Hainan's openness takes new forms

Visiting Qilou Old Street in Haikou, Hainan province, Anna Bondarenko, a 24-year-old from Russia, could hardly tell whether she was in a Western country or China. All around her stood countless qilou, a type of Chinese arcade shophouse that blends Baroque, Southeast Asian, traditional Chinese and other architectural styles.

"If I show my family and friends photos of these Chinese buildings, they'll surely ask where in Europe I'm vacationing," Bondarenko said.

Filled with curiosity, Bondarenko photographed European-style motifs on the qilou before turning her attention to a distinctly Chinese lion pattern rooted in traditional folk culture.

The contrasting details left her wondering why these historic Chinese buildings carried influences from different parts of the world.

As she learned more from the group's guide, an answer began to emerge. From the mid-19th century onward, overseas Hainanese returning from Southeast Asia brought foreign tastes and lifestyles home, where they blended with local customs and helped shape the distinctive architectural landscape she saw.

For Bondarenko, her tour of the street took only a few hours, but it gave her a firsthand sense of the openness and inclusiveness of Hainan, home to China's only free trade port (FTP).

"I thought Hainan's openness was mainly about modern business and tourism," Bondarenko said. "But now I realize it has deep cultural roots and goes back centuries."

Bondarenko was one of 20 young people from overseas who recently visited Hainan under a program called "Opportunity China: Global Gen Z Views on Hainan", hosted by China Daily from Nov 3 to 6.

Over four days, the group traveled to Haikou, Wenchang and Chengmai county, visiting sites related to culture, technology and public services to gain a broader understanding of the island's development.

At the Hainan Free Trade Port Resort Software Community in Chengmai, 26-year-old Pakistani student Naveed Muhammad began to see how Hainan's connections with the wider world extend beyond its physical heritage into the digital realm.

Looking around, he was drawn to a large screen. It showed users from Mauritius, the United States and other parts of the world playing online games on an overseas gaming platform developed by the Software Community.

Naveed initially assumed the games were created by developers from around the world. He later learned that they came from small and even micro-sized Chinese studios, with the platform helping these lesser-known developers reach overseas users.

For him, the experience offered a contemporary counterpart to the international influences he had seen in Hainan's history and culture.

"Old buildings represent Hainan's historic openness built on ocean trade. Today, the Software Community shows how that connection with the outside world has taken on a digital form," Naveed said.

High-tech horizons

As the journey continued, the group encountered other sides of an island they had initially associated largely with tourism and tropical scenery. For 28-year-old Nicolas Roumaneix from France, that contrast emerged during the group's visit to Wenchang.

On his first day in Hainan, Roumaneix took in the island's beaches, coconut juice and sunshine. Trying qingbuliang, a local dessert, also helped him break the ice with people he met. But a visit to the Wenchang Aerospace Supercomputing Center challenged his first impression of Hainan as primarily a tropical destination known for its laid-back island life.

There, Roumaneix was amazed to get a close-up encounter with space, touching a meteorite replica for the first time while learning about Hainan's growing role in China's aerospace sector.

For Elliott Mae Leigh from the US, the different sides of Hainan raised another question: how could they be presented to young audiences overseas?

A content creator herself, Leigh wanted to showcase local intangible cultural heritage such as Li brocade and coconut shell carving in short videos. Through her camera, she also hoped to bring the island's technology and natural beauty to audiences abroad.

"Hainan has so much more than people outside realize, and it needs to be promoted better, especially to young people," Leigh said.

For the young participants, the four-day journey offered different ways of understanding an island whose links with the world stretch from the architecture of its old streets to the digital platforms of its software park.

For Naveed, experiencing it firsthand made a difference.

"Online content can only show what's on the surface," he said. "I believe nothing beats seeing it all in person and building real connections with people through programs like this."