A Panda City- An Excerpt From Chengdu A City Of Paradise By Jack Quian

It was spring, 1936, Ruth Harkness a fashion designer and a socialite in Manhattan, New York, un folded a map of China drawn by the Operations Command of the Royal Army of Britain in her upper-city apartment. Her figers were moving slowly westward from Shanghai along Yangtze river, searching carefully for a city. Bill her late husband and outstanding explorer, had told her that this city was located in a basin on eastern edge of the Chinghai-Tibet Plateau, not far from the other end of the Yangtze river...

Seventy years later, it was also spring, Danny and I googled this city and nearly 3,000,000 items appeared on the computer screen...
This city is Chengdu with an area of 12,400 square kilometres and a population of about 11,000,000. It is just teh biggest provincial capital in west China, but also the only city in the history of China whose name remain the same for 3,000 years since the establishment.

Chengdu was the starting point of China’s famous southern Silk Road, which ran past Ya’an, Lushan, Xichang, Panzhihua to Zhaotong, Qujing, Dali, Baoshan, Tengchong, Dehong in Yunnan province, then entered Burma and Thailand, and finally arrived in India and the Middle East: thus Chengdu was the most importsnt stopping place along this bridge between Chinese culture and worls civilizations.

In Chinese “cheng” means “ success or successful” and “du”, “big city or capital.” This “Successful City” not only boast a long history, but also holds an annual position: latitude 30 degrees north. A An imaginary circle marked out by geographers, it never theless posesses a magic power that no other longitude or latitude could possibly rival. It is on this circle that the highest mountain, mount Everest, and the lowest tranch, Mariana Trench lie: and it is on this circle that the Yangtze River, The Mississippi River, The Nile River, and the Euphrathes River all pour into the sea. It is also a mysterious circle, on which stand the pyramids and Sphinx of Egypt, the “god of fire and kindlings” mural in the Sahara Desert of North Africa, the Bermuda Triangle in the Caribbean Sea, The Hanging Gardens Of ancient Babylon, Mount E’mei. Mount Huang, Mount Lu of China. It was on this circle that the four civilizations of acient China, ancient Babylon, ancient Egypt, an ancient India all developed. Why are there so many coincidences? We felt even more puzzled and curious than ever when another wonder- the Sanxingdai-Jinsha civilization created by the Shu people in Chengdu Plain of latitude 30 degrees north-was discovered...So many unsolved mysteries throuh the ages have kindled many people’s interest in and even fascination with this city...