A natural sounding pastime

In 2013, he traveled to Fujian during the National Day holiday. It was the first time he had visited the coast and he was so impressed by the sound of the waves that he wanted to record them.

"It was 4 am, the sun was not out yet. I walked on the beach with wind blowing on me," he recalls. "I closed my eyes and felt I wanted to fall asleep. Immediately, I wanted to record it (for future use)."

When he was back in Hangzhou, he took the recorder to the suburbs at weekends to collect the sounds of nature.

People often associate white noise with television static, or the serene sounds of rainfall and crashing ocean waves. White noise creates a masking effect, blocking out those changes in ambient sound that can frustrate and disturb light sleepers, and it has become popular among people whose daily stresses make it difficult to fall asleep.

There are half a million people who listen to the sound of crickets on Ximalaya, while the sound of rain, thunder, wind and birds are also quite popular.

He likes to record in the morning, collecting the sound of dogs barking, wind blowing, birdsong or the voices of hawkers on street.

He started uploading his recordings to the audio platform in 2015 and, so far, his recordings have been played by listeners over 100 million times.

The sounds Shenggu uploaded reminded many listeners of their hometowns. One message claims that the sound of dogs barking on a farm evoked the childhood memories of the listener.

Of the audio clips, the sound of rain has proved to be the most popular. One such clip, recorded in a small pavilion in Hangzhou Botanical Garden, has been played over 45 million times.

Many of the platform's users have stored that clip in their list of favorites to help them to go to sleep, and one listener commented that they could almost smell the soil when listening to that rain.