Bye Bye China

Four days ago we rode a train then a tuk-tuk (a scooter converted into a mini taxi) to the border of China and Vietnam. In many ways, I was sad to leave. In one very important and overriding way, I was happy - happy to have discovered the country when and how we did. China has been the unparalleled pleasant surprise of this trip. Admittedly, I entered with only the vaguest notions of what was in store. Due to such vacancy, China had only its immediate predecessors to live up to. Being that the most recent of those had been the decidedly inhospitable Laos, the ground was fertile for an upside surprise.

Boom truck, decorative rocks and billboard outside Dali

China's natural beauty, comparative tidiness, ambition & industry but most of all her people, coalesced into an unfailingly pleasant place in which to spend time. Again, our visit here has to be qualified by the caveat that we visited only three provinces quite far from the political and population centers. Nevertheless, if New Mexico, Washington State or Missouri can be said to typify at least a few things American, our travels had to have touched on some of what is China in 2007.

Neon sign that covered the entire side of a building in Kunming. Check out the small blue symbol of an atom on top.

And if a country can have a collective mood, it's really 1960 for the people of the 'Middle Kingdom'. China is ebullient, genial and above all else, welcoming. For many Chinese, things are looking up for the first time in their lives. Kids are all going to school. People are (again...for better or worse for the planet) are buying things they could never buy before. Chinese are traveling in their own country, a place of which they are very proud. Folks are out trying to make money in all kinds of ways - and, from what we saw, there is money to be made....even if some of the ways are entry-level.
Tami and our bikes on a bamboo ferry - Cost for two: about a buck.

One-girl band at a big, outdoor night market in Yangshuo.

Very, very nasty looking truncheon carried by men guarding an armored truck. There were NO smiles when I took photos.

For those such as the Tibetans, Uighur or any other ethnic minorities out of favor with the ruling Hans, the same cannot be said. We didn't see any repression or talk to anyone who had but that might have been due to the language barriers and the short length of our stay. We certainly read enough about cultural hegemony, restrictions on freedom of speech, punitive economic treatment, among other curtailments of rights. I suspect plenty of that does go on. It just was not apparent. Some residents of New Orleans, former and present, might say something similar about their plight.


Post-Katrina New Orleans


Before leaving, we'd spent the prior few weeks cruising around areas that are, for the most part, barely touristed by non-Chinese. It's a bit of a mystery to me why hordes of Western travelers set their sights on the countries of Southeast Asia when China, just to the north, offers such an interesting and fun array of possibilities. Even more, China ain't gonna stay like it is for long. I know I've said it before but, from when we arrived to our last minutes in the country, you can see evidence of the gargantuan energy going into modernizing the country.

For my money, most of that modernization is a tragedy because what China is losing is rare and becoming harder and harder to find.

One-man sawmill carving a beam from a tree for a traditional style bridge. Check out that pipe.

So, that's it for China. If we're lucky, we'll be back. If you're lucky, you'll go.

Artful Farming

Since we've left home, we've spent time in chili pepper plots that filled the shallow valleys of southern New Mexico; cotton fields of west Texas that were plowed so close to the dirt roads that there was no shoulder or ditch, tulip fields laid out in Holland that looked like a Mondrian canvas - only brighter; fragile, high-mountain fields of barley and buckwheat in the Himalayas that (and this is a fact) will not exist in twenty years because the glaciers that supply the water for irrigation will be melted; super-verdant planes of rice that stretched to the horizon in the Mekong delta where conditions are so fertile they can plant and harvest three crops in a single year. There were others but, for sheer, fully-realized beauty, none hold a candle to what we hiked through in Guizhou Province.

Wandering around the developing world, you come to the undeniable realization that most of the world's population is still involved with farming. In the US, something like 40% of our population still farmed as recently as the early 1900's. Now, the number is closer to 2.5%. Not so in almost all the countries we've visited. During planting or harvest, fields are CRAWLING with PEOPLE digging or cutting or threshing or carrying or plowing.

In the hills of southern China, for example, they don't even use gas powered roto-tillers. Almost all the farmers still plow with Oxen and hand-made, wooden, single-bottomed plows. We even saw one guy pulling a plow himself while his wife steered it. If you think you have any idea what hard work is, try doing that. I will forever remain humbled.

Imagine if this were your office.

They work hard but, wow, what beautiful plots they tend. We traveled around this area for a few weeks. I haven't felt so at peace since we were isolated on an island in Thailand or high in the Himalayas of Nepal. I have no idea how long areas like this will remain. China is undergoing such huge and sweeping changes right now. The largest migration in human history started some twenty years ago and is accelerating each year. Rural, farming Chinese are flocking to the cities for higher paying work. The trade-offs don't make the choice look simple.

