Customs
The General Administration of Customs is the superior of customs in China. It is a ministry-level organ directly under the State Council of the People’s Republic of China, governing all customs in China. In the General Administration of Customs are 15 departments, governing 6 subordinate public institutions, 4 social institutions and 3 institution stationed abroad. The Supervision Dept. of Central Commission for Discipline Inspection sets a Discipline Inspection & Supervision Bureau in the General Administration of Customs.
Currently, China has class-I 253 ports approved by the state and nearly 200 class-II ports approved by provincial governments. According to the Customs Law of the People’s Republic of China and applicable laws and regulations, China customs mainly undertake four basic tasks, i.e. exercise supervision and control over the means of transportation, goods, and articles entering or leaving the territory; collect customs duties and other taxes and fees; uncover and suppress smuggling; work out customs statistics and handle other customs operations, and seven duties including customs clearance monitoring, tax collection and management, processing trade and protective tariff supervision, customs statistics, customs inspection, smuggling strike, and port management.
China Customs carry out the work guideline of “administration based on the laws, holding the pass for the country, serving economy, and promoting development” and the team construction requirement of “strong politics, skillful business operation, and trustworthiness”.
(Articles prohibited or restricted for import and export) Articles prohibited to enter the country
1. Weapons, emulated weapons, ammunitions and explosives;
2. Counterfeit currency and securities;
3. Presswork, film, photo, disc, movie, tape, video, laser video disk, computer storage medium and others that may do harm to China’s politics, economy, culture, and moral;
4. Severe toxicants;
5. Opium, morphine, heroin, Marijuana, and other addictive narcotic and psychoactive drugs;
6. Animals, plants, and their products with dangerous bacteria, pests, and other harmful organisms; and
7. Foods, drugs and other articles that may affect human and livestock health, come from an epidemic-stricken area, and can produce or breed infectious disease.
Articles prohibited to leave the country
1. All those prohibited to enter the country;
2. Script, presswork, film, photo, disc, movie, tape, video, laser video disk, computer storage medium and others that involve in national secrets;
3. Precious cultural relics and others prohibited to leave the country; and
4. Endangered and previous animals, plants (including specimen) and their seeds and reproductive materials.
Chinese Currency
Chinese currency is called Renminbi, which is issued by the People’s Bank of China. The unit for Renminbi is Yuan, and also Jiao and Fen. The abbreviated symbol of Renminbi Yuan is RMB￥.
Foreign currency exchange
In China, such foreign currencies as US Dollar, Pound, Euro, Japanese Yen, Australian Dollar, Canadian Dollar, Hong Kong Dollar, Singapore Dollar, Malaysian Ringgit, Macao Pataca, etc. can be converted into RMB. Banks can provide foreign currency exchange business.
Foreign credit card business available in China:
Currently, business of the following foreign credit cards is available in China:
1. Master Card
2. Visa Card
3. American Express Card
4. JCB card
5. Diners Card
Shopping
Chinese Tea Culture
China is the hometown of tea. Tea processing and tea drinking have a history of several thousand years. Famous brands of tea assemble here, mainly including green tea, black tea, oolong tea, scented tea, white tea, yellow tea and dark tea. Tea has efficacy of fitness and curing disease, enjoys appreciative interests and cultivates people’s mind. Tea tasting and hospitality with tea are decorous entertainments and social activities of Chinese people. While drinking in teahouse and having tea party are social group tea art activities. Chinese tea art enjoys great popularity around the world, being introduced to Japan in the Tang Dynasty and formed Japanese tea ceremony there.
Silk
Silk is a symbol of Chinese ancient culture. Chinese old silk industry woven and embroidered glory history for Chinese art and culture, making an indelible contribution towards development of human civilization around the world. Chinese silk is famous for her excellent quality, delicate pattern and abundant cultural connotation.
China
China is a pioneer in the invention of china in the world, writing a brilliant page in human history. The invention of china is our country’s “The Fifth Invention”. Its achievements in technique and art spread various countries around the world and influence the development of china and culture deeply there, winning high reputation of “China Country”.
