By CCTV.com Panview editor team
Editor’s foreword: "Looking China" International Youth Film Project is co-organized by the Academy for International Communication of Chinese Culture (AICCC), Beijing Normal University and Huilin Foundation, which aims to showcase the contrasting simplicity and glamour, the antiquity and fashion of China through unique perspectives of young foreign film makers.
As of the year 2016, 101 students from 25 countries were invited to participate in the project. They were stationed in 13 municipality, provinces and autonomous regions here in China. Every filmmaker has worked out a 10-minute short film about Chinese culture around the topic of “ethnic minority”.
The film Grasslands, highlights the history and scenery of Inner Mongolian, showing the passion Mongolians have for horses and paying tribute to Genghis Khan’s glory days about 800 years ago.
The film makes mention of horses and the sounds hoofbeats from a far away distances, but the main live animals featured end up being camels.
Parts of Inner Mongolia has been swallowed up by the Gobi Desert where sand dunes, sandstorms and sandy grounds sweep across the plains. The weather stay breezy.
Such climate patterns and topography are more suitable for camels, since they can walk long distances under harsh conditions without needing to drink water for days.
Perhaps centuries ago, scenes in the film were the actual sites where caravans of merchants with camels transported their goods between the Persian Empire in the Middle East and China.
That was known as the Silk Road Age, a time when China supported cross-border trade with nations from the far reaches of Earth. One could consider that the starting point for globalism.
The camels played a pivotal role, carrying heavy loads amid harsh meteorological conditions in isolated regions. But these were the place nomads could thrive. The Mongolians can not remain in one place for too long.
( The opinions expressed here do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Panview or CCTV.com. )
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