Like farming a skyscraper

Chance Meeting in South China

Travelin' Tish Hendershot and Tami Quest

I think we have a new category in our "heroes" gallery.

Perhaps it had to happen eventually. If you're out here on the road long enough, you start bumping into other travelers who you've met one, two or three countries prior. It doesn't occur often but we've met familiar backpacker types in back alley eateries or sitting at the other end of a restaurant full of people - sometimes months and months after last seeing them. Maybe your eyes develop a latent sensitivity to picking the known from masses of unfamiliar faces teeming the cities and streets of Asia.

That might help explain my reaction a few nights back while Tami and I were eating dinner on a side street in Yangshuo, a tourist destination in Guanxi Province. It was a Saturday night and the street outside had a steady stream of strollers like the midway at a fair. Suddenly, a profile and walk looked distantly familiar. Without even thinking, I got up, ran around the corner and tentatively uttered the name of the person I thought it was - "Tish?" She turned around with an "I've just seen a ghost" look but we knew right away we'd just made a very, very....very low-probability connection.

For the first few minutes I think we were all too stunned to say much. After we came back down to earth, we realized that Tish had some time, we had some time and so, we spent the next four days doing a bike tour around some of the most sublimely beautiful country on this planet.

Back to front: David, Tamara, Tami, Tish, Sarah

I've known Tish from San Francisco for quite a few years now. Her work takes her all over the world but I was still stunned to meet up with her unexpectedly. As a further note of coincidence, a few years ago, Tish bumped into Captain Ken on a street in Bangkok - the same Captain Ken who just visited us! Tish and Ken get around.

She was in Yangshuo because she'd just finished a project up in Beijing and Shanghai. She came south with some friends and we all rode to Fuli town the next day to a market.

Man at the Fuli Market selling all manner of creepy crawlies that bit stung and otherwise apparently work wonders when rendered in rice whiskey for you to drink or rub on that aching joint. The original snake oil? Note the elderly patrons to his left.

The day after, we headed north into the countryside with the town of Xiping as our destination. No decent maps were available so we set off with a hand-rendered tourist diagram and asked farmers along the way for guidance. What we thought would be easy to reach in a day proved utterly elusive with only an hour or so of light left. We covered a lot of ground but we had yet to cross (or find a ferry to take us across) the Li River. Plus, every time we asked people which direction to Xiping, they invariably got agitated and launched into an indecipherable monologue in Chinese.

David practices some circus moves during recess.

Luck was with us, though. As we entered a small village, two people were motioning animatedly for us to go just up the hill to . . . what looked like a small guesthouse. Low and behold, after riding for seven and a half hours through nothing but seventeenth century farmland, we'd found refuge. The proprietor, Zhao Qiao Young, could not have been happier to see us nor more hospitable. He loaded his refrigerator with coveted beers and we settled into a long spell of relaxation.



Things at Camp Zhao were so comfy, in fact, that we stayed for a full extra day just to explore and soak up the beauty of the area.

Tami, Mr. Zhao and Tish above the Li River

We finally did make it to Xiping - two days later than planned but I remember no one complaining. Tish departed north and Tami and I, as our visa was running out, made for the Vietnamese border. If life's best pleasures are those that come unexpected, Tish helped make our already wonderful time in China that much more magical.

Ron Paul

I've been reading speeches by this guy for a couple years. He makes more sense than any politician I've heard in a long time. I can't believe the system actually allowed him to get elected in the first place. Let's see how the other Republicans try to take him out of the race.

Here's what he had to say about patriotism a few days ago before Congress:

The true patriot is motivated by a sense of responsibility and out of self-interest for himself, his family, and the future of his country to resist government abuse of power. He rejects the notion that patriotism means obedience to the state. Resistance need not be violent, but the civil disobedience that might be required involves confrontation with the state and invites possible imprisonment. Peaceful, nonviolent revolutions against tyranny have been every bit as successful as those involving military confrontation. Mahatma Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., achieved great political successes by practicing nonviolence, and yet they suffered physically at the hands of the state. But whether the resistance against government tyrants is nonviolent or physically violent, the effort to overthrow state oppression qualifies as true patriotism. True patriotism today has gotten a bad name, at least from the government and the press. Those who now challenge the unconstitutional methods of imposing an income tax on us, or force us to use a monetary system designed to serve the rich at the expense of the poor are routinely condemned. These American patriots are sadly looked down upon by many. They are never praised as champions of liberty as Gandhi and Martin Luther King have been.