China is the hometown of china. The invention of Chinese china is Chinese Nation’s great contribution to world civilization. In English, “china” also has the meaning of “China”. About the Middle of Shang Dynasty, the sixteenth B.C., China produced the early china. Due to its roughness both in body and firing technology of enamel layer and low firing temperature, showing primitiveness and transitivity, so it’s commonly called “proto-china”.
Painting and Calligraphy
Painting and Calligraphy is colloquialism for Calligraphy and Painting.
Calligraphy refers to methods of brush writing, mainly are brush holding, brush using, trace, structure, distribution (position and composition) and other methods. There are five common fonts of calligraphy artistic work: regular script, running script, cursive script, official script and seal character.
Chinese painting develops its own style in field of world art with long history and excellent tradition, referring to paint things on silk, cloth, thin silk, paper, and twill with brush, ink and color. They were not painted by normal people but famous painters in the history. Some paintings were not painted by famous painters, but they enjoy long history and are cultural relics, we should keep and document them.
Jade
China is the main country in the world rich in jade resource with a long history in exploiting, wide distribution and abundant contents.
According to Holy Mountain, over 200 jade-yielding sites were scattered in China. After thousands of years’ exploitation, some jade mines have already become empty, but a few famous jade mines still are being mined in large quantities which provide the raw material in a steady stream for the further progress of Chinese jade carving art. For instance, Yiwulvshan Mountain in northeast in China described in Holy Mountain produces Zigexun. After thousands of years, this place remains the same name. Now it locates at Yingkou, Liaoning Province, yielding talc. The most famous jade in China is Hetian, Xinjiang. Hetian jade has the richest yield jade, the gorgeous color, the most excellent quality and the most expensive price. It’s an important source of Chinese jade raw material in ancient times. The imperial families loved to use Hetian jade to make jade-grinder. The earliest old Silk Road is Jade Road, formed by expanding toward west later. Besides Hetian jade, Jiuquan Jade from Gansu, Lantian Jade from Shaanxi, Dushan Jade and Mixian Jade from Nanyang, Henan, Xiuyan Jade from Liaoning and others are common raw materials of Chinese jade.
For Chinese people, jade is out of common. It has already surpassed simple category of single taxology and become inner resource of Chinese Nation’s ethic group.
Art
Traditional Chinese Opera
Opera is a form of Chinese traditional Drama. It is incorporated by various factors like literature, music, dance, fine art, martial art, acrobatics and performing arts etc. It was derived from three different art forms with folk music and dance, hip-hop and antimasque. But the most prominent feature that distinguishes itself from different operas is reflected firstly by its music singing voiced from different tune systems. The music voice is created by collecting music in other areas on the basis of the language, folk songs and folk music in local areas. The characters in the play are acted by the male characters, female characters, “painted face” characters, middle-aged male characters and clown etc with different painted faces. In the performance, it attaches much importance to the programmed action inspired and created from life as well as the simulative treatment for space. And the art of singing, reading, acting and fighting etc and performance for transporting and excellent dancing with high technology content has constituted the complete opera art system which is distinguished from other operas.
Cross Talk
With a history of at least 2,000 years, our cross talk is derived from the miscellaneous drama “Fools” in its earliest time.
“Fools” was always put on performance in palace, with humorous talk, mordant and sarcastic mock. And it is so entertaining that it rewards so much laughs. These japes reflected actors’ mock and lash against the rulers.
Acrobatics
It is the general name of various performing arts such as cycling, gastriloquism, Pagoda of Bowls, ropedancer, lion dance and Magic etc.
Around the Neolithic Age, the acrobatics of China has sprouted. The earliest Acrobatic art was derived from a kind of entertaining game and performance displaying the labor skills of primitive men formed in hunting and the martial arts and substantial physical strength generated from self defense and attack, displaying rest and entertainment scene as well as the happiness for hunting and victory.
Many programs of Acrobatic are abstracted and changed into arts from the life skills and labor technique and skills of martial arts.
