On a street where the Red Army once roamed, a group of retirees in historic pastel-blue army uniforms belt out tunes made famous through countless movies, television shows and other forms of propaganda. Historic locations in Jiangxi and Guizhou provinces — the sites of revolutionary leader Mao Zedong’s early battles, his escape from Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist forces in the Long March and the cementing of his leadership in Zunyi — are experiencing an influx of tourists this year as post-pandemic travel returns to China.
In Guizhou, tourism in the first quarter of 2021 has already recovered to 2019 levels, local official Lu Yongzheng said. The province, among China’s top tourist destinations, received millions of tourists who brought in billions of dollars in revenue. On a recent government-organized tour, descendants of the Red Army told stories of their forefathers at the Zunyi Memorial Museum, which houses artifacts from the period and hologram recreations of a key meeting at which Mao established his dominance.
