From which point on he kept standing right behind me, watching every move I made. Since he couldn’t read English, he continued:
“How do I know you’re not sending out any secrets?”
I decided to show him my blog site and the project site (http://project95.sina.com.cn). When he saw Nokia and the China Youth Development Foundation he relaxed for a little while, but still kept standing right behind me.
“You know, foreigners are not supposed to be here,” he declared.
“No, in this area. It’s a military area. Actually, you can’t be here,” he said nervously.
“I don’t think so. No one has told me that this is a sensitive area. (æ•?感区) Don’t worry, I’m almost finished uploading my pictures.”
Instead of relaxing, he began to ask where each of the photos I uploaded yesterday was taken. I explained each one in turn. When I eventually departed, he was visibly relieved.
This experience made me ask one of the hotel staff whether many foreigners have come to Tongdao. After thinking audibly hard, she mused:
“I think I’ve seen one once.”
Later on, the hotel owner came to chat with me over dinner.
“Do many foreigners come here?” I asked him, too.
“Not at all. Until this year, this area was strictly off limit. Has the PSB come and asked you questions?”
“No,” I said, suddenly being worried myself.
“I’m surprised. They used to question foreigners and cart them off. But I suppose it’s ok now that we’re developing tourism here.”
And with these words he asked five of his waitresses to sing for me and give me rice wine (米酒) to drink. The matter was apparently closed. I suppose spies don’t drive around in the most conspicuous car anyone could possibly be driving in China. Still, I couldn’t help wonder whether perhaps the PSB might make a raid on my room at 5am…and chase me out in my underwear. In the event, I had a peaceful sleep, here in Tongdao.
I love these small “buses��?…often I see them loaded with ten or more people…this the best picture I could catch today.
***
At lunch time I was in between two cities when I was getting hungry and suddenly spotted a small wooden house by the road side. Friendly people smiled at me and I waved. After I had passed, I wondered whether they might serve lunch. I turned around and stopped in front:
“Something to eat?��? I shout.
“Instant noodles!��? comes the reply.
So I park Miss Daisy and get out. It turns out that this little house is both a convenience store and a pharmacy. The owner is a doctor who studied a bit further north in Huaihua (怀化). His wife heats up the instant noodles for me and gives me a bottle of water. Their accent is so heavy that I don’t understand a whole lot. At some point he wants to know my Chinese name. I hand him one of my name cards. He studies it for a while then says:
“When I come to your country, I’ll look you up.��?
“I welcome you,��? I reply.
“What if I come with you right now?��? he suggests.
For a moment, I am lost for words, but he rescues me: “Just kidding.��?
After I’ve eaten my noodles, I ask him where to put the near-empty paper container. He looks at me as if he doesn’t understand the question. Then he points to a ditch in front of his house. Reluctantly I pour out the contents, then I hand him the container, which he unceremoniously throws into the ditch as well.
“But, but, why make such a mess? What about pollution?��? I ask.
“Don’t worry,��? he says, “in the countryside we’re used it. We don’t worry about pollution.��?
I had difficulty with this because just a minute ago he had told me how clean the countryside is, how peaceful and how fresh the air. How this squares with messing up one’s own front yard, I can’t quite comprehend. Don’t get me wrong, I fully appreciate that “When in Rome, do as the Romans do��? (入乡��?俗), but it nonetheless makes me wonder. Can anyone explain to me why a sense of orderliness is so much lacking in the Chinese countryside?
***
This part of China, Southern Hunan, has beautiful wooden houses that to me look rather picturesque. This is because I am a tourist. In fact, however, this region feels very poor, and the only reason I suspect why it still has these wooden houses is that there isn’t enough money to tear down the old and bring in the new.
***
You might wonder how I get to the destinations. I am actually quite lazy. Whenever I get to a city, I ask a taxi to show me the day. It costs a little, but it is quick and reliable.
Today, I didn’t find a taxi, so I just pulled up next to a guy on a motorbike and asked:
“Do you know of a reasonable hotel?��?
“Sure.��? And he named two.
“Would you mind showing me the way? I’ll make it worth your while.��? And off we drove.
