Lonely Planet China

by Lonely Planet

  China has almost 90 cities with populations of five to 10 million people and more than 170 cities with between one and five million people.

  CHINA'S DEMOGRAPHICS

  APopulation: 1.37 billion

  ABirth rate: 12.49 births per thousand people

  APeople over 65: 10%

  AUrbanisation rate: 3.05%

  AMale to female ratio: 1.17 : 1 (under 15s)

  ALife expectancy: 75.4 years

  Women in China

  Equality & Emancipation

  Growing up in a Confucian culture, women in China traditionally encountered great prejudice and acquired a far lowlier social status to men. The most notorious expression of female subservience was foot binding, which became a widespread practice in the Song dynasty. Female resistance to male-dominated society could sometimes produce inventive solutions, however: discouraged from reading and writing, women in Jiāngyǒng county (Húnán) once used their own invented syllabic script (partly based on Chinese) called nǚshū (女书) to write letters to each other (which men found incomprehensible).

  Women in today’s China officially share complete equality with men; however, as with other nations that profess sexual equality, the reality is often far different. Chinese women do not enjoy strong political representation and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) remains a largely patriarchal organisation. Iconic political leaders from the early days of the CCP were men and the influential echelons of the party persist as a largely male domain. Only a handful of the great scientists celebrated in a long photographic mural at Shànghǎi’s Science and Technology Museum are women.

  The Communist Party after 1949 tried to outlaw old customs and put women on equal footing with men. It abolished arranged marriages and encouraged women to get an education and join the workforce. Women were allowed to keep their maiden name upon marriage and leave their property to their children. In its quest for equality during this period however, the Communist Party seemed to ‘desexualise’ women, fashioning instead a kind of idealised worker/mother/peasant paradigm.

  China's population is expected to peak around 2028, but will be overtaken as the world's most populous nation by India in around 2022.

  Chinese Women Today

  High-profile, successful Chinese women are very much in the public eye, but the relative lack of career opportunities for females in other fields also suggests a continuing bias against women in employment.

  Women’s improved social status today has meant that more women are putting off marriage until their late 20s or early 30s, choosing instead to focus on education and career opportunities. This has been enhanced by the rapid rise in house prices, further encouraging women to leave marriage (and having children) till a later age. Premarital sex and cohabitation before marriage are increasingly common in larger cities and lack the stigma they had 10 or 15 years ago.

  Some Chinese women are making strong efforts to protect the rights of women in China, receiving international attention in the process. In 2010 the Simone de Beauvoir prize for women’s freedom was awarded to Guo Jianmei, a Chinese lawyer and human rights activist, and film-maker and professor Ai Xiaoming. Guo Jianmei also received the International Women of Courage Award in 2011.

  In a sign of growing confidence among the female workforce, a young Běijīng woman won the first ever gender discrimination lawsuit in China in 2014.

  The colossal Yangzi River Bridge in Nánjīng has surpassed the San Francisco Golden Gate Bridge as the most used suicide site in the world.

  Rural Women in China

  A strong rural–urban divide exists. Urban women are far more optimistic and freer, while women from rural areas, where traditional beliefs are at their strongest, fight an uphill battle against discrimination. Rural Chinese mores are heavily biased against females, where a marked preference for baby boys still exists. This results in an ever greater shift of Chinese women to the city from rural areas. China’s women are more likely to commit suicide than men (in the West it is the other way around), while the suicide rate for rural Chinese women is around five times the urban rate.

  Religion & Philosophy

  Ideas have always possessed an extraordinary potency and vitality in China. The 19th-century Taiping Rebellion fused Christianity with revolutionary principles of social organisation, almost sweeping away the Qing dynasty in the process and leaving 20 million dead. The momentary incandescence of the Boxer Rebellion drew upon a volatile cocktail of martial-arts practices and superstition, blended with xenophobia, while the chaos of the Cultural Revolution further suggests what may happen in China when ideas assume the full supremacy they seek.

