He was a volunteer teacher in the West African country of Benin. When his term ended, Yuan Jianglei made a big decision – to return to China with little more than a bicycle. Here’s his story.

YUAN JIANGLEI BICYCLE TRAVELER "I just want to see the world and to live the story and to tell my own stories. My name is Yuan Jianglei, and I'm 27 years old.I was a volunteer teacher at Confucius Institute in Benin. And after that, I rode a bike from the Western African country Benin to China, passing through 16 foreign countries in a total distance of 16,000 kilometers. It takes 360 days.

I never set a goal, I never set a destination for me. What I want is the story, so I just try my own pace, and I see something strange, and I see something interesting, so I just stop there and talk to local people, and buy the local food, and eat something I've never eaten before. For me that's the meaning of traveling by bicycle. The local people, they are always open-minded to host me.Despite that, I slept in the riverside, sometimes under the bridge, wherever I can stay.

There was one time when I was cycling, I was going to one of the World Heritage Reserve in Burkina Faso, Tiebele, and when I was approaching there, I felt bad. I was vomiting, I felt cold, then I realize that it might be malaria. So I called local people in the near village and he came to me and brought me to the hospital with his motorcycle.

There were several minutes that I want giving up. But soon after that, this is a small case. You can overcome it. we cannot gain or we cannot experience without paying something. You have to take risks.

It's a different world from what you have seen from the social media. So the basic discipline is to see directly with your own. I mean we should stay positive and you will see something positive. If you stay negative, I mean you will see much negative.

I have watched a film named "Life Cycles." And there's one quotation from that - "Life is a river. There's a beginning. There's an end. And there's thousands of ways in between."