Ruo Gu lives in a small studio in the hills near his hometown of Wenzhou, in the eastern Chinese province of Zhejiang. He makes a living selling handmade soap, osmanthus-scented jam, and plum drinks on China’s e-commerce platform, Taobao. Previously, he was an advertising executive at a prominent agency. 

Guan Pin is a tiny dessert shop which arguably makes the best tofu cheesecake in the world. The shop sits in the eastern end of Beijing’s Wudaoying Hutong  and the owners are a young couple who also began their careers in advertising. Now they make dessert for a living.

The generation born in the 1980s and 1990s are commonly known as “millennials.” The millennials born in China I have dubbed the “Green Tea Generation.” When Starbucks first came to Beijing in 1999, there were serious concerns that there would be an overthrow of Chinese tea-drinking culture. The older generation was worried that young people would turn to coffee over the Chinese tradition of drinking tea. Ironically, the opposite turned out to be true — it is actually the younger generation of China that is the current driving force behind the resurgent popularity of tea.  Many young Chinese are turning to alternative lifestyles over the hustle and bustle of urban living. They are going back to their roots and searching for something that they feel they are lacking in their fast-paced city lives. 

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In Songkou Village — a tiny town about an hour’s drive from Fuzhou, the capital of Fujian province — four millennials opened a bed and breakfast with the support of the local government. The Chinese name of the hostel translates to “Deep Breath” — alluding to its purpose as a countryside escape. Originally from Fuzhou, the four millennials had previously left their hometowns to attend university — each one of them filled with big city dreams. 

But no longer. Songkou is a charming village and well-preserved. The local government decided to maintain the area as a weekend getaway from Fuzhou. They wanted to modernize while protecting their heritage. To begin with, they hired a Taiwanese architecture firm to renovate the village without having to destroy the old houses or relocate villagers.

The Deep Breath Hostel was a slaughterhouse before being transformed into a 12 bedroom bed and breakfast. The village then enticed the four millennials to come and run the establishment. The hostel has a fully equipped kitchen and boasts Songkou’s only espresso machine. When asked whether they miss the glitz of the big city, one of the girls replied, “It’s the 21st century, when we miss the city we’ll hop on a train and return for the weekend. But we prefer living here.” 

Since 1982, at least 400 million Chinese have migrated to China’s urban centers. For decades, young Chinese dreamed of making it in the big cities, but in recent years, harsh reality of urban living, pollution, lack of affordable housing, and high-pressure work environments caused many of the Green Tea Generation to think twice about urban migration.  

In addition, there is a cultural factor influencing this generation. Being a hermit or recluse has always been glorified in Chinese traditional literature, much of which extols the Daoist virtues of escapism. Recently this mood has been regaining popularity and an increasing number of young people are leaving the cities, as well as participating in tea ceremonies, calligraphy, and other hobbies that exemplify Chinese culture. The studios where people practice these arts are tranquil — they allow the Green Tea Generation a moment of peace in an otherwise high-pressure life. 

The Internet has been fueling these changes. A high demand for local specialties and artisanal products has resulted in an increasing number of online stores. Many of these stores are owned and operated by young people who have decided to use the Internet to grow the small industries of their hometowns. 

We can actually draw many parallels between this return-to-nature movement of the Green Tea Generation and the hippie movement in the U.S. and the U.K. in the 1960s. Both movements outright reject materialism, both focus on nature and nurture, and both espouse anti-capitalist and anti-consumerist ideals. The critical difference — and what makes this movement uniquely Chinese — is that the Chinese millennials are no flower children — there is no political or social agenda. They simply want a different lifestyle. Despite their great love for Chinese traditional culture, they are not nostalgic. They are more interested in infusing traditional China with their modern lives.

My favorite Green Tea Generation story takes place in Fuzhou. Although A Shu’s parents run a local frozen food manufacturer, their son has never been interested in the frozen food industry. He has always been much more interested in fashion. Since primary school, he dreamed of becoming a designer and having his own runway show in Paris.  Somehow, he managed to convince his parents to pay for his master’s degree in fashion design from London’s Central Saint Martins, but soon after graduating, his father delivered an ultimatum: A Shu must either find a proper job in a big city or come home and work in the frozen food business. The father would no longer finance A Shu’s boyhood dreams. 

A Shu tried the big cities, but soon found that sitting behind a desk was not the way he wanted to spend his day. He decided to return home to Fuzhou where he found the frozen food business becoming increasingly competitive. Many stores were manufacturing the same product — dumplings. Seeing a gap in the market, A Shu talked his dad into making something different — rouyan, a type of pork wonton which traces its history back to the late Qing Dynasty. At the end of 19th century, the Qing government sent numerous officials to Fujian to guard the coastline. The story goes that the wives and concubines of these officials were so bored in their new guard post that they sat around inventing dishes to pass the time. Rouyan is a pork wonton wrapped in pork skin. The skin must be pounded paper thin and then used as a wrapper. 

Rouyan was one of A Shu’s comfort foods as a child. And not only his. A Shu quickly realized after beginning to produce rouyan how popular the market was. He even managed to utilize his fashion expertise when designing the packaging for his new product. A Shu’s rouyan has become a hit and is now a favorite gift between locals.

After helping the family business to achieve financial security, A Shu’s family assumed he would return to fashion. Instead, he chose to open a rouyan restaurant. 

A Shu’s story is inspiring to many Chinese, not just to the youth. Returning to our roots is important in discovering more about ourselves. In the case of A Shu, this was a return to the traditions of Fujian. He hasn’t looked back since.

(Header image: An aerial view of a tea plantation in Anshun, Guizhou province, March 29, 2016.  Gong Xiaoyong/VCG)