Games changing lives as well as landscapes

SHIJIAZHUANG - Five years ago, Yu Lei was a security guard in Beijing. If he had not been doing that, he would have been growing corn on his farm in Chongli, a small town in Zhangjiakou, Heibei province.

Today he is a skiing instructor and his hometown has become the focus of international attention as it prepares to host ski events for the 2022 Winter Olympics, along with Beijing.

July 31 marked the fourth anniversary of Beijing winning the bid to host the Games, which have been making a huge impact on local people's lives in places where venues and infrastructure are being built.

Yu has seen his own life and that of his town in Hebei province transformed. His income has increased from 2,000 yuan ($290) a month to nearly 10,000($1,452) a month as an instructor at a ski resort.

Chongli, situated 200 kilometers northwest of Beijing, had just one skiing resort in 2003. Today, it has seven.

According to official statistics, 30,000 of the 126,000 local residents are now doing jobs related, directly or indirectly, to the Olympics.

"Developing the skiing industry and hosting the Games have changed our lives a lot," Yu said. "We used to get very few visitors. Now we are getting tens of thousands a year."

Yang Jingzhi, former vice-director of Hebei Sports Bureau, has witnessed the tremendous changes that have taken place. He recalls his first visit to Chongli, nestled among mountains near part of the Great Wall about 10 years ago.

"White clouds, black land, green trees and grass, and the fresh air made a big impression on me," he said.

But he also noticed the poverty. "The residents were so poor that their houses were made of soil or stone, even half underground.

"At that time, people there earned a little money by selling wild mushrooms."

For young people, the employment options were limited: they could be a farmer or a miner of low-quality gold.

Yu returned to his hometown in 2015 to become a ski instructor, a job in high demand as resorts expanded. Now he teaches kids to ski.

"Some children can ski independently after two to four hours, which brings me a sense of achievement. Skiing could be the career of my lifetime," he said.

Since Beijing was awarded the Games in July 2015, more and more young people in Chongli have been trained and hired by ski resorts as instructors, while others have also found jobs as security guards, service staff or caterers.

In May, local authorities officially declared the area had been lifted out of poverty.

The number of ski resorts rose to seven last year from four in 2015.and the number of ski runs has doubled. Wanlong, Thaiwoo, Genting Secret Garden and Fulong were last year listed among the top 10 resorts in China.