An american tourist unmasked

So far in China, I've been able to fly below the radar since I blend in with the local folk. Though I get laughed at sometimes for not being able to speak Chinese, its worth it to not get hassled by touts to buy things constantly. But when we got to Yangshao, my cover was blown. There were soooo many Western tourists there that people automatically knew I didn't belong and the hassling began hardcore.

I came to Yangshao with Stephen, Jamie and Conville, the 3 British guys I met on the Yangzi River cruise. We were looking forward to getting out of the big cities and enjoy some country life and we had heard that Yangshao, just south of Guilin on the bank of the Li River, was the perfect place to see some lovely scenery and laidback life. Boy, were we wrong. We got to Yangshao and headed down to the street with all the hostels and the first thing that we noticed were the sheer number of Westerners, Western restaurants and tons of souvenir shops. Its was insane! After weeks of standing out in the crowd, the guys soon found themselves just as 3 among millions. All the things we've done so far in China have definitely been touristy but the number of Chinese tourists outnumbered everyone else by so much. Not the case here. West Street (where all the hostels were) seemed to be swarmed with touts selling or pushing something. It was worse at night. The entire street was lit up with fluorescent lights and the restaurants were all pumping incredibly loud music or really bad karaoke. It was impossible to sleep!

I wish I could add sound to this picture. It doesn't look that busy but it almost hurt to look down the street with all the flashing lights and loud sounds.

Lots of Western food and beverages in Yangshao. But of course, with Chinese translation. (Leo, this is for you!)

The one good thing of being in Yangshao was of course the food. Me, Stephen, and McKay, enjoying some unbelievably good rice claypots. But we were given this incredibly small table and even smaller stools to sit on, which was totally ridiculous, but we didn't care after taking one bite of our food. Soooo good!!

But luckily we were able to escape it all. The 4 of us decided to rent bikes and cycle around the countryside outside of Yangshao. And it was beautiful. Rice paddies with farmers and their oxen and these crazy rock hills (called karsts) that seemed to suddenly sprout from the ground. Unfortunately, it rained most of the day so we got pretty wet and our pictures didn't really come out. Our tour also included some pretty touristy activities that didn't really have anything to do with our surroundings but were fun nonetheless like bamboo rafting and visiting a mudbath in a nearby water cave. I was happy to do these things but the guys were like kids in a candy shop. But what else would you expect from a bunch of boys? :)

Just look at those hills behind the paddies! They looked like granite covered in vegetation and were so dramatically tall.

A farmer and his ox, prepping the land for the next rice harvest.

They actually gave us water guns on the bamboo rafts. Here's me getting Jamie pretty good. To be fair, they got some good shots in as well. Well, almost as good. :)

We had to wear hardhats in the cave since we had to crawl through some parts. Lookin' good!

Getting pretty dirty in the mudbaths. I refused to get mud in my hair. Hey! Its impossible to get out!

But even going out of town wasn't enough to get away from the insanity in Yangshao. I also ran into Yvonne and McKay, the Canadians from Xian and Chengdu, and they mentioned that they were going to spend a couple of days visiting these villages that farmed these really interesting rice terraces. It sounded like exactly what we were looking for so the guys and I decided to pack up and head for the hills.

We took an early bus up into the Longsheng area to visit the villages of Daxhai and Ping'an, home to the minority Yao, Dong and other groups. These groups have grown rice up in the mountains by using these terraces that were built into the hills over 700 years ago. Its amazing to see how these people have adapted the land around them to survive. The terraces are basically dug into the mountains to create these mini-shelves were rice can be planted. There are so many terraces and they look like dragon scales from far away, hence the name the Dragon's Backbone. The terraces were being flooded in anticipation for the next harvest so with the water reflection, you could definitely imagine a dragon there.

The views were unreal. I still can't believe that they farm rice in these little paddy terraces.

You really could imagine these as dragon scales.

Local Yao women in traditional dress. Its great that they are keeping their traditions alive even though the are only 2,000 Yao people. Maybe its the cynic in me, but I think its partly to sell stuff. Tourism is big business!

We paid 10 yuan each to see the Yao women sing, dance and dress their hair. They apparently have the longest hair in the world. It was cool to see though it made me a little uncomfortable because it seemed like such a spectacle.

The village we stayed at was much newer than this one but its quite a contrast from the big cities I've stayed in.

Staying in the villages overnight was just perfect. We stayed at this hotel run by this really nice family who fed us dinner and even acted as our guide. It was picturesque and it felt so good to fall asleep to the sound of crickets (rather than bad karaoke!). But there was no escaping the touts. A lot of the income of these people come from the tour groups that get shuttled in and they were absolutely relentless in trying to sell us something. But we were able to ignore it long enough to enjoy ourselves.

So after the misfire in Yangshao, we were able to find what we were looking for in Longsheng. But I bet in a couple of years, Longsheng will be just like Yangshao and we'll have to look even deeper for that unspoilt experience!

I'm now in Guilin, waiting to take a 22 hour train (yes, that's right. 22 HOURS) to Kunming. From there I'm heading into Western China to see some more minority cultures and trek the Tiger Leaping Gorge. I can't believe I've already been here for 3 weeks!