Over the past few weeks, massive displays of small cakes covered in elaborate pastry designs have popped up in several shops and cafes across China. These pretty pastries are an Asian specialty called moon cakes, and appear every year in the run up to the Lunar Festival, which this year falls on 25th September. The Lunar Festival, also known as the Mid Autumn Festival or the Moon Cake Festival, is China’s Harvest Festival that has been compared to Thanksgiving Day in America. Traditionally it is a time for families to gather together and be reunited as a whole again, just as the full moon in the sky is whole.

The giant panda is high on the endangered species list; only a few thousand of these unique animals remain, all in Gansu, Sichuan and Shaanxi provinces. The Chinese government is making great efforts to increase their numbers. The Chengdu Panda Breeding Center constitutes one such effort. The 92 acre center is dedicated to providing pandas, and many other endangered species, with natural surroundings so that they can multiply. Plans are in place to add over 500 acres to the enclosure

If you are one of those people who think that all zoos are the same, a visit to the Beijing Zoo will change your opinion. Located in the Xicheng district in west Beijing, the zoo encompasses vast stretches of land, beautifully maintained flowerbeds and a stream, and houses some of China’s most exquisite animals.

The Chinese emperors believed themselves to be the Sons of Heaven, who had come to Earth via the Sacred Way, by which they would also return to Heaven when they died. Thus a Sacred Way is an integral part of most imperial tombs.

China’s civilization and society is much older and richer than another in the world. The lineage of emperors and eras of various dynasties that have contributed to building China as we see it today are varied. One of the most prominent of these dynasties was the Ming era. The emperors of this dynasty got a lot of buildings constructed, repaired as well as restored. Many parts of the Great Wall of China were built under this dynasty.

There are many myths about China and how things work there, mostly misleading. Some exaggerate the negative aspects, while others do the opposite. One of the most prevalent myths, and one of the easiest ones to mistakenly believe, is that China is Westernizing. Foreigners usually go to Beijing or Shanghai and see the impressive skylines, the modern cars, luxury hotels and so on, then return home and tell our friends that China is becoming like New York or London. The truth is more complicated.

Chinese food has a real international presence. Not many other countries boast restaurants with their national food across every continent, from Aberdeen to Ulan Bator. All the same, a trip to a Chinese restaurant that is actually in China has quite a unique etiquette, which even those who have been to several Chinese restaurants in their home country might not be familiar with.

Feng shui has made its way into the fringes of Western culture, along with yoga, kung fu, Ayurvedic medicine, acupuncture and a number of other Asian and South Asian cultural practices. But though books on feng shui populate Western book shelves in their dozens, it's not widely known just exactly what feng shui is, nor what it means to the Chinese.

Fortune cookies - crisp wafers folded around a bit of paper with some Chinglish wisdom or a vague fortune printed on one side and lottery numbers on the other – are a ubiquitous feature in Chinese restaurants in America or Europe, so much so that people often get the mistaken impression that these cookies are part of Chinese cuisine. Nothing could be further from the case. In fact, fortune cookies were invented in California.

Tea is such a popular drink all over the world that it's easy to forget, or never even think about, where it comes from. Before tea drinking developed into a British stereotype and before the green tea loving Japanese invented green tea ice cream, tea was essentially Chinese.