Everest without oxygen, exponentially more than a national public-relations campaign budget from Harbin to Hainan.

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Stunning, intricate creations by world-class carvers include those from the ice city of Harbin, in China.

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At Nanshan Ski Village, a ski resort near the northern city of Harbin, they manufacture snow from wells deep underground.

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The authors acknowledge funding from the State Key Laboratory of Robotics and System of Harbin Institute of Technology and the National Natural Science Foundation of China.

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In eight of the 70 cities, including major cities Chongqing and Harbin, prices of newly built homes were up in March from the previous month.

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Elsewhere, Senegal and China played out a goalless draw in an international friendly in Harbin while Junichi Inamoto's late strike helped Japan come from behind to claim a 4-3 victory over Ghana in an entertaining friendly in Utrecht.

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In short, daily life in a hardscrabble farming village in Szechuan province is a world away from the Shanghai Nanjing Road ritzy shopping street or even an old, walled neighborhood in Harbin, a crossroad of many cultures in northeastern China.

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