BEIJING—China celebrated the 57th anniversary of its founding on Sunday in different ways, kicking off a week-long holiday.
Some 220,000 people were on hand at Tian'anmen Square in the heart of Beijing as a warm autumn sun rose to the playing of the "March of the Volunteers". As the national flag reached full staff at 6:10 a.m., 10,000 pigeons were released.
The throngs of people in downtown Beijing perhaps contrasted most sharply with National Day activities at the Suanjingzi frontier defence outpost in Araxan League, in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. It lies near the border between China and Mongolia, and while temperatures dropped below zero, 12 frontier guards rose early in the morning to dust the courtyard of their barracks.
Their National Day celebrations started at 8:30 a.m., when the 12 guards took turns as actors and audience as they performed sketches, dances, and sang for each other. The guards then climbed a hill and arranged stones to form a map of the country.
Far to the south, in Shanghai Sunday's celebrations mixed theater and sports for many. Wang Bin, a native of east China's Anhui Province, on Saturday came to Chin's largest city to take in the Chinese Formula One Grand Prix.
"I would have missed the farewell race of Michael Schumacher if it were not the week's holiday," said the sports car fan excitedly, who was wearing the Ferrari team's famous red racing suit.
A man surnamed Fang drove his middle school son for about 300 km from his home in Zhejiang Province to watch the Disney musical, "The Lion King" being staged at the Shanghai Grand Theater.
National Day was marked by a fireworks display and singing in Fuding in Fujian Province, one of the worst hit areas by typhoon Saomai in August.
Lan Chengzhong, Party secretary of Xiamen township, told Xinhua News agency that as of Sunday, 36 families had moved into newly built houses, and 200 other households are still busy building new homes. "I believe most of families whose homes were razed down by Saomai will have moved into new houses by New Year's Day," said Lan.
In Tibet, a smaller flag-raising ceremony was held to mark National Day on the square before the Potala Palace in Lhasa, the regional capital. It was attended by 3,000 people, many of whom were tourists who had taken the new Qinghai-Tibet Railway which began service on July 1.
East of Tibet, residents of different ethnic groups in Dulong-Nu Autonomous County of Gongshan, which falls under jurisdiction of southwest China's Yunnan Province, wore their best festive costumes as they sang and danced to celebrated the 57th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic and the 50th anniversary of founding of the autonomous county.