Tourists flock to offer condolences, cherish memories

To cope with the surge in visitors, the exhibition hall changed the opening time from 9 am to 8 am starting from late December in 2023, and extended opening hours.

Since the beginning of this year, the daily average number of visitors has continued to surpass 17,000. As of the end of January, the exhibition has welcomed over 500,000 visitors, with approximately 90 percent coming from outside Heilongjiang, and 60 percent being young people.

Meanwhile, discussions about visits to the exhibition hall continued to gain widespread attention on Chinese social media. On Sina Weibo, searches related to these topics surpassed 360 million, and posts tagged with "731" were viewed around 2.6 billion times on Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok.

"More and more young people are braving the wind and snow to come here and learn about history, demonstrating the strength and responsibility of the younger generation in China," said Jin Chengmin, head of the exhibition hall.

In the final room, an electronic screen displays the names of the victims, accompanied by bouquets placed there by the visitors. At the exhibition hall exit, visitors pass through a lengthy, dimly lit tunnel with a glimmer of light at its end. Staff members gently prompt them as they attempt to turn back, advising, "Keep moving forward, don't look back."