The year 2022 has just come to us in an indescribable mood, it seems that the mountains and rivers remain the same, yet everything has changed in a way that no one can tell.
Spain. The morning and evening in Madrid are cold, the sun rises, and at noon it is surprisingly hot.
Despite the epidemic, the Salamanca district was still crowded at Christmas, and I met Mr. Jia Yunfeng, an expert from the UN World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), in a street-side tavern.
A glass of cold Coke, a few slices of ham, a packet of Huazi, behind the fireplace burning on the street, the warm atmosphere, he had a lot of ideas, and we laughed a lot, so that the surrounding foreigners who do not understand Chinese are also infected. I'm glad I met a famous brand planner, a mature crossover artist, but more importantly, an interesting person.
My whole life is about looking at loneliness
Q: I've heard that you look forward to your trip to Spain every year. During your time in Madrid, you always write a great deal of words that you love to read. Looking at the time spent publishing on your website and circle of friends, I get the impression that you hardly sleep. How do you keep up this enthusiasm?
Ja: I find that I'm jet lag free.
In 2014, I had a deep experience in Europe, I came on a late flight from Beijing, arrived because of the 7-hour time difference, it happened to be the daytime here, and immediately asked friends or went to the office to work. When I went back to China, I flew to Spain in the morning, arrived in China in the morning, put down my luggage and immediately went to work again. My secret is to go to sleep when I want to, and think when I wake up, everything is as it should be.
Often on long-distance airplanes, looking at the suffocating darkness like ink knocked over soaked rice paper, overhead seatbelt reminder lights and distant bathroom lights flashing like beans, the flight time as if trapped. This kind of travel across the world, there is a kind of emptiness, winter hearth-like silently burning around, always feel like their own figure in the ice and snow walking alone.
2016 began a short life of 1-2 times a year in Spain, every day in the early morning when it is still dark to get up, deal with those who have to return to WeChat in China, the afternoon began to meditate. Sleepy, sleep, go out at night to wander the streets, every alley is gorgeous and moving, wine shops everywhere, surrounded by all the day high atmosphere, excited to keep a glass of wine Madrid people, often walk a section will find a unique buyers store or a small bazaar. Walking 10,000 steps back home, looking out the window into the darkness of the day, the Chinese side of the information on the stupid.
I realize more and more these days that I'm fighting loneliness with my work, and I'm fighting resentment.
Q: Loneliness? Seeing as you've been meeting up with friends and laughing, you use travel planning to beat loneliness?
Jia: Yes, I was an only child, my parents were too busy working, I went to middle school and high school alone, and lived in school at a very young age.
On weekends when my classmates went home, I would take a warm water bottle to fill it with orange soda, often feeling lonely, parents in the field, not many friends around classmates, can talk to people is even more rare. At that time there were only two things to do, one is to write, and the other is to go out and travel. I've found that traveling can be a life-changing experience, and this "change" is a change that I've been inspired to make by external forces.
I learned to observe the people on the street, and I was fascinated by the two couples in the heat of the snack bar, the monks in the temple who had just finished their morning classes, the old man who had been reading a newspaper all day, and the girl who was tramping through the fields. Travelers have "three realms": the lower class of debauchery in the landscape, the place is someone to travel here; middle class of love in the landscape, care about the landscape, but also care about their own; the upper class of forgetfulness in the landscape, up to the realm of things I forget.
I learned to think and epiphany: the meaning of travel is divided into curiosity, pleasure, smelting and interpretation of the Tao. The curiosity of the traveler is in the sensory stimulation, the pleasure of the emotional needs, the smelting of the heart is in the psychological training, and the release of the road is in the spiritual sublimation.
I learned the philosophy of traveling. It is believed that "loneliness is a subjective and conscious feeling and experience of isolation and alienation from other people or society, the self-enclosure of a person's living space and state of being, and the lonely person will be separated from the social group and live in a negative state." The process of traveling, on the other hand, is to get rid of loneliness and establish trust with those around you (or to establish your own system of trust in interactions).
Q: Is it the beauty of the journey that one's perspective always takes a turn for the worse as things happen along the way?
Ja: Traveling allows you to break away from the daily grind of the mundane and to temporarily free yourself from the noise of life. Facing unfamiliar people, listening to stories on the way, and immersing yourself in the scenery is an attitude of life.
When I was in college, I had an uncontrollable urge to go out and see the world. When I was about to graduate, everyone was looking for a job, but I was attracted to Ai Wu's "Journey to the South". The book is full of somber life and delightful natural poetry, and there are all kinds of contradictions running through it all the time. Stability and drift, abandonment and wandering, the author passionately experienced a miserable life. He loves nature, and he loves life even more.
