About six months after coming to China, we got an email from my sister Freddie. It said that she and my cousin MaryAnna had signed up for a package tour of China in October. They would spend five days in Beijing, two days in Shanghai, two days in Xi'an, etc. It was a standard tourist package, with everything included and no way to deviate from the standard tour. She suggested that perhaps we could meet them in Shanghai or Guilin. Having no desire to see the modern miracle of Shanghai, we readily opted for Guilin -- the home of that surreal landscape of mountains that jut up with vertical sides from the flat plain. It has been celebrated in Chinese classical landscape painting for many centuries, and is one of the great natural attractions of China, if not the world. In the Lonely Planet travel book, several places are billed as "poor cousin to Guilin," implying that they are similar but cannot quite compare with that mother of all karst-terrain postcards. October sounded perfect -- early in autumn, not too chilly, and before the gray skies of winter settled in.
As the time approached, we began to make plans for our scenic vacation. I went to Zhuzhou and bought tickets for three hard-sleeper berths on the train. I taught extra classes the week before, to make up for the ones I would miss. We were scheduled to leave on a Tuesday evening, arrive Wednesday morning, meet Freddie Wednesday evening, and return on Friday or Saturday night. During our year in China we had met several people who were from Guilin. In China, everyone offers to guide and assist you if you ever visit their hometown, and they mean it. A lady from the local newspaper had a son who was going to school in Guilin, and she had offered his services to us. On the first of October we got an email from Geoffrey, the son. He reminded us that it was October and that he was ready to help us and serve as our guide when we visited. He sent us his address, in Chinese characters, to show to the taxi driver when we arrived. Everything was falling nicely into place.
With the customary change in the weather at that time of year, we had colds and sniffles. Anne developed a nagging cough. She went to the campus infirmary, and was told she had a slight case of pneumonia. They treated her with pills, shots, and the ubiquitous IV drip. On the Monday before we were to leave, she felt worse and had a definite pain in her chest. We went downtown to the hospital; they decided she should stay there for a week. (For the exciting conclusion to that tale, stay tuned for a future episode, coming soon to a website near you…) We discussed whether or not to cancel the trip. "Go," Anne said. "There are lots of students scheduled to visit me; friends are eager to bring me dinner and other treats; with the kids to take care of you won't be able to spend a lot of time with me anyway; and you don't want us all to miss the chance of seeing Freddie. Take the kids and have a good time." Yielding to the logic of the situation, I agreed to leave Anne in God's hands and in the hands of God-knows-how-many helpful Chinese.
I taught class on Tuesday morning, packed up, and made sure the kids didn't head back to school after lunch. I took the guinea pig upstairs to Joe for safekeeping. We grabbed a taxi to the bus station and caught the "fast" minibus to Zhuzhou. It dropped us at the correct station this time, and we had time to have supper before getting our four small bags to the train station. We went into the big waiting room and sat with everyone else. A few minutes before the train was scheduled to arrive, a young man in some kind of uniform came up and said some things to me in Chinese. In such situations, I'm only good for giving dumb looks. Fortunately, after the second repetition Taalan was able to understand the message. "He says that there's not much time to get on the train and that, if we wait here, the crowd will slow us down and we might miss it. He wants us to go with him." So, we followed him. He took us to another, smaller room which was full of more-well-to-do people and folks in uniform -- obviously the waiting room for cadres, the elect few. Soon it was time. We followed the crowd to the platform and found our berths. For once, the train was not crowded and no one had slept in our bunks before us. We stayed up for a while; Taalan played Chinese chess with some folks in the next section; then we slept through the night as the train headed south and west.
We arrived in Guilin around dawn. We got off the train and out of the station without incident. The day promised to be warm, and we saw lots of light-blue sky behind scattered clouds. Ahhh, it feels good to travel. Guilin is a small city by Chinese standards. It's reasonably clean and prosperous, and it has a mild climate. Naturally, it caters to western tourists. We ate breakfast at a street-side restaurant and caught a taxi to Geoffrey's college. We met Geoffrey. He is in graduate school, mostly studying modern Chinese culture. His English is quite good, and his courtesy seemed boundless as he patiently guided us around for the next few days. He checked us into the guest hotel at his campus -- cheap and pretty comfortable. The one exception was that the hot water in the room was turned on only between 7 and 9 in the evening. During the whole time we were in Guilin, we never managed to be there at the right time.
