My first impression of china during the ITTE short-term visit

By Eric Mang’unyi (Kenya)

It was my first visit to the People’s Republic of China and truly I enjoyed every moment… China is way “advanced!”. She is a head in progress on technology not only for themselves but also for the world. They already enjoying 5G tech in some aspects – in actual fact they are already 5 – 10 years ahead of the rest of the continent!
Media collaboration with all sectors is first class! – highly synchronized and perhaps there are fewer if not ‘no misses’ in reporting compared to my country Kenya. This works well for the government and China as a whole in how the country is portrayed to the outside world – it is working for them, good public relations (PR) strategy! Which is also used to market china as a world tourist destination.

Security is real across China. I felt safer than even my home country where you can be even mugged by a police officer!
China makes use of its scarce resources efficiently and effectively. For example, they seem to have limited water bodies but water is available to majority of its citizens. I hardly missed water from the taps!
With its opening up to the world, they are genuinely pursuing this strategy to enhance its cooperation/businesses/ trade that its ultimate goal is to benefit all parties.
From a social perspective, I had this impression like there is considerable level of disputes from a local perspective be it family, land, person to person etc. which has culminated to the implementation of this social governance strategy. Its social governance approach at local level is going to have a huge positive impact to the general society/lessen costs, time and burden to its citizens in various cities and towns while seeking services. I think other developing countries can learn and/or emulate/adapt this kind of model.
Collaboration between various sectors/institutions like government is ‘top notch’. I think China utilizes and/or consults more university think tanks (professors) to develop/generate ideas including other diverse sources. This is more commendable.
Chinese people in particular in Zhili town and environments in Zhejiang province where I visited seem more receptive and welcoming. They also have a unique culture and more so food. It was just wow! Furthermore, a quick3 seconds glance on people gave that picture of a culturally disciplined society. For example, while at the Communication University of China I hardly saw students (both gender) displaying love/affection in public the few days I was there!
Continuous huge investment in infrastructure and development – housing which some seemed to go as high as over 30 floors something that is hardly visible in other developing countries was just amazing. I am used to up to 10 floors residential apartments. Double decker and more roads, with dedicated bicycle lanes, bullet train – which I would refer to it as “the real Standard Gauge Rail (SGR)” was quite different from what my country implemented!5 hours covering over 1500kilometers – wow! My country still has the British lunatics!
Am still wondering whether China is still a developing world!