China Archives - Page 2 of 4

The Myanmar highlights of Inle Lake and Bagan

Now online: our Myanmar pictures, including some snaps by our friend Janneke Verhagen.

We quickly settle into our Nyaung Shwe home. It is an amazing place, simple, spacious and light. We have our first home cooked European breakfast extravaganza since forever which makes us feel like kids playing house, set table and toasted bread and all. We even like doing the dishes. The house is a couple of kilometers from Nyaung Shwe centre, set in a quiet village-like surroundings with herds of cows plodding by our sand path in the early morning and at sunset. A sweet Nepali family lives on the grounds and friends of Patrick help us out with settling in and finding our way around. Home.

Boating Inle Lake

One friend of Patrick is Zaw, aka Mr. Sugar. He takes us on a two day tour of Inle Lake. We settle into a couple of big comfortable chairs in a large longboat and veer out onto the gigantic lake. Seeing the landscape glide by without having to make any physical effort is quite a treat. Mr. Sugar tells us a lot about life on and around the lake, and takes us to see a village where his grandfather used to live.

It is a touristy place but traditional life goes on as it has for the last few centuries, with fishermen and craftsmen working and bringing their wares to the markets around the lake by boat.

With a surface of 116km2 Inle lake is large but shallow, with a maximum depth of less than 4m in the dry season, and only 1,5m more in the wet season. It is a busy place with longboats motoring to and fro, transporting Intha villagers, tourists and goods. There are fishermen who use small shallow boats, not much bigger than a surfboard, with one oar. They have an incredible technique where they balance on one leg on the stern of the boat, curl the other leg around the oar to navigate the boat and simultaneously throw their nets in.

Other lake labourers are harvesters who drag up weeds to use as fertilizer for the floating gardens. There are many different crafts being practiced around the lake; we visit blacksmiths, silk and lotus weavers, cheroot makers and small village factories where crispy rice pancakes are made. We visit a market where hill tribe women are selling their vegetables. Zaw tells us how king Alaungsithu founded the Hpaung Daw U pagoda by the lake and transported craftsmen and -women from the coast to here, so they could produce all that was needed to keep the monks in robes and the pagoda with all its rituals functioning.

We visit a few notable Buddhist sites. One is the Hpaung Daw U pagoda, home to five venerated Buddha images that have been so thickly covered in gold leaf they now resemble five big golden boulders. When we are there it is not just Buddhists who are covering the images but also many tourists, scrambling to get close to the action with their cameras. Later on we visit an older and much more serene monastery, with beautiful 16^th century Buddha statues.

Another impressive place is Indein. This is a large collection of stupas, first commissioned by King Narapathisithu in the 12^th century CE. They are in various states, some crumbling but many heavily restored by private donors from all over the world. The mix is nice, historical ruin as well as a very much alive religious site.

The floating gardens are very impressive, banks of green held in place by bamboo poles and being tended to by farmers on boats, producing tomatoes and rice for the surrounding villages. When I read up on it I discover this is actually not a very sustainable practice, as the floating gardens eventually solidify and reduce the lake surface ever further. The fertilizers encourage weed growth, and all around us we see the water hyacinth encroaching on the lake. Other environmental issues are for instance the lack of proper sanitation in the stilt houses, with toilets dumping directly into the lake. Another issue is excess run off from the surrounding mountains into the rivers that feed the lake, due to lumber felling and slash and burn farming, causing the lake to become even more susceptible to weeds and fill up with silt.

Our guide is one of the local people concerned with environmental issues and sustainability of life of around the lake. He supports poor students in a neighbouring village and wants to do something about all the plastic strewn around. It will be difficult to effect much change when the primary interest of the military leadership is not so much in the people and the environment as protecting their own interests. Let’s hope that the change symbolized by Aung San Su Kyi will happen, slowly but surely. Later on we meet another concerned Burmese who tells us about his ideals, his dreams for the country, and what he does to effect local change. We get the impression that many people are doing what they can to help each other in these politically difficult circumstances, possibly motivated by Buddhism which encourages merit making.

