With only 700 yuan in his wallet, Beijinger Sun Hong sets off on his dream journey to Guilin. Though a total stranger to the city, he quickly settled down at a home of one of the locals. The householder Wang Xia gave him a warm-hearted reception, not only providing him with free room and board, but also voluntarily guiding him around the city sights.

But Sun and Wang had never met each other before. "We got to know each other on www.huzhuyou.com, and reached an agreement that I will give Wang the same treatment when he visits Beijing," said Sun excitedly.

The new method of touring is called "inter-help travelling," which has been catching on quickly with travellers.

Compared with traditional agency arranged tours, wasting too much time on shopping and waiting for others, the self-help inter-help travelling seems much easier. "It is like dropping in on a friend and you can get more effective help from the householder," said Sun.

The householder will not only provide the visitors' lodging, but also give useful suggestions for local travelling, sometimes even taking on the role of tour guide. The only condition is that when the host travels in the opposite direction, the original traveller must give the same reception.

Zhong Yi is the creator of the site. Two years ago, with 4,000 yuan in his pocket, he set off on a brave trip around the country. He travelled to 31 cities and was received by dozens of his online friends. Spending only about 3,000 yuan, mainly on transportation, he got in-depth knowledge of different areas, which is hard to achieve using traditional travelling methods.

"Most people, as I did, have the wrong idea that they have no time and money to travel," the 25-year-old said. Working for a travel website, the young Sun noticed that many web friends liked to invite each other to travel together with costs equally divided.

He was then inspired to design a personal site, realising his dream of travelling around the country using his new idea of inter-help travel. To win netizens' trust, he pasted his picture, ID numbers and even his college graduation certificate on the page.

The site soon got a surprising response. He began receiving numerous messages from people around the country, who invited him as a guest to their towns and homes. After careful preparation, Zhong started his unique journey. His first stop was at a Dai ethnic group's village where he stayed for half a month. He then got cheated into eating toad in Guangzhou, visited the biggest cooking oil factory in the country, and even held a big party for his web friends on one stop of his journey. After the trip he was invited to work on one of China's biggest travel websites.

Zhong's modus operandi is to communicate with potential hosts in depth beforehand, and to publish all his personal information on the web to win others' trust.

"To build mutual trust between both parties is the key to inter-help travelling," admitted Zhong. "Plus it is a precondition to assure the journey's safety," he added.

Many inter-help travellers also post their trip agenda and details on the website as an added safety precaution prior to travelling.

(China Daily 03/17/2006 page2)