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Qingtian, one hometown to emigrants scattered over 100 countries
Qingtian county?is located in southeastern Zhejiang province. There is now a population of half a million while it’s calculated that more than 250,000 people originally from Qingtian now live all over the world. First-generation emigrants to Europe mainly earned their living in businesses dealing with stone carvings from home.
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Map shows the routes Qingtian people traveled around the world in 17th and 18th centuries. [zj.qq.com]?
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Arts of stone sculpturing
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Stone sculptures are on display in Qingtian museum. Such products were taken overseas to be sold.? |
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Stonework skills have been passed down over hundreds of years and many top-class sculptors originate from Qingtian.
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A piece of traditional sculpture is seen in the local museum.
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A modern work called “Red Detachment of Women” is also on display in the museum.
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Three?pieces of work is displayed in the museum.
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A dragon egg stone exhibited in the museum. It is named for its shape and is rarely found any more in local mines.
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A dragon egg stone “hatches” in the local museum.
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Qingtian stone was popular for making name seals among Chinese intellectuals during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) and beyond. Seals, made of Qingtian stone, now cost more than gold by weight in auction markets. Each of the four above may be worth more than two million yuan ($320,000) according to the museum.
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Charts illustrate the processes involved in stone sculpting.
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Scenic spots in Qingtian:
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The ferry to the Shimen Cave scenic spot.
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Shimen Falls is made of five tiers with the last one a 112-meter drop into a pool as deep as 10 meters. Qingtian is working hard to attract tourists to visit its natural scenery.
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An old local ancestral temple is seen in this photo.?
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Local specialty:
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A high-quality waxberry or Yangmei is a local specialty famous for its size, like a ping pong ball. It can be tasted between mid-June to early July.
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