Xishuangbanna

Say that 5 times really fast!

Well it’s been a while hasn’t it? My blog is now seriously suffering from procrastination and sharing everything I want to has turned into a Herculean task. I will give it my best shot but unfortunately it looks like details will suffer for the sake of time. Here is goes anyway- (you’ll have to forgive me though b/c a lot of the interesting details I had written down on small pieces of paper and put into my wallet which was stolen/lost the day before I left for Germany 2 weeks ago…more on that later though)

Here is the link to my pictures on Kodak Gallery. Unfortunately not all of them are downloading from my camera so these are just a few.
And here are my Dad's. His are of the whole China trip though

So. After tooling around Shanghai for about a week my parents and I decided to take a trip somewhere in the country. Collectively we had all been to the major attractions in China so a standard trip was not going to cut it. I had originally chosen Lijiang as our destination, which is in the Southern province of Yunnan, close to the Tibet border. However, due to my Mom’s asthma, which really hit hard in the sullied surroundings of Shanghai, we thought the altitude may be too high for her. So we headed south to the tropical region of Xishuangbanna (she-shwong-ban-Na), also in Yunnan province. It was a fantastic decision.

Before I get to the trip though, lets discuss how we booked it. We felt more comfortable booking through an agency rather than doing it ourselves online. This was not as easy as it sounds though. I found an agency in a heavily frequented expat area and figured it had to cater to non-chinese. Have I not learned yet that there is no logic in China?!? We walked in and, like every establishment in China, there seemed to be oh five thousand people working there. Not one spoke English though. I could communicate that we wanted to buy flights to Xishuangbanna (XSB) but the buck stopped there. They called in a girl who could speak some English and after much half Chinese/half English explanations we got a 4 day itinerary for the region with a personal tour guide and driver. With fingers crossed that all would work out we set off for our adventure.

My first observation was that we were the only non-Chinese (or Asian at least) on the flight. Now normally I would be elated to be going somewhere non-touristy but we would soon find out that most places we were going to were anything but. And the only thing worse than obnoxious American tourists are obnoxious Chinese tourists. Not that they are overtly obnoxious in behavior but by virtue of the fact that there ARE SO MANY of them it becomes obnoxious and suffocating. And this was just the flight.

But alas we arrived. The air was warm and steamy and everywhere we turned our eyes were met with green mountains and terraced hills. It was already beautiful. Greeting us at the airport was our guide, Dianna, who, in all circumstances, was wonderful. Her English was fantastic and she had been born and raised in XSB so her knowledge was immense. Our driver, Mr Li, was a man of few words but still very friendly. Since it was the evening and nothing was planned they dropped us off at the hotel and told us about a Western restaurant, or California Sunshine Café, just around the corner for dinner. (This is where I tell my Dad to stop reading because he knows what is coming!) Hm…I am weary as it is about “western food” in Shanghai, let alone in this sleepy, rural town without a round eye as far as this round eye can see. Although it was a decent and clean place my reservations were justified just by glancing at the menu: Fruits Pizza, Mesican-style Chicken and American-style steak were just the highlights of the menu. I chose the safer route and went with Chinese noodles and my mom went w/ a vegetable salad that never came. My Dad though would not heed our warnings of disappointment and went with the American-style steak. Before I get to the steak, let me explain the setting: of the maybe 100 tables in the restaurant, only 3 were occupied besides us and they were all Chinese patrons. We still hadn’t seen a single non-Asian person since leaving Shanghai and they had fruits pizza on the menu for crying out loud. Would you have gone w/ the American-style steak?? NO. And so I ask: What’s brown and white and red all over? My dad’s steak. Not only did the fat and bone outnumber the meat but the thing was still mooing! It was about as rare as rare could be. Still strong in his convictions though my Dad sent it back to get it cooked more SO HE COULD STILL EAT IT! It came back and was still inedible and that was the end of our first “meal” in XSB. Looking forward to the next day.

Day2: We were met bright and early by Dianna and Mr. Li and set off immediately for a small village up in the rolling green, forested hills of XSB. We still had no idea what to expect of this trip as none of us knew too much about the region AND I may have forgotten to bring the Lonely Planet (oops!). We first stopped at a daily market. This in of itself deserves its own blog post. I guess you could call this place the Costco of rural China. Anything and everything you could want was here at mass quantities and low, low prices. Fruits & Vegetables (many I’ve never seen before), spices, fresh tofu, live and dead fish, live and dead chickens, live and dead ducks, hanging beef, baby chicks, dead bees (?!?!), cloth, nuts, and the crowd favorite- chicken plucking station for your viewing pleasure. However, even though we were the only white folk around we didn’t cause much of a stir. It was actually us staring and taking pictures this time rather than vice versa (take that China!). We could have spent hours there but Dianna ushered us off to our next adventure.

Along the way we came across an old pagoda from the days before communism and Dianna let us get out and take some pictures. Normally this wouldn’t be so interesting- any one who’s traveled in Asia knows: you’ve seen one pagoda, you’ve seen em all!- but the greater significance, at least to me, was the setting. Here was this Pagoda, clearly run down and no longer worshipped nestled among acres and acres of rubber trees. XSB is very close to the Tibetan, Thai, Laos and Burmese borders and thus Buddhism, at least at one time, was very strong. Rubber trees, however, are not indigenous to this area but were brought in by the Han Chinese after Mao “encouraged” Han people in the 60’s to move to the region and utilize the fertile land to produce much needed rubber. The Han Chinese are the ethnic majority in China at nearly 80% but had never lived in this area before the 60’s. Apparently, Mao thought the indigenous people, called the Dai (pronounced die) people, were not capable of handling such a task (I’m not going to pull the R-A-C-E card here but it sounds fishy to me). Most farms were co-owned by the government and Han individuals, as are most businesses in China today (similar scenario in Tibet). So here at this Pagoda was the clash of old vs new. Indutrialized China triumphs leaving cultural traditions to decay. It was an interesting setting to observe for many reasons.

Onward ho! Ah, just when I was getting used to the peace and quite of rural China we were sucked back into the fray of never-ending Chinese tourists. Dianna took us to what would be the first of 8 scheduled “traditional dance shows”. YES 8!!! We cut her off after 3 but that was 3 too many. At this water dance show on the Mekong river (which starts in this area) we were made VIP since Westerners rarely make it out that way. VIP means we got chosen with about 15 other tourists to participate in a Dragon boat race. This is only worth mentioning b/c of my Dad. He is looking slimmer than he’s been in years but he still could put 3 of these Dai men in his pocket. Normally the Chinese fit 2 to a seat on these boats but he got his own…and looks of paralyzed fear filled their faces as he climbed into the tiny boat. He made it though and miraculously we won the race (see it pays to have the white people w/ you) and were treated to a chair ride around the stage after the race. I have no idea of any significance this may hold but we did get some good pineapple.

Next, we went to another Dai village. This was hands down my favorite part of the trip. We had lunch in a large hut that a family had set up next to their own hut/home and watched the women cook our meal using only a wood fire for barbecuing. I still dream of this meal. It was so fresh and tasty with the highlight being the pineapple rice served in a carved out pineapple. Mmmmm. After a quick tour of the family’s home (Dianna knew them well) we were off to see dance show #2 where I fell into a food coma and asleep. Yep. I slept straight through the entire thing. I think Dianna got the picture after that and we skipped the “Water Splashing Festival”, which was next on the agenda and headed home. Not before stopping to take some pics on the Mekong and sharing sour papaya dipped in salt and pepper with nearby villagers.

This day would be our most unique for the whole trip and couldn’t have been a better way to start the adventure.