When we got to the hotel he had in mind, I wanted to pay him. “No need,��? he stated unequivocally. I asked him to sign on Miss Daisy. That he liked. We chatted a bit. I told him that I lost one of the two screw nuts that attach the rack (or bracket or frame or whatever it is called) which Miss Daisy uses to hold up her soft-top roof.
“Would you know whether I can get such a screw nut in your town?��? I wondered aloud.
“Don’t worry, give me the other one, and I’ll find you one just like it.��? Then he thought for a while, and continued: “Never mind, I’ll go and get several; one will fit.��? And he got on his motorbike, only to return thirty minutes later with several different screw nuts. Sure enough, one was the right size. Again I wanted to offer him money, but he steadfastly refused with the words: “That’s [my helping you] is as it should be. (这是应该的。)��?
***
The fellow who took me to the hotel and went to get the screws for me brought with him the local TV crew. Could they interview me, he wanted to know? Take pictures? Of course, I said.
And so I ended up in the company of beautifully dressed Dong girls…life could be worse.
***
As I am writing this, I am wondering how to continue tomorrow. Apparently, all roads from here to Guangxi are under repair. Miss Daisy, I am told, won’t be able to get through. What to do?
I was taking the G209 south today. It is a lovely country road that is mostly smooth with only moderates bumps, reminiscent of older Italian or French roads. The G209 leads through beautiful Southern Hunan countryside that is hilly and rich in vegetation. It is winding and runs up and down small mountains. It is perfect territory for Caterhams. I was longing to enjoy it, but really couldn’t. Why? Because I was constantly on the look-out for on-coming traffic on *my* side of the road.
Once I ended up having to lock all four wheels and evade a bus passing another bus by putting my right-hand-side wheels on the grass. Another time – and this really was a first in my over 1,000,000km of driving – I had to break hard, come to a full stop, and start reversing for 20 metres so as to make room for a huge truck passing another.
It is – and I hope I don’t cause offense – truly remarkable under what circumstance some Chinese drivers – often the professionals: bus and truck drivers – undertake passing manoeuvres. They pass cars when they can’t say ahead at all.
What makes them do that? I thought long and hard about it, but still can’t figure it out:
Do they fail to understand the risk?
Do they believe in fate – that is, hope that they themselves and on-coming traffic will be alert enough and react quickly enough to avoid a collision? In other words, is it purely down to hope and prayer?
Or are they paid by the mile or by speed such the pursue speed in order to increase their income?
Or are their lives under so much pressure that impatience rules above all?
If I had to bet, I think it’s this last reason. If yes, what a terrible life.
Or is it something else that I don’t understand at all?
I feel as if I am in South-East Asia. The crooning of the hidden birds, the loud chirping of the invisible cicadas, the thickness of the lush vegetation, the shape of the sweating trees, the gait of the round hills, the muddiness of the bubbling ponds, and the dripping humidity of the heavy sky, they all remind me of journeys in, say, Malaysia.
“See these caves up there?” asks Mr. Wu, formerly a teacher, then the major of the village, and now, retired, a part-time tour guide. “It was in 1951 that our brigades (土匪) fought the liberation army here.” He takes off his straw hat and gazes up to the caves with they eyes of someone who’s fought here himself. At 65 years of age, he’s too young for that, however.
I am at the bottom of a ravine through which runs a river mostly underground. I’ve come to the river’s edge by descending eighty meters down a set of stairs. A women washes her straw basket full of clothes. “There is no water up there where the village is,” explains Mr. Wu. “All the water we need is pumped up using electricity these days.”
“Our fighters, all 280 of them, hid up there in these caves,” Mr. Wu continued his story. “They were shooting the liberation army with guns. We killed quite a few, but eventually the army starved out the fighters until they gave themselves up.”
As I am walking along the river inside the caves, Mr. Wu suddenly turns around and says with some pride, “And you know what? Two thirds of our fighters were women. How did they become fighters? In fact, it’s a sad story. They were rejected by society because they couldn’t bear male children.”
Now the caves are lit with bulbs of different colours. In 1951, torches made of bamboo, oil and cloth illuminated these slippery caves.
