Letter from China 4: These I have loved...

[dolorous_ett]

This isn't going to be a proper diary entry, not as such - just a list of the little things I loved when I lived in Guizhou, or have come to love on revisiting the place. I'm leaving tomorrow night - a day and a half in Kunming (pleasant mountain city to the west - lost a lot of its picturesque old buildings in the great drive for modernisation but still contrives to be charming), then on to the far west, so far in fact that it's not really Han Chinese territory at all, and I don't know that much about it.

So this is just a few little bits and pieces I've had fun with over the past couple of weeks. Some are just lovely, full stop; others are just the whimsies of a spoiled foreigner who doesn't have to live here all the time and enjoys the novelty.

1. Water buffaloes. It's difficult not to be charmed by these gentle-eyed, slow-moving, pot-bellied creatures at the best of times. I've never seen one lose its temper, though I have seen a shy specimen retreat back into its stall and refuse to come out to be photographed by an over-boisterous foreign tourist. School's out at present, at least for primary schools (some of the kids in secondary school are back at the grindstone already, poor little mites), but during term time you can see small children who've been sent out after school to pasture the buffalo sprawled on its back doing their homework, as the beast ambles along, pausing from time to time to take a bite of grass.

2. The smell of ripening rice. I can't describe it any more cleary than saying it's a green smell, and vaguely malty. When out in the countryside today with my friend, we kept finding ourselves going mmmmmm! in unison. I'm particularly charmed by this one because I was afraid I was just going to miss it - this is the first day I smelled it.

3. Hot pot. Not the boring stuff the matriarchs in The Archers serve up in smug tones to their cringing relatives - far from it! This is a wok full of soup or stock - often heavily flavoured with dried chilli or sour chilli - with a low gas burner beneath it. The diners are supplied with a series of delicious meats, veggies and fish (chosen to suit individual tastes and the hot pot in question) which they drop in the boiling hot stock and fish out a couple of minutes later, fully cooked. A real treat, especially when it's cold (homes round here generally have inadequate or no heating). The nearest thing to "the subtle simmering of the cauldron, bewitching the mind and obscuring the senses" that you'd ever want to actually eat.

4. Dragonflies! For some reason they are everywhere this year - huge great orange things with charming pairs of transparent wings. There are a lot of singing insects and butterflies around here too (though rather fewer birds than the UK, which I don't think is a coincidence), but this visit the dragonflies definitely win the prize.

5. Bong-bong che. This is a dialect word for the kind of agricultural vehicle with a very basic engine, a little cab up front and a tarpaulin-covered bit at the back where goods can be piled up or people sit (rather uncomfortably) round the edges. Che means car, and the noise their engines make really is bong-bong-bong-bong-bong. In some ways I'm being  a bit silly here, as busses are a lot more comfortable and I can't believe they're environmentally friendly - but I have very fond memories of these machines, as I rode one to a martial arts school out in the middle of nowhere a few afternoons every week (I was terrible - but that's a story for another day), and I'll be sorry to see them go. Things like that do have a way of disappearing here, and often that's a good thing. But it's disconcerting to see it all happen so fast.

6. Chillis drying in the sun. Farmers (or sometimes urban people with relatives in the countryside who can get them really fresh chilli) put them out to dry on any flat concrete surface, a big shiny square or circle of bright red against all that grey. Particularly charming when they are mixed with drying sweetcorn kernels, rice or melon seeds to provide contrast.

That's it for now - if I don't stop writing about things I like now I won't be able to appreciate any more nice things tomorrow, and that wouldn't do at all.

Comments

[hannahmarder.livejournal.com]

That conjured up wonderful images of fields and water buffalo and China in general. Hope you have a safe journey.

[ignipes.livejournal.com]

Water buffalo! I love water buffalo, too. They're so...I don't know. Dopey-looking, gentle, lumbering, sort of silly for all their size.

Where are you going in the west?

[bufo-viridis.livejournal.com]

3. Hot pot. [...]This is a wok full of soup or stock - often heavily flavoured with dried chilli or sour chilli - with a low gas burner beneath it.
Huoguo rules! And only with chilli, the white, fishy stuff is for whimps! And a good bowl of winegar, mashed garlic and sezame oil in front of you to dip your goodies after eating. MMMM. Yum.
Note for the people of weaker somachs: large cut of atermelon qunches the fires in the stomach and prevents laduzi (diaorrhea) next morning.