  Religion Today

  The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) today remains fearful of ideas and beliefs that challenge its authority. Proselytising is not permitted, religious organisation is regulated and monitored, while organisations such as Falun Gong (a quasi-Buddhist health system) and the Church of Almighty God (a radical Christian group) can be deemed cults and banned outright. Despite constraints, worship and religious practice is generally permitted and China’s spiritual world provides a vivid and colourful backdrop to contemporary Chinese life.

  China has always had a pluralistic religious culture, and although statistics in China are a slippery fish, an estimated 400 million Chinese today adhere to a particular faith, in varying degrees of devotion. The CCP made strident efforts after 1949 to supplant religious worship with the secular philosophy of communism but since the abandonment of principles of Marxist-Leninist collectivism, this policy has significantly waned.

  Religion in China is enjoying an upswing as people return to faith for spiritual solace at a time of great change, dislocation and uncertainty. The hopeless, poor and destitute may turn to worship as they feel abandoned by communism and the safety nets it once assured. Yet the educated and prosperous are similarly turning to religious belief for a sense of guidance and direction in a land many Chinese suspect has become morally bereft.

  Religious belief in China has traditionally been marked by tolerance. Although the faiths are quite distinct, some convergence exists between Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism, and you may discover shrines where all three faiths are worshipped. Guanyin, the Buddhist Goddess of Mercy, finds her equivalent in Tianhou (Mazu), the Taoist goddess and protector of fisher folk, and the two goddesses can seem almost interchangeable. Other symbioses exist: elements of Taoism and Buddhism can be discerned in the thinking of some Chinese Christians, while the Virgin Mary finds a familiar toehold in the Chinese psyche owing to her resemblance, in bearing and sympathetic message, to Guanyin.

  Anyone interested in Tibetan Buddhism will find Inner Mongolia easier to reach than Tibet; the province is home to many important and historic Lamaseries, including Dà Zhào in Hohhot, Wǔdāng Lamasery and Guǎngzōng Sì.

  Buddhism

  Although not an indigenous faith, Buddhism (佛教; Fójiào) is the religion most deeply associated with China and Tibet. Although Buddhism’s authority has long ebbed, the faith still exercises a powerful sway over China's spiritual inclinations. Many Chinese may not be regular temple-goers but they harbour an interest in Buddhism; they may merely be ‘cultural Buddhists’, with a strong affection for Buddhist civilisation.

  Chinese towns with any history usually have several Buddhist temples, but the number is well down on pre-1949 figures. The small Héběi town of Zhèngdìng, for example, has four Buddhist temples, but at one time had eight. Běijīng once had hundreds, compared to the 20 or so you can find today.

  Some of China’s greatest surviving artistic achievements are Buddhist in inspiration. The largest and most ancient repository of Chinese, Central Asian and Tibetan Buddhist artwork can be found at the Mogao Grottoes in Gānsù, while the carved Buddhist caves at both Lóngmén and Yúngāng are spectacular pieces of religious and creative heritage. To witness Buddhism at its most devout, consider a trip to Tibet.

  Origins

  Founded in ancient India around the 5th century BC, Bu
ddhism teaches that all of life is suffering, and that the cause of this anguish is desire, itself rooted in sensation and attachment. Suffering can only be overcome by following the eightfold path, a set of guidelines for moral behaviour, meditation and wisdom. Those who have freed themselves from suffering and the wheel of rebirth are said to have attained nirvana or enlightenment. The term Buddha generally refers to the historical founder of Buddhism, Siddhartha Gautama, but is also sometimes used to denote those who have achieved enlightenment.

  Siddhartha Gautama left no writings; the sutras that make up the Buddhist canon were compiled many years after his death.

  Author of Titus Groan and Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake was born in Lúshān in 1911, the son of Ernest Cromwell Peake, a missionary doctor from the London Missionary Society.