Listening to Mr. Wu’s story, I can’t help but ask: “So, what did your parents think of the liberation army? Did they think that their lives were liberated?”
“Of course they did,” Mr. Wu replies with hesitation.
“But then how come their fighters hid in the caves and shot at the army?” I want to know.
“These fighters, they simply had not yet come to understand that the liberation army brought them a better life,” Mr. Wu explains.
And the river, now as then, keeps flowing for twelve kilometres (25里) underground all the way to Fenghuang.
Mr. Wu is a member of the Miao minority. They make up 55% of the population of Fenghuang. 17% are Yi; the rest are Han and other small groups.
“What makes the Miao different from the Han?” I ask.
“There’s the clothing of course. And we have our language, albeit not our own writing. We’re a bit shorter and some say our skin is a bit darker. We also tend to use only a small set of last names like Long. But most importantly, we have our own distinct customs.”
“Such as?”
“Our children marry early. In fact, they first have babies at the age of fourteen, fifteen or sixteen. Then they get married. We have three Valentine Days: 3rd Day of the 3rd Month; 6th of the 6th Month, and 7th day of the 7th Month.”
This makes me think that surely some enterprising Han Chinese is seriously evaluating this Miao practice for adoption country-wide in the interest of commerce.
“Our women are free and independent too. If they don’t like their first husband, they can freely look for another, leaving the first with the responsibility of raising her children. Then, if she doesn’t like the second one, she can go back to the first husband who is obliged, more or less, to take her back.” What a deal!
“When a man loves a lady, he tucks at her shirt to express his interest. When she loves him, she stamps on his feet. The harder she stamps, the more she loves him.” Ouch.
When I am shown in the erstwhile house of the founder of the village, an elderly woman suddenly appears, wearing nothing but her skin for a top. She chats with me while I am fascinated by the lack of shame in nudity.
The Miao make – or at least used to make – their own clothes, all the way from growing their own cotton. It takes a full day to weave two meters worth of fabric.
I love watching the practiced motions of the weaver and listening to the rhythm of the creaking loom because it is the natural, slow and imperfect rhythm of a life I barely know.
106 years old, still smoking and six generations apart
NOTES:
- 40% of my RMB80 entrance ticket will go to the village.
- Any factual errors are due to my poor understanding of Chinese. Please feel free to point out where I’ve got it wrong.
Yesterday evening I was exhausted. I suppose traveling - driving, scouting out locations, processing all I’ve seen and learned, blogging - for almost four weeks since leaving Beijing has taken its toll. So, I was looking forward to an early night’s sleep. When I returned to the hotel from dinner, a karaoke bar next to my hotel (and terribly close to my room window) was blasting the cacaphony of ill-practiced performers through its loudspeakers.
I asked the front-desk when this would likely stop. At 11:30, came the reply. “At 11:30 at night? You’ve got to be kidding. Surely other customers will be complaining, too.” Just as I said this, the phone rang: another customer asked for the noise to be shut down. ”
“You see,” I pressed my point, “I’m not the only one who needs sleep. Isn’t there anything that can be done?”
“Not really,” said the front-desk lady, “if it was a wedding, we might perhaps be able to do something, but since it is a funeral, we really can’t.”
If ever I’ve come across an uncrossable cultural barrier, this one is it. Karaoke, carousal and merry-making at a funeral? I shook my head in disbelief, went to bed and pulled the second pillow over my head.
The comparison is inevitable - both sport old towns (�城) inhabited by minorities (Naxi (纳西) in Lijiang, Miao (苗) in Fenghuang).
I must say, I like Fenghuang better. Lijiang’s old town is a bit like Switzerland - a microcosm of perfection. Everything is clean and orderly. Nothing seems out of place. Fenghuang is more like Italy - a microcosm of imperfection, but all the more loveable for it. There is dirt, there are broken items, things hanging crooked. That just doesn’t happen in Lijiang (or in Switzerland).
Lijiang is fully internationalised and fully geared for Westerners - a decent cafe late or a pizza is as easy to be found in Lijiang as it is in New York or in Italy, ironically. Fenghuang, on the other hand, hardly sees any Westerners…and so no lates and no pizzas. Fenghuang is not mentioned in the Lonely Planet Guide of the Rough Guide. That says something. And how refreshing it is to be in a lovely town that is not yet overrun with my kinsmen.
