Lost on Planet China - J. Maarten Troost [134]
We’d entered the land of the Tujia, one of China’s distinct minorities. Once they had been trackers, using thick ropes to pull river traffic through the shallow rapids of the Yangtze. Famously, the Tujia men were always naked as they heaved the boats over the shoals. Chafing, apparently, was an issue. But, of course, today the river is deep and there is no need for the Tujia boatmen, and so instead they make their living from us, the tourists, pulling sampans, little flat-bottomed wooden boats, up shallow rapids. And, as I was gratified to learn, they keep their clothes on now. Lu Hang left to attend to her tour group, and soon we had all hopped off our little cruise ship in Badong, another new city of apartment blocks built far above the remains of the old town, which lay submerged. Next to us was an enormous cruise ship. Ikea Components Kick Off, said the sign draped over the side. We boarded another, smaller boat, which would take us to the even smaller sampans.
“This is a new village,” said our guide, pointing. She was a young woman of the Tujia tribe with a golden laugh, the sort of rare, perfect laugh like a baby’s that you want to box up and take out from time to time because it makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. “See, all new houses, very nice. You like wine? They don’t drink beer here, only corn wine.”
Above us was a village of new cinder-block houses, constructed for the farmers who had lost their homes to the deluge caused by the Three Gorges Dam. Maybe they were better off. Probably not, I thought. Hundreds of thousands of people were claiming that they hadn’t been compensated fairly. Everyone displaced by the rising waters had to start anew. New villages, new apartments, new land, new work, new relationships. Everything was new, and not everyone likes new.
“What do you think of the dam?” I asked the guide.
“It is safe,” she said neutrally.
Let’s hope so.
We were let off next to a small stream where we could board the sampans.
“They are called peapods,” my guide informed me as we stepped in and six men began to pull us up the stream using bamboo rope. They sang and they raced against the other boatmen pulling tourists. They wore shoes made of rope as well.
“Fifteen years ago, the boatmen were naked,” the guide informed me. “Their clothes were rough and hurt the skin when wet. When hot they drink the river water, and when cold they drink spirits. Before the dam was built, they pulled the river traffic. Now they pull tourists.”
It all seemed kind of pointless to me. I listened to the singing and scanned the canopy of trees looking for monkeys. The government had reintroduced macaques to the region and, very thoughtfully, was training them how to ask for food from tourists. Ideally, they should do a performance. It’s endless, really, the lengths to which the government will go to ensure that visitors have a good time in China. I, however, did not see any macaques, and so I reflected on the trackers pulling this sampan of tourists. It seemed like an inane endeavor. But, I thought, the dam had put the Tujia boatmen out of business. And pulling sampans filled with frolicking tourists has got to beat pulling barges of coal. And they seemed to be enjoying themselves, and that’s a good thing, this enjoyment of work.
My guide began to sing a soft, piercingly haunting song, and when she finished I asked her about its meaning.
“We sing this song when we get married. When girls get married, it is the custom to cry for fifteen days.”
But there would be no tears today, not for her, she of the golden laugh. I spent the remainder of my journey up the Shennong River, pulled by the no-longer-naked Tuija boatmen, doing everything I could to elicit this laugh because it was so splendid.
Normally on board this cruise ship on the Yangtze, we woke to the strains of Doctor Zhivago softly wafting through the intercom system. On this