  Buddhism in China

  Like other faiths such as Christianity, Nestorianism, Islam and Judaism, Buddhism originally reached China via the Silk Road. The earliest recorded Buddhist temple in China proper dates back to the 1st century AD, but it was not until the 4th century, when a period of warlordism coupled with nomadic invasions plunged the country into disarray, that Buddhism gained mass appeal. Buddhism’s sudden growth during this period is often attributed to its sophisticated ideas concerning the afterlife (such as karma and reincarnation), a dimension unaddressed by either Confucianism or Taoism. At a time when existence was especially precarious, spiritual transcendence was understandably popular.

  As Buddhism converged with Taoist philosophy (through terminology used in translation) and popular religion (through practice), it went on to develop into something distinct from the original Indian tradition. The most famous example is the esoteric Chan school (Zen in Japanese), which originated sometime in the 5th or 6th century, and focused on attaining enlightenment through meditation. Chan was novel not only in its unorthodox teaching methods, but also because it made enlightenment possible for laypeople outside the monastic system. It rose to prominence during the Tang and Song dynasties, after which the centre of practice moved to Japan. Other major Buddhist sects in China include Tiantai (based on the teachings of the Lotus Sutra) and Pure Land, a faith-based teaching that requires simple devotion, such as reciting the Amitabha Buddha’s name, in order to gain rebirth in paradise. Today, Pure Land Buddhism is the most common.

  Beyond Tibet, China has four sacred Buddhist mountains, each one the home of a specific Bodhisattva. The two most famous mountains are Wǔtái Shān and Éméi Shān, respectively ruled over by Wenshu and Puxiang.

  FALUN GONG

  Falun Gong – a practice that merges elements of qìgōng-style regulated breathing and standing exercises with Buddhist teachings, fashioning a quasi-religious creed in the process – literally means ‘Practice of the Dharma Wheel’. Riding a wave of interest in qìgōng systems in the 1990s, Falun Gong claimed as many as 100 million adherents in China by 1999. The technique was banned in the same year after over 10,000 practitioners stood in silent demonstration outside Zhōngnánhǎi in Běijīng, following protests in Tiānjīn when a local magazine published an article critical of Falun Gong. The authorities had been unnerved by the movement’s audacity and organisational depth, construing Falun Gong as a threat to the primacy of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The movement was branded a cult (xíejìao) and a robust, media-wide propaganda campaign was launched against practitioners, forcing many to undergo ‘re-education’ in prison and labour camps. After the ban, the authorities treated Falun Gong believers harshly and reports surfaced of adherents dying in custody. Falun Gong remains an outlawed movement in China to this day.

  Buddhist Schools

  Regardless of its various forms, most Buddhism in China belongs to the Mahayana school, which holds that since all existence is one, the fate of the individual is linked to the fate of others. Thus, Bodhisattvas – those who have already achieved enlightenment but have chosen to remain on earth – continue to work for the liberation of all other sentient beings. The most popular Bodhisattva in China is Guanyin, the Goddess of Mercy.

  Ethnic Tibetans and Mongols within China practise a unique form of Mahayana Buddhism known as Tibetan or Tantric Buddhism (Lǎma Jiào). Tibetan Buddhism, sometimes called Vajrayana or ‘Thunderbolt Vehicle’, has been practised since the early 7th century AD and is influenced by Tibet’s pre-Buddhist Bon religion, which relied on priests or shamans to placate spirits, gods and demons. Generally speaking, it is much more mystical than other forms of Buddhism, relying heavily on mudras (ritual postures), mantras (sacred speech), yantras (sacred art) and esoteric initiation rites. Priests called lamas are believed to be reincarnations of highly evolved beings; the Dalai Lama is the supreme patriarch of Tibetan Buddhism.

  China’s oldest surviving Buddhist temple is the White Horse Temple in Luòyáng; other more ancient Buddhist temples may well have existed but have since vanished.

