really sucks and I am afraind this is unique sence in China’s golden week. Although all the highways in the golden week are free, we have to spend more time on travelling on the highway, like double or triple or even more time on the driving. That is only because all the people would like to travel or go back home by car. Besidse the highway, I heared of lots of places are full of tourists, which make you have to wait in long line for everything. Pan: Yes, you are right. Every sight will be full of people, that why we have a funny saying people montain people sea. Taking our city Hangzhou as another example, can you guess how many people have visited our city during the past golden week? Jian: 10 million? Pan: Close to but the reported data is 15 million. 15 million people, that is almost doubled as the population of the lagest city in America New York! And this is only the people travel to one city. According the report, the whole 8 days holiday, 0.71 billion people will travel, that means half Chinese travle. I don’t like to go to travel in such holiday, west or east, home is best, it makes sence. Jian: Yes, quite amazing and incredible. I am an introvert and dislike crowded people, so I agree with your saying home is best. I am JUST curious about how our city could hold such huge amount of travellers? Pan: Hangzhou is hot city for travellers, we have lot sights, such as West lake, Xixi Wetland Park, Song Dynasty City, a lot famous historical and nature sights. I think we have to make one podcast about the sights of Hangzhou in the future. Jian: Sure, we definitely should. And any friend has plan to travel to Hangzhou, we would like to offer our guide. But i have the best advice for you: don’t come to China for travel when it’s holiday here. I think you surely understand why when you are listening to this episode. So this is our first episode of our podcast, we hope you like it. See you next time. Pan: Yes, see you soon. Bye.
In God we trust