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| Dragon's Backbone Rice Terraces |
Well, we are now in Guilin, a large city about an hour’s ride from Yangshou where we just spent 4 glorious and educational days in the countryside.
Guilin is a town whose name means “Osmanthus Tree Forest“, and, as you may have guessed, has a plethora of osmanthus groves. Never heard of that tree? Well, the berries of the osmanthus tree are used for making a unique great-tasting tea. Speaking of tea, we never realized that how important tea is here in China. You are always given tea in every restaurant, and it would make you “peculiar” here if you didn’t have some at every meal. It certainly lends credence to that old adage “I wouldn’t trade all the tea in China for ..……”
We’re always talking about the wild drivers here, and finally saw our first traffic accident in this country of crazy, less than good drivers. Outside our hotel was a van in the middle of the intersection with a motorcycle crunched under its hind wheels. We think that everyone was ok, as there were no bodies laying around in the streets, and two Chinese gents appeared to be in discussion and exchanging paperwork.
On Saturday, we employed a driver and tour guide to take us out to see the famous Dragon‘s Backbone Rice Terraces (in Mandarin it is called “Long Ji“ which literally means Dragon‘s Backbone). Our 25-year old Chinese tour guide “Sara” who took us there was one of those delightfully pleasant Chinese girls with whom you can easily bond and have a great time no matter what the activity. She spoke English quite well, and was our teacher, mentor, and translator for the day, as well as tour guide to the famous rice paddy in the mountains northwest of Guilin. Frank loved her because she taught him some cool Mandarin slang that you will never find in the standard mandarin phrase books, and which he got to use thru out the day as we ran the gauntlet of nuisance peddlers that we encountered everywhere.
It was a full 2-hour car ride to the Dragon’s backbone, so we had a lot of time to get to know Sara and listen to her facts and figures about China. Sara belongs to the Dong tribe, one of 55 minority groups in China. These minority groups are indigenous people with their own dialect who still follow many of their old traditions. Sara said the Dong Tribe were easily identifiable by their long slim “horse faces.” We tried not to laugh, but she was so honest and sincere in her analysis. She was so pretty, and definitely did not look like a horse! And we told her so.
While we were on the topic, Frank asked Sara why Chinese people stare at us so much. She told us that city people aren’t too interested in us, other than as a passing curiosity; to them, we are just “lao wey“ (foreigners). But, to the people in the country who have rarely seen a white man before, we are called “Chang Bi Za” (the long noses). Funny. We thought our unslanted eyes and skin/hair/eye color was what gave us away!
Before climbing up to the rice terraces, we watched a pretty schlocky mock-wedding performance by the Yao women, another minority group who Sara said had “pumpkin-faces.” These women revere long hair believing that long hair means long life. They cut their hair only once in their lives at the age of 18, and even then they save the cut hair to use in their elaborate hairdos. We watched as they unraveled and combed their lengthy locks. These are short people so their hair can grow longer than they are -- some of the women had to stand on a staircase in order to completely let down their Rapunzel-like hair!
The constant rain and thick fog (we were lucky if we could see 100 feet in front of us) were very discouraging and we wondered if we would get even a glimpse of the beautiful Dragon’s Backbone rice paddies. We almost called off the hike, but perky little Sara beckoned us to go up with her. So, with ponchos donned, we made the steep 1000 foot ascent (about a 1.5 mile hike) to the top of the mountain.
When we reached the top, the fog parted like a modern-day Moses Red Sea trick, and low and behold, there were the famed rice paddies!! We were dumbfounded, and even Sara was awestruck. Sara had told us that the rain would actually drive out the fog -- and she was right!. The scene before us was like a Chinese painting. The emerald green rice paddies swirled and undulated following the contours of the mountainside looking like it’s namesake: the backbone of a Dragon. Beyond the rice paddies, the mountains were covered with white mist, and we could see mountain peaks poking thru the mist like islands in a sea of clouds. What a rare natural beauty!!