I was y touched by Ai Wu's activity of wandering, which is a kind of extreme experience, purposeless, non-utilitarian life experience, so that the experiencer can integrate with the environment in a natural state, and create a connection with the places he has traveled, and the emotion of not being able to part with them. The unpredictable encounters, the unforgettable smiles, the stories of long-distance traveling and the frontier are full of suspense and tension, which are fascinating. His indelible personality emerges as a result of walking.
I think travel is a walk in the space of the will, through the will to walk, expanding the scope of their own control and mental energy. Traveling is also a process of removing makeup, removing all of one's external packaging and restoring one's true self.
After 20 years old, every summer and winter vacation, is my departure time, when I walked around the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau in 70 days, I realized that travel is to have reference to see themselves. People are traveling, but also at the edge of your world, pulling the net of your sight ever farther and farther away.
Most importantly, traveling has been a balm for life, healing my loneliness and feelings that had faded during the day, and giving me the courage to value myself. Traveling increases the experience of life and freedom of mind, and eliminates the reality of utilitarianism and exhaustion.
Q: According to you, it sounds like traveling is also a kind of practice?
Jia: That's right. The process of traveling is in a sense Zen. Zen is the Buddha nature, everyone can participate in Zen, Zen is not the patent of the monks. Different cultures have different forms of expression. The more you travel, the more humble you become, and with a humble heart you can really enter different cultures.
Many years later, while planning a vegetarian fair at Yixing Dajue Temple, I met Master Nebula, whose 365 Days of Travel Zen says that traveling is practicing life, which contains an invisible energy.
Traveling is a process that inspires us to think, to explore, because there is room for imagination, for humility and generosity, and for the most valuable and glorious human spirit from ancient times to the present.
Q: Rather than wither in waiting, we should bloom in action. What are true travelers like?
Jia: A true traveler must be a wanderer, experiencing the joys, temptations, and adventurous intentions of a wanderer. A good traveler doesn't know where he's going, and a better one doesn't even know where he's coming from; he even forgets his own name.
Man, coming from the road where prosperity falls, the heart is full of holes, shallow smile and walk alone. The soul of the heart and loneliness meet unexpectedly, each other look at each other y, suddenly, the long joy haloed the infinite mountains and rivers.
The back of the city is a lonely figure
Q: We all know that you drove across 35 countries in 700 days, so you should be a professional traveler, why suddenly want to get up to marketing the city?
Jia: All the work I do, others seem to be a cross-border, to me is completely one and the same, I am well versed in innovative marketing, the desire for new things, in the journey to find the beauty at the same time, but also found that so many good places do not have a brand, resulting in the desire to market them.
I started traveling by car at the age of 30, and the first car I bought for myself was a Santana 99 rookie. I remember taking a broken plastic bag with more than 100,000 yuan of cash to buy a car, the car back, so excited that I couldn't wait to sleep in the car.
As I traveled around the country, I began to understand the different cultures and lives in different cities. Many cities are rapidly urbanizing and becoming "three no's", with no highlights, no emotion, and no interest. There is an overabundance of homogenized supply and too little research on the demand side.
When I wake up every day, the first thing I do is ask myself: what city are we in today? Push open the window, all the same streets, the same houses, the same sky, so that I often confused where they are in the end.
Q: The first thing to do in urban development is to plan, but reading through the planning, many cities are confused about their positioning, and behind the scenes, there is a lot of wavering and lazy copying. How can this be solved?
Jia: the city's respect, not just by big projects and buildings, but by retaining a unique indigenous life as a consideration. The legacy of non-heritage and the pervasive urbanism are all determining factors. Many governments neglect long-term planning for sustainable development because they can't wait. At this time in history, it's not just the choices you have to make, it's also the peace of mind and the confidence you have.
When we are on the "second generation of rich people", "elite layer", "free trade zone", "urban cluster". When we talk about the "rich two", "elite layer", "free trade zone", "city group" at the same time, but also to clearly know, the big city outside the six rings are all counties, those disadvantaged people is the real majority of China. In terms of the big concept, China has two markets, a middle-income-oriented market and a huge sinking consumer market. So we have to work backwards from a market perspective to position and plan for the city.
Q: What do you think about the "internationalization" that cities are talking about everywhere?
Jia: Chinese cities are always looking to Shanghai to catch up with Shenzhen, but in fact, in the context of the "Belt and Road", maybe "looking west" and looking to the world is where the hope lies.
