WHEN the Shanghai Writing Program started 11 years ago, the host, Shanghai Writers’ Association, knew little about how to run a writer’s residency program and the visiting writers knew nothing about China or its financial center.

Change has been gradual with each year’s program and the visiting writers, who come from an increasing number of countries, have many more reasons to visit instead of just getting a glimpse of China. This year, among the visiting writers, one is fascinated by the Monkey King and has adapted the story as a Greek children’s book, while another wants to research adoption in China so that she has better answers for her daughter adopted from China.

Some find tranquility in the parks in the city, others like to observe the interaction between Chinese men and women on the street.

Shanghai Daily spoke to them and asked about their explorations in Shanghai.

This is Mansoura Ez Eldin’s first time in China, “a dream come true,” as she calls it.

“Shanghai ignites my imagination,” she added.

In Egypt and the Arab world more generally, many people view China as a place of magic and mystery; a land of wisdom and knowledge.

While here, she has been exploring the city for two to three hours a day. At first, she would take the subway, but then she realized that her mental map and understanding of the city would benefit from experiencing it by walking the streets.

Many Shanghai residents start their day practicing tai chi in the park, as does her husband back at home in Cairo, one of the similarities the writer from the ancient nation of Egypt has discovered in China, also an ancient civilization.

She said many Egyptian scholars and authors share her strong interest in traditional Chinese texts. Her first novel Shadow Specters was influenced by Taoism, specifically the famous butterfly dream of Taoist philosopher Zhuang Zhou (369-286 BC). The master dreamed of turning into a butterfly, and when he woke up, he wondered if it may have been the other way around — that he was turned from a butterfly.

During her time in Shanghai, Ez Eldin has been reading the works of various Chinese authors. She is working on her own novel about Shanghai and her experiences in the city. She credits the stimulating atmosphere of the city that has led her to have this novel nearly complete as the program winds down.

Ever since she was a young child growing up in New Zealand, Frances Edmond has been fascinated with China. To her, China was exotic and yet present. She felt a sense of familiarity with the country but also a cultural distance.

“What leads us to behave differently, have different values and different ways of thinking?” she often asked herself, while studying history and culture.

And she is aware there may not be a universal answer to such an existential question.

A scriptwriter, she has gravitated toward traditional Chinese theatrical forms, especially Peking Opera, after attending a recent performance, calling it “astonishing and incredible.” The grand gestures, stylized languages and extravagant costumes were unlike anything she had seen before. Although the performance was almost four hours long, Edmond was captivated by every minute of it.

The scriptwriter’s interests in history, culture and China all come together in her ongoing writing based on Kathleen Hall, a New Zealand nurse who helped many Chinese during the Japanese occupation.

Hall traveled to remote rural areas of China to set up clinics to provide healthcare for local people. Despite the chaos and battles all around, she purchased medical supplies in Beijing and then smuggled them to rural areas in Hebei or Shanxi provinces.

Eventually, Hall was caught and deported, but that didn’t stop her desire to help those in need.

This story of unsung heroism is important to Edmond. She hopes that her screenplay will one day be made into a film that honors Hall and the people she worked to protect.

When Tetiana Bieliaieva visited Beijing four years ago, she almost sealed a contract to teach.

“I fell in love at first sight and I wanted to move here to live for a year,” she recalled. Her visit was in February when she experienced Chinese New Year celebrations. She said it was a pity the teaching contract did not work out but beyond pleasant that she had finally returned to another part of the country in another season, “with all the greenery and flowers.”

The Ukrainian novelist also teaches English literature at university. She had been a journalist before she left for an academic career and writing.

“People around the world saw Ukraine and the revolution in the news, but little has been reported or shown about the aftermath, which has been very difficult for everyone in the country,” she said.

“Most young people have to work multiple jobs to survive, including myself. I have these part-time jobs at IT companies to compensate my income. It has also been much more difficult for writers, because the literary journals are either shut down or can’t afford to pay as much to writers.”

That is the reason behind the novel she is currently working on — a depiction of people from different walks of life who are all affected by the revolution.

Katerina Mouriki, who writes children’s book in Greece, finds her biggest Chinese inspiration to be the Monkey King. The famous monkey in the “Journey to the West” often reminds her of the great Greek epic Odyssey by Homer.

“Odyssey tries to be cleansed from a sin committed against the God, through deep suffering, many dangers and adventures. He meets monsters, gods and goddesses and he struggles with his body and spirit until he manages to return home and feels happy again,” she said.

“The Monkey King and his companions are making efforts to reach their destinations, through difficulties and pain.”

Such was the inspiration that she adapted the Monkey King’s journey into children’s books in Greece, which turned out to be popular with both children and adults.

She is most impressed by the magnificent traditional architecture styles in Shanghai, which inspires her to feel like a journey through time.

“I take pictures in Shanghai not only with my camera, but also with my heart and soul,” she said.

German writer Matthias Politycki’s first visit to Shanghai was back in 1985, a long-awaited journey for someone who grew up with stories about China.

His mother has a strong personal affinity for the country and his father was an avid reader of Confucius texts. As a child, he also developed curiosity for the country after reading a German children’s book about traveling to China.

“The city was flat at the time, Pudong didn’t even exist yet,” he recalled, saying it was long before the arrival of the skyscrapers and sprawling metropolis that have come to define Shanghai.

Thanks to the robust networks of cultural exchange between China and Germany, the writer has visited many times in different parts of the country. His recent book “Wild, Wide and Awfully Beautiful” explores how people change while traveling and what that means for the world, as he looks forward to a book tour with his Beijing-based publisher.

