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On September 20th, during the 2016 Chongqing Fragrant Hills Tourism Summit, Ms. Theresa Belpulsi, the Vice President of Tourism and Visitor Services, Destination DC was interviewed by members of the press media and talked about the travel resources of Washington DC and discussed the idea of “shared economy.”
Ms. Belpulsi said that whenever people mention Washington DC, first of all, they think about the White House. Definitely White House is the most famous scenic spot of DC, but other than that, a trip to Washington DC has the potential for more variety. “Over the past few years, with over 8 billion dollars of development that is happening in the city, more and more people are moving into Washington DC now. It really has stood up a lot of new things in the city. And with that becomes new restaurants, new shopping, new infrastructure that is happening inside the city itself. More tourists come to Washington DC for traveling and now most of them are from China.”
2016 is the China-US Year of Tourism, along with which the ten years visa policy was released providing the great convenience for the Chinese tourists travel to US. “The Ten Year Visa might be a milestone for us. China now has become our No.1 inbound market for oversea visitors as 2 years ago. Last year, Chinese visitors increased by 30% in one year, which is astronomical growth.”
Washington DC and Beijing became sister cities in 1984 and established a city agreement. On September 19th, during the summit Washington DC signed the MOU with Chongqing. Commenting on that, Ms. Belpulsi said she had been to China a couple of times, however this was the first time she been to Chongqing and she had very good experience in Chongqing. The River Tour on 19th gave her a very deep impression of Chongqing and she thought that Chongqing is a potential city. “We learn the pillar is about cultural exchange. We try to celebrate each other’s different cultures. I think