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Family album charts accomplishments 
By Mark Hughes (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-06-01 12:02

Many families have matured from a subsistence existence to a life of comfort.

Journeys once undertaken by foot over many days now pass in the neon-lit, electrically-charged twinkle of an eye.

Family album charts accomplishments 

Roads replace tracks, skyscrapers replace wattle and daub huts, air conditioning relieves the lassitude of extreme heat and e-mail challenges the most nimble of postmen.

Although still developing (and at what a rate) China's cities are now high-tech, modern metropolises with every conceivable service known to man. Rural areas have also borne witness to remarkable change.

As Zhu says, "Certainly, 60 years may represent a drop of water in the long river that is history. But this drop captures the vicissitudes of a great epoch, just as our collection of photographs is a testament to the various facets of Chinese people's rich life."

Wang Yong, vice-president of Beijing Shengshixing Foundation, also contributes to the book. He comments that some observers cannot help but wonder how a nation that had been asleep for hundreds of years could, once it started to change, become so fond of revolutionary changes - with virtually endless new plans, new goals and new actions that defy their imagination.