Full text of speech is here:

http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul388.html

His campaign website:

http://www.ronpaul2008.com/

China Consumes

A shot of China Consumes Association's TV show "Consume Times"

If you haven't been reading the financial press for the last decade or so, China's economy is a mega-beast poised to gobble down, process and spit back out a tsunami of consumer and industrial goods like the world has never seen. I can vouch for their appetite to shop. Those with the means have what seems like an undending supply of stores in which to blow time and money. Now and again, due to equipment wearing out, I've had to dive in myself.

Before some recent hiking, I needed to find a pair of trailworthy shoes. In the country that supplies the bulk of the world's footwear, you'd think finding shoes wouldn't be a problem. Not so. Many of you have heard such tales before but I was astounded to find out how difficult it is to get shoes big enough for Caucasian feet. I wasn't in a huge hurry but, over the course of a couple weeks, I must have asked at well over a hundred stores. The best any of them could come up with were high-top basketball shoes.








A world-class star for some world-class consumers












Old Yao has had quite an impact here but it didn't do me any good. Luckily I found a store in Kunming selling top-of-the-line hiking shoes at a third the cost I'd have paid at home. Had my feet been two sizes smaller, I'd have had an infinite supply. Also in Kunming, we went to what only can be described as malls - of just athletic shoes. All the big cities have shopping like this. Multi-storey buildings specializing in shoes or women's accessories or whatever. My sister would love it here.

The Chinese middle class is estimated to be around 300 million people strong currently and growing fast. The buying power of each of those is something like one fourth to one third of that of a typical American consumer. The thing that frightens me most is how the whole tendency to consume is accelerating. We've only spent a couple months here but you can get an idea of the growth continuum from snapshots by visiting different places.

China still has plenty of poverty. We've spent a lot of time in villages and the people there buy nothing more than the absolute essentials - things like farm tools, rice, sandals, etc. In bigger towns you start to see cell phone stores and motor cycle dealers. The big cities are as I described above - they have it all and all you want of it. Keep in mind, we've only been visiting the southwestern hinterlands of the country. The real wealth and buying power is concentrated in the east. What I've heard about those areas sounds like a consumerist's shangri-la. All I can say, is look out Planet Earth.

School's In

Day after day
Day after day
We study English every day
Don't be lazy that's the way
We study hard day after day


China is old. For some odd reason, I take comfort in that. I think the Chinese do, too. And from the knowledge of how long their civilization has been around (5000 years - give or take), it seems they possess a deep and abiding faith in their culture. Not much seems to shake them. From what I've seen so far, they harbor a belief that if you're going to do something you might as well try to do it right (unless, of course, you're selling pet food to the United States). I can only speak comparing China to some of the other countries we've visited. So many of them just can't seem to get ANYTHING together. I used to worry about visiting India before it changed too much. I might have said the same thing about Laos or Cambodia or Honduras or any number of a handful of other developing countries. Now I think there is not so much to worry about. I will be old and gray before some of these places start to look like the US or Europe. There are countries that seem to be on an effective path of development and some that aren't. For better or worse, China's on that path.

Thirty-five years ago China had one of the very lowest per capita incomes on earth. Twenty-eight years of Mao Tse Tung drove the country into the dirt. Today China is among the more comfortable places we've traveled. Growth (again, for better or worse) is evident everywhere. The Chinese, as a people, seem to have said we're going to modernize and get with the Global program.

The photo above is from a small, ethnic village in rural Guizhou Province (the poorest province in China). They're starting the kids on English at nine years of age. Recently, the government in Beijing declared that all primary students in the COUNTRY will learn English. Prior to that, middle and secondary students studied it. We've talked to some young people fresh out of college. Before they graduate, they must pass certain levels of CERT (College English something or other...) exams to graduate. There is such an immense amount of pressure to be proficient in English that written Chinese is being neglected. (Everyone speaks Chinese but it takes a virtual lifetime to learn the thousands upon thousands of Chinese characters.)

Are the Chinese afraid of the language of their primary rival, the US? Do they let the official history of "imperialist aggression" and "exploitation" suffered at the hands of "capitalist roaders" cow them into thinking "it's the Chinese way or the highway"? Nope. They know, just like any business person anywhere, that English is and will be increasingly essential for global business. They're on it. Look out.

Old Folks At Home

Since we've been in China, I've had a feeling of comfort and I couldn't quite put my finger on why. China seems exceptionally safe. It's relatively (for now) cheap. As I've mentioned, the people are exceptionally helpful and friendly. That said, seldom have I felt so at ease in a country. After spending more time here, I think I can see one reason why.

