High speed trains to be available from Ningbo to Guiyang and Nanning

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Category: Ningbo News

Published: Tuesday, 01 December 2015 09:20

China high-speed railway network will be adjusted on Jan 10th,2006. It was learned from November21st that Ningbo railway station will arrange more high-speed trains going westward, including trains to Guiyang, Nanning with letter G. This updated train schedules are expected to bring great convenience to Ningbo tourists heading westward.
After the adjustment of the railway lines, Ningbo railway station will place seven more pairs of high-speed trains on the lines to the west, namely: 3 pairs to Changshanan station, 1 pair to Nanchangxi station, 2 pairs to Guiyangbei station, 1 pair of Nanningdong. Among them, high-speed train from Ningbo to Guiyang will operate from Hangzhou- Ningbo, Shanghai-Kunming lines, while the train towards Nanningdong will operate on Hangzhou-Ningbo, Shanghai-Kunming, Beijing- Guangzhou, Hengyang-Liunan and Liunan lines.
Will there be any differences in speed and ticket price with the operation of new high-speed trains? It is understood that there will be two Ningbo-Guiyang with the number beginning with the the letter K, which will take about 27 hours to cover the whole journey. The hard-sleeper ticket of Ningbo-Guiyang train is 381yuan.However it will only take 9 and half an hour to complete the journey by high-speed train. Passengers heading for Shaoshan, Loudi, Huaihua and Kaili can all take this train and the price for second-class seats is about 730 yuan. At present, there is only one fast train from Ningbo to Nanning, which takes 30 hours and 58 minutes and cost 381yuan for  a hard sleeper ticket. However, high-speed train from Ningbo to Nanning east only takes 11hours and 30 minutes and costs 765 yuan for a second-class seat. Passengers heading for Hengyang, Guilin and Liuzhou can all take this train.

Public bicycle system blooms in Ningbo

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Category: Ningbo News

Published: Tuesday, 24 November 2015 09:17

Word came from Ningbo Passenger Service Bureau on November 18 that as the public bicycles are becoming popular among the citizens, Ningbo has completed the five-year target for public bicycle network construction over the past three years. By the end of October, Ningbo has built 1099 public bicycle spots with 31,000 parking spaces and 30,000 bicycles. 
Ningbo started the public bicycle network construction on August 7, 2013. Then on September 22, the first 800 bicycles in 32 spots were put into operation. According to the planning, Ningbo will have built 30,000 parking spaces and arranged 30,000 bicycles for use by the end of 2017.
During the morning and afternoon rush hours, the public bicycles are used to prevent the congestion situations. It is said that the peak time for bicycle renting is between 7am to 9am, accounting for 22% of the total renting, and between 4pm to 7pm, accounting for 26% of the total. 
So far, there are 73 docking spots for rail transit and public bicycle with 2420 spaces, which can meet the demand for public transport. In the three urban districts, 70% of the bus stops are connected with public bicycle spots. There are four spot and 165 spaces around the Ningbo Railway Station, realizing the direct transfer between railway, rail transit and bus. In addition, the public bicycle network covers all areas around the vegetable markets, large supermarkets, CBDs and half of the urban communities. 
Statistics show that the citizens are fond of the network. As of now, the citizens have opened 433,000 renting cards. The total renting amount is nearly 60 million, with the highest daily renting amount being 150,000 and the lowest being 110,000. 
As is reported, in 2016, Ningbo will build 200 public bicycle spots and put into use 5000 bicycles. During the 13th Five-year Plan period, a total of 10,000 bicycles will be put into use. The network spots will be expanded to all the entrance areas of the rail transit system and the neighborhood, especially to the Haishu District, Jiangdong District, and Jiangbei District. Spots will be established in such new developed areas as the west urban area, the west Yinzhou District, and the Yaojiang River New Town, benefiting the residents in such towns or streets as Cicheng Town, Gaoqiao Town, Jiangshan Town, Gulin Town and Shiqi Street.

