Cheng Shuxian, owner of a traditional home inn

After much hesitation, two customers ask Cheng Shuxian, owner of the Tianyuankui inn in which they are staying if he could lend them an antique table for their exhibition.

"Of course," Cheng answered immediately, and then he asked, "do you need chairs?" Before they can answer, Cheng tells two inn workers to carry the table and chairs into his truck for transportation.

"Often customers find it embarrassing to ask for help. So we have to be considerate and proactive." Cheng said.

The inn features age-old tradition. Cheng was an antique dealer. As it became increasingly difficult to collect real antiques, he turned his shop back into what it used to be 300 years ago: a small hotel of seven rooms. The furniture, vases, stone lions and calligraphy posters, which add to the inn's charm, were all stock he collected as an antique dealer.

Cheng said he still remember the words of his first customer, a French gentleman. "Tradition is what attracts the customers while comfort is what keeps them."

"Our Inn has accommodated many celebrities, including an Italian president, the Canadian ambassador to China and his wife, the Austrian ambassador to China and the wife of the U.S. ambassador to China," said Cheng.

People in the 2.25-square-kilometer city are closely inter-related. Cheng, the home inn owner, is a colleague of paper-cutting master Wen's younger brother; "county magistrate" Zhang is "banker" Fan's neighbor and close friend; the mooncake vendor on the street may be a relative of the one selling hand-made shoes in the shop.

Their combined efforts have preserved the city and kept its traditions alive.

(People's Daily/Xinhua September 23, 2009)