Despite the environmental concerns the lake is incredible and we enjoy spending two days out and about on a boat with Mr. Sugar. We wander around the market, smoke an aniseed cheroot and have lunch in a restaurant built on stilts in the lake. The Golden Kite restaurant is owned by Patricks friends and later on in the week they invite us for a delicious dinner. As everywhere in Myanmar the people are the biggest draw, waving and smiling at us from passing boats or lake houses.

The rest of our days in Nyaung Shwe we spend in supremely lazy languor. We meet up again with Janneke, who made it all the way up North by bicycle. She did run into the police multiple times and got escorted back and forth to places where she was allowed to stay, but she also got a real personal insight in everyday Burmese life, invited into the home of people, staying in temples and far away from the tourist trail. An epic journey. She is a great photographer, you can find her work here and we have included some of her pictures from the days we cycled together in our collection of photos from Myanmar.

Bagan

We rent a couple of wobbly wheels to explore Bagan by bicycle but we miss our own rock solid work horses on the sandy tracks.

We had high expectations of Bagan and we are not disappointed. It is difficult not to make a comparison with Angkor Wat but the sites are really quite different. Where Angkor has beautifully preserved temples which are each a gem on their own, Bagans beauty lies in the overall view of the landscape, with thousands of pagoda spires rising above the dusty plain. Funnily enough here mass tourism has enhanced rather than destroyed the beauty. Every morning hot air balloons glide over the plain, a beautiful and romantic sight, silent apart from the burners throwing flames every now and again.

Bagan was the capital of the Pagan kingdom between the 9th and 13th century. In its heyday 10.000 pagodas were built on the plain, but many were devastated by earthquakes. A big one hit in 1975, 8 on the Richter scale, and destroyed much. Still, much remains and even if the individual temples are not in a great state or not well restored the overall view of the stupa-dotted plain is wonderful. One morning we get up at around 4am and cycle out into the dark to look for a spot to witness the sunrise. Unfortunately many of the 2229 remaining temples are in repair, enveloped in scaffolding and not accessible due to a 2016 earthquake. We therefor miss out on a temple top sunrise but we find a small knoll and watch the hot air balloons floating by.

We are staying in Nyaung Oo, the budget friendly village a few kilometers from Old Bagan which is more upmarket. Here we meet three German and Swiss cyclists and have a great evening sharing inspiration. Andreas is a young guy from Switzerland who made a spontaneous decision to do a bike tour in Bangkok. He bought a $200 bicycle (way too small for his size) and fitted it out with two simple wire baskets acting as rear panniers with his backpack on top. He made it all the way to Myanmar and picked our brain for future bike travels. I really loved his low budget set-up, proving bike touring is accessible for everybody and any kind of budget. German Katharina and Lukas are now in turmoil because they never thought about going to China and now, because of our enthusiastic stories, they are tempted to include it in their travel plan. It was great to see their poor brains swirling with all the possibilities.. so many places to go, so much to see!

Andreas' low budget bike touring set-up — Andreas’ low budget bike touring set-up

In Nyaung Oo we also met Pipyo, the owner of Leo, a great little restaurant. He told us a lot about nature and traditions in Myanmar and his dreams for the future. He is from a small village where traditions are still observed and he told us all about the upcoming full moon festivities, with special candy being made and shared by everybody in the village.

New directions

From Nyaung Oo we set off on an epic three day bus journey which takes us back to our bicycles in Bago, across the border to Mae Sot in Thailand and up to Chiang Mai. Here we will stay for almost a week, waiting for a new Chinese visum for Vera.

Yes, I am going back to China. This is not what we planned when we left, but unfortunately our relationship has stranded, and we are making new plans for the future. This happened a good few weeks ago so we have had some time to process this and share with family and close friends. We are fine and have decided to continue traveling together as friends. We will finish the trip together as we planned, in Tokyo. After that we will go our own way. I will move to Kunming to work as an English teacher and to focus on my writing practice. Cyril will cycle back via Korea, Rome, Corsica and Sardinia, crossing the Alps into Switzerland and eventually back home to The Netherlands, visiting old and new friends in Europe.

