Throughout man's evolution, every one of us has thought of ways to do things on a bigger scale than our predecessors. From caves to huts, from huts to high-rises, our one-upmanship in the name of progression literally knows no bounds. This is exemplified by the Chinese and their West Lake restaurant in the province of Changsha.

Employing a staff of over 1,000 and seating roughly 5,000 hungry diners, the West Lake restaurant is the world's largest Chinese restaurant and number-two on the list of the biggest in general behind the 6,014-seat Damascus Gate in Syria.

West Lake is much more like the Mall of America than what you'd expect a typical Chinese restaurant to be. It's open, very expansive, and features a host of other things to do besides eat. The restaurant was created by Qin Linzi, a business woman whose vision has inspired the residents of Changsha and beyond.

The world within a world is made up of an extremely large formal dining room, and over one hundred individual “private” rooms. Qin's ultimate vision is to have West Lake act as a microcosm of what China will hopefully become: a flourishing, vibrant society where people, even packed in, can get along, entertain one another, and truly lead happy lives.

To help the happiness along in West Lake, there's plenty of entertainment. Of the over 1,000 staff members, a large portion is made up of dedicated entertainers, i.e. singers, dancers, and the like. A lot of them live on-site, so they're always around to keep the many visitors entertained.

West Lake is situated on 14 acres and has pavilions, an Imperial Hall, and other stages as well as five kitchens. All told, the restaurant employs 300 chefs to feed the 5,000 diners. Surprisingly, or maybe not since China has a population of over 1,000,000,000, the restaurant is almost always nearly full to capacity. This takes a great deal of work from a dedicated staff.

On top of all this, as if things couldn't be more complicated, the land of television entertainment caught wind of West Lake and decided to film a documentary recently about the struggles of controlling a restaurant this massive.

Conventional wisdom would suggest that a spectacle of this size wouldn't require fine-dining status too. After all, it's enough to know that you can go there, get great entertainment, dance. The quality of the food, you might expect, is secondary to ambience. However, Qin made sure that this wasn't the case. The food served earns very high praise for being some of the best traditional Chinese food in the area. Even on this huge scale, extra care is taken to ensure the product doesn't suffer.

West Lake also earns big points because it's affordable. Since it's supposed to be a celebration of everything that China could and should be, almost every resident can afford to eat there regularly. It's all about making the most out of life - getting to enjoy great food in the process is just a bonus.