CRI听力:Spring Festival Travel Rush Continues

A female graduate student surnamed Chen bought 4 train tickets and travelled more than half way across China to get home.

The journey took her three days, starting at the northern city of Tianjin, via Nanning, the capital city of south China's Guangxi region, and stopping at Fangchenggang, a port city facing the South China Sea.

She said the travelling is much more comfortable now, compared with 5 years ago.

"When I was a freshman, tickets from Beijing to Nanning were extremely difficult to get as there are only two pairs of trains running on the route. So we can only get hard seats. But this time, I travelled on a sleeper. "

The operator of China's rail network, China Railway Corporation, said it would add 15 percent more trains during the period, in light of the huge migration.

But some still complain that buying tickets for the travel peak was difficult.

Ren Chongyuan, studying in Beijing, was travelling home to east China's Shandong.

"I feel it is a little bit easier to buy tickets this year, but you have to book tickets two months ahead of your trip, so still kind of hard to get a ticket."

However, despite long-hours travelling and going through trouble to get tickets, millions will still make their way home to spend the holiday with family.

Ma Xijie, a migrant worker from southwest China's Sichuan, was travelling back home by train with his son and wife.

"I have my parents back in my hometown and I must go back and have the family reunion. It's great to have the whole family sit down and enjoy a family dinner together. I have been working far from home with my kid for a whole year."

China's authorities estimated that this year's travel rush would see some 3 billion trips in total, up 3.6 percent year on year.

There would be about 2.48 billion trips by road, 332 million railway journeys and 54.55 million trips by air.

Si Shenmin, deputy chief of the passenger transport division of Urumqi Railway Bureau, north-west China's Xinjiang, explained the reason for the sharp increase in passenger numbers.

"There is a travel peak before the Spring Festival, with an influx of migrant workers, students and people traveling home for family reunions. After the Spring Festival, there will be a peak of migrant workers and students going back to work and to school. The first peak is between January 24th and February 6th, and the second peak is between February 15th and March 3rd."

Chinese traditionally get together for a reunion dinner with their loved ones on Chinese New Year's Eve and let off fireworks in the streets.

This year's Spring Festival falls on February 8th.

For CRI, this is Fei Fei.