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Journey to the West

Chinese Tourists Do Europe -- in 14 Days

By Wieland Wagner

Chinese tourists have recently discovered Europe as a destination. SPIEGEL traveled with a group who covered 11 countries in 14 days by bus, snapping the sights and buying up brand names. But for some the Old World was a disappointment, full of lazy Italians and slovenly French.

Liu Hong, 28, is on her third attempt in front of the video camera. This time her appearance is a success, and she is practically euphoric as she records her little introduction: "Today, finally, our great journey through beautiful Europe begins," she says, pressing her right hand to her heart. "Eleven countries in 14 days." The way she says it, it sounds more like a promise than a threat.

The 30 other Chinese in her group are standing around taking pictures and videotaping. Like Liu, they all wear yellow stickers that identify them as part of the "Flying Dragon on a 10,000-mile Journey." They are so trigger-happy with their cameras that one would think that they had already reached their goal, the Far West. In fact, they are still waiting for their flight at Beijing Airport.

The hectic marathon tour that will take them across Europe -- from Frankfurt to Rome, then Amsterdam and, finally, Paris -- hasn't even begun yet. It will be another day and a half before the group touches down at Frankfurt Airport on their Sri Lankan Airlines flight. Flying via Bangkok and Colombo, the Sri Lankan capital, is cheaper than a direct flight -- which would cost as much as the entire trip. The Chinese are paying about €1,000 apiece, which includes transportation, overnight stays in double rooms and meals.

It takes an ordinary Chinese factory worker about a year to earn €1,000. Even for Liu Hong, a successful TV presenter, it's a lot of money. She is traveling alone to keep expenses down, leaving her husband and two-year-old son at home.

Not for Fun

But this European road trip is not for fun and games, not even a vacation. In fact, it's more of an educational tour -- practically a research trip or expedition. Liu Hong and her group represent the vanguard of a nascent Chinese tourism business.

Their goal is to absorb as much as possible, as quickly as possible, about these peculiar Europeans. There is one thing, above all, that the members of Operation "Flying Dragon" want to take home from their journey -- the ability to enjoy life. They've already mastered the art of making money, but spending it is a different talent altogether.

The group encounters Germans -- tanned from their vacations on Sri Lanka -- on the flight from Colombo to Frankfurt. The global village is already a reality in economy class, where all package tourists are the same, a fact some Europeans aren't quite ready to accept.

"A Chinese group? I'd rather sit next to a bunch of kids!" says one irate German annoyed by the chattering Chinese on his flight. This is about as close as these Chinese tourists will come to their research subjects. Close, face-to-face contact with other people is risky, demanding and time-consuming.

The group already begins isolating itself from its German surroundings on the bus ride to a hotel near Frankfurt Airport. The next morning, a Sunday, official Zu Fazheng, 58, gets up at 6 a.m. to explore his surroundings with his SLR camera. But aside from a few houses with closed shutters, he finds little worth photographing.

Photographic documentation is almost as important on this expedition as collecting brand-name consumer products, the group's show-and-tell exhibits for the folks back home. When their flight lands early in the morning at Frankfurt Airport, the Chinese quickly converge on the one souvenir shop open at this early hour. They are interested in anything people at home see as quality German craftsmanship, especially knives and scissors from Solingen.

Party official Zu acquires a potato peeler. Within an hour, the group has checked Frankfurt off its to-do list. Travel guide Luo Zonghao, 48, urges his charges to pack up and move on. "Lai, Lai" -- "Let's go" -- he tells them.

Every minute counts. At noon they make a short stop in Stuttgart, the home of Daimler and Bosch, as Luo explains. This group is less interested in the country's regions than in its brand names.

German companies have been generous in helping China industrialize. Everyone on the bus is grateful, of course. They like the Germans for this reason, unlike the Americans, who are constantly applying trade pressure, as 50-year-old Cheng Xisheng, a financial official, says complainingly. Meanwhile the group's bus races to the next stop, Innsbruck.