It is hard at this point in the trip to be in the moment, as we were before when we were just rolling along and experiencing day by day. We haven’t cycled for a few weeks now and we sorely miss the freedom of camping and cooking our own breakfast. While we are waiting in Chiang Mai we are planning ahead, booking flights, looking at whatever lies beyond the end of the trip. On 30 March we will fly to Japan, to start 6 weeks of cycling in Kyushu and Hokkaido before traveling into Tokyo, our final destination. We are eager to satisfy our cycling addiction one more time, and super excited about Japan. It is the last country on our list, and possibly the most alluring.

Our first haircut in 7 months - exciting stuff — Our first haircut in 7 months – exciting stuff

Zài jiàn Zhōngguó, sabaidee meuang Lao!

After two and a half months the time has come to say goodbye to another one of our favourite countries. Goodbye China, and hello Laos! We loved the last stretch along the quiet country roads of Yunnan. We moved from subtropical Kunming, crossing the Tropic of Cancer, into the lush jungle of Xishuangbanna, China’s most Southern prefecture and home of the Dai people.

Our newest team member Hong

We are currently in the small border town of Mohan, and tomorrow morning we will attempt to cross into Laos. This should be pretty straightforward. The only complication is we have found a pet on the road and we want to bring him along for the ride. At least until he is big enough to stand on his own chicken feet. Right now Hong (meaning ‘wild swan’) is still a fluffy little chick who likes nothing more than hiding in our pockets and tweeting like a canary. We found him in Mengla where a lady was selling chicks, dyed in all the colours of the rainbow. Later on that evening we found Hong, all alone, wandering the pavement, squeeking. He is dyed a bright pink so we call him the Only Gay in the Village sometimes. He travels in the snack pouch I have attached to the handle bars. When we stop for a break we let him out to eat and drink and then he follows us like a puppy, running after us with his little pink wings flapping. At night we make a warm nest for him, filling up our hip flask with hot water to keep him cosy. How could we possibly leave him behind?

Update: it is with great sadness that we found little Hong dead in his box this morning. But we are happy with the good memories of the last few days. We will miss his tweeting and nesting under our wings.

Wild swan, red book

Hongs name is inspired by the book Wild Swans, written by Jung Chang. Her birth name was Er Hong, meaning second swan. She later changed her name to Jung, meaning ‘militant action’. The book tells the turbulent history of China in the last century by chronicling the life of her grandmother, her mother and herself. It is an amazing read and although it is still on the blacklist in China I found it secondhand in a bookshop in Kunming. It is hard to believe just how many changes and how much upheaval China has been through in only three generations. The book starts during the reign of the last emperor Pu Yi of the Qing dynasty, ruling a country bound by ancient traditions until 1912. Quite literally bound; as were Jung Changs’ grandmothers feet. Through war, famine, oppression, all the way down to the lowest point: a sustained campaign of terror by a totalitarian ruler, who kept a whole country in the dark by cultivating ignorance and fear and division. It is especially hard to believe since China appears so different today. Most people we meet are working, cheerfully going about their business, building houses, traveling, interested in us foreigners, dancing together in the city squares in the evenings. This was unimaginable only 30 years ago.

In the same bookshop we bought the famous Little Red Book with quotations from Mao, translated into English. I’ve read a few and with the clear hindsight of recent history it is hard to believe that this was followed like the gospel for a long time. The titles of the chapters alone are interesting: ‘The correct handling of contradictions among the people’. Whereby people are classed as being with the communists or as enemies. One thing I like however is the fact he wanted equality for women, after a long history of brutal suppression in imperial China. Even if the primary goal was not so much a better life for women but to have a larger work force in order to surpass the capitalist world with rapid industrialisation. Unfortunately today this equality is mostly visible in hard labour jobs such as road works, and not so much in high profile jobs or political functions.