Advent and a German Christmas Countdown

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Category: Ningbo News

Published: Friday, 27 November 2015 08:51

Adventszeit und Weihnachten 

By: Evelyn Groemminger

Christmas, or Weihnachten, is considered by Germans to be the most important of the major holidays. Although secularized and commercialized compared to Christmas celebrations of years before, the German holiday season is a time for celebration and family and friends. Not only the holiday itself, but also the weeks leading up to the celebration of Christmas involve many traditions and customs of diverse origins.

Advent (Latin for "arrival, coming") is the four-week period leading up to Christmas. In German-speaking countries and most of Europe the first Advent weekend is the traditional beginning of the Christmas season when open-air Christmas markets (Christkindlmärkte) appear in many cities, the most famous ones being those in Nuremberg and  the Striezelmarkt in Dresden.

Advent officially begins on the first Sunday after Nov. 26. Four Advent Sundays lead up to Christmas.

Now it is the time for the  Advent wreath (Adventskranz) which  is adorned with four candles, one of which is lit on each of the four Sundays preceding Christmas.

The Christmas pyramid ( Weihnachtspyramide ),

originally from the Erzgebirge region of Germany, the wood or rope pyramid was the "poor man's Christmas tree." Today it is a popular Christmas decoration in many parts of Germany, often adorning window sills, usually made with candles and bells that ring as the heat from the candles turns a wooden rotor at the top.

During the four weeks before Christmas, Germans celebrate Advent, a romantic and delightful time of the year, which is strongly linked to traditional Christmas markets in wonderful settings. You'll find plenty of hand-crafted Christmas decorations, cute little incense burners, wooden-carved toys and nativity scenes to place at the heart of your Christmas display. Germany's first Christmas market was recorded in 1393, and today there are thousands of them all over the country.

The town squares, normally dark early in winter months, are lit up and buzzing with activity during this time. Townspeople gather together, listen to brass band music, drink beer or hot mulled wine (Glühwein) or apple cider, and enjoy the hearty traditional fare of the region. Vendors peddle baked goods, including gingerbread hearts, sugar-roasted almonds, crepes, cookies, stollen, cotton candy and other sweets. Christmas tree decorations, seasonal items, and handcrafted articles, such as wooden toys and hand-blown glass ornaments, are also sold.

Both gingerbread houses and the Nutcracker came from German stories. Before the Nutcracker became a Tchaikovsky ballet, he was the hero of an 1816 story by Berlin's Ernst Theodor Amadeus (E.T.A.) Hoffman. The gingerbread house first appeared in the Grimm brothers' tale of Hänsel and Gretel, then in Humperdinck's short opera which premiered on December 23, 1893. Gingerbread has quite a history on its own. It dates back to ancient Egypt. But it was in Nuremberg in 1643 that gingerbread bakers were first allowed to form their own trade guild. They developed export markets, and today, one Nuremberg exporter produces about three million pieces of gingerbread per day in the months before Christmas, for shipment around the world.

Another Christmas tradition is the Advent calendar, first printed in Germany in 1908. The Adventskalender with its 24 windows, helps children count down to Christmas Eve (Heiligabend), beginning on 1st of December.

Small treats are hidden behind little paper doors for the 24 days until Christmas.

Read more: Advent and a German Christmas Countdown

Direct flight to Budapest to be launched

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Category: Ningbo News

Published: Tuesday, 24 November 2015 09:13

Ningbo Lishe International Airport and Budapest Airport signed a cooperation agreement at Ningbo Administrative Convention Center to establish the sister-airport relationship on the afternoon of November 18.
With the CEEC Expo successfully held and settling permanently down in Ningbo, and the increasing close trade and tourist ties between Ningbo and CEEC countries, there is a urgent demand for convenient and efficient air transport. However, there is currently no direct flight to the CEEC area in Zhejiang Province. With the realization of the direct flight to Budapest, it will play an active role in promoting the trade and cultural communications between Ningbo as well as the surrounding cities or provinces and such CEEC countries as Hungary. 
To address the problem, the two parties have agreed to become sister airports, and conduct extensive cooperation in such fields as flight route expansion, marketing and strategic cooperation.