Interacting with the world is to build one's own system of thought in the interaction. China's publicity to the world, we must find the same channel, mutual recognition is a prerequisite, otherwise it is all self-indulgence. The big change in world relations, the big reshuffle in industrial promotion, and the big change in business model have a huge impact on the development of the city and the integration of culture and tourism, which is both a danger for the city to face and an opportunity for development.
Food is the cure for loneliness
Jia: Yes, in 2021, I released five new books, which I call "Fortune, Longevity, Happiness, and Wealth," as a gift to 2022. Food is the easiest industry for cities to break into.
The Chinese can describe everything as food. The first thing you need to know is how to get the job done, how to get fired, how to get jealous, how to take advantage of the situation, how to eat the tofu, how to get sued, how to get a kickback, how to not see it, how to eat it, how to eat it.
How much pleasure we get from food determines how much strength we can gain from leaving it to fend off the loneliness and anxiety that follows. Food is a stress reliever, a reminder of childhood memories, and a cross-cultural social currency. In this age of anxiety, depression and uncertainty, food is the soothing agent of life and the thermometer of society.
Q: This is a great idea! How can we explore the culinary resources of different places to highlight "local culture"?
Jia: In my writing, I insist on "independent discovery and individual walking". I've been searching for people's stories in the streets and in the fields. Sometimes waking up in the cold, the smoke on the street, the footsteps on the stone road, people excitedly whispering, the first bowl of fragrant hot breakfast ...... Every discovery we make becomes the reason for the next return.
I think food is particularly important to women, as it records their movements and thoughts, their satisfaction and sighs, their philosophy of survival and their unique understanding of the world, which can be expressed metaphorically through food.
In our new book "Awakening Cuisine in Ruzhou", the stories of Ruzhou's cuisine are all about romance and affection. Trying to use spiritual words and multimedia videos in jitterbugs and video sites, we will let these stories of cuisine and the people in the stories to be solidified forever in the books, and this book about Ruzhou's cuisine will stimulate your taste buds at any time and send out a sincere call to you.
The book is a selection of 34 exclusive discoveries from the streets and alleys, 34 short Jitterbug video documentaries, 34 wonderful stories of life and entrepreneurship, 34 fascinating lifestyles, and 34 of the most representative Ruzhou dishes, which are compiled into the book. Whether it's non-heritage food or street food, whether it's a specialty restaurant or a star hotel, there are both street and alley people and manners and customs. Text, video and maps are synchronized for the first time!
Q: With the emergence of Netflix food consumption over the years, I think food is evolving into an identity, a new aesthetic style, and even a way to gain a sense of community belonging and self-labeling.
Jia: Food is a social artifact and a stress reliever. Against the loneliness of the companion food, addictive behavior exposes the increasing psychological pressure of modern people. Gourmet brand planning, should focus on playing "three cards" - celebrity card, creative card, origin card; good "three words" - the original material "material" scripture, the original technology "technology" scripture, the original flavor "flavor" scripture.
Tell me what you eat, I can know what kind of person you are, what we take today to feed the next generation, that expresses how high our cultural standards. In the future, we should think about food from the perspective of sustainable development of the earth, and the planning of food is a systematic nature education, so that more people to pull the ingredients in the land, to see the valley free-range chickens and geese, to see the mothers handmade for the purpose of the children must know, how the food came to us.
Curating is the way to turn loneliness into positivity, courage and solidarity
Q: " To establish a realm for the mountains and the rivers and to the countryside to pass on the spirit. "is your advertising slogan, but also the direction of struggle, after the epidemic, how to adjust the development of ideas?
Jia: All sharpening is cultivation, all metamorphosis is creation. The future of cultural tourism must be determined by the vision of the pioneers.
The first is to find the market. The Netflix economy is what allows us to find our customers precisely, and then precisely again.
The second is to create explosive products. The important way is food, night tours are also the core of the launch of tourism pop-ups.
The third is the formation of industry. In the process of tourism travel, the role of tourists from residents to tourists, the definition of "tourists" is not only in the attractions, this identity should be integrated into the industrial chain of time "line", rather than in an isolated The concept of "point". It is generated around the retention of customers and vacation, many good B&B cluster is a social group, circle of friends, entrepreneurial field, but also a dream of life.
In addition, as urban-rural interaction continues to occur, the countryside will say goodbye to hollowing out and revitalize once again, and villages will be full of details and surprises, and the imagination of the industry will follow.
The formation of a good tourism brand is like making a luxury product: first, there are wonderful materials, second, there are craftsmen and craftsmen, and third, there is enough time.
