Reporting China students offer a collection of photos chronicling early impressions from their journey through the People’s Republic.

After three long days of final exams, teachers, families and friends gathered to watch 112 fifth-graders graduate at the first private school to open in Shanghai.

Xi’an is undergoing vast modernization to make itself more inviting to tourists and locals and is simultaneously attempting to keep all of its history important. This subject is controversial to some Chinese who worry about the city losing sight of its historical importance.

Beishe is a village located in rural Shaanxi province, a two-hour drive from the ancient capital of Xi’an. While change has come to Beishe over the years – the introduction of electricity, an increase in motor vehicles and other labor-saving devices, and overall improvement in the quality of life – it has come at a much slower pace than in the country’s booming urban centers. This video offers glimpses of a day in the life of the people of Beishe, who manage to honor age-old rhythms in a time of dramatic national transformation.

And you thought walking a tightrope was hard. The sport of slacklining developed in the 1980s in the United States and is gaining popularity around the world. It has been slow to catch on in China, however, a country not known for freedom of expression or citizens trying their hand – or feet – at out-of-the-ordinary sports. But at least one Beijinger, Rio Zhang, is trying it out, and he talks about his experience with this extreme pastime.
Says Zhang: “I think when you try to balance your body, it helps to balance your mind.”