Big Ben and London's red double-decker buses are often the first images young Chinese people associate with the UK, since these symbols once graced the covers of the English textbooks used in Chinese schools. Grown up, those students have traveled to the very places once seen only on their textbook covers. Recalling the books that sparked their dreams, they started a "textbook relay" along the River Thames: a book was hidden in a "secret spot," and whoever found it could photograph it with the real Big Ben, then leave a message in the margins about a dream fulfilled or a hope for the future. The activity has since drawn many foreigners, some of whom, moved by the warmth of China's younger generation, joined in.
Time-turner tales
Now involving over a hundred participants, the "textbook relay" began as a graduation wish of Yin Yansu, a Chinese student at the Royal College of Music. She thought of the junior high English textbook with Big Ben on its cover - a trusted companion that first tied her generation to the world beyond China - and had it shipped from home to photograph in front of Big Ben, marking the end of her UK studies.
As she held up the book beneath Big Ben, passing Chinese students asked to borrow it for photos, and some explained to curious onlookers: "This is a textbook from China, and the cover is right here!" Watching strangers' handwriting fill its pages, Yin had an idea: why not leave it for others to photograph, as a keepsake for fellow travelers far from home?
She hid two copies along the bridge - one behind a lifebuoy, one behind a trash can. Days later, a social media post revealed the secret, and a selfless "textbook relay" took off. When Yin returned five days later, despite the rain, a long line of students and tourists was still waiting to flip through the books. "They had changed from blank new copies into ones covered in writing on every page," she said.
"What once felt like a distant world in my textbook is now right before my eyes." Notes like these fill the margins, capturing dreams realized and hopes for the future. Worried the pages might run out of room, some students shipped new textbooks to hide in the same spots.
Gentle magic
Shantay (pseudonym), a Malaysian student in the UK, tracked down four hidden textbooks with help from Chinese friends, and brought a book of her own that once connected her to the wider world. "While the landmark in our textbook wasn't Big Ben, I too dreamed of traveling the world as a child," she told the Global Times, adding it felt like "a dream finally come true." "Chinese students are so creative and thoughtful. In that moment, all I felt was warmth and kindness, and it was incredibly healing," she said.
Caroline Gao has lived in London for nearly a decade. When her husband Kale Evans asked why a crowd had gathered around a book by the river, she explained the story, and the two joined the queue to read the notes. Kale was moved by a line from an ancient Chinese poem inside: "A bosom friend afar brings a distant land near." Watching young Chinese exchange knowing smiles at the sight, he said, "That's a look only they understand - the very embodiment of that saying." Romance, he said, runs deep in the Chinese character, yet is never forced - it finds its truest expression through simple, fitting gestures. "This is one of China's most enchanting qualities," he said.