I was told that the road from Zhangjiajie south would be marvellous – in good repair and with fantastic scenery.
I decided therefore to leave the roof down, even though the sky looked dark. Perhaps I’ll be lucky and the rain holds out. After driving for exactly fifteen minutes, a light drizzle set in; five minutes later it turned into real rain. Stop the car. Pull out the soft-top roof from the tiny boot. Unfurl it. Starting from the windshield, attach the soft-top using the push buttons all the way around. Then tighten it using the internal straps. I’m still not very good at doing this..it still takes me about three minutes.
Then I climbed back into Miss Daisy like a contortionist. When Miss Daisy wears her hat, she’s a really bother to get into it. Anybody watching somebody getting into a Caterham will wonder why on earth anyone would want to drive a car like this. Well, you know why.
Anyway, I drove off. Once I was through Zhangjiajie and on the correct road, I decided to take my chances again since the road had dried up. Out of the car. Buttons un-bottoned, roof rolled up and stowed in the tiny boot. Back in the car. Wind in my face again; I breathe freely; what a delight For exactly ten minutes. Then the rain comes back. Roof on again. No matter what, I tell myself, I’m not taking it down again today.
After ten minutes the rain stopped once more, and I was tempted to ignore what I had just promised myself, but then decided to leave the roof on. That turned out to be the right decision since rain came and went all day.
The road south was indeed in great shape, but unfortunately I barely got a glimpse of the promised landscape since it was shrouded in mist and rain clouds. Getting through Jishoushi (�首市) was slow, especially since by now it was pouring heavy rain. When I finally saw the first G209 milestone, I was happy. I new I was heading in the right direction.
The G209 started off very narrow, but I had heard that it wasn’t a wide road, so this didn’t bother me. I passed some red “road repair” signs (施工), but since I see them all the time, I didn’t think much of that either. I was told the G209 was a great drive, so it’d better be. Next I came up to an abandoned toll booth. Instead of wondering why it was abandoned, I was happy not to have to pay since that always involves a tortuous procedure of pulling my wallet out of my back pocket. (Space is limited in Miss Daisy, don’t forget, and so even a simple task like getting a wallet out of ones back pocket can be a major effort!)
I pressed on for a while, still under heavy rain. Through a small village. The usual stares. Nothing new. Another kilometre and before me opened up a huge puddle. “How deep is it?” was my first thought. I got out of Miss Daisy and through a rock into the puddle. It disappeared. Ok, deeper than that rook. But how deep? After a few minutes, another car arrived. I watched it clear the puddle. At least 15cm. Much deeper than Miss Daisy’s floor pan, but at least it’s only water. So, back into Miss Daisy and through the puddle in a hurry. Since Miss Daisy is leaking some water right under the dashboard when it rains heavily, I fully expected that water would leak into the compartment from below. But it didn’t.
I was now in red-alert driving mode, keeping my eyes glued to a few metres in front of Miss Daisy to avoid major obstacles. Ahead the road was covered in mud, thinly at first, then deeper. The next time I lifted my eyes to look further ahead, I slammed on the brakes: another 100 metres further of thick and thicker mud, then a lake (no longer just a puddle) and beyond it a steep and tall pile of dirt. That was the end of the G209 as far as I could tell.
I got out to assess the situation. Soon a Mitsubishi four-wheel drive came up behind me. They rolled down their windows, smiled the smile of someone looking at someone deranged, and then kept going. While I was thinking about how I could turn around here – the mud was forbidding and the road narrow – I suddenly heard a howling engine. It was the Mitsubishi that was stuck in the lake – steam rising, wheels spinning, water splashing out. Since there wasn’t much I could do, I decided to start the procedure of turning Miss Daisy around. The road surface under the mud was solid, but it was clear that if I ventured only an inch beyond the solid underpinning, Miss Daisy would sink into the mud. Instead of a three-point turn, I made an eleven-point turn, forward, then backward, forward, then backward, each time turning the steering wheel from one extreme to the other. Eventually, Miss Daisy’s long nose pointed in the direction whence I came. I started driving again. Mud flew everywhere – unto the roof, the side windows, and the windshield. I could hardly see outside. So, my next stop was the petrol station I had seen a few minutes earlier.
