Last Train Home 归途列车

[abcdefg]

It's that time of year again. The Spring Festival transportation 春运 rush is in full swing. If you haven't yet seen this fine documentary film about it,  now would be a good time. 130 million souls are "going home," many carrying those huge woven bags stuffed with bedding, a few clothes, and some presents. For many factory workers at the lower end of the socioeconomic scale, this is the only time all year they can see their elderly parents and young children who were left back in the village when they went away to work 打工 in the big city factories. 

 

This is an essential part of any "getting to know the real China" project, along with a couple of Peter Hessler's early books. I watched it again last night for the second or third time. The language is difficult because of Sichuan accents, but the version I found on Amazon had English subtitles. 

 

The film also has an interesting theme dealing with the family's teenage girl "coming of age" and rebelling with parental authority. All in all, struck me as an honest "slice of life." 

 

Here are two links to more info:

 

http://www.pbs.org/pov/lasttrainhome/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Last_Train_Home_(film) 

 

 

[Alex_Hart]

One of my favorite documentaries about China! I'll have to watch it again before going away for spring festival.

[ChTTay]

Yes, I made my Mum watch it to let her know coming to China during Spring Festival is a bad idea. 

[LiMo]

I've been planning to watch this for ages but have been unable to lay my hands on a "free sample." I might bite the bullet and buy it when I get home.

[abcdefg]

LiMo -- I found it free at Amazon as a subscriber benefit ("Amazon Prime.") Before that, I found a place to rent it for $2.99 US (24-hour rental.) The rental deal was at Vudu.

 

I don't know whether it might be available from one of the many free Chinese movie streaming websites. (These are not available to me while I'm temporarily in the US.) If you are in China now, you could check, searching with the Chinese name. 归途列车

[abcdefg]

Related clipping: (Source: https://www.axios.com/newsletters/axios-china-35465d09-256b-49d0-9f27-34371dc74ab6.html?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=&stream=top-stories )

 

Spring Festival travel madness has begun

 

The Lunar New Year holiday, also known as the Spring Festival in China, has begun. New Year's Day falls on Feb. 16 this year. By the numbers: Every year hundreds of millions of Chinese travel during the 40 day period around the holiday and the country basically shuts down for a week starting on New Year's Eve.

 

This year officials expect 2.98 billions trips between February 1 and March 12, with a maximum daily peak of 100 million journeys.

 

As the above tweet from People's Daily shows, recent gains in the yuan is expected to have a positive impact on Chinese nationals traveling overseas.

Be smart: Chinese travel patterns are shifting and more people are taking overseas vacations during the Spring Festival holiday. Online travel agency Ctrip reports via China News Service that: Chinese overseas tourists will spend 9,580 yuan ($1,510) on average during the Spring Festival holiday, led by the most expensive trip — a journey to the Antarctic at 160,000 yuan; The number of tourists who have booked Antarctic trips nearly doubled over last Spring Festival.

 

Get ready for the Year of the Dog.

[LiMo]

@abcdefg

Cheers, I'll take a look