Crossing into Xishuangbanna

Since we left Kunming we have mostly followed a country road with little traffic, closely following the Eastern border of Yunnan with Vietnam and Laos. The S218 takes us away from the mud and dust of road works and into the jungle.

China's country roads

As it veers away from the busy main road a few kilometers below the Tropic of Cancer it also takes us into the tropics and into the home of the Dai people, the autonomous prefecture of Xishuangbanna. We anticipated the change in climate and we saw early signs of the tropics in the palm trees we saw here or there. Still, crossing the tropic line marks an immediate and profound change.

Banana, tea and rubber plantations, a different people who live in a different kind of housing suitable for year-round hot weather, nights that are no longer uncomfortably cold and beautiful mornings with steaming forests around us.

The earth is red and the rivers run brown, flanked by lush green hills full of exotic sounding birds. The nights when we are camping we hear crickets whirring loudly, owls and other animals we haven’t heard before.

We camp a few more nights. Usually we find a spot where we are out of sight and on land that is not in use, in the bend of a road or close to a mountain pass. One night we spot a village with a church and try our luck with the builders who are working nearby. They indicate it is fine with them if we put up our tent wherever, so we pick a small field empty of crops on the edge of the village square. An old man comes to check on us from a safe distance. Later on in the night five police officers with torch lights arrive. Cyril talks to them in his best Chinese (hello, thank you, we are from Holland, thank you, hello) and eventually they leave us alone. We don’t sleep so well after that. This is the first time authorities have disturbed us during our wild camping nights and it is quite unnerving. It is officially prohibited in China, as it is in most countries. The language barrier makes it harder, even though we have a nice Chinese note explaining we are nice people who will leave early in the morning.

The rest of the trip down to the Lao border is peaceful and very beautiful. The road goes up and down a lot and we do about 1000 climbing meters every day, making for great views, a nice sense of accomplishment and ever stronger legs. Cyril logs our rides on Strava and we accomplish the monthly climbing challenge of 7.500m in no time.

We see traditional Dai villages with large wooden houses, open all around and raised on wooden pillars, with roof ornaments similar to those in Thailand.

The Dai people are related to the Thai in language, religion (theravada buddhism) and culture. And in cuisine: we have a fried fish for lunch with lemon grass, chili and coriander.

The famous Pu’erh tea comes from this region, and we see shops where they sell the double fermented black tea pressed into fancy shapes like large coins or sculptures. The tea gets better with age so it keeps for a long time. Special vintages can be collected, like wine.

Xie xie China, you have been wonderful. After two and a half months we have only had a glimpse of everything we could possibly see and experience here, so we definitely hope to come back. We are happy with the choices we made: the historical and culinary highlights of megacities like Xi’an and Chengdu, the time off and a chance to make some local friends, far away Silk Route places like Kashgar and Turpan, and finally the weeks of cycling through the countryside of Sichuan and Yunnan. The countryside which in many ways showed us the un-touristy, only ever so slowly changing and ‘real’ China of the minority people and the peasants, in contrast with the polished face of the future we saw in the city centers.We loved meeting the people of China, who never treated us as tourists but were always interested in us in a friendly, helpful and curious way. This will surely be different in Laos and Thailand, where we will no longer be the only white people in the village.

Our hotel manager in her festive garb

So, thank you Zhōngguó, we salute you in a way you will surely understand:

Happy New Chinese Year

The speed of life

Since leaving Chengdu we have cycled about 900km and climbed almost 7000m. We have another 650km to go before we reach the Lao border, meaning we are finally clocking up some proper bike touring distances. In our first two months in China we have done a lot of train travel, sight-seeing and exploring cities, but these last couple of weeks in Yunnan province are all about bike travel in the countryside, apart from a visit to the capital Kunming. Less touristy = more riding.

