Gifford last chapter begins to rely more on the negative aspects of China. Gifford explains that he doesn’t want to end on a bad note. He sheds light on some great topics. One of my favorite points he made “The road has witnessed everything: the poverty of the countryside, the growing wealth of the cities, and of course the people who travel along the road itself. It’s a conveyor of hope and despair, bringing escape and choice to places that have known little of either. I’ve come to love Route 312 in all its schizophrenic ways, but I’m an outsider. I can leave. I am leaving. It’s not quite so romantic for the people who have to stay.” We will be leaving next month and I also have though I can leave. I have the opportunity to return to a completely different lifestyle. I will return to freedom of many things. Freedom to view my opinions, freedom of religion, and the freedom to know everything that goes on in my country. In the last chapter Gifford oddly relates his departure to traveling to the West U.S. in the 1890’s. Gifford states, “not knowing what the future held for the great country that you’ve just seen, but feeling just the sheer privilege of having witnessed the churn of history, the transformation of a nation, the emergence of a new power, that takes place only once every three or four generations.” It’s hard to image the world and witnessing the transformation of a nation. Especially witnessing that transformation when a country has more history than your own. China has lived through the turmoil and failure and now it is picking it’s self back up. China is trying to become the next rising power.

His final remarks were a perfect way to end China Road. He quoted Lu Xun a famous Chinese author. Lu Xun states, ” Hope cannot be said to exist, nor can it be said not to exist. It is just like roads across the earth. For actually the earth has no roads to begin with…but when many people pass one way, a road is made.” I loved this quote by Lu Xun, it was as if he made the quote for this book. This amazing transformation of China is being made. The people of China are paving the road. Each day all the people who have raised their voices in need of a change pave this road. By the poor and the rich China is begin a new country and country that still has problems to be worked out. But that road is being flourished with the people of China, and each step they make is making that road each day.