Written by Iris Zhu from California, USA One blazing summer after the school year ended, I left America and returned to my mother's hometown in Changsha, China. Along the Xiang River and capital of the Hunan Province, Changsha comes from a Mandarin word meaning “a long sandy place,” and it is average-sized. In China, this means around 10 million inhabitants. The city is known for its local, spicy cuisine and small, meandering alleyways teaming with bustling stores and restaur