Around noon Geoffrey collected us from our room. We took a bus downtown, ate lunch, and walked to the downtown campus of his university. That campus was formerly the palace of an emperor (a provincial governor), and was adjacent to one of the scenic hills in the city. We walked up the path to the top. The city was spread all around us, punctuated with those odd, steep-sided, tree-topped, limestone thumbs. Into the distance, the funny hills surrounded the city, which was in a mostly-flat plain with a small river running through the center. The day was breezy but not chilly; we admired the view in our shirtsleeves. We walked down and then a few blocks to a park that contains several hills. We paid our yuan and walked up the hill on the left. As usual, Taalan ran ahead, chiding us for being to slow and exhorting us to speed up. We admired the view; we walked down to a cave. Taalan didn't want to wait, so he went ahead toward the next hill. We came to a large, outdoor aviary. It was covered with wire mesh that was stretched across the hollow space between the hills. Inside there were many kinds of birds, most of them new to me, and all of them tame. A young man was sitting there; as we came in he stood up and whistled. About a thousand birds flocked to him; he got a bowl of seeds out of a barrel. He scattered some, then handed the bowl to me. Birds crowded around, landing on the bowl, sparring with each other for position. Some of them were quite unusual, though I can't remember how to describe them now. The three of us went on, up the next hill, expecting to find Taalan at the top. He wasn't there. We waited and admired the view. We walked down the hill and looked all around. We split up, agreeing to meet at the bottom. Geoffrey headed back to the entrance; I backtracked to the aviary. Taalan was sitting there, talking with some people in Chinese. He had turned in another direction to go to the hill and had waited for us, but we hadn't come that way. We went in to visit the birds, went up the hill, rendezvoused with Geoffrey and Tariqa, and visited a beautiful butterfly museum on the park grounds.
It was still mid-afternoon, and we walked down to the river. Geoffrey arranged for a boat trip to take us over to Elephant Trunk Rock. We got on a "bamboo raft," used by fishermen in the area for centuries. They lash together about a dozen large trunks of bamboo, each about 20 feet long and curved gently upward at the ends. For tourists they mount some bamboo chairs amidships. The boatman poled us smoothly along, down the river and across a shoal to the opposite shore. We got out, wandered around a little, skipped stones, and admired the view of Elephant Trunk Rock directly across from us. It looks very much like a large elephant, up to its chest in water, with its trunk down into the water. A large, curved opening through the rock creates the space between the trunk and the body. Cormorants were tied on some of the rafts on the shore. They still fish with cormorants, although these birds probably attract more tourist value than fish. They put a ring around the bird's neck. The bird dives into the water, swims around, and catches a fish in its mouth. Because of the ring, the cormorant can't swallow the fish. The fisherman gets the fish instead. When he has enough fish, he takes off the ring and the cormorant can satisfy its own appetite. The fishermen get to know the birds personally and keep them for many years. While we were on the shore a dragon boat came by. It was manned by about 20 men, sitting in pairs, each man with one oar. One man kept the rhythm of the stroke by beating a big drum. They rested as they floated downstream, and then practiced by working upstream against the current.
Our boatman poled across the river and let us off. We walked around a small inlet toward the Elephant Rock. Taalan raced ahead, with Tariqa trailing valiantly behind, as Geoffrey and I walked along. We watched them cross a small footbridge onto the grounds around the rock. We crossed the footbridge; there's Taalan; where's Tariqa? We looked all around; no luck. Suppressing a slight panic, I asked a foreign couple if they had seen a little girl with blonde hair; no luck. We looked more; I decided to backtrack. As I walked down to the footbridge I looked across, and there was Tariqa on the other side, with the couple escorting her back in our direction. She hadn't seen us, so she had gone back across to look for us. Somehow, I had lost both children within an interval of two hours. Ahhh, the blessings of having headstrong and independent children. Ahhh, paradise lost, and paradise regained…
We walked a few blocks along the river, to the hotel where Freddie would be staying. They hadn't checked in yet. Geoffrey took us to a place that had western food downstairs, and the kids had pizza. Back at the hotel, we eventually got up with Freddie and MaryAnna and had a good evening with them. We caught up on some news, showed her some photos, and opened her presents, including coffee and hot chocolate! It was very late, and we caught a taxi back to campus.
When we woke up the next morning it was raining steadily. Freddie and MaryAnna were taking the boat tour southward, down the Li River to the small town of Yangshuo. We had decided to pass up the tour when we found out that the price was a tourist-skinning 700 yuan per head. The guides told them that they were fortunate to be making the trip on a wet and gray day, with many of the hills obscured by clouds -- it created the perfect mood for appreciating the beauty of the countryside. Whether we agreed or not, we decided to head in the same direction. We boarded a local bus and rode 90 minutes southward to Yangshuo. The countryside scenery was spectacular. We seemed to be in a clearing of fields, surrounded by a forest of high limestone hills. We arrived at Yangshuo in a downpour and opted for an early lunch, someplace dry if you please. Yangshuo has developed a reputation as a haven for off- the-main-track foreigners. It is a small town, nestled among the rocks. A substantial part of the town is devoted to the tourist trade, and there are many western-style cafés and places to stay for a night or a month. We puddle-hopped to a place called the Country Café and ordered French fries, milkshakes, and some Chinese food. We waited for the rain to stop as Tariqa and I danced to old Beatles music. The music ended but the rain had not.