The speed of life

We are into a steady rhythm of getting up around 7am, then faffing about for about two hours before we start our cycling day. It doesn’t seem to make a difference if we are camping or in a hotel. To get going always takes a long time, despite us being seasoned bike travellers by now. It doesn’t really matter. There is no rush and the mild winter weather allows us to ride all day. We kick off our day by cooking a first breakfast of hot porridge and espresso outside our tent or in our hotel room. Then we pack up the tent, get into our cycling clothes, load up the bicycles and off we go. Usually we stop soon for a second breakfast of steaming jiaozi (dumplings) with a hot and sour dip.

Jiaozi - or Second Breakfast — Jiaozi – or Second Breakfast

Then we’ll have an early lunch: a big bowl of spicy noodles in simple roadside restaurant.

An early dinner of noodles or fried rice and vegetables and a beer in the place where we will stop for the night. We will look at the route for the day after and do a bit of reading but we are usually in bed by 7pm and sound asleep not long after. Bike, eat, sleep, and repeat. We love this rhythm, it feels healthy and it gives us everything we need. The speed of bike travel is the perfect speed of life.

Yunnan

A few days ago we crossed from Sichuan province into Yunnan, China’s southernmost province. The change in scenery is subtle but immediate, starting right at the top of the mountain range that defines the border. Yunnan is less developed and less densely populated than Sichuan. As we cross the border and descend towards Kunming we can see endless forests on the hills around us. This means we can camp more, as there is more undeveloped land. Still, it’s a challenge to find an even spot for our tent in this hilly province. One night we sleep in the bend of a hairpin, halfway up a 2500m mountain pass.

Another night park rangers allow us to camp on a beautiful beach on Dianchi lake, South of Kunming.

We cycle through villages and towns that are on no tourists’ itinerary because there is nothing in particular to see. We see village markets, hill tribe people, kids going to school, everybody going about their everyday business. It’s lovely precisely because it is so mundane.

Only one town is at first sight a real disappointment. Panzhihua is ugly, dirty and dusty and we have a hard time cycling into town with the busy traffic. It was founded only 50 years ago and is thriving because of a giant mine, one of the largest in the country. After our initial dislike of the place however we find that people, as in most places, are really nice and they are curious about our bikes and gear. I am fascinated by the fact that it is possible to stamp a whole city out of the ground and make it such a lively place in such a short time. The same thing happened when new land was created in the Netherlands but in China everything happens on a much larger scale and much faster, because the government can realise their plans without having to go through procedures with planning and environmental commissions etc.

Kunming

Our first destination in Yunnan is the capital Kunming. It’s a relative backwater by Chinese standards, with ‘only’ 5 million inhabitants. During the communist heyday it was considered some sort of Siberia, with party officials who were falling out of favour being sent here. One huge difference with Siberia: the climate here is very moderate, earning Kunming the title of Spring City. As the city is close to the Tropic of Cancer and is located at a 1900m altitude plateau it has year-round pleasant weather and very little pollution. When we arrive it is in the low twenties during the day and around 10 degrees at night. Perfect for cycling.

Kunming is less developed than Chengdu, and the pace of life here is different. It is decidedly more Southern and we enjoy the laid-backness for a couple of days. We meet some great English speaking locals and have some good conversations about life in China and in Europe, art, politics, the future, cycling, embarrassing toilet moments, everything under the sun.

We learn the Kung Fu tea ceremony from our all-round wonderful warmshowers host Lin and celebrate our three year anniversary together with a vegetarian feast with TCG Nordica art gallery director Luo Fei and his colleague Wei Bang. After a couple of weeks where we could only talk to each other it’s refreshing to share ideas and dreams with other people. It’s also refreshing to find out how well-educated Chinese people see their own country and culture and their place in the world. Just like everywhere else, there is no one set definition of China and the Chinese people and we appreciate discovering all the subtle nuances and varieties in opinion. We have made new friends here and we’d love to come back one day.

But first we will cycle a bit more. We have picked a route that will take us away from the highway and the towns. The S218 is a much smaller road that leads through hill tribe villages along the Lao border. More cycling, more camping, more of this simple speed of life.