China: her size roughly that of Canada or the United States. Her population one billion one hundred million, 22 per cent of the planet's human beings.

China: very young, 60 percent of the Chinese under 25 years of age. Very old, millennia of accumulated and still potent history, pride of remembered greatness motivating her march towards the new technological era which is changing the world, and changing her.

中国面积大致相当于加拿大或美国，人口11亿，占全球人口的22%.

中国非常年轻，60%的中国人年龄在25岁以下。中国又非常古老，具有数千年累积起来、现仍具有强大影响的历史，对往昔文明鼎盛的自豪激励着她迈步走向新技术时代。这个时代正在改变世界，改变中国。

China: her history not unitary, but made up of many histories; as she is made up of many different peoples, altogether 56 nations. Yet she is a oneness, coherent, whole. THE GREAT WITHIN.

There is a China of the plains, easily travelled, a tourist delight. Here are the wealthiest, the most advanced metropolises: Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, Nanjing, Guangzhou...fertile alluviallowlands which seem vast, yet are less than 15 per cent of her total territory. And China's arable, cultivable acres make up only seven per cent of the world's total acreage. On this she feeds almost a quarter of the world's people. A prodigious achievement!

中国的历史并不是一部单一的历史，而是由许多部历史组成，因为中国是由许多不同的民族组成的——总共有56个民族。然而她却是一个紧密完整的统一体。真是一个伟大的、自成一统的国家。

中国的一部分地区是平原，旅行便利，为游览胜地。这里有最富庶、最先进的大都市：北京、天津、上海、南京、广州……肥沃的冲积平原似乎广阔无边，而实际还不到总领土的15%。中国的耕地面积只占世界耕地总面积的7%。她凭这么少的耕地却养活几乎占世界人口四分之一的人，真是一个了不起的成就！

This China of the plains stretches from Manchuria to Hong Kong; most of it lies eastwards, with easy access to the ocean. Here both urban and rural areas have greatly profited from the recent economic reforms. Most of the foreign investments, the special economic zones, the new industrial plants,are sited here. Here are the skills, the manpower, the markets, the communication network. Most of the universities are also here, and more than 80 percent of the population. Prosperity is evident-over 60 per cent of new houses in the villages, over 20 per cent of families with television installed in the last ten years, large new apartment houses for urban dwellers, modem hotels...

But there is the other China, 85 per cent of the total surface of the land. This China is not easily visited, for communication is still a problem. It stretches in an immense bow fiom North to South, and in it live, besides the "typical" Chinese, who call themselves the Hans, fifty-odd other races or ethnic groups called "national minorities". These hark back to China's very beginning. With them the Hans both warred and traded; co-existed, intermarried ostracized, for nearly 5,000 years.

中国平原地区从满洲里一直延伸到香港，多半位于东部，临近海洋。新近的经济改革使这里城乡地区都受惠匪浅。多数外资企业、经济特区、新兴工厂都在这一地区。这里拥有先进的技术、充足的人力、广大的市场和发达的交通网络。多数大学也在这里，还有这个国家。80%以上的人口。繁荣景象是显而易见的——农村60%以上的房屋是新建的，20%以上的家庭在过去十年中添置了电视机，城市居民住上了宽敞的新公寓，还有现代化的旅馆……

但是中国还有另外一部分，占国土总面积的85%。中国的这一部分出入不便，因为交通仍然是一个问题。它由北向南伸展，构成一个巨大的弓形，其中除了自称汉族的“典型”中国人之外，还居住着另外五十几个民族或种族，称为“少数民族”。这些少数民族早在中国形成之初就已存在。将近5，000年间，汉族和少数民族既有战争又有贸易，或与之共存，或与之通婚，或相互排斥。