“At the farthest end of the Great Wall, Yang Yongfu limps along the section he arduously restored, in effect ‘privatising’ it and putting himself on a collision course with the authorities. The farmer spent five million yuan ($800,000) and years of backbreaking work renovating several hundred metres of the national symbol deep in northwestern China, turning it into a tourist site. He set up an entrance area for tourists, complete with a car park and fishpond, and his wife Tao Huiping collects the 25 yuan admittance fee at the ticket booth — a table in the open air. A 2006 law gave the government the exclusive right to manage national relics — making Yang’s project illegal.”