When I pulled into the petrol station, one of the attendants, shaking his head, asked: “Didn’t you see the detour sign? The G209 is impassable up ahead.” In my hurry and unshakeable belief that the G209 was smooth sailing all along, I failed to read the signs properly. The “road construction” sign was there not just for decoration. I’ll remember that.
On the Road south from Zhangjiajie today I saw this town planning dream:
The reality, at the moment, looks like this:
I see these two pictures - dream and reality - in China wherever I go. Reality often still falls far short, but for how long? What if all these dreams come true? Can the world sustain it? But how could anyone deny anyone else the chance to dream? The chance to realise their dreams?
I had not heard about Zhangjiajie until about a few weeks ago. One of my Chinese friends insisted, however, that it is a must-see. “The landscape is uniquely primeval and rather undeveloped. You will love it.”
I checked out my trusty “Lonely Planet Guide” – one of the holy books for independent travellers. It had nothing to say about Zhangjiajie. That intrigued me – primeval landscape, as-yet undeveloped and not a word of it in the “Lonely Planet Guide.” This combination gave me visions of fame for writing about a gorgeous undiscovered place. And so I added two nights of Zhangjiajie to my itinerary.
The Good
The cable car is, once again, furnished by my home-town company Doppelmayer, the same one that provides the cable car at Huangshan. That isn’t exactly newsworthy, but it made me feel good.
More interestingly, I thoroughly enjoyed a visit to a Tujia Minority village. The Tujia Minority aren’t exactly a minority in Hunan Province – they make up about 80% of the people in Hunan – but even though they make up the majority their cultural identity is being blended into that of the Han. I had heard about the Tujia before, but new next to nothing about them. Still, the hour I spent in their village today was the best hour of the whole day. The village high up in the mountains of Zhangjiajie lies along the tourist trail. It is in its original location and looks authentic, even though it has been refurbished for tourism purposes. Under most circumstances that would have turned me off, but the refurbishment is so tastefully done, the exhibits so well presented and the tour guide so delightfully lively that I enjoyed myself thoroughly, and learned a few things along the way.
I usually remember nothing after leaving a guided tour – either I don’t understand the tour guide or I am inundated with facts I can’t relate to. The fact that I remember anything at all about my Tujia Village visit therefore says a lot. For example, Tujia men have to work for three years in the wife-to-be’s household – free of remuneration – before they are allowed to marry their love. Even though this is only rarely practiced these days, this sort of dedication seems a custom that our modern instant-gratification societies could benefit from. The fact that women need to prove themselves proficient in many different forms of art before they in turn are considered eligible for marriage seems like a lovely idea, too. A cultured home is a good one, I’d like to think.
Later on, I learned more about the rape seed (油�?�) the Tujia plant and their traditional way of gaining oil from it….after many processing steps (one of which is steaming) the rape seeds (or rather what remains of them) are put into a container which is then pressed hard to squeeze out the oil. The squeezing – demonstrated live – is done by four sturdy man
hammering a wedge into the machinery. The oil is then put into big vats and used for cooking.
My friend was not wrong – the landscape north of Zhangjiajie is dramatic. It reminds me of both Kings Canyon and Bryce Canyon in the U.S. The forest is rugged and undisturbed. From its midst rise spiky, majestic rocks that left me in awe. These rocks are not the giants of Huangshan, but more tree trunk-like formations of various shapes. How much I’d love to spend a week here hiking in this paradise.
The Bad
What made my friend say that Zhangjiajie is not yet developed I will never understand. Perhaps he was referring to the beauty of the rugged and undisturbed landscape. I hope so, because in all other respects the “Zhangjiajie World International Tourism Area” is a machine that eats up tourists at one end and spews them out at the other. It began to be developed in 1980 and now processes 20,000 – 30,000 tourists per day.
