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Snapshot: Kunming in the 1980s

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Editor's note: This story first appeared online on our sister site, GoChengdoo.

"In December, 1985, I led a group of my fellow Berkeley MBA students on a winter-break trip to China. We wanted to make some contacts there and see, firsthand, the new economic forces at work. I especially wanted to visit Kunming because I had met some managers of the local telephone service when they were visiting California on a business trip the previous summer. They had done a great job selling me on their hometown with its wonderful weather that they described as 'four seasons like spring' (四季如春).

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"We arrived on December 31 and spent New Year's Day celebrating with the locals—seeing the new cultural center, visiting a local teahouse that put on a live ethnic dance performance, walking around the crowded streets filled with pedestrians, and eating the local cuisine. What I remember most distinctly about our three short days there is something that I never could capture on film: the taste of the local chicken soup. I have to admit—it was the best I have ever had! (sorry Mom and Grandma!)"
—David Gleit

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This article by David Gleit was originally published in CHENGDOO citylife Magazine, issue 17 ("how 2.0"). Photos by David Gleit.

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Comments

[UNF]

How so much has changed!

I'm a 80's,it's all about my memories.

[UNF]

Seems those flying white rats in Cuihu Gongyuan were already around at that time.

my wife posted the pic above of lots of people of dongfeng and it got deleted as inappropriate content - WTF? perhaps they thought it resembled a scene from later in same decade a bit further north-east?

I meant "on Dongfeng Lu".

[UNF]

Where did you post it?

I wonder if there is any organisation that collects pics of Kunming, I think anyone who has lived here for more than 2 years has pics of "old" Kunming

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