Q: How to do a proper cultural tourism planning?
Jia: To be a good planner, you need to have the knowledge of a philosopher, the romance of a literary scholar, the decisiveness of a military man, and the sensitivity of an entrepreneur. Cultural city tourism vitality, if only under the appearance of entertainment to carry out tourism is short-sighted; only the surface of the entertainment, perhaps losing the real connotation of a city and long-term vitality.
I think that planning should be done before planning, comparison and analysis of tourism resources and consumer demand, the selling point "carry" out. The first thing you need to do is to make sure that you have a good idea of what you want to do, and what you want to do. The brand is not stable and will not last long if we only rely on replicas.
Do planning, not only to stand in the planner's point of view to think about the problem, but also put themselves in the position of an ordinary tourist to perceive. Tourism Planning industry, know 80% called "know", not "knowledge", because everyone knows 80%. In fact, the real professional in the last 20%, that is the real "knowledge". No planning is nonsense, no planning planning is empty words.
Q: Now some cities or scenic spots everywhere in the "Venice of the Orient" "China Tuscany" and other overseas titles, is not more important than the capital is the resources, more important than the resources of the idea, more important than the idea is the The idea is more important than the idea is the creativity?
Jia: from the perspective of planning to examine the project, is to enhance its "three": uniqueness, exclusivity, authority.
Focus on solving not only "what to do" but also "what I am", "sold to what people" of the ultimate question. The best planning is not the most wonderful planning, but the most suitable planning with the project. It is to answer three questions: "Why come? Why should I come again? Why would I recommend others to come?" .
The planner is living in the problem, only interested in the problem. To constantly subvert their own theories and doctrines, and constantly subvert their own behavior patterns, only in the constant subversion of their own, in order to constantly save themselves. Human nature is the master key to planning, grasp the human nature, you can sell any product to the people who need it.
Marketing is not possible to use a standardized process, according to the strategy tailored to develop an effective and reasonable process, according to the product characteristics and brand positioning to a comprehensive consideration, the goal of the service is not only to make tourists satisfied, but to let the customer touched.
Q: What is the key to successful planning?
Jia: If you have not been the first, you have to find the right way to be the only one through strategy. Finding a logic to the most illogical things may lead to breakthrough results. Marketing is the process of creating newness, wonder and joy.
This discipline is issued in human nature, based on human nature, but also stop at human nature. Words are a powerful tool in the dissemination of travel innovations, and words are infused with passion and soul in the expression of ideas. The first thing you need to do is to get your hands on some of the most popular products and services in the world, and then you'll be able to get your hands on some of the most popular ones. This process is also a spiral.
Curiosity is the driving force behind learning and the measure of vitality. The essence of creativity lies in the fleeting inspiration that erupts at the level of thinking, the new ways of solving problems, and the originality of thinking. We want consumers to say: "This is a great product". We want consumers to say, "That's a great product," not "That's a great ad.
I think a great idea has a power and a life of its own. It's hard for an idea to do wonders for a product that people don't need or desire to own, but a skillful idea can bring out the overlooked features of a product that inspire a desire to own it, touching on needs, desires, dreams, and hopes.
Q: Finally, coming back to loneliness, how do you understand loneliness now, after working in planning for so long?
Jia: Since I became a brand planner, the loneliness that settles in my heart is like a piece of charcoal, lit, burned, like sandalwood rising a wisp of light smoke, emanating through my body surface, and finally turned into a pile of ashes, a breeze blew by, the ashes flew out, leaving no traces, as if it had never come.
Curating provides an openness. Nolan's movie "Creed" uses "entropy" as the central idea of the whole movie. Entropy increases as the loss of time, and counter-entropy to travel through time and space. The core idea of the law of entropy increase is that any system, as long as it is closed and not maintained by external forces, it will tend to chaos and disorder.
Haruki Murakami said that no one likes to be alone, just not disappointed. You do planning, is to let the small personal expectations, and the city's big feelings mingled, so that the micro people's wishes, convergence of macro people's livelihood, in order to let everyone in the city to experience more sense of belonging.
"Simple, easy, not easy," said the I Ching. The law of the market is always the same, is always changing. 2022, we should say to our audience, our city leaders, your loneliness, with me. Our job is to alleviate loneliness, create a new cognition, and implement positive values and attitudes towards the world in brand planning, so that people can discover the beauty of life and the glory of humanity in the experience of cities and cultural tourism.
2021 has passed through countless trials and tribulations, and 2022, instead of living in isolation, let's embrace it tightly.