Chinese Acrobatics can be generally characterized by nine features, among which the emphasis on training for strength of waist, legs and head is the prominent feature one.
The second feature is to seek stability in risk, find peace in motion, which shows a calm, smart, accurate technique and a much-steeled hard effort.
The third feature is to seek exception from ordinary arts.
The forth feature is soft or hard kungfu’s supplementation with each other.
The fifth is to combine super strength with swift tumbling;
The sixth is to use daily appliance and labor tools as acting tools.
The seventh is to combine simplified craft arts with figure performance skills.
The eighth is that Chinese Acrobatic has greatest adaptability with a variety of acting forms and sites.
The ninth is that Chinese acrobatic boasts strict inheriting system and is closely related with sister arts.
Our country lays much emphasis on protection of intangible cultural heritage.
On June 8, 2007, the circus in Wuqiao county, Hebei province got the first prize of “first session cultural heritage day” conferred by National Culture Ministry. eng an Shadow play studio in Tai’an ,Shandong got the prize of “ first cultural heritage day” issued by National Culture Ministry.
Puppet
Puppet was called figure-head, Fukui-puppet, puppet-Cave in ancient times. The drama performed by puppet was called puppet show.
The puppet art has a long development history, and the earliest puppet was possibly related to the funeral soldier figures in slavery society.
Puppet is a form of drama performed by the actors who operates the puppets. The puppet show in China rose from Han Dynasty, and had new development and improvement in Tang Dynasty, and can perform song and dance drama with puppet. Song dynasty is a crucial period for the development of puppet, as the workmanship and operation technique for puppet has further developed. With the development of social economy, the puppet show in Ming dynasty has been prevailed throughout China, and in the developed provinces of southern China, the puppet show is more prosperous and was crowned as “puppet tools of South” .After Qing dynasty, the puppet show welcomed its flourish period with large popularizing scale and increasing vocal cavity, followed by the emergence of puppet show in western Liaoning, Zhangzhou bag puppet show, Quanzhou puppetry show, Jinjiang bag puppet show, Shaoyang bag puppet show,
Gaozhou puppet show, Chaozhou bars puppetry, North Sichuan puppet show, Shi qian puppet show, Yang puppetry show, Taishun drug-made puppet show, Lingao figure puppet show etc. Viewed from the form of performance, the puppet can be divided into five kinds, namely Tixian puppet, Zhangtou puppet, Bag Puppet, Bars puppet and Drug-made Puppet.
The Shadow Play
The shadow play was born in Western Han Dynasty some 2000 thousand years ago, and called Yangpi opera, also generally named as head drama or shadow play, was derived from Shaanxi Province of China, and became mature in Qin, Yu, and Jin areas in Dang and Song dynasties, and was prosperous in Hebei Province in Qing dynasty. As the name suggests, shadow play is made of leather. Considering of firmness and transparency, the cowhide and donkey skin is best leather. Five kinds of transparent pigments namely red, yellow, blue, green and black were applied for dying. In china, some operas in quite a few places were all derived from Shadow play, of which the shadow performance principle and the performing art etc also take the lead in the invention of modern movie and the development of modern art movie. Meanwhile, it is also the present for mutual exchange of Chinese government and other national leaders. To sum up, the shadow play enjoys high artistic value in China and even all over the world.
Due to the shadow play is a form of folk art, there will be some differences as per different places, and its materials are dependent on the animal skins in local areas. In China, cowhide, sheepskin and donkey skin etc. are most frequently used.
Shadow play is a form of folk art in China. The East Gansu shadow play in northwest China exist mainly in Pingliang and Qingyang county, especially focuses on the Delta area adjacent to Shaanxi and Ningxia province in the east.
Our country attaches much importance to the protection of non-materialized cultural heritage. On May 20, 2006, the shadow play was listed in the directory for the first group of national intangible cultural heritages after approved by National congress. On June 8, 2007, Yunmeng Shadow play artistic group in Hubei and Fanzheng an Shadow play studio in Tai’an, Shandong got the prize of “first cultural heritage day” issued by National Culture Ministry.