  GUANYIN

  The boundlessly compassionate countenance of Guanyin, the Buddhist Goddess of Mercy, can be encountered in temples across China. The goddess (more strictly a Bodhisattva or a Buddha-to-be) goes under a variety of aliases: Guanshiyin (literally ‘Observing the Cries of the World’) is her formal name, but she is also called Guanzizai, Guanyin Dashi and Guanyin Pusa, or, in Sanskrit, Avalokiteshvara. Known as Kannon in Japan, Guanyam in Cantonese and Quan Am in Vietnam, Guanyin shoulders the grief of the world and dispenses mercy and compassion. Christians will note a semblance to the Virgin Mary in the aura surrounding the goddess, which at least partially explains why Christianity has found a slot in the Chinese consciousness.

  In Tibetan Buddhism, her earthly presence manifests itself in the Dalai Lama, and her home is the Potala Palace in Lhasa. In China, her abode is the island of Pǔtuóshān in Zhèjiāng province, the first two syllables of which derive from the name of her palace in Lhasa.

  In temples throughout China, Guanyin is often found at the very rear of the main hall, facing north (most of the other divinities, apart from Weituo, face south). She typically has her own little shrine and stands on the head of a big fish, holding a lotus in her hand. On other occasions, she has her own hall, often towards the rear of the temple.

  The goddess (who in earlier dynasties appeared to be male rather than female) is often surrounded by little effigies of the luóhàn (or arhat; those freed from the cycle of rebirth), who scamper about; the Guānyīn Pavilion outside Dàlǐ is a good example of this. Guanyin also appears in a variety of forms, often with just two arms, but frequently in multiarmed form (as at the Pǔníng Temple in Chéngdé). The 11-faced Guanyin, the fierce and wrathful horse-head Guanyin (a Tibetan Buddhist incarnation), the Songzi Guanyin (literally ‘Offering Son Guanyin’) and the Dripping Water Guanyin are just some of her myriad manifestations. In standing form, she has traditionally been a favourite subject for déhuà (white-glazed porcelain) figures, which are typically very elegant.

  Taoism

  A home-grown philosophy-cum-religion, Taoism (道教; Dàojiào) is also perhaps the hardest of all China’s faiths to grasp. Controversial, paradoxical, and – like the Tao itself – impossible to pin down, it is a natural counterpoint to rigid Confucianist order and responsibility.

  Taoism predates Buddhism in China and much of its religious culture connects to a distant animism and shamanism, despite the purity of its philosophical school. In its earliest and simplest form, Taoism draws from The Classic of the Way and Its Power (Taote Jing; Dàodé Jìng), penned by the sagacious Laotzu (Laozi; c 580–500 BC), who left his writings with the gatekeeper of a pass as he headed west on the back of an ox. Some Chinese believe his wanderings took him to a distant land in the west where he became Buddha.

  The Classic of the Way and Its Power is a work of astonishing insight and sublime beauty. Devoid of a godlike being or deity, Laotzu’s writings instead endeavour to address the unknowable and indescribable principle of the universe, which he calls Dao (道; dào; ‘the Way’). Dao is the way or method by which the universe operates, so it can be understood to
be a universal or cosmic principle.

  The opening lines of The Classic of the Way and Its Power confess, however, that the treatise may fail in its task: 道可道非常道, 名可名非常名; ‘The way that can be spoken of is not the real way, the name that can be named is not the true name.’ Despite this disclaimer, the 5000-character book, completed in terse classical Chinese, somehow communicates the nebulous power and authority of ‘the Way’. The book remains the seminal text of Taoism, and Taoist purists see little need to look beyond its revelations.

  One of Taoism’s most beguiling precepts, wúwéi (inaction) champions the allowing of things to naturally occur without interference. The principle is enthusiastically pursued by students of Taiji Quan, Wuji Quan and other soft martial arts who seek to equal nothingness in their bid to lead an opponent to defeat himself.

  During the Cultural Revolution, many Christian churches around China served as warehouses or factories, a utilitarian function that actually helped preserve many of them. They were gradually rehabilitated in the 1980s.

  Confucianism

  The very core of Chinese society for the past two millennia, Confucianism (儒家思想; Rújiā Sīxiǎng) is a humanist philosophy that strives for social harmony and the common good. In China, its influence can be seen in everything from the emphasis on education and respect for elders to the patriarchal role of the government.