Chángshā City Museum

A colossal 1968 statue of Mao – cast out of an aluminium-magnesium alloy in Hēilóngjiāng – affably greets you at the entrance to the museum's pleasant grounds. Compare his carriage – right arm raised aloft, heralding a new dawn – with that of his more demure statue erected in Sháoshān in 1993, when the reform drive had long kicked in and Mao was a demigod no more.

The statue is the first clue that this hammer and sickle–decorated museum is essentially a shrine to Chángshā's most famous adopted son, despite the paintings, ceramics and jade on display here. Check out the huge portrait of the young Mao, with shafts of light emanating from his head, which hangs over the entrance.

Also in the museum grounds is the former site of the Húnán CCP Committee, where Mao lived from 1921 to 1923 with his first wife while secretly running the local CCP. The spartan family living quarters, along with a few photos and historical items, are on view.