Reluctantly we stepped outside into the drizzle and arranged for a local taxi to give us the deluxe local tour. Our taxi driver was a woman who knew just enough English to carry on her business. The "taxi" was a motorcycle with something like a homemade covered sidecar -- perfect for exploring the countryside. We drove out of town and our driver took off down a village alley and into the countryside. The rice was about half harvested. We took a dirt road through the rice fields and down to the river. A farmer with an umbrella and a large, hump-backed ox posed for a picture, and then asked us to pay him something. Because the ox had been such a good subject, posing quietly as it ruminated on some grass, I gave the man a yuan. He was happy, I was happy, the ox was happy. By now a small crowd had gathered. Ladies wanted us to buy some souvenirs. One lady had a beautiful, handmade straw hat, but I didn't want it enough to buy it. Taalan and Geoffrey had walked down to the river, and I followed. The lady with the hat followed; she was determined that the hat was for me. Taalan saw the hat, looked up at the sky, and said he would like to have that hat now. So, I bought it for him. He looked great in it and wore it whenever it rained, which was the remainder of the trip. The hat was round, with a gently rounded crown, woven on the outside from split bamboo, and with bamboo leaves as the rain- shedding inner layer. We continued our ride through the countryside. We came out at the main road and went a little farther to Moon Hill, a natural arch shaped like a half moon. Then we headed back to town, bought Tariqa some new, dry shoes and socks, boarded the bus, and rode back to Guilin. We met Freddie and MaryAnna at their hotel and went downstairs to the buffet, where we indulged in imported cheeses, French bread, and cream pies. Freddie is known for taking lots of pictures. I glanced at her photo notes, and saw that she had taken 20 full rolls of pictures before getting to Guilin. After a good evening we said goodbye to the kinfolk, for they were leaving the next morning for Hong Kong.
In the morning it was still raining. We caught a taxi to the Reed Flute Cave, not far from downtown Guilin. The cave was indeed spectacular. It had several huge chambers, with lots of columns, all tastefully lit by colored lights. We joined a group; the guide held Tariqa's hand for the entire tour. Outside the cave we bought some little whistles. They are about four inches long and made from a reed or small piece of bamboo, with a simple fipple cut near one end. In the other end is a movable plug. As you move the plug in and out, the pitch changes dramatically, like those whistles they use in the Navy movies. Perhaps this is a reed flute; I'm really not sure.
We ate lunch and at Geoffrey's insistence we went to a large downtown park. It was raining steadily; there was water puddling and running off everywhere. We crossed a covered bridge into the park and started to wander. We came to a large open area with a long, semicircular stone monument. It was about 15 feet high and 100 meters long, with many kinds of inlaid stones and carvings. There were sunbursts, dragons, people of many sorts, and other symbols. An old man came up to us and offered to explain the meaning. It symbolized China and all its history, he said as he explained a few of the motifs to us. Taalan and Geoffrey were ready to move on, but Tariqa mutinied. She refused to go any farther and demanded that we go back to someplace dry. Even with an umbrella, she was soaked. I carried her back to the bridge, the only place nearby that was out of the rain, and we discussed what to do. To expedite the story, we went to the train station and bought tickets for the evening train, checked out of our hotel, and stayed with Geoffrey in his dormitory for a few hours. We ate dinner at a little students' restaurant, thanked Geoffrey profusely, headed off in a taxi to the station, and made it onto the train with no trouble.
The hard-sleeper berths had been sold out, so we paid a little extra for soft- sleeper. This was our first excursion in such deluxe accommodations. The "mattress" was indeed thicker and softer, and the compartment was decorated with clean linens. There were four berths per compartment, instead of six. Best of all, the compartment had a door, which gave good privacy from people and noise in the hallway. We played some games and slept soundly through the night. We arrived in Zhuzhou early the next morning, caught the minibus back to Xiangtan, and were home well before noon. The guinea pig was healthy, but Anne was still in the hospital. You might say that one out of two is not bad, but somehow I wasn't quite satisfied. It would be another week before she came home. She has told me many funny things that happened there, but still insists she would rather have spent the time in Guilin.
Notes about this web page