Guangzhou History

Dear my friends and visitor, In Order to welcome the 60 years founded day of china anniversary on 1st October 2009, hereby i want to share the story about my city. I hope this little story will adding a little knowledge about my city Guangzhou.

Guangzhou or simplified chinese name 广州 (Canton) and also known as Kwangchou is located in southern part of People's Republic of China (PRC); Many people is taken wrong and about this city. This city is not a province, but its a sub provincial city and the capital of Guangdong Province. The city is a major port of the Pearl River Delta, heading to the South China Sea, and is located only about 120 km (75 miles) northwest of Hong Kong, and Guangzhou is the third most populous metropolitan area in mainland China. The official estimate of the metropolitan area's population at end 2006 by the provincial government was 9,754,600. Guangzhou's urban land area is the third largest in China, rank only after Beijing and Shanghai.

Since Guangzhou is located on at 112°57'E to 114°3'E and 22°26'N to 23°56'N in the south, our climate is a humid subtropical climate influenced by the Asian monsoon. In the summer just a few days passed away, we have Summers with wet and high temperatures high humidity and a high heat index. Winters are mild, dry and sunny and no snow, this is the most i like about my city hihihi.

Guangzhou became a part of China in the 3d century B.C. The first known city built at the site of Guangzhou was Panyu founded in 214 BC. The city has been continuously occupied since that time. Panyu was expanded when it became the capital of the Nanyue Kingdom in 206 BC.

In 111 BC the Han Dynasty annexed Nanyue , and Panyu became a provincial capital and remains so until this day. In 226 AD, the city however became the seat of the Guang Prefecture (廣州 Guangzhou). Therefore, "Guangzhou" was the name of the prefecture, not of the city. However, people grew accustomed to calling the city Guangzhou, instead of Panyu hihihi.

The Nation of Hindu and Arab merchants reached Guangzhou in the 10th century, and the city became the first Chinese port regularly visited by European traders. The Portuguese were the first Europeans to arrive to the city by sea, establishing a monopoly on the external trade out of its harbor by 1511. But, they were later expelled from their settlements in Guangzhou, but instead granted use of Macau as a trade base with the city in 1557. Portuguese in Macau, Spanish in Manila, and Armenians and Muslims from India were already actively trading in the port by the 1690s, they would keep a near monopoly of foreign trade in the region until the arrival of the Dutch in the early seventeenth century.

In the 18th century the French and English British East India ships began frequenting the port. Trading, however, was restricted until the Treaty of Nanjing (1842) following the Opium War between Britain and China. The treaty opened four new treaty ports, allowing British merchants to trade in Fuzhou, Xiamen, Ningbo, and Shanghai in addition to Guangzhou and which opened the city to foreign trade.

By the middle of the 18th century, Guangzhou had become as one of the world's great trading ports under the 13 Factories, which was a distinction it maintained until the outbreak of the Opium Wars in 1839 and the opening of other ports in China in 1842. The privilege during this period made Guangzhou one of the top 3 cities in the world.

Nowadays As labor costs increased in Hong Kong, manufacturers owner opened their new plants in the cities of Guangdong province including Guangzhou. As the largest city in one of China's wealthiest provinces, Guangzhou attracts farmers from the countryside looking for job in the factory. Cantonese links to overseas Chinese and beneficial tax reforms of the 1990s have aided my city's growth rapidly.

Today, my city had a suburb underground railway Guangzhou Metro (MRT). The first line of Guangzhou Metro opened in 1997, Guangzhou is the fourth city in Mainland China which have an underground railway system, instead of Beijing, Tianjin and Shanghai. Currently the underground network is made up of four lines, covering a total length of 116 km, while another four lines are under construction and must be completed in 2010 before the Asian Games. A long term plan is to make the city's underground system expand over 500 km by 2020 with 15 lines in operation.

If we want to go to Hongkong is easy, we can use Express fast train. Express trains depart from the Guangzhou East railway station Gǔangzhōu Dōngzhàn and arrive at the Hung Hom KCR station in Kowloon, Hong Kong. The route is approximately 182 km in length and the journey takes less than two hours.

Other transportation is ferry service including an overnight steamer service, which takes eight hours, an also high-speed catamaran service which takes three hours, to the China Ferry Terminal or Macau Ferry Pier in Hong Kong. We depart from Nansha Pier located in the distant Nansha District outside the city centre, is also operating six daily 75-minute catamaran services to Hong Kong.

That's all i think that i can share with all of you, see you on my next post, thank you.