Lost on Planet China - J. Maarten Troost [101]
“So what did you think?” Jack asked me afterward.
“I’d be very curious to know what he said to the Chinese audience members. I mean, twenty-one years in prison for being a Naxi. I’d say he has cause to be just a trifle pissed off with the Han Chinese.”
“That’s the Chinese Chinese?”
“Yes.”
“Well, there sure are a lot of them here.”
All wearing cowboy hats like Jack. Yes, Lijiang was now very touristy and very Chinese. True, there were many who were Naxi. But most seemed to be employed to be the cute supplicant minority, with young women in traditional dress stepping out of the restaurants to do a dance on the canals at five-minute intervals. Ten kilometers to the north in the town of Baisha, Dr. Ho’s home had become an extremely popular stop on the tourist trail.
We had dinner on a second-floor balcony, overlooking the hordes of visitors. And then, below us, through the bustling crowds, three young, very dirty pilgrims were lying down, touching their foreheads to the street, standing and bowing, repeating this devotional rhythm again and again, as they made their way forward through a crowd that pointed and laughed. They were Tibetan Buddhists on pilgrimage to the Yufeng Temple, a small lamasery outside of Lijiang.
“So,” I said to Jack after the Tibetans had passed. “Are you feeling rested? Ready to do some hiking?”
“I’m not entirely convinced this is a good idea. The thought of marching into the wilderness in some remote corner of China with you kind of scares me.”
“It’ll be fun. Trust me.”
“Okay. Now I’m really worried.”
16
A week earlier, somewhere in the hills above Dali, it had occurred to me that hiking the high trail above Tiger Leaping Gorge might be a little challenging. This is because I was apparently traveling with the world’s laziest man. Jack and I had gone to look at the Zhonghe Temple, perched upon Zhonghe Shan, a lofty eminence riddled with Bai cemeteries. It’s above 7,500 feet, a good hike. But we did not hike up this mountain. From Dali we had taken the chairlift. Where we stepped off, there stood a sign pointing us to a café 100 meters upward.
“We are not going up,” Jack had insisted. “It’s 100 meters—that’s, I don’t know, a long way in feet.”
“It’s about 300 feet.”
“That’s a long way. And I’m tired.”
“Don’t be such a wimp. My four-year-old could run up 300 feet. Even my one-year-old could waddle up the hill.”
Finally, Jack had relented and, with an astonishing display of gasps and labored breathing, followed by innumerable breaks, he managed to heave himself up to the café.
“There. You happy now? You’ve got a Coke, a plate of French fries, cigarettes. It wasn’t so bad, was it?”
Jack was dripping in sweat. “Salt. I need salt.”
“Look,” I had said. “This is nothing compared to Tiger Leaping Gorge.”
“Well, I’m not much of a hiker.”
“Evidently. But you did bring hiking boots, right? You’re going to need them.”
“No, I didn’t bring hiking boots. I’ve got running shoes.”
“And clamp-ons,” I had mused. “We’ll need to buy some clamp-ons.”
“Clamp-ons,” Jack had sputtered. “What do we need clamp-ons for?”
“For the ice.”
It was early October, far too early for ice. But as always in China, I didn’t know what to expect of this hike above Tiger Leaping Gorge, a deep canyon carved by the Yangtze River and framed by spectacular 16,000-foot mountains. Once, long ago, a tiger was said to have leapt across the gorge, and the Chinese, who have a strong disposition toward poetic place-names, commemorated the event by calling it Tiger Leaping Gorge. Really, it is remarkable that Communism, with its deadening effect on language, lingered for so long in China. Mao, no doubt, would have called it Gorge Number Fifty-three, or some other buzz-kill of a name. The fifteen-mile, two-day hike above the gorge is said to be among the finest hikes in the world, offering breathtaking vistas of immense cliffs and the frothing river. This is what I knew. That is what I sought.
And this being China, which is still very much under the thumb of the Communist Party, this would likely be my only