The Potato Inn

When the earthquake in Sichuan province struck last Tuesday, I was in Yunnan province, to the south. Sounds very bad; it has been all the news here.

After leaving Yunnan province, I stayed a night in Kaili. Apparently, there are some interesting minority villages not too far from Kaili. I went to the China International Travel Service for some advice. The kind ladies there worked out an itinerary for me, given the time I had left. So, I started out that very day, plan in hand (I had arrived in town very early in the morning). Unfortunately, their schedule was wildly optimistic about what could be seen in a given amount of time. For the morning, for instance, they told me, go to place X, north of town, and there was some sort of regional fair. They even gave me a map. You get there by getting a bus to place Y, but make sure that this bus passes through place X, because there are two ways to go. Then, on the way back, you can see place Z by getting off at place W, then walking a few kilometers up the hill.

The hard part was finding someone who knew where the heck place X was. Now, place Y, the place I take the bus in the direction of, that was OK. So, the ticket agent sold me a ticket there. Then, when I got on the bus, I told the driver and conductor I wanted to go to place X. "Place X?", they said. Yep. Near place XY. "Oh, sure. No problem. You can get off at place V, and it is very close to there." I figure, sounds good. I can't quite make out what they are saying the name of place V is, but I figure they'll tell me when toget off. So, winding bumpy roads and mountain scenery and the bus sound system turned up so loud I had to put earplugs in. And finally, after a couple of hours of this, around mid-afternoon, we reach place V. And sure enough, the conductor says, "Here you are, get off here." I'm in a dusty crossroads town of no particular charm. I figure I'll get a bit to eat, then work out how to get to the place I really want to be. I walk a market: fruit and cassette tapes (?) and rope and odd bits of meat. The (only) thing to eat seems to be a sort of cold dish of cubes of rice with glop on it. It doesn't call to me. I ask around and confirm the name of the little town, then sit down to study the map. Hmmm. I'm only a little more than HALFWAY to my destination. So, it took me two hours plus to get to where I am now, it'll be another hour an a half there, then I'm looking at a further three and a half to get back to my hotel in Kaili! And that isn't even including the stop on the way back, which I can't do anyway, because the route I'm on is the other route. Grumble, grumble. Like I said, the ladies at the CITS were wildly optimistic. The bathrooms at this little dusty town were notable, too. Check out this video. This is what I'd call a "type six" public bathroom- the worst of the worst. You've got your auto flushing, your "flush it yourself", your "it flushes when the dripping bucket fills up, and the "it is supposed to flush and may oneday." Those types- what I'd call types one, two, three, and four- are all the flushing sort. Then, there's the type where there is no water involved, but maybe you've got a bit of a drop. Say, you're up here and the effluent falls a good number of feet down there, below. This can actually be sort of OK, with proper ventilation. Let's call that one type five. Now, what we've got here is a type SIX, the worst of the worst. Latrine-style and no drop. Watch your step and don't fall in! See video at the bottom of the page...

Anway, I digress. So, in the end, I figured I had to go back to my own plan. The next day, I headed down to the town of Congjiang. It was a good 7 hour bus ride away, but at least I knew right where I was going. And the minority village was only 7.5 kilometers up the hill from town. In town, I checked into my very comfortable hotel. The next day, I caught a motorcycle taxi up the hill to Basha, the Bai minority village. They've held onto their traditions very tightly. Beautiful architecture and rice fields. Women in embroidered clothing. Cows and chickens about. And it was quiet! Very peaceful. I explored for a while, then sat and enjoyed the silence, and walked back down into town.

I spend another night in Congjiang, the (mostly) Chinese river town, the headed to ZhaoXing, one of the larger towns of the Dong minority. This town has all traditional architecture, over seven hundred households, and five drum towers. This was one of my favorite places in China. On the bus on the way in, I saw a sign for "The Potato Inn." Sure, enough- English and Chinese both- "Potato Inn." So, I had to stay there. I never did ask what potatoes had to do with it, but it was a very comfortable place.

For some reason, blogger is loading all my images at the top, rather than where I place them. But anyway, (in something like reverse order) there is a picture of my hotel, the view looking out from the porch just outside my window, some scenery from a hike I did way up the hill from ZhaoXing on my second day there (larger picture), and a view of LiLun village, just up the hill from ZhaoXing.

Today, I took a LONG and bumpy bus ride south, hoping to get as far south as Guilin, so I could secure a ticket to Guangzhou. I got as far as Sanjiang, and the bus station was shut down for onward travel. Although Sanjiang seemed a bit provincial when Tama and I first came here, this time around it is sort of like "bright lights, big city," since I've been in smaller villages. As I was outside across from the bus station trying tofigure out where to stay, a woman said they had accomodations. OK, I'll have a look, I say. I was expecting a bit of bargaining, since she was coming to me, rather than me to her. We walk up to the third floor (passing the internet bar in which I'm currently writing this). The room is clean, the bed feels less sprung than most. "How much?" I ask. "Thirty," she says. "It's cheap." Sure enough, I didn't even have the heart to bargain with that, since that is less than most of the dorms I have stayed in this time around in China. "I'll take it."

Off to Guilin tomorrow, then the night train to Guangzhou... unless I am unlucky and a berth is unavailable, in which case I'll have to catch a bus.