5. Bong-bong che. No, these were one of the more sary tings I've sen in China. First, the cooler is constructed in a form of oepn bowl on the top of the engine (well, there supposed to be a cover, but I've seen it but once). So it splashes hot water around. Second, the accursed thing has the big wheel on a side, with a large, fast spinning transmission belt, all of course in the open. And it's squeezing its way through the market crowd. Good for me I've never been around when somebody was shredded by this belt.

6. Chillis drying in the sun. [...] on any flat concrete surface You forgot to add that "any flat, concrete surface" may mean an express road if it happens to pass the village. And because the cars would destroy the drying crops, farmers protect them by placing large boulders around. And then unsuspecting driver finds himself with a lane completely blocked by something which resembles a miniature anti-tank defences...

Ah, China the glorious.

[dharmavati.livejournal.com]

Wow. It all sounds really beautiful! The chillis, from your description, sound especially interesting and beautiful. I hope you could provide a picture of that!

[dolorous-ett.livejournal.com]

Glad you liked it - and have just arrived safely. Saw sand dunes and snow-capped mountains on the plane out - squeeeeeee!

[dolorous-ett.livejournal.com]

Yes, water buffalo are great, aren't they? Bless their mild eyes and slow gait!

Where are you going in the west?

Only the boring tourist places - Urumqi, Turfan, Kashgar, Tianchi, then back to Beijing for the plane home, alas, alas. I don't have the background (or the time) to plan anything more exotic.

[dolorous-ett.livejournal.com]

Huoguo rules! And only with chilli, the white, fishy stuff is for whimps!

Yes - agree completely, but Guizhou has a sour-chilli variety that is neither as hot as the full-on red chilli one, nor as... well... wet as the plain. I don't think this version's made it as far as Yunnan or Sichuan, though.

Bong-bong che. No, these were one of the more sary tings I've sen in China. First, the cooler is constructed in a form of oepn bowl on the top of the engine (well, there supposed to be a cover, but I've seen it but once). So it splashes hot water around. Second, the accursed thing has the big wheel on a side, with a large, fast spinning transmission belt, all of course in the open. And it's squeezing its way through the market crowd. Good for me I've never been around when somebody was shredded by this belt.

This one is really the reason I started apologising earlier in the post for irrational whimsies. I more than half expected to be called in on this by someone who knew the territory, and it's a fair cop. You're right. To be fair, I didn't actually see any with an uncovered belt this time. Though I've no doubt they're still going strong further out in the moutains, where people can't afford to replace them with newer, safer models.

It's more the associations that make me feel affection for the things - the rides I took on them were part of a good time now lost. Though there were a few hair-raising moments they were more to do with overloading - passengers hanging off the back, apparently by their fingernails, in the most worrying manner.

You forgot to add that "any flat, concrete surface" may mean an express road if it happens to pass the village. And because the cars would destroy the drying crops, farmers protect them by placing large boulders around. And then unsuspecting driver finds himself with a lane completely blocked by something which resembles a miniature anti-tank defences...

Now this I didn't see this time - though it's instantly familiar - as are the bus drivers who take some pains to make sure they drive over the peasants' crops anyway... Admittedly it's a little early in the season for grain harvests in Guizhou, but from some slogans I saw on walls in the countryside, it appears that this practice has now been made illegal and people are cracking down on it. Hope you aren't too crushed by this!

[dolorous-ett.livejournal.com]

There will be pictures.... some time!

Glad you think it sounds beautiful, because it really, really is - which makes it surprisingly hard to describe properly.

[bufo-viridis.livejournal.com]

This one is really the reason I started apologising earlier in the post for irrational whimsies. I more than half expected to be called in on this by someone who knew the territory, and it's a fair cop. You're right. To be fair, I didn't actually see any with an uncovered belt this time.
Oh, please. Your L-J, write whatever you want, you're not selling or advertising these bloody machines after all! Myself, I still have a v.fond memories of my bike in China, which allowed me to be third fastest biker in the dorm - but I'd be afraid to mount it at home, I guess, seeing its technical state.
Or maybe not. My current one is not much better :)

But from some slogans I saw on walls in the countryside, it appears that this practice has now been made illegal and people are cracking down on it. Hope you aren't too crushed by this!

Not really... China at "my time" was full of "anquan diyi" (safety first!) painted here and there and they were still checking the tightness of a full gas bottle with a lighter.

Which leads to interesting thoughts about percption of danger, but at the time send my friend, who saw it, scurrying to the other end of village. He claimed he had never run so fast before!