Maohua Fei was born in Kunming, southwest of China, in 1974. He studied journalism at the Communication University of China from 1992-1996 and cut his journalism teeth at the Audio-Video Services of Xinhua News Agency as a television journalist. He was assigned to the African Head Office of Xinhua (based in Nairobi, Kenya) in 2003 as one of the first group of Xinhua television journalists based abroad. Inspired by the great nature of Kenya, he took a fancy to photography and has since become engrossed in the photographic world. Having finished his tenure at Kenya in early 2005, he returned to Beijing and moved to Photography Services of Xinhua. In July 2005.