A night view of Shanghai near the Bund celebrating the 100th Anniversary of the Founding of the CPC Photo: VCG

As the Communist Party of China (CPC) prepares to celebrate its centennial this week, Chinese government bodies and society alike are holding various activities, from preparing for the grand celebration to light shows in multiple cities, to activities that recall the Party's arduous journey to celebrate the big day.

Xi Jinping, general secretary of the CPC Central Committee, will present the July 1 Medal, the highest honor of the Party, to outstanding Party members at a ceremony to be held on Tuesday morning. 

Xi, also Chinese president and chairman of the Central Military Commission, will deliver an important speech at the ceremony, reported the Xinhua News Agency. 

Photo: Xinhua

At a Sunday press conference that introduced the literature on the Party's history over the past 100 years, officials revealed that a 100,000-characterwork, which marks significant events of the Party's history, will be published soon. The book chronicles events ranging from 1921 to this June, when the Museum of the CPC opened.

The second and last comprehensive drill for the grand celebration at Beijing's Tiananmen Square concluded on early Sunday morning. It started at 8 pm on Saturday and some 33,000 people took part.

Tiananmen Square, where the celebrations are expected to be held, was closed to the public from June 23 and will reopen on July 2 morning. Measures are in place prohibiting the flying of any aerial objects that may affect the safety of flight activities during the celebration.

The Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Carrie Lam will leave for Beijing on Monday to attend the celebration activities. 

As the celebration date comes close, exhibitions themed around the founding of the Party are gradually opening to the public. 

A little girl takes picture of a statue at revolutionary base at Yezizhai village in Qionghai, South China’s Hainan Province, on Sunday. The base is welcoming groups of members of the Communist Party of China, who come to reminiscence about revolutionary martyrs and review their own oaths taken when joining the Party.

An exhibition held at the "Red building," once the main campus of Peking University, will open for visitors on Tuesday in memory of the "red prologue of the brilliant cause" of the Party.

The building re-enacts historical scenes featuring how the leading figures of the CPC, including Mao Zedong, Li Dazhao and Chen Duxiu, worked in the early stages of the CPC's history.

A staffer of the museum told the Global Times on Sunday that the venue has received a number of phone calls making appointments, starting on Sunday when visitor registration opened. The exhibition will allow 1,000 visitors to enter by appointment per day. 

The Museum of the CPC, a site devoted to permanent and comprehensive exhibitions of the Party's history, also recently opened in Beijing. 

A person who visited the museum on Friday, who requested anonymity, told the Global Times that the objects displayed in the museum told stories of the CPC's arduous journey and great achievements over the past 100 years. 

"They also made me realize that the founding of People's Republic of China was hard-earned, and Socialism with Chinese characteristics is also hard-earned," he said.

 The holographic cinema featuring the Red Army's Long March deeply impressed the visitor, who said that he felt like he had embarked on this journey himself, and felt the lofty aspirations and fearless sentiment of the army.

Moreover, light shows highlighting the Party's achievements and its 100th anniversary have been held across the country as part of the grand celebration. 

From the Great Wall in Beijing, to the Datang Sleepless City in Xi'an, Shaanxi Province to the Yangtze River Bridge in Wuhan, Hubei Province, lights on landmark buildings have decorated cities in China with color and joy. 

In Hefei, East China's Anhui Province, a remarkable AR light show was held on Saturday night. In Shenzhen, South China's Guangdong Province, 2,021 drones formed celebration patterns to light up the night sky in a visual spectacle.