While Indonesia has seven enchanting points locally known as Sapta Pesona to attract tourists, China draws foreign visitors under a motto consisting of seven luring points -- cleanliness, beauty, order, hospitality, remembrance, safety and peace.

The reality of these luring factors can be witnessed or felt in many places in China, especially at tourist sites and supporting places of interest like hotels, restaurants and shopping centers.

In an effort to preserve its historical and cultural values which have existed for thousands of years, the Chinese government is promoting its historical and cultural tourist objects under the motto comprising the seven luring points.

Among the historical and cultural sites being promoted by the Chinese government are the Great Wall of China, Shaolin Temple and Longmen Grottoes Scenic Zone.

Local and foreign tourists are invariably impressed by the 5,000-kilometer-long Great Wall of China not only because of its size and strength but also by the application of the seven enchanting values on and along the wall.

The long wall according to Wikipedia encyclopedia is a series of stones and earthen fortifications, built, rebuilt and maintained between the 6th century BC and the 16th century to protect the northern borders of the Chinese Empire from Xiongnu attacks during the rule of successive dynasties.

Several parts of the Great Wall of China were built as far back as the 5th century BC.

Although the peak of the Great Wall reaches a height of thousands of meters above sea level, many male and female visitors try to reach the top of the wall which was built in the period of the Ming Dynasty.

During a recent visit to the wall, Naushad Ahmed, a tourist from Maldives, said he had intended to reach the peak of one of the seven wonders in the world even while he was still at home in his country.

"When I was still at home, I already planned to reach the peak of the Great Wall although I realized it would be a difficult venture to reach the high place during the fasting month," said Ahmed, a Muslim who was fasting when he made the climb.

Ahmed and a number of other foreign tourists including Etienne Toyo Demanou from Cameroon actually almost gave up their effort to reach the peak of the Great Wall as they got extremely tired of making the ascent via thousands of stony steps.

It was only their high spirit that helped them finally to arrive at the peak of the wall.

"Finally, we reached the peak although gasping from exhaustion. It was great. The view from the top was beautiful. It was really an unforgetable experience," Toyo said.


Cleanliness

To enable tourists to reach places of interest from their hotels, the Chinese government has constructed infrastructures including roads both in urban and rural areas where clealiness gets priority and tourists can enjoy beautiful sceneries on both sides of the roads.

"The roads leading to tourist sites are good as they are clean and well maintained like new roads. The mountain sceneries with corn plantations along the roads really fill one's heart and mind with peace," a tourist from Nepal, Maha Prasad Lami Chhane, said.

Maha Prasad also commended the Chinese government's ability to preserve and maintain the country's cultural heritages and turn them into tourist objects like the Longmen Grottoes Sceneic Zone, a one-kilometer long hill where thousands of Buddha statues are sculptured in small and big holes (grottoes).

Tourists also expressed satisfaction about the hospitality shown by people dealing with tourists like tourist guides who always smile when explaining and answering visitors' questions about tourist objects.

"The biggest Buddha statue at the Grottoes Scenic Zone is 17.4 meters high. The statue was built in 24 years during the Tang Dynasty in the 6th century," said Ming, a tourist guide at the Longmen Grottoes Scenic Zone in Henan Province.

Thousands of Buddha statues in different sizes are scalptured on the wall of a hill located on a bank of clean, beautiful and tranquil Yishui river.

The hospitality of tourism people is also found in other tourist sites like at the Kung Fu show arena which is part of the Shaolin Temple complex.

Tourist guides at the Kung Fu show arena always involve visitors in Kung Fu performances. They (the tourist guides) ask some visitors to come to the stage and let Kung Fu masters teach them some basic steps of the Chinese martial art.

One foreign tourist who was patiently taught by a Kung Fu master at Shaolin Temple was Adama Edouard Ndiaye from Senegal who never studied Kung Fu before.

"I was impressed by their hospitality and patience when they taught me Kung Fu. I'll tell this experience to my brothers, sisters and friends at home," Edouard said.

After being taught Kung Fu, tourists receive video cassettes containing recorded materials on their Kung Fu exercises in the hope the cassets would be beautiful remembrances.

The Shaolin Monastery or Shaolin Temple is a Chan Buddhist temple in Zhengzhou City, Henan Province. It was built by the Emperor Hsiao-Wen in 477 AD. It is famous for its association with Chinese martial arts, particularly with Shaolin Kung Fu.

The building of Shaolin Temple is still well maintained with historical and cultural relics like a big pan for cooking herbal medicines and an old well about 50 cm in diameter aged thousands of years old and its water never runs out until now.

In the eastern part of the Shaolin Temple, there is a pagoda forest containing hundreds of old pagodas in different sizes from which visitors can get information about the history of pagodas in China.

Besides enjoying the beauty of tourist sites and objects, holiday makers also feel safe from their departure from the hotels to destinations they wished to visit.

Policemen are found at every corner of streets making people including tourists feel safe staying in cities like Beijing whose traffic is crowded but orderly arranged.

Transportation means like comfortable buses, trains and taxis to various places are convenient to tourists as the traffic is kept order in many areas in China.

Cleanliness both in urban and rural areas as well as tourist sites in China creates soothing atmosphere to tourists who are also impressed by the hospitality of people dealing with the tourism industry.

Attractive souvenirs as well as beautiful sceneries and places of interest are unforgetable and leave nice memories to tourists especially foreign vacationers.

Tourists are also spoiled with various kinds of Chinese foods. One of restaurants in Zhengzhou city for instance serves its visitors with 24 dishes of soup as they call water banquet for each person.

"Great, how can I finish all these foods. We have chicken soup, fish soup, mashroom soup and different kinds of vegetables which are served hot," said Manur from Bangladesh who only learned to eat using chopsticks.

Meanwhile, a restaurant near Shaolin Temple introduces vegetables without meat usually served for monks. The vegetable dishes are fit for vegetarians.

"It is no wonder that the monks and members of the temple have slim shapes as they eat vegetables which make them healthy," said Eza from Timor Leste.

The seven luring points in the tourism industry have made tourists especially foreigners feel convenient, safe, impressed and remember what they have experienced in China.

China is now rapidly developing in many sectors as indicated among others by development of infrastructures and public facilities including new business centres and apartments growing in many areas in the country.

China also continues to develop its technology as it successfully launched its latest satellite, Shenzou-7 which was carried by a spacecraft manned by three astronauts late last month.

Despite its rapid development, China manages to preserve and maintain its historical and cultural heritage and relics which have been existing in the country for thousands of years ago like the Great Wall, Shaolin Temple and Longmen grottoes as well as its traditional arts and mores.