The China Pavillion. When I was there, a troupe of acrobats was out front doing typical, jaw-dropping acrobatics. I stoipped and chatted with the kids, mostly in their late teens, from Wuhan. They were the real thing, young pros. And they couldn't speak English. Nothing inauthentic there.

Inside, there was a talented musician playing one of the many Chinese stringed instruments for which there is no English name. She was from northern China (yes, she agreed that Florida was very hot, but she only had six more weeks to go and was looking forward to going back home, where it was cooler) and played with great ease and mastery.

The film was hokey, but no hokier than it would be in China-- go to the Great Wall at BaDaLing and you'll see a film made by people with the same out of date and cheesy production values.

The food? Dead on-- just like you would find in Beijing, though at US prices.

Yeah, a lot of Epcot is Go Big Corporation! stuff, but some of it is pretty darn real-- and millions more Americans can get a sniff of what China and some of those other countries are like than can actually afford to pony up for a passport (like what, nearly $100 these days?) plus visas, air fare, etc etc etc. It's not a substitute for the real thing, but it's good for what it is, a hint, a taste, a glimpse.