Dongdong Qiang works as a senior copy writer for a 4A advertising agency. From his cross talk experience, his articles are very humorous. He keeps one regular blog called This Is Dongdong Qiang.

Dongdong Qiang visited South Africa as part of a bloggers tour organized by the South African Embassy in Beijing during February 2009.

Highlights:

1. I am going to visit summer

Before this trip, I didn't know anything about the place. Even though our hosts had provided a large amount of text and pictures for our reference, even though I have skimmed through Xu Jinglei's South Africa travel book published last year after her travels, it's still hard to imagine what kind of experience I'm going to have ... there will be the sea, red wine, sunshine, beaches ...

We have already been told that there will be no real outdoor activities: I don't know if we'll be able to see the rare trees, tall grass and far and wide landscapes. In any case it's Africa, and unavoidably that familiar song wells up in my heart: "In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the lions sleep tonight... "

2. From the Ethnic Cultural Palace to Panjiayuan

The film The Gods Must Be Crazy was filmed in South Africa. The one where they picked up the cola bottle.

That was when different races were still separated in South Africa. Perhaps during that time there was a more traditional African culture and life.

This kind of thing always proposes a contradiction. No-one has the right to block any group or culture to seek, copy or get closer to modern culture, and improve their lives. But this assimilation, this simple modern culture that engulfs everything: it has written off so much else.

Plus South Africa is already quite modernized. Although we were at a park which had traditional culture as its theme, so-called "modern civilization" was still everywhere. For example, our tour guide was clothed in traditional clothing but on his shoes was the Nike logo.

3. Peach blossom, Vessel, Old sign

We went to the biggest bank in Africa － Standard Bank － established 146 years ago. If this was China, there would be a bronze sign at the store-front: "Hundred-year-old name" in the milieu of Wang Zhihe (王致和)， Rui Fuxiang (瑞蚨祥) and Tong Rentang (同仁堂). The Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) bought 20% of their shares last year (was it last year?). By Chinese custom, there should be a sign put up, right?

Their CEO gave us a presentation. The CEO is a jolly old man, and always chuckling. Very sweet.

Compared to other bankers, he gave me a very different impression. In any case he didn't look like someone who managed a wealth consortium. I have met the big and small directors of big and small Chinese enterprises. They all look pretty hard.

4. Dashilan youth and long-legged Nobel-prize squirrel

On the evening of the twentieth, we went to a club in Cape Town under the supervision of some youths. I've never been one to promote clubbing; I was only there to see what all the fuss was about.

The club is different to Beijing’s clubs - they’re not as extravagant, more like an upgraded version of [popular Beijing live music venue] Mao Livehouse. But, it must be said, if you added up the lengths of all the girls' legs from that club, the total length would be longer than all the girls’ legs from Chaoyang district put together.

My heartfelt suggestion is that the criteria for a country’s potential should not be dependent on GDP, but on GDL - Gross Domestic Legs. Or even GDB - Gross Domestic Breasts. I hope that everyone will unite and work hard to try and put our country into the ranks of developed countries.