Qu Zhe, producer of the recent ‘Indepth Travel Across Korea,’ a special episode of the CCTV-7 travel program ‘Traveling to Beautiful China’s Rural Towns,’ says that his program will continue to show more parts of the Korean countryside, beyond the capital, Seoul, which has been the center of travel to Korea, on Oct. 18 in Seoul.
The Korean Culture and Information Service, Arirang TV and the mainland Chinese national public TV station Chinese Central Television 7 (CCTV-7) have worked together to film and air a program that introduces each part of Korea.
In “Indepth Travel Across Korea,” one of the special episodes on the travel program “Traveling to Beautiful China’s Rural Towns,” cast members experience rural life and introduce beautiful spots, meals, and historical events of rural areas. The program airs for 25 minutes, starting at 6:05 p.m., from Monday to Thursday, and reruns are from 11:17 p.m. to 11:42 p.m. from Tuesday to Friday. After visiting Gangwon-do Province, Incheon and Busan for their first round, they visited Incheon, Jeollanam-do Province and Gangwon-do Province this time. The Korea.net team sat down with Qu Zhe, the producer of “Traveling to Beautiful China’s Rural Towns,” on Oct. 18. The program won the first-place prize in the tourism TV programs category at the sixth China Tourism TV Week in 2013.
Qu Zhe says that the program’s focus on the beauty of nature, regional specialties, popular restaurants and delicious foods are the common theme of broadcasting across borders on Oct. 18 in Seoul.
In regard to the general viewers of the program, he said, “Half of the general viewers are people in cities, and the rest are people in the countryside. A variety of people watch the show. Our program aims at showing the beautiful side of the countryside so that people from the cities will travel to the countryside to see first-hand the beauty of the areas. I realize that there are more places to visit other than Seoul, like Gangwon-do Province, Incheon, Jeollanam-do Province and Busan. I want to introduce the beautiful landscape, regional specialties, popular restaurants and delicious foods from each local area.”
The program extended its stage settings to broader areas. The producer said, “Our program’s objective is to discover beautiful places in the mainland Chinese countryside, so exploring rural areas in Korea goes well with our objectives. Our visit this time was meaningful in that CCTV-7 and Korea’s Arirang TV have built a common platform. We will show the episodes filmed in rural areas of Korea to Chinese audiences for now, but later we also want to introduce attractive aspects of the countryside in China to Korean tourists.” He said that he hopes for an exchange of great cultural content between China and Korea. “I hope both countries can introduce trips to the countryside to each other and expand cultural exchanges.”
Qu Zhe talked about how they started filming in Korea. “Chinese President Xi Jinping officially mentioned the environment, the ecology and creating a beautiful countryside. President Xi said, ‘Green rivers and mountains are gold and silver mountains.’ This means that they hold economical value, like gold and silver. Visiting rural areas, which puts an emphasis on ecology and preservation, and history, and introduces them to general viewers, fits his command. A trip to the countryside in France last year became an opportunity to turn our eyes to non-Chinese countries. I think our program dovetailed nicely with Xi’s admission that the Han Chinese people should communicate with other countries and head out to the world.”
CCTV-7, the CCTV Agricultural Channel, have been receiving favorable comments from viewers, as the actresses and actors experience nature naturally and simply, and sincerely convey the scenes to the viewers. He said, “The station is working on large scale projects regarding the Yangtze River and the Yellow River. Later, I hope we can make documentaries, too.”
Finally, he said, “The relationship between our two countries has been uneasy recently, but we are building on a relationship from a long time ago. I hope we can expand exchanges in terms of business, the arts and tourism.”
By Wi Tack-whan, Yoon Ji-hye
Photos: Jeon Han Korea.net Photographer
whan23@korea.kr
