The Hani village, my first homestay
So the theme of our trip is long bus rides. On day three (2/9) we woke up super early to take the bus. It was meant to be a 4.5 hour bus ride, but it turned into 6. We made it to Zuofu village of the Hani minority group around 1:30. It was the first time that this town had gotten a tour group of our size, but it is the 3rd largest Hani village in Yunnan. So to them, we were quite an anomaly. They created a gate welcoming their “foreign friends” to the town. We had to walk a good 10 minutes down a hill to the basketball court. There, most of the town was waiting for us as well as a huge group of curious children. We then met up with our host families. What’s intimidating is that they separated us into three groups: those doing a research project on the minority group, those in advanced Chinese, and everyone else. So I got herded into the advanced Chinese group, and it was a little uncomfortable to be standing in front of everyone. Anyway, our host family’s last name was Li, and I think he was a military officer. The man of the family spoke mandarin, but he frequently mixed it with the Hani dialect so it was very difficult to understand. The wife doesn’t speak any Mandarin, and sometimes we weren’t able to speak, so there was a lot of pantomiming going on. I also had someone doing a research project on the Hani minority people so I was under more pressure to translate if she had any questions for the family. My housemates were Jamie, Gwen and Sam in this house. The house itself was pretty impressive with a kind of patio without a roof so you could look at the sky, and you could see the beautiful view of the rice terraces. We were then to have lunch, which ended up being very spicy and a little exotic. Since this family was obviously relatively well off, they gave us meat products which included pigs blood and a very strong version of bai jiu. After we had a presentation, we climbed the rice terraces. A bunch of kids fell in since we were basically walking on the terrace walls which were less than a foot thick. One even broke his hand. But it was beautiful and I think it was worth it. After we got back to the village and after a lot of climbing, we headed back to the basketball court. At one side, there was a giant swing. Basically, it’s part of their ritual new year. According to legend, the Hani people were cutting down a lot of the forest and upsetting the animals. The animals went to the creator god to complain, and he agreed to punish the people. At first, he tortured them once a year. But after a few years of this, the god started to feel sorry for the Hanis. Instead, he told them to build a swing and have the official priest start whooping and groaning. The animals, after hearing the cries from the people, decided that this was a good enough punishment, and left them alone. We did get a short demonstration of the priest swinging, and although it is impressive, it looks like he’s having a lot of fun rather than in pain. I guess animals are gullible then? After hanging out, we had a long street banquet which basically they set up many tables along the street and people feasted. Again it was the super spicy food, and they encouraged us to drink the really strong bai jiu. The village was so remote, the sky was so clear and you could see so many stars. We had a performance with the Hani people where they showed off their traditional dances and we showed them ours. It was a little embarrassing because no one had really prepared anything yet so it was a little rocky but it was still a good time. Once the performance was over, we started to make our way back to our host family. I am still surprised that we even made it back. It was pitch dark with no lights whatsoever. And with windy streets I’m surprised we didn’t get lost. Once we made it back, our host mother insisted on feeding us noodles, which we accepted gladly. Although I had a hard wooden plank with a sheet on top of it and I had to sleep in all of my clothing, I slept surprisingly well.
When I woke up the next morning (2/10), I was greeted by the beautiful terrace view. Once awake, we had fun with the toilet situation. Basically, the women’s toilet is a hole in the ground. Not the porcelain kind, but a slanted ramp where you can see everything the previous occupant left behind. Even worse, is there is a giant window to the outside world. There is a wall, but it only goes waist high. Luckily, no one was there when I decided to make my pilgrimage, but I got out of there fast. Anyway, back in the house it was basically a game of charades with our host mother. She ended up giving us a bowl of hot water to wash our faces in, and breakfast ended up being slightly spicy noodles. After we ate, the host father emerged. Although we wanted to socialize and try and communicate with them, our host dad basically told us to get out of the house and explore. So we wandered back to the basketball court from the day before to see what was there was to do. I tried to play/ talk to the children, but they were super shy. They still were not used to foreigners being around. Even when I just smiled at the little girls, they turned away and ran, or hid their faces. I gave up, and decided to play a little bit of basketball, even though I’m not a big fan. For some reason, China is absolutely crazy about basketball. It has even permeated the most remote village like this one, and even the head of the town joined in the game. After hanging out and trying to socialize with the people, we returned home for lunch. Even though we specified that we would eat at 11 and that we had to leave at 12, our host family didn’t really get it, and started cooking at 