At first glance, China's Northwest can appear remote, vast, and empty. Within this apparent emptiness, however, a lot is going on. Diverse in landscapes and peoples (though not always as in-your-face about its diversity as China's southwest), the northwest has always been China's most restive region. This has always been a borderland, a region of harsh landscapes, barbarian peoples, and unknown horizons. Indeed, for much of China's history, the main Chinese presence here consisted of military forts and outposts designed to protect the famous Silk Roads - perhaps the most famous of which, Jiayuguan 嘉峪关, guards the far western end of the Great Wall.
The northwest's links to the "inner lands" of China have occasionally proven tenuous and testy, with regional minority peoples often proving a formidable force of resistance facing Chinese cultural and military hegemony. Over the past two decades, the advent of the 西部大开发 "Open the West" campaign has seen new waves of Chinese migration into the region, creating a fascinating cultural mosaic while inflaming age-old cultural and political tensions. This is where to travel to see the beauty of modern China's diversity - as well as its accompanying difficulties.
CAIS began offering programming in this region in 2014, and has a regional program base in Xining, Qinghai. The CAIS 8th grade visits locations in Qinghai and Gansu provinces, traveling to a number of towns, villages, historic sites, and national parks to gain a sense of the region's diversity.
The northwest's links to the "inner lands" of China have occasionally proven tenuous and testy, with regional minority peoples often proving a formidable force of resistance facing Chinese cultural and military hegemony. Over the past two decades, the advent of the 西部大开发 "Open the West" campaign has seen new waves of Chinese migration into the region, creating a fascinating cultural mosaic while inflaming age-old cultural and political tensions. This is where to travel to see the beauty of modern China's diversity - as well as its accompanying difficulties.
CAIS began offering programming in this region in 2014, and has a regional program base in Xining, Qinghai. The CAIS 8th grade visits locations in Qinghai and Gansu provinces, traveling to a number of towns, villages, historic sites, and national parks to gain a sense of the region's diversity.