Much like the older people of India, elderly Chinese, for lack of a better way to describe it, aren't afraid of being freaky. The old people rock styles that would make the illustrator of any book of childrens' fables, weep. Expressing a personal panache here seems to be a sign, if not an outright requirement, of reaching your senior years.

Any effort at all seems to be deemed better than none.....and admittedly, you do see some clunkers- the haphazard towel thrown around the head or the lopsided farm hat that makes the wearer look like they've lost any sense of balance.

In an environment like this it's kind of hard to shock people. Their flair helps put a foreign traveler a little more at ease. You can stand in the middle of a public square scribbling down some thought in your journal and no one bats an eye. You can wear sunglasses with crazy colored lenses and, if they do anything at all, they just laugh.

What's that? You say you've got a country where freaky is the norm? A place where they put a premium on being yourself? I like it. Sign me up.

"Captain Good Times" is More Like It

(Been out of Internet territory. Time to catch up.)

May 17, 2007

Just got a farewell e-mail from Captain Ken. Today he leaves China. Tami and I don't head back into Vietnam for at least a couple more weeks so, I find it strange (perhaps because Ken is going home) I'm already starting to miss this country. More on China later but, without a doubt, I'll be missing Ken.

We parted ways over a week ago. Ken has a neice teaching in Henan Province far to the north so he went to visit her and see some sites in that area. Just knowing that he was still in the country and getting his e-mail updates so we could compare notes made traveling here seem more familiar - and fun.

We spent a couple weeks together running around Yunnan Province. From the moment I first saw him walking up the street, the guy fell right into the rhythm of things. We met up in the moutain town of Dali and immediately took a two-day bicycle ride through the fields around Erhai Lake checking out the villages during a big harvest. Many people, even many backpacker-style travelers, might have found that kind of touring a little esoteric if not boring - not to mention physically challenging. Not Ken. We rode, stopped in village after village, chatted with people to get directions, snapped a ton of photos, scrounged around for food and blundered back and forth in one village to find the only guest house - and it was a ball for all of us.

When we returned to Dali, we sought out a bar that let us use their video system. Ken had brought a DVD of videos he shot out at Burning Man last year. It was the first live action Tami and I had seen of the Playa since being there ourselves. Tears ran down my cheeks even as I laughed out loud at many of the images. Ken, with a lifetime of experience in the movie business, had captured a beautiful half hour of Burning Man life - and he couldn't have found a more appreciative audience.

Ken gets friendly with Fei Fei - our Dali friend and sometimes host.

From Dali we headed north to Lijiang and the Tiger Leaping Gorge. We spent the better part of four days hiking a canyon cut by the Yangtze below the "awe inspiring diadem" (inside LOL) of the Jade Dragon Snow Mountains. Brother K celbrated his sixty-fifth birthday last year yet he hiked the mountains with the enthusiasm of a Boy Scout. As Pleasure Sean sagely observed of Ken's exuberance and style, "We're all taking notes."

Accomodating Tami's addiction to photography can be a touch trying at times. Captain happens to be a monster behind the camera, too. Between the two of them I knew immediately I'd have to ratchet up my patience if I didn't want to see them only at the guest house at the beginning and end of each day. Watching one of them scramble up a hillside or squat next to a gravestone to get a good shot worked as a positive contagion for me, I have to admit. Ken brought us both some fresh eyes and his helped invigorate mine.

Any of you who've spent time with Ken know he doesn't just bring enthusiasm to an activity. The man has more stories and tales than just about anyone I've ever met. I'm just about ready to petition the National Archives to declare Ken Phelps a national treasure and force him to get it all down on paper.

(Buy this man a beer,sit down and listen - Money-back guarantee for a good time)

Follow-up On Internet Access (the COPE bill)

I posted last summer about the COPE bill (renamed HR 5252):

http://holidaydarin.blogspot.com/2006/06/for-sale-one-not-very-recently-used.html

I'm happy to report that after passing the House of Representatives, the bill died in the Senate when Congress adjourned at the end of 2006. That's great news for now. The telecommunications companies donate big in DC. Don't expect that they'll give up trying to abscond with profits from a system they never even had a hand in creating.

Another Sweet Reunion

And the first member of our "Heros" list to be inducted for the second time . . .

Captain Ken Phelps!

Ken met up with us in Dali a few days ago. He's brought news of home; a full, in-person summary of the Garage Mahal fundraiser party and his own unexcelled and inimitable self.

Stay tuned for more photos and stories.