In a city as large as Nanjing, the greenway is a breath of fresh air both literally and figuratively.

在南京這樣大的城市里, 無論從字面上還是在日常生活中, 綠色通道都提供了新鮮空氣。

is a breath of 有提供的意思嗎？

My comments:

If you’ve been staying inside a stuffy room, a meeting room for instance full of smokers, and then you go out to the balcony, you’ll literally feel what a breath of fresh air feels like.

Yes, it’s like inhaling clean air for the first time in a long while, air that’s not stale, contaminated and smelly.

Figuratively speaking, one can feel what a breath of fresh air spiritually when one experiences something new, imaginative, relieving and very welcome.

After 2,000 years of feudalism, for example, the Chinese people embraced science and democracy in the early 20th century like a suffocating people longing for oxygen.

Science and democracy were a much needed breath of fresh air for us then. In fact, they are something we still need, and in large quantities, today.

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Go to Zhang Xin's column

本文僅代表作者本人觀點，與本網立場無關。歡迎大家討論學術問題，尊重他人，禁止人身攻擊和發布一切違反國家現行法律法規的內容。

About the author:

Zhang Xin（張欣） has been with China Daily since 1988, when he graduated from Beijing Foreign Studies University. Write him at: zhangxin@chinadaily.com.cn, or raise a question for potential use in a future column.