Tuesday, June 10, 2008

The Torch Made it and So Did We

We felt a little sorry for ourselves having to get up at 6:30 and and catch a bus for our "torch duty", but then again, the students and non-foreign teachers from the College were on 5:30am duty! The days and weeks leading up to the Olympic Torch's arrival have been shrouded in mystery and speculation. Our class schedules have changed on an hour's notice, as of yesterday the College was still negotiating its role in the affair with the local government and of course the Torch route was secret. At first it appeared we, the foreigners, were meant to be show pieced by the local government for our loyalty to China and our support of the Torch. We all politely refused that honor, but nevertheless found ourselves on a bus full of foreign teachers and students from the two colleges in Lijiang and the head of the Lijiang Foreign Affairs Department (who knew we had one?). Instead of heading into town as we had expected, we headed north into Jade Dragon Snow Mountain park. We found ourselves lining a corridor full of traditionally dressed minority people (at least 1000) and students in matching t-shirts. Flags were ubiquitous. After our arrival we learned there would be a 3.5 hour wait. We had been told not to bring any bags or food for fear of "issues" so you can imagine how painful a 3.5 hour wait was with a tired, hungry, under-clothed 6 year old. Since we had expected to be in town we wore t-shirts and rain coats, fine for town, not good for the Park which is over 10,000' in elevation.

Eventually of course the excitement began. The buses bearing torch bearers dropped them off at their designated stations and we had a front row seat for the hand off of Torch Bearer #173 and #174. #173 was a big white guy, story unknown! After the brief event complete with drumming from the Tibetans and chanting from the Chinese we waited for another 1.5 hours until the Torch Bearers were reloaded in their buses and taken back down the hill. We made it home by 12:30pm in time for a nap.

In some ways the actual event was anticlimactic, but in other ways it was pretty astounding. The minority costumes were beautiful, the mountain a stunning backdrop, the actual torch hand-off occurred less than 10 feet from us and it is likely some of our pictures will make the local newspaper given the number of times we were photographed and interviewed.

Beijing here we come!

Sunday, June 1, 2008

Around NW Yunnan in 5 Days

5 days, 25 hours of driving, plenty of snacks and two moderately stir crazy children encompass the theme of our recent adventures. We traveled a large loop in NW Yunnan with our friends Molly, Bruce and Kaili Hampton, our ecoguide Lily and our tireless and always smiling driver Mr. Duan. Molly works for The Nature Conservancy (TNC)in Wyoming and was eager to see the work TNC is doing in this part of China with an eye to bringing donors at a later date. And, well, we came along for the ride. Li was ecstatic to have a long time friend and playmate (11 year old Kaili) to speak English with and to absorb some of the constant attention she gets as an adopted Chinese girl in a Caucasian family (Kaili is also adopted from China).

After a few days on our home turf in Lijiang and meals and presentations by TNC staff, we headed out of town towards Tiger Leaping Gorge. We had visited this valley once before, but this time we drove through the entire gorge on semi-maintained dirt roads with impressive cliff edges. The labor to build these roads is mind boggling. We walked down to the overlook of the famed rock the tiger leapt upon and declined the offers to be carried back up in a sedan chair-much to Li's dismay. That night we found ourselves at the Haba Snow Mountain Inn. The girls loved the huge beetles and caterpillars when they were in the garden, but didn't appreciate their company quite as much when they were in the room. Walking through the fields and houses in the village it is astounding to see how much firewood one household uses in a year-a reported 6000 pounds! TNC has been trying to help villages develop biogas programs to reduce fuel wood consumption.

The next day we continued north through Baishuitai stopping to visit the travertine terraces that reminded us of home. We discovered some wild irises and marveled at the leaves calcifying in the spring water that feeds the terraces. That afternoon we hiked through Pudacuo National Park-China's only National Park in spite of signs to the contrary. The park was lovely, but expensive and poorly promoted as a tourist destination.

After a night in Zhongdian and a morning of shopping for Tibetan knives we headed NW to the Botanical gardens. Bruce added new orchids to his list and Li took photographs of everything. After 90 minutes walking through the gardens her eyes were swollen and itchy. Perhaps she is not only allergic to Wyoming, but China as well. After a spectacularly steep drive in which we descended 4000 feet and survived a passport check point, we ended up in a small dusty Tibetan town called Benzilan. The highlight of our stay there was the hour Li and Kaili spent building sand and rock creations in the Yangtze River. In addition to negotiations at night about why our power was out we were serenaded by a man sounding like a lovesick hound dog at 1:30 in the morning. As always, Li and Kaili were fascinating to the locals and many people wanted to talk to us about them.

From Benzilan we took a "shortcut" along the Yangtze southwards. Imagine dirt roads, washouts, large boulders in the road and long drops to the river. Our driver whistled to keep himself calm. The scenery was spectacular and the remoteness of these Tibetan villages is amazing. Lander seems perfectly urban in retrospect. We passed about 20 kids walking back to school about 15 miles away. Fortunately we didn't blow a tire (I assume we had a spare) or get stuck in the mud and eventually made it back to the pavement. Li waited until this day to get carsick which is pretty good considering the driving marathon we did.

We spent our last night in Liming, a stunning village set amongst red rock towers and mesas. Whereas Haba Snow Mountain felt like Colorado and Benzilan felt like Wyoming, Liming was definitely Utah. There is an unusual red sandstone base here and houses are constructed from blocks of bright red. We hiked up to 1000 Turtle Mountain so named because the rock formation looks like 1000's of turtle shells. Our guide instructed us to take off our shoes to protect the sandstone-needless to say that was Li's favorite part of the trip! We happened to be in Liming on both Children's Day and the thrice monthly market day. Children's day was fun to see the local school kids in traditional Lisu, Naxi and Yi outfits. Market day was fun to watch the locals come to town from their villages and have a meet and greet. Many of their baskets were filed with alcohol to carry them over for the next 10 days. We were most definitely the only whites in town.

We left Liming reluctantly and headed back down the Yangtze towards Lijiang. We made one last stop in LashaHai to see our guide Lily's family home. TNC helped them build a biogas and solar system. Sitting in her courtyard eating walnuts and crabapples it is easy to forget how difficult the subsistence life of a farmer is. Lily works for an ecotourism company that is community owned and operated and tried to empower the local LashaHai villagers to celebrate their environment and create sustainable tourism.

Needless to say, starting back to school this morning was a rude awakening for us all. This was probably our last big adventure in Yunnan Province and we turn our minds towards completing the school year and two months of Asian travel this summer.