The Winds and Lanterns of Ili

Reporter Fang Yuan indirectly causes a pastoral area's girl to drop out of school and get hurt through a mistake at work, so she heads to Xinjiang to take part in a year-long charity program.

Amid the sights and sounds of nomadic life, she experiences the border region's scenery and the warmth of its people. She learns to embrace life and eventually finds herself, grows, and attains inner peace on the vast Ili grasslands.

Building libraries in pastoral areas, helping Kazakh embroiderers promote grassland culture, constructing a school soccer field... Each of these projects helps heal the herders on the grasslands, while everything here helps heal Fang Yuan in turn.

In the end, Fang Yuan decides to stay on the grasslands.

Then she meets Helan.

Helan is a gentle, quiet Kazakh police officer, as steady as the poplars lining the grassland roads.

This is more than a vast, boundless expanse of land. It is a great place that can temper the human heart, a great place where the soul can grow rich and resilient, and a great place that can reshape a life.