11. We didn’t get food until 11:35, and we were planning on getting out of there soon. The problem is the bus was planning on leaving at 12:30, and TBC’s policy is that they wait for no one, so I didn’t want to be left behind in this remote village. There was also a huge hill to climb carrying all of our stuff. Anyway, lunch was cool. I tried some snake, but I didn’t like it because it was really spicy and pretty fishy. At 11:55, we started to say our goodbyes, but our host dad looked a little disappointed since the village head was eating with us. As we went back towards the bus, we ran into some other Hani women letting some other TBCers try on their clothing. Before we knew it, the Hani women were handing other their beautiful jackets. They wouldn’t let us go, so we decided why not. We took a bunch of pictures and got our host mom to laugh. But at 12:10, we reluctantly began our trek back to the bus. I gave my host mom a huge hug and then began to run up the hill. On the way up the hill, I said goodbye to so many friendly people, I was really sad to leave. I ended up making it up the hill in 15 minutes though I sweated and cursed all the way there. We ended up getting out of the village really late because others were late, and we left at 1. It was a scary winding road down, so I fell asleep to ignore the fact that there was a cliff only a few feet from the bus. After we arrived in the Yi prefecture, we couldn’t go down the big highway because it was being paved. So instead we went down a tiny dirt road that was never made for buses. We went straight to this special lake where the Yi minority would fish and sing their seaweed song. We went on the lake and even had some Yi women singing for us. We ended up having dinner on the lake. By this time, we were all exhausted so we just headed to the hotel to take a well deserved shower and sleep.
Now faithful readers, did I deliver, or did I deliver? I'll let you wade your way through my huge thicket of words and come back with a new update soon!
When I woke up the next morning (2/10), I was greeted by the beautiful terrace view. Once awake, we had fun with the toilet situation. Basically, the women’s toilet is a hole in the ground. Not the porcelain kind, but a slanted ramp where you can see everything the previous occupant left behind. Even worse, is there is a giant window to the outside world. There is a wall, but it only goes waist high. Luckily, no one was there when I decided to make my pilgrimage, but I got out of there fast. Anyway, back in the house it was basically a game of charades with our host mother. She ended up giving us a bowl of hot water to wash our faces in, and breakfast ended up being slightly spicy noodles. After we ate, the host father emerged. Although we wanted to socialize and try and communicate with them, our host dad basically told us to get out of the house and explore. So we wandered back to the basketball court from the day before to see what was there was to do. I tried to play/ talk to the children, but they were super shy. They still were not used to foreigners being around. Even when I just smiled at the little girls, they turned away and ran, or hid their faces. I gave up, and decided to play a little bit of basketball, even though I’m not a big fan. For some reason, China is absolutely crazy about basketball. It has even permeated the most remote village like this one, and even the head of the town joined in the game. After hanging out and trying to socialize with the people, we returned home for lunch. Even though we specified that we would eat at 11 and that we had to leave at 12, our host family didn’t really get it, and started cooking at 11. We didn’t get food until 11:35, and we were planning on getting out of there soon. The problem is the bus was planning on leaving at 12:30, and TBC’s policy is that they wait for no one, so I didn’t want to be left behind in this remote village. There was also a huge hill to climb carrying all of our stuff. Anyway, lunch was cool. I tried some snake, but I didn’t like it because it was really spicy and pretty fishy. At 11:55, we started to say our goodbyes, but our host dad looked a little disappointed since the village head was eating with us. As we went back towards the bus, we ran into some other Hani women letting some other TBCers try on their clothing. Before we knew it, the Hani women were handing other their beautiful jackets. They wouldn’t let us go, so we decided why not. We took a bunch of pictures and got our host mom to laugh. But at 12:10, we reluctantly began our trek back to the bus. I gave my host mom a huge hug and then began to run up the hill. On the way up the hill, I said goodbye to so many friendly people, I was really sad to leave. I ended up making it up the hill in 15 minutes though I sweated and cursed all the way there. We ended up getting out of the village really late because others were late, and we left at 1. It was a scary winding road down, so I fell asleep to ignore the fact that there was a cliff only a few feet from the bus. After we arrived in the Yi prefecture, we couldn’t go down the big highway because it was being paved. So instead we went down a tiny dirt road that was never made for buses. We went straight to this special lake where the Yi minority would fish and sing their seaweed song. We went on the lake and even had some Yi women singing for us. We ended up having dinner on the lake. By this time, we were all exhausted so we just headed to the hotel to take a well deserved shower and sleep.
Now faithful readers, did I deliver, or did I deliver? I'll let you wade your way through my huge thicket of words and come back with a new update soon!