As an enthusiast of travelling, a young French entrepreneur has dedicated her life to sharing the vitality of China’s eastern economic hub with more people.
On the streets of Shanghai, China’s eastern mega city, you can often see a young French woman leading a group of tourists around the city on citywalks, introducing the history and culture of the metropolis to them in Chinese, English, and French.
Clarisse Le Guernic, now nearly 30 years old, runs a cultural company that has taken as its mission helping locals and foreigners better understand Shanghai by the concept of citywalks. After coming to study in Shanghai in 2015, she has regarded the city as her second hometown ever since. “Even though I’m a foreigner, the city is no stranger to me,” she joked.
Clarisse Le Guernic (first from right) leads a group of Chinese and foreign tourists on a citywalk along Xinle Street in Shanghai.
Starting a Business
Le Guernic’s story with China began back in 2008, when she chose Chinese as her second foreign language in middle school. A couple years later during her second year of high school, she visited China for the first time together with her classmates and a teacher. During that visit, they traveled to several famous places in China including the Great Wall, the Palace Museum, the Summer Palace, and hutongs in Beijing, as well as the Terra Cotta Warriors in Xi’an. In addition to visiting historical sites, they also met with pen pals and attended classes with Chinese students. The short journey deeply impressed her. “I longed for more opportunities to go to China and experience the local life,” she said.
During her college years, she chose Chinese language as her major. Then while in her junior year, she participated in a student exchange program between Rennes 2 University and Fudan University in Shanghai and came to China again. As a fan of travelling, she traveled to many places in China during the holidays. After returning to France, she applied for a master’s program in tourism management jointly run by Ningbo University and the University of Angers, hoping one day to explore China more deeply.
During her first year of graduate study in China, she did an internship at a travel agency that provided bicycle tours. Every day she guided tourists through local alleys of longtang, and she soon became quite familiar with the old buildings and history of Shanghai. It was also at this time that she learned about the concept of citywalks. Although this concept gained popularity in China in 2023, prior to that, Le Guernic was already an experienced “city walker.”
After her graduation, she chose to stay in Shanghai and launch her own business. With Shanghai’s friendly business environment for foreign entrepreneurs, she was able to register her company within two weeks in April 2020. Her company provides citywalk tours to help tourists experience Shanghai.
“Citywalks appeared in Shanghai as early as the 19th century. At that time, a British guide provided a walking tour for foreigners who came to Shanghai for the first time, introducing them to the history of the local streets,” she said. “Today that demand is still high. For foreigners who come to China for the first time, citywalks are a good way to quickly become familiar with the city. It is also beneficial for the people who have lived in Shanghai for many years, but might know very little about the city.”
Clarisse Le Guernic (middle) is introduceing the history of Fuxing Park to a group of tourists in Shanghai.
Exploring Shanghai Through Citywalks
Le Guernic’s first challenge was to tell interesting stories about Shanghai so her audience could better understand the city. In order to achieve this, she did extensive research, which took up most of her time during the early months of her enterprise. She poured over books, archives, and documentaries and collected maps and photos of old Shanghai. She also visited old buildings and talked to elderly people living in longtang to learn about their life stories. Finally, she started designing many specific tour routes and began promoting them.
Over the past four years, she has created more than 20 walking products. In order to provide a richer tourist experience, she also attempted to combine the routes with music and role-playing.
Among the featured routes she designed, there is a popular one that is related to the Belgian cartoonist Hergé’s The Adventures of Tintin. In 2021, a French couple living in Shanghai who were her former clients wanted to take a themed citywalk before they left China. As they were fans of Tintin, they wanted to know more about the story of the Blue Lotus described in the book that took place in Shanghai, but they could not find relevant information. In fact, Hergé had never been to Shanghai. The whole historical fiction was written based on certain historical events with the help of one of his Chinese friends.
In a bid to connect the fictional old Shanghai in the story with the real modern Shanghai of today, she read the comic dozens of times, bought related books, and visited the relevant themed exhibition held in Shanghai at that time. After a month of planning, the route was finally finished, and the couple were delighted with the end experience. Due to the combination of comic strips with historical stories, the route is suitable for tourists of all different ages and remains one of her company’s most popular products at the moment.
For her, Shanghai has both a historical and modern sense of fashion. It has a bustling city style, while at the same time a quiet life in the alleys. It has a unique food culture on one side, and a strong artistic atmosphere on the other side. “This is a very diverse, open, and inclusive city,” she said. “That is why Shanghai is called the ‘Magic City.’ I hope more people can discover the multi-faceted nature of Shanghai through citywalks.”
What makes her company different from other travel agencies is that it pays more attention to the promotion of Shanghai’s history and culture, according to Le Guernic. She usually guides groups of less than 10 people, and shares with them real historical stories while walking down the streets. “Sometimes locals join our visits, and I also invite them to talk about their experience. The interactions are very interesting,” she said.
Clarisse Le Guernic (left) leading a group of Chinese and French children on a tour of local complex Longmencun, showing them Shanghai’s old history and the various blended architectural styles. Photos courtesy of Clarisse Le Guernic
Promoting Sino-French Cultural Exchanges
This year marks the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and France, as well as is the China-France Year of Culture and Tourism. Earlier this year, she was recommended by the Shanghai Municipal Administration of Culture and Tourism to be the Shanghai International Tourism Ambassador 2024. For her, this is a great honor and responsibility. “I hope more French people can learn about Shanghai’s history, culture, architecture, and food in depth,” she said.
To better promote dialogue between French and Chinese, while learning about Shanghai, she has created two French featured routes. One covers the stories of two French architects, Alexandre Leonard and Paul Veysseyre, who founded a firm in 1922 and later went on to design more than a hundred buildings in Shanghai. The other is called “Learn by the Walk,” which is mainly for Chinese people learning French and French people learning Chinese.
On the International Children’s Day on June 1 of this year, as a volunteer and tourism ambassador for Shanghai’s Laoximen area, she led a group of Chinese and French children to a local complex Longmencun, showing them how the architecture exhibits a blend of Chinese and Western styles. The French children were also attracted by a local game in the typical alleys of longtang.
“With visa exemptions and the start of the China-France Year of Culture and Tourism, the number of foreign tourists, especially French, which I have received this year has significantly increased,” she said. Now, she works from morning till night seven days a week, sometimes leading three groups and walking 40 kilometers on a busy day. During her leisure time, she busies herself with developing new routes and visiting museums to expand her knowledge of the history and culture of Shanghai.
Le Guernic also hopes to help simplify traveling in China for foreign tourists. In order to solve the problem foreigners face in making mobile payments and simplify the booking for them, Shanghai launched the Shanghai Pass on the Travel Day on May 19, 2024. Le Guernic plans to buy one and promote it on social media. She also found that many websites run by Shanghai’s official departments have provided very useful contents for foreign visitors. Due to the limited influence of those platforms outside of China, she plans to introduce them to more foreigners.
“Born in France, made in China.” This is Le Guernic’s brief introduction on social media. Her rich experience while living in China makes her feel right at home here. “I can’t say I truly know China because the country is so big,” she said. “But I hope I can help more people know about Chinese culture and history.”
