Hangzhou has legendary beauty. Marco Polo praised it as the “most noble and magnificent city in the world”. Boasting the two World Heritage Sites of the West Lake and the Great Canal, natural scenery and majestic buildings are well merged in harmony. Rapid development and ongoing improvement of people’s life enrich and complement one another.

Hangzhou has a robust economy driven by passions of entrepreneurship. Its total economic output ranks fourth among China’s provincial capital cities. For years Hangzhou tops the chart of China’s Best Investment Destinations. It is proudly the host city for the International Cartoon & Animation Festival, the West Lake International Expo and the World Leisure Expo.

A beautiful land breeds fair people and phenomena.

Li’s call comes amid spats between Asia’s two biggest economies over several issues, including the territorial conflict in the East China Sea and wartime history.

Li told the head of Japan’s National Security Council, Shotaro Yachi, that Beijing and Tokyo must set aside differences and reduce negative elements in the bilateral ties, state news agency Xinhua reported.

According to Li, relations between China and Japan are in a delicate state, despite signs of improvement.

Yachi also met Yang Jiechi, China’s State Councilor who outranks the foreign minister, on Thursday (25 August). He too called for cooperation to ensure the success of the G20 summit.

Li said he hoped Japan would have a proper understanding of China and take advantage of China’s development.

Yang and Yachi signed a four-point agreement in 2014 on the sidelines of an Apec meeting in Beijing to improve Japan-China relations.

China G20 summit

China, which will be hosting the G20 summit on 4 and 5 September, is pulling out all the stops to ensure its success. Earlier in August, it emerged that its host city of Hangzhou has embarked on a mission to teach basic English to its residents to help visitors to the summit, including top leaders from across the world, find their way around the neighbourhood.Hangzhou, covering 16,596 square kilometers including an urban area of 4,876 square kilometers, is home to more than 9 million residents.

“The city is surrounded on three sides by hills, which makes it difficult to expand,” Chen said.

It also announced the closure of nearly 250 factories in the nearby provinces to get rid of smog. Besides, the government reportedly gave expensive travel vouchers to some residents to travel to other tourist destinations in a move to reduce congestion.Hangzhou is one of China’s fastest developing cities, posting an economic growth rate of 10.8 percent in the first half of this year, which is well above the 6.7 percent registered by the country as a whole.Beside an equally scenic body of water in Hangzhou – the famed West Lake – it’s now China’s turn to decide who will enjoy the better spots and who will be kept some way away.

Vu Lan is the Vietnamese version of the Chinese Zhong Yuan Jie or Yu Lan Jie festival, which is celebrated in the same month of the lunar calendar. The festival’s Sanskrit name, Ullambana originates in the Mahayana Ullambana Sutra, which consists of a discourse by Shakyamuni Buddha to Maudgalyayana, one of his two chief disciples, about saving his mother from suffering after death. According to the story related in the sutra, Maudgalyayana had a vision in which he saw his mother reborn as a hungry ghost due to her evil actions while alive. The Buddha advised Maudgalyayana to organize an assembly of monks to make offerings for the benefit of his deceased mother. The festival is widely observed in many countries in which Mahayana Buddhism is practiced. In addition to honoring one’s parents and ancestors, the main purpose of the festival is to make offerings to the sangha and to pray for the liberation of the deceased who have been reborn into undesirable states.

Observance of the festival also extended to the Vietnamese Buddhist community in the United States—including at Chua Giac Hoa Temple in Amarillo, Texas. Venerable Thich Tin Nghia from Dallas led the celebrations on 14 August, which included a two-hour prayer session. “We are praying for parents still alive and great, great grandparents passed away,” the Buddhist monk said. (Amarillo Globe-News)

 Bhutanese lama, filmmaker, and writer Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche made its world premiere in Switzerland earlier this month. Titled Hema Hema: Sing Me a Song While I Wait, the film debuted at the Locarno Film Festival (3–13 August) to a positive reception.

Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche has previously directed three major feature films: Vara: A Blessing(2013), Travellers and Magicians (2003), and The Cup (1999). He is also the author of the books Not for Happiness: A Guide to the So-Called Preliminary Practices (Shambhala, 2012) and What Makes You Not a Buddhist (Shambhala, 2007).

Hema Hema, which can been translated as “once upon a time . . .” takes the form of a modern fairytale, largely shot in a remote village in Bhutan, that examines the themes of identity, anonymity, illusion, reality, and the transition between life and death.

 “The whole notion of the story, the setup, is sort of imagined and you cannot really say it’s a documentary of a specific society; it’s really invented. But having said that, there are certain universal values, or stories, or emotions that we can relate to,” Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche said of the film in a recent interview with the Bhutan Broadcasting Service. “[The primary theme of] identity . . . is really something that we human beings cling onto so much. Even if you look at the world today, so many people suffer due to the lack of identity, or having no identity at times. We all have names, for instance—you have a name, I have a name, and then on top of that we have title, we have gender, we have citizen cards, we have passports, we have addresses, we have homes, we have friends who can validate our existence. So identity is very important.” (YouTube)

Executive producer Jeremy Thomas, known for working on such cinematic hits as Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence (1982), The Last Emperor (1987), and Little Buddha (1993), presented the screening in Locarno, alongside Bhutanese producer and photographer Pawo Choyning Dorji.

“I’ve been with [Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche] in all his films, to sort of support him,” said Thomas, who also spent time in Bhutan for the filming of Little Buddha, on which Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche worked as a consultant. “He also has an enormous film knowledge; really knows cinema back to front. . . . The story that he’s telling in this film it has a credibility to it, because of his telling the story. It’s the story of a man’s [spiritual] journey to act the way you would act if you had no identity.” (Variety)

The film is scheduled to make its North American premiere this year at the Toronto International Film Festival (8–18 September).

 Born in Bhutan in 1961 and now based in Himachal Pradesh, India, Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche is the son of Thinley Norbu Rinpoche and was a student of Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche. He is recognized as the third incarnation of Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo (1820–92), founder of the Khyentse lineage, and the immediate incarnation of Jamyang Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö (1893–1959). His projects include the Khyentse Foundation, which provides the financial support necessary to fulfill his aspirations; 84000, which oversees the translation of the Word of the Buddha into modern languages; Lotus Outreach, which directs a wide range of projects to help refugees; and most recently The Lhomon Society, which promotes sustainable development in Bhutan through education.From a young age he has been active in the preservation of the Buddhist teaching, establishing centres of learning, supporting practitioners, publishing books and teaching all over the world. Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche supervises his traditional seat of Dzongsar Monastery and its retreat centers in Eastern Tibet, as well as his new colleges in India (inBir and Chowntra (Himachal Pradesh)) and Bhutan. He has also established centres in Australia, North America and the Far East.