At the ticket gate I had to purchase – for the princely sum of RMB245 – a smart card. Then my finger print was taken, digitally encoded and stored on the card.
“Why!” I asked my tour guide.
“It’s to avoid the cards being sold and reused.”
I would have thought a good old-fashioned paper ticket that is punched would have sufficed since the card was used exactly once – at the entrance!
Since I couldn’t help but wonder why such sophisticated theft-avoidance technology needed to be used, I commented to my tour guide:
“Sorry, I can’t help it, but I think you Chinese are amazing…to think of using such advanced technology.”
“Thank you,” said the tour guide, “You all have pretty good technology too.” Aha.
The Ugly
From when I entered at the park still full of hope to when I left it tired and dejected, the machine was chewing me up. Out of the seven hours I spent in the park, I was either lining up for or spending time in various means of transportation for about four hours. The rest I spent walking in file. When I did try to gain just a touch of freedom by retracing a few steps, I felt like a sperm trying to swim the other way.
“Quick, quick, have a look here. Now, come, faster, we need to go, c’mon, hurry up, quickly.” An actual quote from a tour guide.
I looked around into other tourists’ faces, hoping to get an idea whether they enjoyed themselves or not. I just couldn’t tell. Am I alone to find this a dreadful experience? (Here and now in Zhangjiajie I probably am because I’ve had the luxury of travelling in a different style…)
Strip Bar
In the end, the “Zhangjiajie World International Tourism Area” made me feel like being in a strip bar. Here I was near a gorgeous lady showing herself off in the best light – the mountains of Zhangjiajie did look glorious in the morning light. And yet, I could not touch her, not even go near her. Tour guides and railings made completely sure that I couldn’t. And you know what, even if I could’ve gone near her, I would have been in the company of ten thousand other people. No way to have sex, or to enjoy nature.
I was in search of a quick dinner since I was tired. Even though the street the hotel directed me to was lined with little restaurants, nothing stood out. I was about to return to the hotel when I heard someone shouting “Jiaozi”. That immediately attracted me. I asked what else they had. “All sorts of Northern food,” the shouting lady advertised. She knew she had me cooked.
So I went in, sat down and ordered two types of jiaozi (one with a vegetable stuffing, one with pork), stir-fried vegetables and a beer. The jiaozi skin was paper-thin (as it should be in my mind) and the fillings were tasty and light. The few months I’ve recently spent in Beijing made me fall sufficiently in love with Northern home-style cooking (家家介) that I now felt completely at home in this tiny restaurant.
While I was enjoying my jiaozi, the family running the business was preparing for dinner themselves. Eventually all eight (or were there even ten of them?) sat down at a table next to me. When a birthday cake came out and “Happy Birthday” was sung for one of the family members, I couldn’t help but chime in. That broke the ice.
Pork jelly was served to me, another bottle of beer opened, and a piece of birthday cake shared – all on the house. And so we began to chat.
The owner and his family had moved down here to Zhangjiajie from Liaoning only recently. The restaurant was opened only two months ago, “but business is already quite good.”
“What made you decide to move here all the way from the North-East?” I asked.
“Well,” explained the owner, “I have a friend at the China Travel Service. I asked him about which places are developing in tourism. He mentioned Zhangjiajie. And so we packed up our bags to try our luck.”
“Your food is really good. I suppose your cook is a long-time friend, isn’t he?”
“Not at all. I came down here. Ate a restaurant. Thought the food was excellent. Asked who was the cook. Then asked him if he’d come work for me. A few months ago we didn’t know each other at all,” the owner explained.
“Really? You look like old friends. Anyway, it sounds like a big risk, what not knowing anyone, not even your cook, and bringing your whole family with you.”
“Yes. I invested almost RMB50,000 in this place. RMB30,000 to buy it. Another RMB20,000 to outfit it and the kitchen. About five months of income,” he volunteered.
That didn’t seem too long in my mind. In fact, the way he said it, I was sure that he wanted to impress me with how little he had in fact invested. But I was wrong.
“Five long months. I hope I can make it back!” the owner continued
What a great story about venturing out into the world and taking risks in search of new opportunities. If I had not come to love jiaozi in Beijing, I’d have never learned about this story.
