From Tian’anmen Square to remote borderlands, Chinese people celebrate National Day with patriotism, pride

This October 1 marks China's National Day and the 77th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China (PRC). From Tian'anmen Square in Beijing to Hong Kong's Victoria Harbour, from the country's borderlands to the China Space Station, people celebrated with flag-raising ceremonies, patrols, performances and greetings sent from orbit, beaming with excitement, patriotism and pride.

With the first sunlight in the morning, shortly after 6 am on Thursday, the national flag rose over Tian'anmen Square in Beijing.

Many in the crowd had waited through a chilly night, waving small flags and singing patriotic songs, marking the 77th anniversary of the founding of the PRC, China Central Television reported.

At the ceremony, Jian Xinyi, a 101-year-old veteran of the Chinese People's Volunteers, raised his right hand in salute and repeatedly called out, "Long live the motherland!" Accompanied by his family, he arrived at Tian'anmen Square at 8 pm on September 30 and was so excited that he stayed awake all night, the Changjiang Daily reported.

In the square, an 18-meter-high flower basket bearing the words "Blessings to the Motherland" stood at the center, with visitors from across the nation already gathering beneath it the night before.

A kindergarten teacher from Northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region posed for a photograph with her husband and 4-year-old son, saying she would share the pictures today with children in her kindergarten.

Across the square, visitors spontaneously broke into song. Wang Fucheng, a 26-year-old doctor from Gannan Tibetan autonomous prefecture in Northwest China's Gansu Province, held up his phone during a video call with his father back home, sharing the scene with his family in real time, according to the Beijing Daily.

In Hong Kong, at 8 am, the national flag and the flag of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region were raised at Golden Bauhinia Square. A police band performed, school choirs sang the national anthem, and after the ceremony, flag-carrying helicopters performed a fly-by while a fireboat delivered a water salute in Victoria Harbour, the local-based Bauhinia Magazine reported.

Farther west, the holiday was marked in a quieter way along the border in Northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. Police officers from the Kalabulake border police station traveled by vehicle and on foot across the Gobi and mountain passes. Along their patrol route, they cleaned boundary markers and carefully repainted their inscriptions red before standing beside them to offer National Day wishes, the Beijing News reported.

In Southwest China's Xizang Autonomous Region, a National Day flag-raising ceremony was held at Potala Palace Square in Lhasa. Thousands of people from different communities gathered at the square as the national flag rose against the morning light, singing the national anthem together and sending their wishes for the motherland, according to the Xizang Publicity Department.

The celebrations also extended roughly 400 kilometers above Earth.

The Shenzhou-23 taikonaut crew of Zhu Yangzhu, Zhang Zhiyuan and Li Jiaying remain deeply connected to their homeland. Looking down through the spacecraft's window, Li (also known as Lai Ka-ying in Cantonese), Hong Kong's first astronaut to travel into space, said: "From the space station, when I look at Earth, that land lit up with brilliant lights is the motherland we miss day and night."

"We cannot forget that across vast deserts, remote mountains, and distant islands, generations of people have spent 70 years gazing at the stars and striving in succession to create the glory of China's space program," Zhang said, deeply moved after embarking on his first space mission.

Zhu, a member of China's third group of taikonauts, is making his second spaceflight and serving as commander for the first time on a long-duration mission. "Please rest assured, motherland, and rest assured, veteran generations of Chinese taikonauts," he said. "The baton of history has now been passed into our hands. We will fulfill our mission, and continue to protect and build the Chinese people's home in space."

Another National Day gift arrived from orbit in the form of the first remote-sensing images of Hong Kong taken by the Tianyun camera, formally known as the Multi-Spectral Imaging Carbon Observatory (MUSICO), an instrument led by the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and installed aboard the space station. The images clearly showed Hong Kong and its surrounding terrain, offering a view of the city from beyond the sky.

From a veteran's salute at Tian'anmen Square and fresh red paint on a distant boundary marker to Hong Kong seen from orbit, blessings for the motherland traveled across the country - and far above it.