A few students at Kai’s school recently came down with Hand Foot and Mouth Disease, which in China means that the government steps in and closes the school for two weeks - no messing around. Everything on my Things To Do List, including blogging, landed on the back burner, as Kai and I became even more constant companions than usual. He went back to school yesterday, and today I’m digging through layers of midden on my desk to tell the story of our journey to Guilin and Yangshuo.
China has 8,033 cities with populations bigger than Houston, and you’ve only heard of two of them. OK, I’m exaggerating, but not by much. Ever heard of Shantou? 11 million. Ningbo? 3 million. Dongguan? 8 million. Houston, the fourth-largest city in the U.S.? 2 million. All of which doesn’t prove much, except that China is really, really good at getting large groups of Chinese people together, and that geography isn’t a big strength for most of us. So anyway, Allison and I had started hearing about a place called Guilin that we’d never heard of before we came to China. People who’d been there said it was beautiful, a great escape from Shanghai, an easy two-hour flight away; we decided to check it out. What we discovered, in Guilin and in nearby Yangshuo, were some of the most beautiful landscapes we’ve ever seen in Asia.
Guilin is on the picturesque Li River, and for many generations it’s been world-famous, all over China. A popular saying here has it that “Guilin’s scenery is the best among all under heaven.” We walked along the riverfront to get a feeling for the city, and made a trip to the Palace of the Ming Prince, where we climbed the 700-meter Solitary Beauty Peak to have a look around; this is not an easy feat with a cranky toddler who’s missed his nap strapped to your belly in an Ergo, but that’s what I did with Keegan, and Allison did with Kai. We figured what the heck, maybe it would improve their moods -- and it worked, at least for a while. From the top, we could see countless karsts, the rocky, jutting mountain formations that stretch in rows for miles in and around Guilin. They look cool enough in the photos, but in person they’re absolutely otherworldly. The boys were impressed enough to briefly forget they were sleep-deprived; we hurried back to the hotel before they could remember, cutting through a college campus on the way, where they’re apparently still singing Bob Dylan songs on the lawn.
I think it was at dinner that night when I drank this:
I got to the table post-diaper-change with Keegan; Allison had already ordered for us, and it seemed to me she’d gotten a large bottled water and poured me some. That’s what it looked like from above, anyway. Due to some quirk of the light or hallucination, I failed to notice that the restaurant table’s decorative centerpiece was an aquatic habitat for sea-monkeys. I picked up the glass and gulped heartily, quenching my mountain-climber’s thirst; Allison watched me with a brief flicker of horror that immediately gave way to hysterical laughter, as if I were Eddie Murphy, John Belushi, the Marx Brothers, and all three Stooges rolled into one. The boys thought it was funny that Mommy was laughing so hard, and even I got swept up in the ensuing hilarity. Yeah, I get it, it’s funny to watch your husband or your dad knock back an Aquarium-flavored Big Gulp. I just have one question: who the hell puts an Atlantis diorama disguised as a beverage in the middle of every table in a restaurant??? The Guilin Sheraton, that’s who. Be forewarned.
But back to our story.
The highlight of any trip to this region is a boat trip on the Li River from Guilin to Yangshuo, about four hours, 60 kilometers, and a thousand photo ops away. The karst formations are spectacular; many of them have names that sound like yo-yo tricks (or positions from the Kama Sutra) -- Elephant’s Trunk, Moon Water Hill, Hidden Dragon. Along the banks, a fascinating window into Chinese culture opens up, with women washing clothes on the rocks and farmers leading water buffalo through fields, while boats cruise past filled with a few westerners like us, and swarms of domestic Chinese tourists, snapping photos like mad. Riverside markets have cropped up to lure boats to the shores, merchants like syrens calling to the boats (you’re never far from a “silk factory tour” in China). Always the collision of ancient and modern here, with a healthy dose of voyeurism thrown in. We are as much or more the observed as the observers; people can never get enough pictures of Kai and Keegan, and they won’t hesitate to scoop the boys up for a pinch, a cuddle, a photo shoot. Sometimes the boys decide to befriend a particular fan, as they did on this trip with a guide they christened “Panda Man” because he gave everyone panda stickers. But Keegan will often say “Bu yao, bu yao!” (“Don’t want, don’t want!”) And Kai will run away from “the pinchy ladies” at times -- it depends on their moods, and there are moments when they enjoy the attention. (I wish they could compare notes with surviving Beatles Paul and Ringo, but the logistics of that are a nightmare). It’s amazing to see whole boatloads of people light up, wave, and shout “Hello” (an English word!) at the mere sight of the boys. I mean, I know they’re cute, but wow.
