2016年CRI Chinese, Russian tourism police officers patrol in Moscow in joint action

 

A delegation¹ of tourist police from China's southernmost city of Sanya, a popular beach resort, patrolled together with their Russian counterparts on the streets of Moscow on Wednesday.

This is part of the agenda for their visit to the Russian capital this week, to exchange experience and best practices with local tourist police.

The head of the delegation Chen Xiaokun, a top official from Sanya's police bureau, suggests this is by no means an exchange for the sake of exchange.

"Huge number of Chinese tourists are traveling to Russia, and many Russian tourists are coming to China as well. How to provide these tourists with better service while at the time, to safeguard their legal interests. This is an issue, or challenges, facing both sides of us."

Data compiled by Russian authorities show the number of Chinese tourists to the country increased 50 percent year on year through this year's first half, and the momentum² is likely to continue in the second half.

The 170-member tourist police unit in Moscow was established in 2014.

English or other foreign language skills as well as some knowledge on tourism are the requirements for each member in the unit, in additional to capabilities³ as police officers.

Anna, a girl who has learned some basic Chinese language skill, is one of them.

She has been a tourist police officer for nearly two years, a veteran among her colleagues in the unit.

She says it is still pretty normal for her to encounter some difficult situations in her daily work when it comes to serving Chinese tourists.

"Usually, tourists come to me in order to ask how to get to their destinations. Sometimes it's about asking for my suggestion on which place is more interesting, or which restaurant is better. There were times when Chinese tourists were lost, and I offered some help. But the difficult thing is, for example, some tourists from southern China speaks very fast. I can hardly catch what they say. "

By comparison, the Chinese tourist police officers are less experienced.

The delegation from Sanya is by far the only professional tourist police unit in China, set up less than a year ago.

Chen Xiaokun says their pioneering status in China means they have to somehow learn from more experienced overseas counterparts.

"Domestically, we have no predecessors⁴, but police in other places will follow us. So we need to explore on ways, as well as mindsets, to improve our services. So for these purposes, we've come to Russia to learn from them."

Perhaps there is another reason why they decided⁵ to learn from Russia.

The Russian tourists have been a big source of foreign visitors to Sanya.

However, the size of this tourist group has been shrinking since 2012, hitting an all-time low last year.

When local tourist police officers use the practice learned from their Russian counterparts to serve their Russian guests, this could become one reason for more Russian to fall in love with the destination.

For CRI, this is Ding Heng.

1 delegation   

n.代表团；派遣

参考例句：

• The statement of our delegation was singularly appropriate to the occasion.我们代表团的声明非常适合时宜。
• We shall inform you of the date of the delegation's arrival.我们将把代表团到达的日期通知你。

2 momentum   

n.动力，冲力，势头；动量

参考例句：

• We exploit the energy and momentum conservation laws in this way.我们就是这样利用能量和动量守恒定律的。
• The law of momentum conservation could supplant Newton's third law.动量守恒定律可以取代牛顿第三定律。

3 capabilities   

n.能力( capability的名词复数 )；可能；容量；[复数]潜在能力

参考例句：

• He was somewhat pompous and had a high opinion of his own capabilities. 他有点自大，自视甚高。 来自辞典例句
• Some programmers use tabs to break complex product capabilities into smaller chunks. 一些程序员认为，标签可以将复杂的功能分为每个窗格一组简单的功能。 来自About Face 3交互设计精髓

4 predecessors   

n.前任( predecessor的名词复数 )；前辈；（被取代的）原有事物；前身

参考例句：

• The new government set about dismantling their predecessors' legislation. 新政府正着手废除其前任所制定的法律。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Will new plan be any more acceptable than its predecessors? 新计划比原先的计划更能令人满意吗？ 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。