Houston Community News >> China Targets Bad Behavior Before Olympics

5/6/2007 BEIJING (UPI) -- China is targeting bad tourist behavior in an effort to curb it before the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.

Jumping the line, openly spitting and clearing one's throat loudly in public are some of the practices the China National Tourism Administration is trying to quell, China's state-run Xinhua News Agency reported.

The efforts were stepped up this week because of the weeklong May Day holiday, when an estimated 150 million Chinese travel the country.

"We are supposed to remind people constantly throughout the tour, and also lead an etiquette discussion at the end of the tour," said Huang Xiaohui, a tour guide with a Beijing-based travel agency. "The Olympics are coming, and we don't want to get disgraced."

Beijing reportedly expects to receive 550,000 foreign tourists and an estimated 2 million domestic tourists during the Olympics.

(Contributed by Political Gateway)