Guide book

A guide book or travel guide is "a book of information about a place, designed for the use of visitors or tourists". Travel guides can also take the form of travel websites such as the free and open Wikivoyage.

It will usually include full details relating to accommodation, restaurants, transportation, and activities. Maps of varying detail and historical and cultural information are often included. Different kinds of guide books exist, focusing on different aspects of travel, from adventure travel to relaxation, or aimed at travelers with different incomes, or focusing on sexual orientation or types of diet.

History

Antiquity

A forerunner of the guidebook was the periplus, an itinerary from landmark to landmark of the ports along a coast. A periplus such as the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea was a manuscript document that listed, in order, the ports and coastal landmarks, with approximate intervening distances, that the captain of a vessel could expect to find along a shore. This work was possibly written in the middle of the 1st century CE. It served the same purpose as the later Roman itinerarium of road stops.

Beijing

Beijing is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world.

Its total population in 2013 was 21,150,000. The city proper is the 2nd most populous in the world. The metropolis, located in northern China, is governed as a direct-controlled municipality under the national government with 16 urban, suburban, and rural districts. Beijing Municipality is surrounded by Hebei Province with the exception of neighboring Tianjin Municipality to the southeast; together the three divisions form the Jingjinji metropolitan region and the national capital region of China.

Beijing is the second largest Chinese city by urban population after Shanghai and is the nation's political, cultural and educational center. It is home to the headquarters of most of China's largest state-owned companies, and is a major hub for the national highway, expressway, railway, and high-speed rail networks. The Beijing Capital International Airport is the second busiest in the world by passenger traffic.

China

China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a sovereign state in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population of over 1.35 billion. The PRC is a one-party state governed by the Communist Party, with its seat of government in the capital city of Beijing. It exercises jurisdiction over 22 provinces; five autonomous regions; four direct-controlled municipalities (Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai and Chongqing); two mostly self-governing special administrative regions (Hong Kong and Macau); and claims sovereignty over Taiwan.

Covering approximately 9.6 million square kilometers, China is the world's second-largest country by land area, and either the third or fourth-largest by total area, depending on the method of measurement. China's landscape is vast and diverse, ranging from forest steppes and the Gobi and Taklamakan deserts in the arid north to subtropical forests in the wetter south. The Himalaya, Karakoram, Pamir and Tian Shan mountain ranges separate China from South and Central Asia. The Yangtze and Yellow Rivers, the third- and sixth-longest in the world, run from the Tibetan Plateau to the densely populated eastern seaboard. China's coastline along the Pacific Ocean is 14,500 kilometres (9,000 mi) long, and is bounded by the Bohai, Yellow, East and South China Seas.

Beijing Financial Street

Beijing Financial Street, or BFS (Chinese: 北京金融街; pinyin: Běijīng Jīnróng Jiē), is a 40 block area which offers a collaborative environment for foreign and domestic financial institutions and Chinese regulatory agencies. It is part of the city's strategic plan to position Beijing as a domestic center for business and finance. Located inside Beijing's innermost 2nd Ring Road, the area is gaining prominence as an internationally influential business and financial district.

Beijing Financial Street is China's most important financial regulation center, often called China's Wall Street, although it does not include a stock exchange. Mainland China's major stock exchanges are located in Shanghai and Shenzhen. The central bank and all three national regulatory commissions of the central government are located here. They are People's Bank of China (PBOC), China Banking Regulatory Commission (CBRC), China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC), and China Insurance Regulatory Commission (CIRC). The financial asset of Beijing Financial Street accounts for 60% of that of the entire country with over 10 billion RMB cash flow each day and over 13 trillion RMB total asset. It controls 90% of national loans and 65% of national insurance premiums, which makes Beijing the country's largest monetary and financial market.

Nanjing Road

Nanjing Road (Chinese: 南京路; pinyin: Nánjīng Lù) is the main shopping street of Shanghai, China, and is one of the world's busiest shopping streets. It is named after the city of Nanjing, capital of Jiangsu province neighbouring Shanghai. Today's Nanjing Road comprises two sections, Nanjing Road East and Nanjing Road West. In some contexts, "Nanjing Road" refers only to what was pre-1945 Nanjing Road, today's Nanjing Road East, which is largely pedestrianised. Before the adoption of the pinyin romanisation in the 1950s, its name was rendered as Nanking Road in English.

Location

Nanjing Road is located in the city center, running in a west-east direction. Its eastern section (南京东路) is in Huangpu District and extends from The Bund west to People's Square. The western section (南京西路) begins at People's Square and continues westward towards Jing'an District.

History

The history of Nanjing Road can be traced back to the year 1845. At that time it was called “Park Lane”, which stretched from the Bund to He’nan Road. In 1854, it was extended to Zhejiang Road, and eight years later, once more extended to Xizang Road. In 1862, it was named formally “Nanking Road” by the Municipal Council, which administered the International Settlement. In Chinese it was usually referred to as the Main Road (大马路). Around 1930 it was a bustling street with at least one reported casino (probably at nr. 181). In 1943 the International Settlement was annulled, and after World War Two the government changed its name from Nanking Road to "East Nanjing Road", meanwhile they also renamed the former Bubbling Well Road "West Nanjing Road", and the general name of the two roads became "Nanjing Road", comprising five kilometres total length.