Now we are in the city of Hangzhou. We arrived on Sunday on Shandong Airlines, our third domestic flight here in China, and it was another on-time, uneventful flight despite the extreme fog and rain at takeoff.
Upon arrival in Hangzhou, we had a bizarre experience with the airport bus which was supposed to drop us off at a stop near our hotel. Somehow we got on the wrong bus, and when we arrived at God-knows-where at the end of the bus line, the bus men hustled us onto another bus. We couldn’t understand a word they were saying and felt so lost and frustrated, but these bus officials seemed to know what the problem was. One of them pulled our bags away from us, threw them into the belly of another bus parked nearby us, and then like a miracle, 10 minutes later, this new bus pulled up right in front of our hotel! We are still mystified, but grateful to the two Chinese men who took a few minutes of their own time to help a couple of very befuddled westerners in a big confusing city of about 7 million people.
On Monday, we traipsed out into the rain and hiked down to West Lake, a beautiful focal point and park for this city, for hikers, bikers, strollers, and boaters. We took a fancy pleasure boat out to an island with lots of inlets and all flowering plants like rhododendrons and azaleas. The air actually smelled sweet. Later, we took a ride around the island on an electric “buggy.” We had a great time gawking at the graceful willow trees, the lovely lake views, and the hordes of Chinese tourists. We seemed to be the only white faces on the lake! We finished our day on Qinghefang Lu known as the fun street with its many cafes, shops, and street vendors.
Today, Tuesday, we went to see one of the popular nearby water towns called Wuzhen. The simplest and least expensive route to Wuzhen seemed to be booking a bus tour thru our hotel. Only one problem: no English tours, only tours in Mandarin. It was not a pretty option, but what the heck. We threw fate to the wind and went for the unknown.
Wuzhen is unfortunately a tourist haven with an attractive Venice look - lots of canals and steep-arched stone bridges that span the many waterways -- and tons of tour groups. Everybody loves the beauty of Wuzhen, the droopy willow trees that line the canal, the old wooden temple-like housing, canal boats with their single oar propulsion (like a gondolier in Venice), shops of unique artisans that line the narrow street, and the cheap prices of all the goods!!
Because everything about the day’s events were in Chinese, we didn’t understand that the bus was also going to makes a few side stops to the shopping malls along the way - hoping to part some bucks from the tourists in the leather shops, clothing outlets, and even a silk factory.
Unfortunately, it was a bit of a disappointing day for both of us. Maybe it was the several stops of forced shopping, maybe it was the rainy day, maybe the zoo-like atmosphere of Wuzhen itself; or, maybe all of the above. The whole experience was a tourist trap for sure – the kind of thing we usually try to avoid. On the other hand, it was all part of the learning experience. After all, we got to meet and bond with many new Chinese folks on the bus; even tho the language was unfathomable to us, we found lots of common ground, and met lots of new friends in a foreign place.
Frank does not eat breakfast so Anne has been having some real breakfast adventures. In Guilin, she ended up slurping noodle soup with the locals -- since chopsticks are the only utensils available, EVERYBODY slurps the broth and uses the chopsticks to shovel in the noodles! At just 50 cents a bowl, the noodles were great and it was the cheapest breakfast she has ever eaten. This morning, she checked out the hotel’s breakfast buffet and met a professor from Iraq. When he first introduced himself, she was a bit leery of getting into a political discussion, but he has a son in Virginia, and besides, what he really wanted to talk about was China. He had been here 15 years ago and is astounded by their progress. He kept saying, “It is a puzzle to me how they have changed so fast.” Anne said that it hardly feels like a Communist country, and he responded, “These people have left communism behind!!”
Tomorrow, our adventures takes us by train to Shanghai, where we‘ll spend the final days of our stay here in China. Seems like the trip just began, and now it’s almost over.
Zai Jian, all,
Frank and Anne
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