The highlight of any trip to this region is a boat trip on the Li River from Guilin to Yangshuo, about four hours, 60 kilometers, and a thousand photo ops away. The karst formations are spectacular; many of them have names that sound like yo-yo tricks (or positions from the Kama Sutra) -- Elephant’s Trunk, Moon Water Hill, Hidden Dragon. Along the banks, a fascinating window into Chinese culture opens up, with women washing clothes on the rocks and farmers leading water buffalo through fields, while boats cruise past filled with a few westerners like us, and swarms of domestic Chinese tourists, snapping photos like mad. Riverside markets have cropped up to lure boats to the shores, merchants like syrens calling to the boats (you’re never far from a “silk factory tour” in China). Always the collision of ancient and modern here, with a healthy dose of voyeurism thrown in. We are as much or more the observed as the observers; people can never get enough pictures of Kai and Keegan, and they won’t hesitate to scoop the boys up for a pinch, a cuddle, a photo shoot. Sometimes the boys decide to befriend a particular fan, as they did on this trip with a guide they christened “Panda Man” because he gave everyone panda stickers. But Keegan will often say “Bu yao, bu yao!” (“Don’t want, don’t want!”) And Kai will run away from “the pinchy ladies” at times -- it depends on their moods, and there are moments when they enjoy the attention. (I wish they could compare notes with surviving Beatles Paul and Ringo, but the logistics of that are a nightmare). It’s amazing to see whole boatloads of people light up, wave, and shout “Hello” (an English word!) at the mere sight of the boys. I mean, I know they’re cute, but wow.
Waiting for us at the end of the river cruise was the town of Yangshuo, and we were lucky enough to have booked a room at the idyllic Yangshuo Mountain Retreat, with a stunning view of the river and surrounding, karst-studded countryside. The night we arrived, we checked out the big cultural attraction in town, a light and water show called Liu Sanjie, [VIDEO] or “Impression.” It’s designed by the same guy who did the opening and closing ceremonies for the Beijing Olympics, and it was amazing -- a cast of 600 plus, none of them with Equity cards, help to create incredible visual effects that make the water show at the Bellagio in Vegas look like, well, the centerpiece on my table at the Guilin Sheraton. It does not translate adequately on video, but in person, it was a knockout show.
Most of our time here, though, was spent out in nature. We took the boys on a bike ride through some small villages to a mountain formation called Moon Hill, which we hiked, rather slowly, to see more sweeping views from the top. We walked out onto the islands in the river across from our hotel, literally stepping across the flatboats in our path as they moored on rocks before dropping down to the next section of river. (Here's a pretty representative 5-minute video.) We came across wedding photo shoots and grazing cows. We took a motorized “bamboo” boat (actually made from PVC piping) up and down the Li for a duck’s-eye view, and had our pictures taken while impersonating cormorant fishermen. (One of the cormorants took such a liking to Kai that he tried to clip a lock of his hair! Hey, get in line, cormorant, behind the pinchy ladies on the boat.) Cormorant fishing? [VIDEO] Oh, that was another boat trip we took, by the way -- we followed along to watch some men on rafts who use birds -- cormorants -- to catch fish. The men tie the birds to their boats, close their throats partway, and let them do their thing, which is gobbling fish. But then they take the fish out of the cormorants’ mouths, letting them have every seventh fish so they’ll stay interested in working. A bizarre practice, no doubt; does it sound a bit like the tax system?
Keegan and Kai asked us several times on the trip why we were there; we told them we just like to travel. They asked, as 2- and 3-year-olds are wont to do, “Why? Why do we like to travel?” We told them we want to have adventures, see new things, meet new people, try new foods, play, have fun. That sounded OK to them, as long as some of the new foods could be cookies. When we asked what their favorite part of the trip was, Kai said, “The plane!” Just tonight, in fact, Keegan told me he wanted to go back on “our airplane.” The boys love planes; they’re also fascinated by what they call “the big round moon.” They’re not usually out at night, but on this trip there were a few times when we got home late and the boys noticed that the big round moon (which really was full) was “following us.” I remembered being in the car as a kid and thinking the very same thing; it’s somehow inexpressibly sweet for me to see my sons wandering into the same puzzles I walked through, am still walking through, as we all roll around on the Earth, spinning alongside the big round moon. If we figure out any of the answers, I’ll let you know; you be sure to do the same.
When you’re slip-sliding over the zillion and six photos, just remember that we cut more than 75% of them, and be grateful.
A brief note on Thanksgiving:
Halloween is an extremely exportable holiday, especially to a country that loves children, and marketing, as much as China does.
Thanksgiving, though, is a non-starter here -- it must seem from the outside like some bizarre, quasi-religious, hyper-nationalistic ritual, celebrating our cultural heroes the Puritans(!) pulling a fast one on those suckers the Wampanoag Indians. Of course, we know Thanksgiving is really the best of holidays, focusing as it does on getting together with family and friends, getting high on tryptophan, and being grateful for all the beauty that life has to offer (football and being able to open your trousers on the couch included).
Thanksgiving, though, is a non-starter here -- it must seem from the outside like some bizarre, quasi-religious, hyper-nationalistic ritual, celebrating our cultural heroes the Puritans(!) pulling a fast one on those suckers the Wampanoag Indians. Of course, we know Thanksgiving is really the best of holidays, focusing as it does on getting together with family and friends, getting high on tryptophan, and being grateful for all the beauty that life has to offer (football and being able to open your trousers on the couch included).
We’re buying our turkey from a man named Bubba again this year, something I don’t recommend if you’re standing on a street corner in Little Rock or Philly, but here it’s actually safer than the alternatives. I’m not making my famous cranberry sauce, though -- I just couldn’t bring myself to spend 130 RMB, about 21 bucks, on a little bag of frozen berries. If you want to make a fortune, line your clothing with cranberries, fly to Shanghai, and open a stand.
Happy Thanksgiving! I truly wish I could sit down at the table with you, all of you. But we'd run out of turkey, and Bubba only has so much.
Happy Thanksgiving! I truly wish I could sit down at the table with you, all of you. But we'd run out of turkey, and Bubba only has so much.