One of the first things the Hungarian couple, both writers, did in Shanghai was to take a selfie in front of the statue of Hungarian poet Petofi Sandor (1823-1849) in Lu Xun Park, named after the Chinese novelist.

“Saying that Petofi is his favorite poet, Lu Xun has made the Hungarian poet a household name in China, not just among intellectuals,” said Peterfy Gergely, a literature professor and a writer.

“And Lu Xun has got a special fame in Hungary also, partly because he has made Petofi a favorite in China.”

So it is no strange thing when they stayed in Beijing for one month to attend the first writer’s residency program hosted by Lu Xun Academy, and even fairer that they come to the program in Shanghai, where the Chinese novelist and essayist wrote many of his famous works.

“I’m a feminist activist, and as a writer, I write mainly about women’s problems and the life of women,” said Peterfy Novak Eva, whose main observations in Shanghai focused on the physical and emotional communication between men and women.

“I particularly like the gender equality I have seen here, not just in words, but reflected on the streets, between husbands and wives, how they communicate with each other, how they look at each other, the tiny gestures — how they act and behave with each other around. It’s much better than that in Hungary, and in many European countries.”

Her first novel “A Woman,” depicting a tragedy of a woman with a disadvantaged daughter and abusive husband, drew great popularity in Hungary and was later adapted into a best-selling stage drama.

“I share this point of feminist view with her,” Gergely said.

“It’s under my larger theme — the problem of human beings. The most important question forever and from the beginning of human civilization, which is constantly updated and evolves — ‘what is it to be a human being? What is it to be a colored skin person in Europe? What is it to be a woman in China? What is it to be a foreigner? Many great men have given their answers, and we each have to find our own.”

With an Indonesian Chinese father, Mirandi Riwoe first visited Beijing 12 years ago, and felt comfortable here immediately, a feeling that extends to her current stay in Shanghai.

Though deeply curious about the city and its culture, she doesn’t get out to explore before she finishes her daily writing every morning. One of the novels in the pipeline takes place in Australia during the Gold Rush in 1870s. Though many books have been published about the period, few explored much about the Chinese, among others in the world, who went to Australia in the hope of striking it rich.

“I met a man who had amazing knowledge and photographs of Maytown, the setting of a novel I am working on,” she said of her encounter with the great-grandson of one of the Chinese miners who established small mining towns at that time.

Ankush Saikia left the city of New Delhi, after having worked years in journalism and publishing, and went back to write in the much quieter Shillong in Meghalaya State.

“New Delhi is such an interesting city, a multi-leveled and multi-faceted place in so many ways,” he said.

“But it was time for me to go back, back to small towns and back to writing.”

Since then, he has written six novels, three of them in the detective Arjun Arora series. The protagonist is both a typical and unique detective, typical as he is inquisitive with a sense of finding the truth, unique as he comes from a rare marriage of different Indian communities, which has left him quite troubled.

Though not far in distance, Saikia finds it a pity that people from China and India don’t know about each other as one would expect. He is particularly interested in exploring more about the southwestern areas in China, where he has found many common traces with his hometown in northeastern India.

“As neighbors, we really need to visit each other more and gain more understanding of each other,” he said.

Part of Australian novelist Josephine Wilson’s agenda in Shanghai is international adoption against the backdrop of China’s policies and social development and many factors that impact how a child was abandoned for adoption.

“One of the great things about international adoption is that it brings you a different relationship with another country. A little bit of you — your family — is Chinese, even if the child grows up in Australia,” she said.

“It is important for her to see a connection with China, and to feel her identity somewhat.”

She has adopted a daughter from China, which has made her ask why, so that she could have the appropriate answer for the complicated matter if her daughter asks.

“She already did,” Wilson said.

In addition to answering her daughter, she has written an essay titled “Once upon a time, in China,” which explores international adoption and is included in the forthcoming anthology titled “The Dangerous Book of Mothers.”

Adoption was also reflected in her award-winning second novel “Extinctions” (2016), which follows a retired professor of engineering who has an adopted daughter, a wife who passes away as he moves into an aged care facility.

Greek writer Dimitris Sotakis started learning Mandarin years ago, after his brief yet impressive visits to the country, and this is his first extended stay after all the years of practicing the language with Chinese tourists and students in Athens.

“I want to see everything but that would be impossible,” he explained his effort to balance and manage time between his two passions ­— China and writing.

“I came here to work, to write. But now that I am here, I must go out to explore the city. It would be a crime not to.”

He often starts his day by taking the subway to a destination that he has never been to before and spends hours walking around the city, taking in all its sights and sounds.

Though Sotakis finds Shanghai to be a very inspirational city, his works of fiction typically do not take place in real world settings. His stories are global stories, they deal with humans as a global species, not confined to a single culture, time or location.

Contemporary authors in both China and Greece live in the shadow of their country’s ancient texts. He hopes that both countries will be able to forge a common bond and work to cultivate an international audience for their respective contemporary authors.

Ersi Sotiropoulos has been stunned by the changes in Shanghai since her last visit in 2001, as well as the polyrhythmic qualities of life in the city.

“In Shanghai, I have been able to find ‘small oasis of calm’,” she said, referring to the city’s parks.

She said parks were not only venues for individual enjoyment, but also for culturally significant activities such as tai chi or traditional Chinese board games. Such moments of tranquility and community make Shanghai unique amidst all the cities she has visited over the years.

“Before I write about an experience, I go through a process of internal distillation,” she said.