A Denisovan skull is upending the story of human evolution

Collaboration with outside scholars plus China willingness to slowly grant access to their rich expansive history is still a century or two behind the same amount of study put into the Roman empire. Imo, time will hold the Chinese empire and its role in human history in the same western revered status of the Roman empire. Having had only a fraction of aeral bombing damage of west Europe has left much more of the historical record intact.

As a child I had a deep lasting fascination with the the Iron Curtin and countries behind it. Particularly China. I have no idea why; my parents didn't understand why I wanted to learn Chinese as a young child in the late 80's-90s. I couldn't say why either, I just did. But that wasn't going to happen in 1980's Texas. I never did learn; also never lost my wonder of the place. Probably fueled by my fantastical projection of historical tales and stories (ok, Shaolin kung fu temples too) onto a country that only opened its doors to the rest of the world 45-50 years ago.

FWIW, my fantastical projections mostly lived up to my historical and daoist fascinations after spending time there. Mostly in Shaanxi province (Xi'an's city wall is something to behold -- after recovering from the absolutely terrifying taxi ride from the airport) + a long days hike on Huashan to middle/east/south peaks followed by a very cold night between the South/West Peak to catch the morning views. Took the north peak cable car down because...stairs. Then a brief visit to Henan province where I met the only other "westerns" during the entire trip (the couple were the only other ones to walk up to the english language historical plaques)

I really wish we could get over this west vs east thing and progress humanity as you know, humans, or maybe earthlings.