World's highest graffiti: China watches Mount Everest for vandals

The Mount Everest base camp 17,000 feet is a popular tourist site and has fallen prey to the sort of behavior the Chinese government says is uncivilized and vows to punish.

|
(AP Photo/Hans Edinger)
Mount Everest is seen from peak Gokyo Ri in Nepal in 1996 photo. Chinese state-run news site The Paper report thats workers have removed the signatures, dates, doodles and messages left by scores of visitors on two granite tablets on the Chinese side of Mount Everest's northern base camp and plan to name and shame future defilers.

Next time someone decides to leave silly messages on the world's highest mountain, beware: China is watching.

Mountaineering officials have scrubbed graffiti from two granite tablets on the Chinese side of Mount Everest's northern base camp and plan to name and shame future defilers.

State-run mobile news site The Paper reported Wednesday that workers removed the signatures, dates, doodles and messages left by scores of visitors. They include "let's wander together," ''farewell to the mountain" and "here I come."

The graffiti grew so thick it covered the information about the mountain carved into the tablets in Chinese, Tibetan and English.

The base camp at roughly 5,200 meters (17,060 feet) is a popular tourist site and has fallen prey to the sort of behavior the Chinese government says is uncivilized and vows to punish.

Along with publicizing the names of those leaving behind graffiti, base camp management is considering setting aside separate wall space just for visitors to write their names and other messages, a local tourism official, Gu Chunlei, told The Paper.

"It's a way of getting travelers to change their habits without even knowing it," Gu was quoted as saying. Similar graffiti walls have been set up at other scenic sites, including the Great Wall outside Beijing that has long been a target for those seeking to leave a mark of their visit.

As personal incomes have risen, Chinese have become avid travelers and bad behavior by some of them has become something of an embarrassment. Along with sharp criticism in the media and online forums, the government has set up an online national database naming those involved in particularly egregious behavior and giving airlines, hotels and other travel outlets the option of refusing them service.

In 2013, a Chinese teenager scratched his name on an ancient Egyptian temple and was roundly condemned by his fellow Chinese.

As The Christian Science Monitor's Peter Ford reported, China is concerned about the bad reputation of its globe-trotting citizens.

The Chinese Tourism Agency has taken note of these reports. Last month the government department issued a set of “civilized behavior guidelines” for tourists going abroad, urging them to “be attentive to etiquette, maintain dignity … protect the environment…queue in an orderly fashion and eat quietly” among other recommendations.

 On the same day, though, the agency issued a similar, but even more draconian, charter intended to govern the behavior of visitors to domestic tourist attractions, warning them not to sneeze in other people’s faces, nor to chase and hit animals, nor to spend too long in public lavatories.

In the end, lamented deputy Premier Wang, the problem comes down to what he called “the poor quality and breeding” of many Chinese, whether they are at home or abroad. It looks like the “ugly American” that some Europeans and Latin Americans love to hate is about to get a run for his money.

Everest itself has accumulated garbage, pollution and other ills brought by the vastly increased numbers of climbers and visitors to the peak that straddles China and Nepal.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to World's highest graffiti: China watches Mount Everest for vandals
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-Pacific/2016/0511/World-s-highest-graffiti-China-watches-Mount-Everest-for-vandals
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe