Recently, seeing Chinese tourists while walking down the street has become commonplace, and I frequently come across news articles related to China, such as those concerning its influence on our country. Amidst the widespread craze for learning Chinese, I often found myself wondering if I should study China, and that is when I came across *Real China*. I felt that this book was written from an objective standpoint, based on the author's experiences and reports while living and working in China.

Real China. Ten years ago, I had the opportunity to visit the Yiwu Market in China. My role was not to purchase goods directly from local factories, but to act as a buyer active in the market. I had to stay in China for several days at a time, moving around with ethnic Korean interpreters. The vast landmass and the thousands upon thousands of goods displayed in the Yiwu Market reminded me of our own Namdaemun and Dongdaemun markets. In fact, compared to the Yiwu Market, our own markets are like

“Real China” reads out "Today's China" by selecting 33 keywords across themes such as New China, Chinese people and money, society, culture, special people, Korea and China, and the world and China. After reading this book, I realized that China is changing so rapidly that the phrase "a country close but far away"—usually used for Japan—now seems appropriate for China as well. However, I also felt that our background knowledge of China might be overly outdated or narrow-minded. Like me, even if

I traveled to China frequently for business in the early to mid-1990s. My stays ranged from as short as four nights and five days to as long as about a month. As a member of a company engaged in intermediary trade, the original buyer was Japan while the production site was China; therefore, my main duties involved negotiating labor costs and lead times, personally inspecting production sites to prevent product defects, and meeting with office counterparts and factory managers. The locations

We have heard so much about China's rapid rise that it has become cliché. However, despite this cliché, people actually know very little about China. Koreans tend to look down on Chinese people. One often encounters people who think of them as low-class individuals who don't wash properly and are noisy, despite their national power. It is true that I, too, was unable to escape this mindset. It was at a point where I wished there was a book that would allow me to learn about Chinese culture that

Since there are hotels near my home, I often see foreigners. Among the countless foreign tourists, the ones I encounter most frequently are the Chinese. It used to be difficult to spot Chinese people, but nowadays, wherever I go, I see nothing but them. When I visited Hongdae recently, I saw Chinese tourists on tour roaming the area, fully enjoying the youth culture. Chinese people are truly the mainstream trend for us now. Given this atmosphere, there are quite a few books about China

Today's China has certainly been a major power from the start, both economically and militarily. However, it suffered from severe wealth inequality and was underdeveloped. Yet, it has grown rapidly and is now rising to a position where it challenges the United States. It has changed significantly in a short period of time. It has been just under 10 years since I visited China, and the China of today is so different from the China of then that it makes one wonder if it is truly a different